Why physical movement games are incompatible with our homes
The Microsoft Kinect is available today, and with it come innumerable reviews of its successes and flaws (find a summary of them at Gamasutra). A common property of many negative reviews is the enormous amount of living room space Kinect requires, far more than most people will have in a sizable home let alone a modest apartment. I wrote about… read more
Two tenure-track lines in my school
The Georgia Tech School of Literature Communication and Culture, where I work, has just announced two tenure-track job openings. I’ve pasted the job ads below. I hope any of you who might be interested will apply, and I encourage the rest to spread the word. Job One – Digital Media The School of Literature, Communication and Culture of the Georgia… read more
Ent as Metaphorism
I just read Ted Friedman’s thought-provoking article “The Politics of Magic: Fantasy Media, Technology, and Nature in the 21st Century,” about the reasons for the rise of fantasy genres in popular culture. He’s currently developing this line of thought into a book (to be titled Centaur Manifesto, I believe), but there are lots of interesting ideas to take away from… read more
About Medal of Honor and Afghanistan. From my "Persuasive Games" column at Gamasutra.
In November, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments from the State of California, as the latter attempts to prohibit the sale of certain games to minors. The issue has remained a nail-biter for the industry and its advocates, who see the proposal as an attack on the First Amendment rights of game makers. Despite its importance to American life,… read more
Cultural Studies, circa 1995
I recently fell upon this reprint of a Lingua Franca article from 1995, “The Routledge Revolution: Has Academic Publishing Gone Tabloid?” written about Bill Germano during the golden age of cultural studies book publishing. One thing is for certain: By spotting intellectual trends ahead of the curve and responding with a flash flood of suitable titles, Germano has changed the… read more
In Facebook and Philosophy: What's on Your Mind?, edited by D.E. Wittkower
In Facebook and Philosophy I received two degrees from the University of California, Los Angeles, but Facebook won’t let me join the UCLA network. A Facebook network is an organizational category that allows my profile to come up when someone searches or browses in a particular group. At different stages in the life of the service, networks have been organized… read more
Stuff I said to the Press
I thought I’d share few recent mentions of me in the media. I try not to do this with every little mention, but all of these are really good articles that you should read anyway. First, Chris Suellentrop’s New York Times Magazine story Video Games that Bring Afghanistan Home. It’s a wide-ranging feature, and even though I only have one… read more
Go watch the awesome talks
Back in February, Georgia Tech Digital Media and SCAD Atlanta held the Art History of Games conference, which I organized along with Michael Nitsche and John Sharp. We had an amazing group of speakers as well as an opening for three commissioned games. It was unbelievably amazing in every way (here’s a summary), but until now only the attendees knew… read more
Notes on Glamour
When I was an undergraduate at the University of Southern California, the Academy Awards were still being held at the Shrine Auditorium, which is located just north of Jefferson, directly across the street from campus. It’s quite a structure, built in the Moorish Revival style and opened in 1926. At that time, the surrounding neighborhood of South Central Los Angeles… read more
...but a few successful books might
Via my colleague Mark Guzdial, I’ve just learned that Rice University Press is being shut down entirely. It’s unfortunate to see a university press shuttered, but it comes as no surprise that some will fall given the perfect storm of a terrible current economic climate in both universities and in the book industry. But Rice UP is unique because it… read more