Someone (Paul) actually reads my blog! That deserves a mention. 🙂
Games Learning Society Conference and other news
Man, I haven’t posted an update on my personal life in a while…
1. I got a new adviser, Phil Bell, and along with that, a temp summer RA position doing video editing work. My old adviser, Jen Stone, left UW to go to Alaska to be with someone she met through WoW! 🙂
2. Tomorrow I leave for Madison, WI, for the Games Learning Society conference.
I’ll be presenting a version of my WoW paper on communication and coordination there as part of a panel about different gaming communities. Others in the panel are Laurie McCarthy, Reed Stevens, and Jen Stone with Tom Satwicz acting as the respondent. It should be totally fun.
After a couple of months of trying to wrangle floor space at some grad student’s place (because I’m leechy and po like that), I gave up and got room at the University of Wisconsin’s accommodations for visiting scholars. But I also had to reserve a room in a hotel for Friday since UW didn’t have room. BUT then Moses Wolfenstein responded to an email I sent out to the TerrorNova guild, and now I am actually staying with him! I then had to cancel my bookings. I guess I shoulda just waited and trusted that things would fall into place. Or something. Or maybe I am being a total pain in the ass and just don’t know it.
I plan to take lots of photos and write up how the conference went on here, so check back next week.
Thoguht’s UI
More or less what it is now. I’ve replaced CT with Bartender3 and KHThreatMeter with Omen. I also don’t use Natur’s Enemy CastBar anymore…
- Unitframes: PitBull
- thing up top: FuBar (with QuestFu, LocationFu, etc.)
- buff icons: Buffalo2
- tank windows and other raid stuff: oRA2
- what you can’t see: Cartographer, Auctioneer, SWStats, ItemRack
To get most of these, use the WoWAce Updater tool for ease… 🙂 See my previous post about Ace.
Fallout 3
Google vs. Sicko
Found on The Stranger’s blog, SLOG…
Is Google getting so big that it inevitably has some complete idiots–or, worse, evil-doers–on its payroll?
Tetris humor
Found this on Intelligent Artifice by (he found it on Japan Probe), and OMG, I am such a nerd. The sketch goes on much longer than I thought possible… It’s funny in that innocent, sometimes hilarious, weird as hell, Japanese way.
Photosynth
Really, really cool use of photos to created 3D images, etc.
Photosynth page at Microsoft and the TED talk / demo.
35 Perspectives on Online Social Networking
35 Perspectives on Online Social Networking
A cool article on different views of social networking brainstormed by the article writer thinking about the different people who use it…
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Can Games Teach Ethics?
Good write-up by Leigh Alexander over at Sexy Videogameland and comments on a debate started on another blog (Sirlin.net)…
Sexy Videogameland: Can Games Teach Ethics?
- people play a meta-game where game mechanics-based consequences outweigh any sort of moral or ethical dilemma
- but this is highly individual
- so, for some players they’ll just make decisions based on maximum benefit (acting “rational” in game theory terms)
- for other players, personal and character identity do matter (see Gee’s discussion about projective identity in What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy, for example)
As I’ve said in my general exams and previous papers, I became a games researcher because of the ethical dilemma I found myself faced with in Knights of the Old Republic. 🙂
Blogging Ultima
This guy (CageBlogger) is replaying classic Ultima games and blogging his experiences! Totally awesome!
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