passed away at his Miami home at 8:00pm EST
on Sunday, January 29th, 2006.

Fear of Girls
é um hilário curta
sobre o cotidiano de 2 uberRPGnerds

// Julien Martinez

Okay, wannabe cyborgs, you know you want it: no matter the price, you have to have a robotic armature on your body that sends MIDI data. The latest, via Engadget: the Gypsy MIDI controller. (Wait a second, the gypsy MIDI controller? Now, that doesn't sound very cyborg. Marketing department, please?) It'll cost you US$855 an arm, or US$1,675 for the whole suit (best value, as the marketing people would say). Sound pricey? No, that's about typical in the history of these kind of mechanisms. Speaking of which, despite their claims, this is not the first device of this kind. But it can perform wirelessly, and comes configured out of the box for DJs -- now that's new. Let's take a look at this latest entry, and see which other attempts I can remember . . .

In this book Shepherd and Wicke make a bold and original contribution to the understanding of music as a form of human expression. They argue that music is fundamental to social life. Music is not merely a form of leisure or entertainment: it is central to the very formation and reproduction of human societies.

The authors pursue this argument through a wide-ranging assessment of some of the major cultural theoretical contributions to understanding music. Theories of culture, linguistic theories, structuralist and post-structuralist theories and psychoanalytic theories of music are carefully explained and critically examined. The authors then develop their own account of music as a non-referential yet material form of human expression which embodies and conveys principles of symbolic structuring. They emphasize the human body as a principal site for the musical mediation of social and symbolic processes.

Music and Cultural Theory establishes new links between musicology and cultural studies, showing how each discipline can inform and enrich the other. It will be recommended reading for students and professionals in musicology, media and communication studies, cultural studies and the sociology of culture.

The Cultural Study of Music is an anthology of new writings that will serve as a basic textbook on music and culture. Increasingly, music is being studied as it relates to specific cultures-not only by ethnomusicologists, but by traditional musicologists as well. Drawing on writers from music, anthropology, sociology, and the related fields, the book both defines the field-i.e., "What is the relation between music and culture?"-and then presents case studies of particular issues in world musics. This book would serve as an introductory textbook for the cultural study of music, an area that is increasingly being taught at the upper-level undergraduate and graduate level. Plus it would appeal to scholars in all areas of music, reflecting the latest and most up to date thinking on the complex issues surrounding how music and culture interrelate.

Dance Dance Revolution, or DDR (known as Dancing Stage in Europe), is a music video game series produced by Konami. It was introduced to Japanese video arcades in 1998, after being shown at the Tokyo Game Show earlier that year. Since then, the game has gained significant popularity elsewhere in the world, including large portions of North America and Europe. As of 2005, over 90 official versions have been produced, including those for home video game consoles. The Dance Dance Revolution series is a subset of the larger Bemani series of music games.

The game is typically played on a dance pad with four arrow panels: up, down, left, and right. These panels are pressed using the player's feet, in response to arrows that appear on the screen in front of the player. The arrows are synchronized to the general rhythm or beat of a chosen song, and success is dependent on the player's ability to time his or her steps accordingly.

AVM02 Professional Audio/Video Mixer w/ Effects

Designed for mobile DJs and club installations, Numark’s AVM02 Audio/Video Mixer with effects delivers numerous features optimized for live performance. The AVM02 offers separate, replaceable DJ crossfaders for audio and video with linked mode operation and slope control, Chroma Key (blue screen) and Luma Key (black screen) capability for superimposing images, plus numerous fades, wipe patterns, picture-in-picture (PIP) capability, and two video effects sections. The AVM02 is capable of multiple simultaneous effects. The mixer also incorporates joystick control for wipes and picture-in-picture operations and provides ten background color options

I learned of science fiction and history in a single season.

lessig entra no jogo
second life

Acts of Memory presents 15 tightly integrated essays that illustrate the active role of individual and cultural memory in tying the past to the present. Memory, or memorialization, is a cultural activity occurring in the present that offers history another kind of source or document; one that provides insights into the past as it lives on today. The authors, in fields ranging from philosophy and history through literature and media studies, illustrate how memory serves many purposes, between conscious recall and unreflected re-emergence, between nostalgic longing for what is lost to polemical use of the past to reshape the present. Their essays coalesce around three topics: the need for memory and testimonial facilitation of memory, primarily in the case of historical and individual trauma; the site-specific nature of acts of memory, especially in geopolitically conflicted situations; and the potential contributions of acts of memory when facing the difficulties and needs of the present. "Neither remnant, document, nor relic of the past, nor floating in a present cut off from the past, cultural memory, for better or worse, binds the past to the present and future. It is that process of binding that we explore in this volume" writes Mieke Bal.

On Thursday I got to experience Kabaret’s Prophecy, along with Ruairi Glynn (interactive architecture blog). Created by United Visual Artists, this is an LED wall for a members only nightclub in London. UVA used 2968 Barco MiPix LED blocks and customised their Dragonfly2 software for the installation. They also provide a visual operator (VJ) to mix visuals and generated patterns into the curved displays. It was really nice and was easy to see how the whole moood could be changed with varying effects. I was prompty told that no photography was allowed, so here are some generic shots from official sources.

mapeamento internacional d VJs no frappr

Mark B. N. Hansen's New Philosophy for New Media departs from much theorizing about the cognitive effects of new media to argue that the embodied experience--rather than a de-contextualized, disembodied flow of information--is the proper framework for understanding perception. His nuanced claims, infused with both cognitive theory and science, offer compelling insights into the human interaction with the digital image, but the book falls somewhat short of its title’s dramatic promise.

Ultimately, Hansen's project it to update Henri Bergson's notion of the "affective body" for the 21st century. He claims that in the world of interactive new media "the 'image' has itself become a process, and, as such, has become irreducibly bound up with the activity of the body." The body acts as a filter to frame the digital image. In contrast, Hansen offers a sustained critique of Gilles Deleuze’s "treatment of the movement image in which the cinematic image is purified of connection with the human body" (as described by Tim Lenoir). The book expands Hansen's vision across seven chapters that variously engage with new media art theory, virtual reality, the "digital facial image," and digital artwork. His most compelling illustration comes in the final chapter, where he demonstrates how artists Douglas Gordon and Bill Viola open "experience to the subperceptual inscription of temporal shifts (machine time)." Here, drawing on work of neuroscience, he shows that art actually engages the body and expands perception of the interstices between what human normally experience as "now."

Avant-Garde Film: Forms, Themes and Passions examines the variety of concerns and practices that have comprised the long history of avant-garde film at a level appropriate for undergraduate study. It covers the developments of experimental film-making since the modernist explosion in the 1920s in Europe through to the Soviet film experiments, the American Underground cinema and the French New Wave, structuralism and contemporary gallery work of the young British artists. Through in-depth case-studies, the book introduces students not only to the history of the avant-garde but also to varied analytical approaches to the films themselves - ranging from abstraction (Richter, Ruttmann) to surreal visions (Bunuel, Wyn Evans), underground subversion (Jack Smith, Warhol) to experimental narrative (Deren and Antonioni).

Throughout the history of cinema, a radical avant-garde has existed on the fringes of the film industry. A great deal of research has focused on the pre- and early history of cinema, but there has been little speculation about a future cinema incorporating new electronic media. Electronic media have not only fundamentally transformed cinema but have altered its role as a witness to reality by rendering "realities" not necessarily linked to documentation, by engineering environments that incorporate audiences as participants, and by creating event-worlds that mix realities and narratives in forms not possible in traditional cinema. This hybrid cinema melds montage, traditional cinema, experimental literature, television, video, and the net. The new cinematic forms suggest that traditional cinema no longer has the capacity to represent events that are themselves complex configurations of experience, interpretation, and interaction.

This book, which accompanies an exhibition organized by the ZKM Institute for Visual Media, explores the history and significance of pre-cinema and of early experimental cinema, as well as the development of the unique theaters in which "immersion" evolved. Drawing on a broad range of scholarship, it examines the shift from monolithic Hollywood spectacles to works probing the possibilities of interactive, performative, and net-based cinemas. The post-cinematic condition, the book shows, has long roots in artistic practice and influences every channel of communication.

The New Screen Media proposes critical tools for discussing the inner design and immersive effects of the new media forms and their social, political and cultural contexts. Alongside a discussion of how these new stories relate to issues of identity and the body and restructured temporal and spatial models and interfaces, the book explores differing creative platforms such as the Internet, Media Installation, Interactive Broadcast, CD-ROM and Expanded Cinema. The artists, themselves exploring innovative solutions, critically examine their own practice, with a special focus on fiction-based forms of interaction. This unique volume is presented with an accompanying DVD-ROM, featuring extracts from some of the groundbreaking works discussed by leading media theorists from Europe and the United States, including: Annika Blunck, Alex Butterworth, Sean Cubitt, Söke Dinkla, Jon Dovey, Timothy Druckrey, Malcolm Le Grice, Lev Manovich, Peter Weibel, Paul Willemen and John Wyver. Made in conjunction with the ZKM Centre for Art and Media, Karlsruhe, Germany, this unique addition of a DVD-ROM to the book provides a rich sampler of interactive work and videos by which to explore the experimental territory, where the cinematic and digital arts are converging in new forms of narrative. Carefully cross-referenced with the book, this compilation opens a comprehensive overview to a wider audience. The cross-platform DVD-ROM provides up to four Gigabytes of detailed illustration and analysis of the work of artists and interactive filmmakers from around the world at the cutting-edge in creating and critiquing these new hybrid forms of interactive narrative. Includes: Zoe Beloff, Michael Buckley, Luc Courchesne, Toni Dove, Ken Feingold, Chris Hales, Graham Harwood, George Legrady, Martin Rieser, Jill Scott, Bill Seaman, Jeffrey Shaw, Eku Wand, Grahame Weinbren and Andrea Zapp.

New Digital Cinema: Reinventing the Moving Image tracks the evolution of contemporary cinema as it intersects with the formerly separate realms of film-making, video art, music video, animation, print design and live club events to create an avant-garde for the new millennium. Building on the premise that we are witnessing the most extensive reworking of the role of images since the inauguration of cinema, due to the advent of desktop film-making tools. The book opens with an investigation of digital cinema and its contribution to innovations in the feature film format. While examining animation/live action hybrids, the gritty aesthetic of the Dogme ninety-five film-makers, the explosions of frames within frames and the evolution of the 'ambient narrative' film. The book then moves on to explore the creation of new genres and moving image experiences. What we know as 'cinema' explodes beyond the confines of the movie theatre and television screen into new venues and formats.

What is the relationship between cinema and videogames? Hollywood film franchises are routinely translated into games. Some game titles make the move onto the big screen, none more prominently than Lara Croft, iconic star of the Tomb Raider series. Games often depend on recognized film genres, milieu or devices for branding and marketing. Some aspire to a film-like quality of graphics and action. But games also offer markedly different experiences, especially in the realm of "interactivity."

But what happens in the interface between cinema and games console or PC? Is there a merging of languages as games influence movies and movies influence games? Are some films becoming increasingly like games, and to what extent do they draw on the characteristics of Hollywood or other forms of cinema? ScreenPlay investigates all these issues and explores the extent to which the tools of film analysis can be applied to games, in particular, how the pleasures (and frustrations) of computer games can be compared with those of cinema.

The Video Game Revolution examines the evolution and history of the video game industry, from the 1950s through today, the impact of video games on society and culture, and the future of electronic gaming.

The Wearable Instrument Series, by Marisa Jahn and Steve Shada, turn their wearers into breathing musical instruments. The flesh colored accessories resemble prosthetic devices, suggesting that human relationships can be regarded as corporal, affective, and psychic apendages...

GAME as CRITIC as ART. 2.0.

La apropiación y deconstrucción del software de cualquier videojuego -ingeniería inversa- es en sí mismo un acto subversivo que implica una doble intencionalidad: crítica (de revisión) y creativa (de regeneración). En todos los juegos de ordenador realizados por artistas, juego, crítica y creación se combinan en mayor o menor medida para conseguir productos sorprendentes y paródicos que incitan a la exploración. Estas características cobran mayor relevancia en los juegos online y offline, originales o modificados -también parodias de juegos-, que poseen un marcado carácter socio-político y que se ubican de manera explícita en el territorio del arte.

dubstep warz @ breezeblock
encontro histórico ;-)

+++

D1 - Untitled (white)

Mala (Digital Mystikz)
Digital Mystikz - '10 Dread Commandments VIP' (white)
Digital Mystikz - 'Haunted' (white)
Digital Mystikz - 'Left Leg Out' (white)
Skream - 'Request Line' Mala remix (white)
Digital Mystikz - 'All Of A Sudden' (white)
Digital Mystikz - 'Anti-War Dub' (white)

Skream
Skream - 'Midnight Request Line' (Tempa)
Skream - 'Tapped' (Tempa)
Sunship and Warrior Queen - 'Almighty Father' Skream remix (white)
Skream - 'Glamma' (Tempa)
Skream - 'Deep Concentration' (Tempa)
Skream - 'Rottan' (Tempa)
Digital Mystikz - 'Ancient Memories' Skream remix (white)
Horsepower - 'Egypt' (Skream remix) (white)
Skream - 'Music 2 Make Us Stagga' (white)

Kode 9 and Space Ape
Benny Ill, Kode9 & the Culprit - 'Fat Larry Skank' Kode 9 remix (white)
Kode 9 and Space Ape - '9 Samurai' (Hyperdub)
Kode 9 and Space Ape - 'Backward' (Hyperdub)
Kode 9 and Space Ape - 'Kingston Dub' (Hyperdub)
Burial and Space Ape - 'Space Ape' (White)

Vex'd
Vex'd - 'Saturn' (white)
Vex'd - '3rd Choice' (white)
Vex'd - 'Wavescape Remix' (white)
Vex'd - 'Killing Floor' (white)

Hatcha and Crazy D
Benga - Untitled (white)
Benga - Untitled (white)
Coki - Untitled (white)
Coki - Untitled (white)
Coki - Untitled (white)
Skream - 'Request Line' Remix (white)
Benga - Untitled (white)
Benga - Untitled (white)
Benga - Untitled (white)
Digital Mystikz - 'Ancient Memories' Skream remix (white)

Loefah and Sgt. Pokes
Loefah - 'Mud' (white)
Loefah - 'Ruffage' (white)
Loefah - 'Sukkah' (white)
Loefah - 'System' (white)
Loefah - 'Root' (DMZ)

Distance
Distance - 'My Demons' (white)
Distance - 'Fallen' (white)
Distance - 'Tuning' (white)
Distance - 'Cella' (white)
Distance - 'Cyclops' (white)
Distance - 'Night Vision' (white)
Distance - 'Traffic' (white)

DJ Pinch - 'Qawwali' (white)

Next-generation consoles? We care more about next-generation music-making. In that spirit, CDM's resident game composer and gaming + music columnist W. Brent Latta checks in with a look back at last year's greatest game scores and trends, with a glimpse of what this year could hold.

A MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game) is an online computer role-playing game in which a large number of players can interact together or against one another in the same game at the same time. An MMORPG follows a client-server model in which players, running the client software, are represented in the game world by an avatar — this is usually a graphical representation of the character they play. Providers, usually the game's publisher, host the persistent worlds these players inhabit. This interaction between a virtual world, always available for play, and an ever-changing, potentially worldwide stream of players characterizes the MMORPG genre.

The Alternate Reality Gaming Network is the largest and most complete resource available for players of online collaborative Alternate Reality Games, comprised of a network of independent websites dedicated to the support of the burgeoning genre known as Alternate Reality Gaming (ARG). ARGN's affiliate sites are independently owned and operated by volunteers for the enjoyment of themselves and the ARG community, and have a combined membership of over 16,000 members worldwide.

If Mp3 = the new radio, what else can Mp4 be, but the new TeeVee? In actual fact, no one video codec or format dominates the online landscape the way the audio Mp3 codec dominates, but the rapid upsurge of video being distributed online is what’s worth watching. Where we once chuckled over backyard fences, or in the schoolyard or workplace about a moment from last night’s TeeVee, more and more we’re now referring to some kind of video that ended up in our inbox, that we stumbled across on some blog, or that popped out of our peer to peer software. Like so, the decentralised universe grows. Mmmmmm, mmmmm. Where the Wild Video Things Are.

novas funções
no resolume 2.4

As pop culture, games are as important as film or television--but game design has yet to develop a theoretical framework or critical vocabulary. In Rules of Play Katie Salen and Eric Zimmerman present a much-needed primer for this emerging field. They offer a unified model for looking at all kinds of games, from board games and sports to computer and video games. As active participants in game culture, the authors have written Rules of Play as a catalyst for innovation, filled with new concepts, strategies, and methodologies for creating and understanding games..

Building an aesthetics of interactive systems, Salen and Zimmerman define core concepts like "play," "design," and "interactivity." They look at games through a series of eighteen "game design schemas," or conceptual frameworks, including games as systems of emergence and information, as contexts for social play, as a storytelling medium, and as sites of cultural resistance.

Written for game scholars, game developers, and interactive designers, Rules of Play is a textbook, reference book, and theoretical guide. It is the first comprehensive attempt to establish a solid theoretical framework for the emerging discipline of game design.

New media students, teachers, and professionals have long needed a comprehensive scholarly treatment of digital games that deals with the history, design, reception, and aesthetics of games along with their social and cultural context. The Handbook of Computer Game Studies fills this need with a definitive look at the subject from a broad range of perspectives. Contributors come from cognitive science and artificial intelligence, developmental, social, and clinical psychology, history, film, theater, and literary studies, cultural studies, and philosophy as well as game design and development. The text includes both scholarly articles and journalism from such well-known voices as Douglas Rushkoff, Sherry Turkle, Henry Jenkins, Katie Salen, Eric Zimmerman, and others.

Part I considers the "prehistory" of computer games (including slot machines and pinball machines), the development of computer games themselves, and the future of mobile gaming. The chapters in part II describe game development from the designer's point of view, including the design of play elements, an analysis of screenwriting, and game-based learning. Part III reviews empirical research on the psychological effects of computer games, and includes a discussion of the use of computer games in clinical and educational settings. Part IV considers the aesthetics of games in comparison to film and literature, and part V discusses the effect of computer games on cultural identity, including gender and ethnicity. Finally, part VI looks at the relation of computer games to social behavior, considering, among other matters, the inadequacy of laboratory experiments linking games and aggression and the different modes of participation in computer game culture.

A video game is half-real: we play by real rules while imagining a fictional world. We win or lose the game in the real world, but we slay a dragon (for example) only in the world of the game. In this thought-provoking study, Jesper Juul examines the constantly evolving tension between rules and fiction in video games. Discussing games from Pong to The Legend of Zelda, from chess to Grand Theft Auto, he shows how video games are both a departure from and a development of traditional non-electronic games. The book combines perspectives from such fields as literary and film theory, computer science, psychology, economic game theory, and game studies, to outline a theory of what video games are, how they work with the player, how they have developed historically, and why they are fun to play.

Locating video games in a history of games that goes back to Ancient Egypt, Juul argues that there is a basic affinity between games and computers. Just as the printing press and the cinema have promoted and enabled new kinds of storytelling, computers work as enablers of games, letting us play old games in new ways and allowing for new kinds of games that would not have been possible before computers. Juul presents a classic game model, which describes the traditional construction of games and points to possible future developments. He examines how rules provide challenges, learning, and enjoyment for players, and how a game cues the player into imagining its fictional world. Juul's lively style and eclectic deployment of sources will make Half-Real of interest to media, literature, and game scholars as well as to game professionals and gamers.

Created by (at the time) Royal College of Art student Rolf Knudsen, Random Acts of Music are two prototype projects that cross the borders of product design and musical interaction.

I like that some mobile phone companies are using designers and sound artists to create unique content. London based Universal Everything have created a number of ringtones that fuse audio and visuals together. Motion Garage is a series of tones for the Japanese market; "the movies display the physical energy of the sound, created using waveform analysis software". Leave No Trace is a series of 6 ringtones created for a Nokia snowboarding event, only available for download via bluetooth at the event.

The Sex SIG of the International Game Developers Association welcomes everyone interested in the topic of sexual content in video games, particularly developers active or interested in adult content development.

The adult content development community grows every year. It needs a place where it can discuss the unique issues, challenges and possibilities it faces while sharing information with others hoping to enter the field.

The Sex SIG hopes this "Sex & Games" blog will serve as an informational clearinghouse for such content, helping us to connect with everyone that shares our common goal of responsible, age-appropriate content development.

Art and music collide in Electroplankton, which features the striking visual style of Japanese interactive media artist Toshio Iwai. You interact with 10 species of Electroplankton by using the Nintendo DS touch screen. When you come in contact with the Electroplankton and elements of their environment, the microscopic merrymakers give off a unique sound. The sounds will ring familiar with you, from a piano and percussion instruments to your own voice.

Open Labs is slowly teasing out the specs of a new portable music device called the MiKo, promising a complete portable workstation for everything from DJing to music production to VJing and . . . podcasting? The company won't make a full announcement until the NAMM trade show later this month in Anaheim; in the meantime they're releasing weekly updates, so it's a little like watching a press release as a miniseries. But you can make a smart guess based on Open Labs' previous products, all of which involve Windows PCs packed into music keyboard form factors. If you read the site carefully, you'll also notice Open Labs says it has an audio interface and VGA port, and calls it a "standalone home theater PC." I've also put together some additional specs on the MiKo after the break.

Next Generation has an excellent piece, looking back on the history of game controllers, leading up to the Revolution's fascinating controller. They look at controller design, as well as the usage that some games wrest from the controllers.

scanner music

Postvinyl was created by Mathias Fuchs with Michelle Jay as an experiment in future DJ tools. It is based on a first-person shooter engine, turned into a performative sound tool. The virtual environment features record players and special “sound guns” that the DJ performer can explored and interact with. The result is an interface for creating both sound and visuals, with the virtual enviroment being both a functional and aesthetic space. The images seen by the virtual DJ avatar is projected in the club as the visual part of the performance.

CatchBob! is an experimental platform in the form of a mobile game for running psychological experiments. It is designed to elicit collaborative behavior of people working together on a mobile activity.

Hi. I'm Jesse, the latest member to join the staff here at the Institute. I'm interested in network effects, online communities, and emergent behavior. Right now I'm interested in the tools we have available to control and manipulate RSS feeds. My goal is to collect a wide variety of feeds and tease out the threads that are important to me. In my experience, mechanical aggregation gives you quantity and diversity, but not quality and focus. So I did a quick investigation of the tools that exist to manage and manipulate feeds.

Top 50 Music Videos Of 2005

Electronic games have established a huge international market, significantly outselling non-digital games; people spend more money on The Sims than on "Monopoly" or even on "Magic: the Gathering." Yet it is widely believed that the market for electronic literature -- predicted by some to be the future of the written word -- languishes. Even bestselling author Stephen King achieved disappointing results with his online publication of "Riding the Bullet" and "The Plant."

Isn't it possible, though, that many hugely successful computer games -- those that depend on or at least utilize storytelling conventions of narrative, character, and theme -- can be seen as examples of electronic literature? And isn't it likely that the truly significant new forms of electronic literature will prove to be (like games) so deeply interactive and procedural that it would be impossible to present them as paper-like "e-books"? The editors of First Person have gathered a remarkably diverse group of new media theorists and practitioners to consider the relationship between "story" and "game," as well as the new kinds of artistic creation (literary, performative, playful) that have become possible in the digital environment.

This landmark collection is organized as a series of discussions among creators and theorists; each section includes three presentations, with each presentation followed by two responses. Topics considered range from "Cyberdrama" to "Ludology" (the study of games), to "The Pixel/The Line" to "Beyond Chat." The conversational structure inspired contributors to revise, update, and expand their presentations as they prepared them for the book, and the panel discussions have overflowed into a First Person web site (created in conjunction with the online journal Electronic Book Review).

In the early days of Pong and Pac Man, video games appeared to be little more than an idle pastime. Today, video games make up a $20 billion dollar industry that rivals television and film, and their influence is felt throughout all aspects of popular culture.

The Video Game Theory Reader brings together exciting new work on video games as a unique medium and nascent field of study--one that is rapidly developing new modes of understanding and analysis, like film studies in the 1960s and television studies in the 1980s. This pioneering collection addresses the many ways video games are reshaping the face of entertainment and our relationship with technology. In the volume, leading media studies scholars develop new theoretical tools and concepts to study video games. Drawing upon examples from widely popular games ranging from Space Invaders to Final Fantasy and Combat Flight Simulator, the contributors discuss the relationship between video games and other media; the shift from third- to first-person games; gamers and the gaming community; and the important sociological, cultural, industrial, and economic issues that surround gaming.

Accompanied by an extensive listing of all gaming consoles developed over thirty years since the birth of the video game in 1972, The Video Game Theory Reader is essential reading for scholars, gaming enthusiasts, and anyone interested in understanding the ever-changing world of digital entertainment.

"This book offers a historical, formal analysis of video games that no other book to date has provided in such detail. . . . Wolf also effectively investigates the scientific and market forces that aligned with the development of video games to create a powerful cultural force." --Heather Gilmour, Executive Producer, American Film Institute New Media Ventures Over a mere three decades, the video game has become the entertainment medium of choice for millions of people, who now spend more time in the interactive virtual world of games than they do in watching movies or even television. The release of new games or game-playing equipment, such as the PlayStation 2, generates great excitement and even buying frenzies. Yet, until now, this giant on the popular culture landscape has received little in-depth study or analysis. In this book, Mark J. P. Wolf and four other scholars conduct the first thorough investigation of the video game as an artistic medium. The book begins with an attempt to define what is meant by the term "video game" and the variety of modes of production within the medium. It moves on to a brief history of the video game, then applies the tools of film studies to look at the medium in terms of the formal aspects of space, time, narrative, and genre. The book also considers the video game as a cultural entity, object of museum curation, and repository of psychological archetypes. It closes with a list of video game research resources for further study.

Over a mere three decades, the video game has become the entertainment medium of choice for millions of people, who now spend more time in the interactive virtual world of games than they do in watching movies or even television. The release of new games or game-playing equipment, such as the PlayStation 2, generates great excitement and even buying frenzies. Yet, until now, this giant on the popular culture landscape has received little in-depth study or analysis.

In this book, Mark J. P. Wolf and four other scholars conduct the first thorough investigation of the video game as an artistic medium. The book begins with an attempt to define what is meant by the term "video game" and the variety of modes of production within the medium. It moves on to a brief history of the video game, then applies the tools of film studies to look at the medium in terms of the formal aspects of space, time, narrative, and genre. The book also considers the video game as a cultural entity, object of museum curation, and repository of psychological archetypes. It closes with a list of video game research resources for further study.

This is a look at the revolution that changed the way we play video games. From the prototypical Space Wars, Hunt the Wumpus, and Adventure to modern shoot-em- ups, brain-busters and simulations. J. C. Herz examines what has kept us glued to screens and joysticks. It also explores how video games shaped the way those raised on them (like Herz herself) interact with their world. Joystick Nation gives an overview of video game history, interviews with the brains behind the most influential games, explorations of what makes various types of games work for various people, and even a peek into a major game development company during the critical countdown to a major release. Herz is a witty writer whose personal approach to the topic can resemble a riff by a stand-up comic. You'll find yourself nodding along with her reactions and smiling--maybe even laughing out loud.

Media critics remain captivated by the modernist myth of the new: they assume that digital technologies such as the World Wide Web, virtual reality, and computer graphics must divorce themselves from earlier media for a new set of aesthetic and cultural principles. In this richly illustrated study, Jay David Bolter and Richard Grusin offer a theory of mediation for our digital age that challenges this assumption. They argue that new visual media achieve their cultural significance precisely by paying homage to, rivaling, and refashioning such earlier media as perspective painting, photography, film, and television. They call this process of refashioning "remediation," and they note that earlier media have also refashioned one another: photography remediated painting, film remediated stage production and photography, and television remediated film, vaudeville, and radio.

The Sonar*Axe is a Sci-Fi inspired midi controller that you wear like a guitar. It generates drum/percussion sounds and synth sounds. Designed for intuitive music creation and is operationally similar to a Theremin.

The Frequency Modulator was an experiment in creating a physical instrument to control synthesis, more precisely Frequency Modulation. The concept was a tube shaped instrument that allowed gesture based control over the synthesis and provided a visual feedback to the frequencies using lights.

netpd is a project based on the software puredata. its intention is to create an environment for electronic musicians and give them the opportunity to jam with each other in realtime, connected over the internet or a LAN.