Category: game studies

anything games, games research related

Tieteelliset seurat kyseenalaistavat tieteellisen julkaisutoiminnan arviointi- ja rahoitusmallit

[Spreading the word about the Finnish academic associations’ joint statement:] Kuusikymmentä tieteellistä seuraa on julkaissut kannanoton Monipuolisen ja -muotoisen tieteellisen julkaisutoiminnan puolesta. Siinä seurat kyseenalaistavat Julkaisufoorumi-hankkeen kaavailut luokitella tieteelliset julkaisut ja kirjakustantajat kolmeen luokkaan. Samoin seurat kyseenalaistavat tähän läheisesti liittyvän Opetus- ja kulttuuriministeriön esittämän yliopistojen uuden rahoitusmallin. Mukana julkilausumassa ovat muun muassa Westermarck-seura, Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura, Suomen Historiallinen Seura, Suomen Kasvatustieteellinen Seura, Suomen lääkäriseura Duodecim, Kulttuuritutkimuksen Seura ja Valtiotieteellinen yhdistys.

Sekä Julkaisufoorumi-hankkeen että yliopistojen uuden rahoitusmallin avulla tavoitellaan kannatettavia asioita: halutaan nostaa suomalaisen tieteellisen tutkimuksen ja julkaisutoiminnan laatua ja lisätä kansainvälisyyttä. Nyt kaavailuissa muodoissa molempiin esityksiin sisältyy kuitenkin piirteitä, jotka ovat räikeässä ristiriidassa julkilausuttujen tavoitteiden kanssa.

Julkaisufoorumin ja ministeriön rahoituskaavailujen katsotaan olevan lähtökohdiltaan kapea-alaisia ja mekaanisesti toteutettuja. Niissä ei oteta huomioon eri tieteenalojen julkaisuperinteitä ja -tarpeita, eivätkä ne perustu tieteen sisältä nouseviin kriteereihin. Molemmat mallit laiminlyövät tieteiden monipuolisuuden ja -muotoisuuden sekä eri alojen historialliset traditiot. Mallien pohjalta mahdollisesti syntyvät tieteen ja tutkimuksen ohjausmallit vinouttavat tutkimuksen kenttää ja vaikeuttavat luovan tieteellisen työn tekemistä.

Kannanotossa kysytään, miksi suomenkieliset tiedejulkaisut automaattisesti asetetaan alemmalle tasolle kuin kansainväliset, etenkin englantilaiset. Kotimaisen julkaisemisen aliarvostukselle ei ole mitään sisällöllisiä perusteita. Tutkimuksen laatu ei perimmiltään ole kielikysymys, ja kaikilla tieteenaloilla tarvitaan sekä kansallista että kansainvälistä julkaisemista. Tieto- ja tiedeinstituutioilla on myös yhteiskunnallisia tehtäviä, joita korkeatasoinen suomenkieliset julkaisut tiedeyhteisöjen ohessa myös palvelevat. Tiedejulkaisujen arvioiminen ja arvottaminen nyt suunnitteilla olevalla tavalla on epäoikeudenmukaista eikä täytä tarkoitustaan.

Kannanoton allekirjoittaneet seurat esittävät, että sekä Julkaisufoorumihankkeen että ministeriön rahoitusmallin lähtökohtia pohditaan vielä kerran perusteellisesti. Tärkeä kysymys on, nousevatko mallit todella tieteiden sisäistä tarpeista vai enemmän hallinnollista tai muista tieteen ulkopuolelta tulevista perusteista. Ehdottoman tarpeellista on hakea avoimesti ja tasapuolisesti kestäviä sekä kaikkia toimija- ja tutkimustahoja tyydyttäviä käytänteitä.

Tavoitteena tulee olla maamme monipuolinen ja -muotoinen tieteellisen tutkimuksen ja siihen liittyvän julkaisutoiminnan turvaaminen sekä kansallisesti että kansainvälisesti.

Lisätietoja asiasta antavat:

Trip to Utrecht

Utrecht trip

This week I visited the Netherlands to discuss possible collaborations in game studies, by the kind invitation of Joost Raessens, Sybille Lammes, René Glas, and the University of Utrecht. The buildings of the university create a nice mix of old and new, and there are some photos you can have a look at my Flickr photo stream:

http://www.flickr.com/search/?w=21506315%40N00&q=utrecht&m=text

Game and Internet Studies, University of Tampere

Interested in doing your masters degree about Internet or games in Tampere? Our degree program is open for the international applicants for the first time. You can read more from here:

http://www.uta.fi/sis/en/studies/disciplines/infim/studies/game.html

CFP: User-Generated Culture

I will be presenting a keynote in an interesting conference in May, spreading here word about the call for papers:

CALL FOR PAPERS

You, Me, User – Conference on User-Generated Culture
Friday 25, May – Saturday 26, May 2012 in Helsinki.

From social media to video games and from online fan production to machinima the phenomenon of user-generated culture has secured its position in the mainstream during the last few years. This shift has resulted from the blurring boundaries between media production and consumption as well as between professional and amateur authorship. The phenomenon is claimed to be characterized by collaboration, accessibility and democratic potential. During the You, Me, User Conference we approach the user-generated culture, or in other words, multiple situations where culture becomes modified, produced and distributed through everyday practices, social and new media.

The Finnish Society for Cinema Studies (SETS) invites presentations which explore the questions surrounding user-generated culture. The conference will bring together Finnish and international scholars of a wide range of relevant fields of studies. The conference will offer a chance to focus on a new and active field of study and is open to presentations from a wide spectrum.

Keynote speeches are delivered by David Buckingham and Frans Mäyrä.

Professor David Buckingham (Loughborough University) is a media education researcher.  He is especially interested in children’s and young people’s interactions with electronic media, consumer culture and civic participation. His most recent book is The Material Child: Growing Up in Consumer Culture (2011).

Professor Frans Mäyrä (University of Tampere) has focused on media culture, digital media and games. He leads an interdisciplinary research group on games study where game culture, players, their activities and gameplay experiences are approached. Mäyrä has published Introduction to Game Studies: Games in Culture (2008), for example.

We seek paper proposals from various fields, such as film, television, games, internet, music, art, literature etc. It is our intention to organize the symposium around questions, such as:
•       What is user-generated culture and how to conceptualize it?
•        Changes in the distribution channels of audiovisual media due to user-generated culture
•        Changes in the consumption of audiovisual media due to user-generated culture
•       Fan as an author?
•       How does user-generated culture blur the boundaries of production and consumption?
•       Politically, socially or culturally significant forms of user-generated culture.
•       Global and local implications of user-generated culture.
•       Does user-generated culture produce new forms of community?
•       Problems of control and copyright in user-generated culture.
•       Does user-generated culture produce new forms of community?

What are the problematic dimensions of user-generated culture (censorship, legal issues etc.)

Proposals including an abstract (max 300 words) and a short CV should be submitted to Conference Secretary Maija Uusitalo by email: amkuus@utu.fiby 19.2.2012 at latest. Notification of acceptance will be sent by 1.3.2012.

Organizers:  Finnish Society of Film Research in concert with National Audivisual Archive, Media Studies (University of Turku), Cinema and Television Studies (University of Helsinki), Aalto University, School of Communication, Media and Theatre (University of Tampere) and Koulukino.

More information:

http://sets.wordpress.com/user-generated-conference/

Play and exercise in Active Learning Spaces

Our third new research project is part another large consortium project, coordinated by professor Roope Raisamo (TAUCHI). A work package on play and exercise is situated within Active Learning Spaces, a new Tekes project. (Link forthcoming.)

Play2Work in RYM

Another new project that we have started working on even before Christmas is RYM/Future Learning Environments, where our Gamelab team is joining forces with indoors building experts and educational researchers to look into the future of playful collaboration particularly in the lives of students and researchers in our own campus environment, but also aiming for more generalizable findings. More: http://www.rym.fi/

New possibilities for print media and packaging – combining print with digital

I was a co-applicant in a new COST initiative “New possibilities for print media and packaging – combining print with digital”, coordinated by Anu Seisto/VTT, and the proposal was accepted and is now starting. I am looking forward to networking and organising interesting activities around the increasing hybridization of games and playful media.

The goal of this Action is to promote discussion on the benefits that may be achieved from novel combinations of print and digital. It will also be used to enhance innovations that will make use of the benefits of both print and electronic media as well as innovations where print and electronic media are combined. Several examples exist where successful combinations have been achieved e.g. through the use of image recognition, augmented reality or printed electronics to bring interactivity into fiber based products. To give the forest industry a competitive edge this Action will focus on new innovations by combining knowledge of the end users with most recent technological achievements. New models of ongoing change in social interaction and in the cultural products of paper and electronic media will be elaborated and proposed. The results will promote critical and theoretical discussion on the changing meanings of contemporary media culture. The Action will explore new business opportunities for the fiber based products and the value chains of print media and packaging through novel, innovative uses. It will also serve as a channel for communication between industry and academia, thus contributing to the development of new commercial applications.

More: http://www.cost.eu/domains_actions/fps/Actions/FP1104

SF tutkijatapaaminen / researcher meeting 2012

Here is the CFP for this year’s science fiction and fantasy researcher meeting at Finncon (below in English):

MUUKALAISET, TULKAA KOTIIN –
XIII SCIFI- JA FANTASIATUTKIJATAPAAMINEN
Tampereella torstaina 19.7. & perjantaina 20.7. 2012

Finnconin yhteydessä järjestettävän kolmannentoista scifi- ja fantasiatutkijoiden tapaamisen teemana on muukalaisuus. Muukalaisuutta voidaan käsitellä spekulatiivisessa fiktiossa koomisesti tai kauhukuvitelmana, mutta myös analyyttisesti. Kummeksutun hahmon vieraudessa kiteytyy usein teoksen tematiikka. Tutkijatapaamiseen toivomme pohdintoja esimerkiksi siitä, millaisia ovat etniset konfliktit fantasiassa tai millaista vertauskuvallisuutta kätkeytyy tieteisfiktion alieneihin.

Tutkimuksen kohteena voivat olla kirjat, elokuvat, tv-sarjat tai muut scifiksi tai fantasiaksi laskettavat kulttuurituotteet. Toivomme saavamme tutkijatapaamiseen papereita teemaan sopivista tutkimuksista, olipa tavoitteena essee, seminaarityö tai väitöskirja. Tutkijatapaamisen erityisvieraiksi toivotaan gradu-vaiheessa olevia opiskelijoita, mutta kutsu on suunnattu tänä vuonna myös Pohjoismaisin ja Baltiaan. Paperit voivat olla joko suomeksi tai englanniksi.

Tutkijatapaamisen tavoitteena on edistää monitieteistä tieteiskirjallisuuden ja fantasian tutkimusta sekä suomalaisen tutkijaverkoston kansainvälistymistä. Työskentelyä ohjaavat tutkija Irma Hirsjärvi (JY), prof. Liisa Rantalaiho (TaY), prof. Frans Mäyrä (TaY), tutkija Sofia Sjö (Abo), tutkija Merja Leppälahti (TuY), sekä tutkija Paula Arvas (HY).

Lähetä 500 sanan abstrakti aiheestasi 27.4.2012 (huom! korjattu päivä) mennessä Word- tai RTF-tiedostona osoitteeseen csmaso [at] uta.fi. Väitöskirjaan tai sitä seuraavaan tutkimukseen liittyvien papereiden toivomme olevan englanniksi. Lähetämme tiedon hyväksymisestä ja jatko-ohjeet 21.5. mennessä. Itse seminaariin toivomme 4-8 sivun paperia kultakin. Mikäli osanottajien määrä antaa myöten, käsitellään papereita myös teeman ulkopuolelta. Huom! PORTTI-lehti on tarjonnut joillekin papereille mahdollisuuden tulla julkaistuiksi artikkeliksi muokattuina (http://www.sci.fi/~portti/).

Järjestäjät:
FINFAR – Finnish Network of Fantasy Research ja Finncon (2012.finncon.org/).
Koordinaattori: Markku Soikkeli (csmaso [at] uta.fi)

ALIENS, COME HOME –
THE 13TH SEMINAR OF SCIENCE FICTION AND FANTASY RESEARCH IN FINLAND
Tampere, 19th and 20th July, 2012

The 13th Seminar of Science Fiction and Fantasy Research in Finland will take place in Tampere in connection with Finncon 2012, and for this year’s seminar we wish to invite papers on the general theme of the alien. In speculative fiction the alien can be anything from a comic element to a vision of horror, but it can also be approached in an analytical fashion. Often the theme of a particular work will coalesce in how it represents the odd, the alien and the strange. We are looking forward to seeing papers exploring, for example, the representation of ethnic conflicts in fantasy, or the symbolism of alien beings in science fiction.

The research may be based on literature, movies, TV-series and any other cultural product in the wide field of science fiction and fantasy. Various kinds of papers are welcome: essays, academic seminar papers, parts of dissertations etc. The papers may be in either Finnish or English.

The aim of the seminar is to promote Finnish multidisciplinary research on science fiction and fantasy and to enhance the internationalization of the Finnish research network. Teachers of the seminar are researcher Irma Hirsjärvi (Univ. of Jyväskylä), prof. Frans Mäyrä (Univ. of Tampere), prof. Liisa Rantalaiho (Univ. of Tampere), researcher Sofia Sjö (Åbo Akademi), researcher Merja Leppälahti (Univ. of Turku), researcher Paula Arvas (Univ. of Helsinki).

The deadline for an abstract of 500 words is 27.4.2012. It should be sent by e-mail, preferably in Word- or RTF-format to the address csmaso [at] uta.fi You will receive a message about the acceptance of your paper and further info by 21.5. For the seminar we wish to receive a presentation of 4-8 pages of your research. Dissertation articles or post-graduate research papers should be in English if possible. When the number of participants allows, papers will also be accepted outside the theme.

Organizers: FINFAR – Finnish Network of Fantasy Research and Finncon 2012
Coordinator: Markku Soikkeli (csmaso [at] uta.fi)

The five-year upgrade plan

Here are some retro- and introspective reflections on the occasion of PC upgrade at Christmas 2011. After three days (and one night) of installation, hacking and re-installation, I have again a personal play/workstation that is pretty pleasing to use. (My apologies to the family, who have been surprisingly long-suffering towards daddy’s immersion in computer assembly.) Even while I seem to blog about some ‘upgrade’ or another every other month or so, this kind of major, component-based PC upgrade is something that I thought already was a thing of the past, but now seems more like part of the “five-year plan”. After all, manufacturer assembled laptop systems, gaming consoles, tablets and smartphones have taken up much of the role that used to belong exclusively to a “computer”. But apparently we still need also the PC – the loved and hated general-purpose device that celebrated its 30th anniversary earlier this year. (http://www.pcmag.com/anniversary-of-the-pc)

PC upgrade, Xmas 2011

I will not go to the art or culture of engineering, even while immersing inside a contemporary personal computer allows one ample opportunities to reflect on the character and evolution of both. Also, the history of hackers and their role in the creation of not only the first personal computers, but also in the software and computing and gaming cultures that have driven much of the evolution of personal computing from its early days has been well documented elsewhere, e.g. in Steven Levy’s classic (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackers:_Heroes_of_the_Computer_Revolution). My first ‘home computer’ was Commodore 64, which has gained a cult status over the years. That computer had c. 1 MHz processor – my Intel Core i5 2500K does computations at 3,3 GHz speed, which translates to 3300 times speed increase I guess (over 4 GHz is rather easy to reach in overclocking), and this does not take into account what has taken place in the graphics processing units between 1983 and 2011. (The actual, cross-platform speed comparisons are a much trickier, of course, and it has been claimed that the original 8088 based PC was actually slower than the C64, even while the PC run at nearly 5 MHz: http://trixter.oldskool.org/2011/06/04/at-a-disadvantage/.) Yes, the PC games are not necessarily “better” today (but they look fancier, and are generally much more complex), and you could do word processing or go online with Commodore 64 as well, so nothing extremely radical in those areas. But even incremental quantitative change translates eventually into qualitative ones – the user experience of today’s personal computer hobbyist is rather different from that of the 1980s counterpart.

PC upgrade, Xmas 2011

The actual problems today are a sort of ‘embarrassment of riches’: both the hardware and software developers are providing so many opportunities for the user, that only the most dedicated ones are actually able to make full use of them. Also, some features are still so difficult to set up that few regular PC owners will ever actually be able to get them running, while their system nominally supports them. For example, in my case I had a system (motherboard, processor, hard disks and a processor) that could support something called “Intel Rapid Storage Technology” (RST). (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Rapid_Storage_Technology.) In practice, however, I ended up carrying out a series of multiple full Windows installations, trying out different ways to make the Windows boot from my SSD in the required Raid BIOS configuration, having only OS crash after a crash. Now I have the system all set up and stable, but this is with BIOS set to AHCI rather than the Raid mode, and I will not want to waste another three days to try yet another way to make it work. Also a new technology called Ludic Virtu appeared a bit tricky (in BIOS/Advanced Menu/System Agent Configuration/Initiate Graphic Adapter needs to be set into iGPU rather than PCIE/PCI to get the Virtu drivers to install at all). I still remain puzzled by the precise benefits that the two different options (d-mode / i-mode) allow in terms of gaming performance, power consumption and video transcoding. My new video card is ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II TOP model and together with bundled Asus software it also allows claimed real-time overclocking benefits, automatic temperature monitoring and ‘Smartcooling’, which keeps the system quiet in normal use and then gradually speeds up the CPU fans when 3D gaming graphics heat things up. (http://www.asus.com/Graphics_Cards/NVIDIA_Series/ENGTX560_Ti_DCII_TOP2DI1GD5/) My initial tests show that all this overclocking power and cooling is a mixed blessing: yes, I can now run Skyrim at the Ultra High graphics settings, and perceive all the minor details in dragon’s skin and character clothing that artists had put there, have the system sensors at cool area (the Arctic Freezer Pro 13 CPU cooler I installed to replace the stock Intel one also helps here) – but this also means that the GPU fans sound a bit like a jet engine when all those textures, shaders and millions of polygons hit the screen.

PC upgrade, Xmas 2011

To sum up, here are some of the advertised technologies, most of which I have had no time to test to verify whether they are genuinely useful:

Asus P8Z68-V/GEN3:

  • Fully PCI-Express 3.0 Ready, Intel Z68 motherboard. USB 3.0 Boost includes world’s first UASP support
  • Dual Intelligent Processors 2 with DIGI+ VRM Digital Power Design
  • UEFI BIOS (EZ Mode) – Flexible & Easy BIOS Interface
  • LucidLogix® Virtu (Universal Switchable Graphics) – Auto Switching between Integrated Graphics and NVIDIA/AMD Cards
  • Intel® Smart Response Technology – SSD Speed with HDD Capacity
  • BT GO! (Bluetooth) – Diverse BT Enjoyment, New Technology Lifestyle
  • GPU Boost – Push the Limits with iGPU Level Up!
  • Quad USB 3.0 Support – Double Access, Double Convenience
  • Quad-GPU SLI and Quad-GPU CrossFireX Support

Intel Core i5 2500K:

  • Intel® Turbo Boost Technology         2.0
  • Intel® Virtualization Technology (VT-x)
  • AES New Instructions
  • Intel® 64
  • Idle States
  • Enhanced Intel SpeedStep® Technology
  • Thermal Monitoring Technologies
  • Intel® Fast Memory Access
  • Intel® Flex Memory Access
  • Execute Disable Bit

ASUS GTX 560 Ti DirectCU II TOP:

  • overclocked graphics card for superb 3D Vision™ gaming
  • Top-selected and overclocked to 900MHz, 80MHz higher than reference for faster and smoother performance
  • Speed up heat dissipation with doubled airflow via exclusive DirectCU dual fan design
  • Pump up graphics performance with Super Alloy Power delivering a 15% performance boost, 2.5 longer lifespan and 35C cooler operation
  • Crank up 50% faster clock speeds with exclusive Voltage Tweak
  • ASUS Smart Doctor: Your intelligent hardware protection and powerful overclocking tool
  • ASUS Gamer OSD: Real-time overclocking, benchmarking and video capturing in any PC game
  • Splendid™ Video Intelligence Technology: Optimizes colors in various entertainment scenarios with five special modes — standard, game, scenery, night view and theater
  • GeForce CUDA™: Unlocks the power of GPU’s processor cores to accelerate the most demanding system tasks
  • NVIDIA® SLI™: Supports multi-GPU technology for extreme performance ode
  • NVIDIA PhysX™: Dynamic visual effects like blazing explosions, reactive debris, realistic water, and lifelike characters
  • NVIDIA® 3D Vision™: Immersive yourself in 3D gaming world
  • DirectX® 11 Done Right: Brings new levels of visual realism to gaming on the PC and get top-notch performance
  • D-Sub Output : Yes x 1 (via DVI to D-Sub adaptor x 1)
  • DVI Output : Yes x 2 (DVI-I)
  • HDMI Output : Yes x 1 (via Mini HDMI to HDMI adaptor x 1)
  • HDCP Support : Yes

The world of competitive technology development and particularly the world of tech advertisement are truly worlds of wonders.

There are some more photos that document the components and assembly work in Flickr:

http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=%22PC+upgrade%22&w=21506315%40N00&z=e

Play, fantasy, empowerment and learning

I will be talking about the themes mentioned in the blog topic today in an eLearning seminar in Tampere. My (Finnish) title can be translated as “Games – learning and growing into subjects of online world”. The full program is here:

http://tvt.tampere.fi/?x41061=1681165