The School of Communication and Information at Rutgers is planning a major conference to be held April 8-9, 2011. The conference will cover the cultural, business, legal, and artistic aspects of the videogame and virtual worlds industries — pretty much everything practical and academic about gaming. If you’d like to spend a couple of days conversing with other folks who think seriously about gamers and the video game industry, please consider submitting to the Call for Papers, which can be found here: http://bit.ly/gbgcall (Deadline for 500-word abstract = Dec. 15th.)
For more information about the conference see this link: http://bit.ly/gamebehindgame
More details about the sorts of topics we’re looking to explore below the fold:
The conference will feature speakers, panels, and workshops based on abstract papers submitted before the event. The submission deadline for abstracts, panel proposals, and student posters is December 15, 2010, and registration opens January 2011. The conference will also feature a poster session and exhibits from industry-leading vendors. An award, covering travel and lodging expenses, will go to the authors of the best paper and best poster.
Topics of interest include but are not limited to:
Business and Economic
Labor, production, demand, and consumption of games
Economics and business models in the game industry
Virtual goods, money, property and/or services
Packaging/bundling of gaming into entertainment of all kinds (books, movies, games, theme parks, etc.)
New markets (disenfranchised communities, inexpensive games, etc.)
Marketing and market strategies
Gaming and the globalization processes
The economy within videogames/when “virtual†money becomes real
Bandwidth and video games
Videogame impacts on telecommunications infrastructure
Applications
Business applications of gaming platforms
New technology and non-traditional applications (e.g. defense)
Games as social platforms
Developing games in virtual worlds
Law and Policy
Legal aspects (e.g. Supreme Court case of California law)
Policy/regulatory environment/constraints of videogames
“Filters” and videogames; videogame regulation
Ethics and games
Political role of videogames
Society
The role of the press/media in gaming industry
Social, political and ethical issues related to digital games and gaming
Women and diversity in games/representations and stereotypes in games
Gamer culture and community trends
Impacts of videogames on society
Links:
Conference Website: http://comminfo.rutgers.edu/conferences/game-behind-the-game/
School of Communication and Information: http://comminfo.rutgers.edu
Institute for Information Policy: http://comm.psu.edu/about/centers/institute-for-information-policy/