| D O O R S O F P E R C E P T I O N 5 | |
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| Doors 5, Speaker Biographies | |
Janet Abrams
James Bradburne bradburne@newmet.nl James Bradburne is a British-Canadian architect, designer and museum specialist who has designed World's Fair pavilions' science centres, and international art exhibitions. Educated in Canada and England, he developed numerous exhibitions, research projects and symposia for UNESCO, national governments, private foundations, and museums world-wide during the course of the past fifteen years. He lectures often about new approaches to informal learning, and has published extensively. His books and papers have been translated into seven languages, and his Ph.D. research concerns creating effective educational strategies in informal learning environments. In 1994 he was invited to join newMetropolis Science Technology Center in Amsterdam as Head of Design. In 1995 he was given responsibility for Programming and Education, and is currently head of the Research and Development department, which is responsible for the research and development of new exhibits, exhibitions, programmes, and products for newMetropolis. In January, 1999 he will become the director of the Museum of Applied Arts in Frankfurt. http://www.newmet.nl/ conferences Connectivity http://www.design-inst.nl/reports/connectiviteit http://www.kommwiss.fu-berlin.de/~wissjour/pcst98/inhalt1.htm Rudolf II and Prague : The Court and the City http://www.Amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0500237379/002-7394639- 5328804 speakers
Lewis Bronze lbronze@espresso.co.uk Lewis Bronze is Editorial Director of Espresso Productions Ltd. in London. Prior to co-founding Espresso Productions, and his own independent TV production company, Bronze Productions Ltd., Lewis was the Editor of the BBC's long-running and highly-acclaimed childrenâs programme, Blue Peter. He currently has factual programmes in development for Channel 5 and ITV-2. During 1997, Lewis devised and produced 26 episodes of Attractions, a family days-out programme, for Channel 5. In addition, Lewis was the Executive Producer of Hot Gadgets, a new series produced by BBC TV's Science Department. In 1992, Lewis won the British Academy Award (BAFTA) for Children's Programmes. http://www.espresso.co.uk/ speakers
Uffe Elbaek uffe.elbek@kaospilot.dk Uffe Elbaek qualified as a social worker in 1982 and as a journalist in 1986, but he says that his real professional qualifications have been achieved through his work with the cultural network, 'The Frontrunners', in Aarhus, Denmark. Between 1982 and 1991 he was the initiator and project leader of The Frontrunners Network. Today The Frontrunners Network includes amongst others 'MouseHouse' (multi-media centre) and 'Space Invaders' (multi-media education). From 1991 he founded the project leader training programme The Kaos Pilots, which has evolved from his experience with the Frontrunners Network. In the summer of 1992 the Kaos Pilots was acknowledged by UNESCO, Paris, as 'a remarkable educational initiative'. Uffe Elbaek has lived in both Mexico and the United States, including on the Indian reservation Pine Ridge, South Dakota (Wounded Knee), where he was invited by the American Indian Movement. http://www.kaospilot.dk speakers
Carl Goodman cgoodman@ammi.org / cgoodman@ti.net Carl Goodman is Curator of Digital Media at the American Museum of the Moving Image, where he has overseen the Museum's use, production, and study of computer-based media since 1993. Carl supervised the development of all original computer-based interactive environments in 'Behind the Screen', an exhibition exploring the craft of motion picture and television production. A travelling version of the exhibition will embark on a three year tour in the United States and Europe beginning January 1999. Also at the Museum, Carl organises and hosts a continuing seminar series on the creative aspects of digital media, which plays host to figures from industry, research, academia, and the art world. He also organises exhibits of and about digital media, such as 'Computer Space '98', which surveys the world's first digital entertainment medium: the video game. Currently, Carl is working on Digital Objects, an ongoing series of themed exhibitions (and a 'living collection') of media and art native to computers and computer networks. Carl sits on the Board of Directors of the arts organisations Creative Time and Harvestworks Digital Media Arts. American Museum of the Moving Image http://www.ammi.org/ speakers
Tony Graham Tony began his professional career teaching drama at an all-girls school in the East End of London in the mid-1970's. In 1989, he began a Scottish Arts Council Director's Training Bursary with TAG Theatre Company, Scotland's premier young people's theatre company based in Glasgow. In 1992 he became TAG's new Artistic Director. He directed eighteen touring shows including As you like it and A Clockwork Orange. Tony has directed two large scale shows for the Edinburgh International Festival at the Assembly Hall: Lewis Grassic Gibbon's trilogy A Scots Quari (1993) and Alasdair Grays' masterpiece Lanark which won the Edinburgh Festival Critics Award. From May 1997, Tony became the new Artistic Director of the Unicorn Theatre for Children at the Arts Theatre in London. Tony's current mission is to build a major new cultural centre for children in the heart of London - a centre that reflects the latest development in international children's theatre. speakers Stephen Heppell stephen@ultralab.anglia.ac.uk Professor Stephen Heppell is director of ULTRALAB, Anglia Polytechnic University's learning technology research centre in Chelmsford. ULTRALAB has a long and global record of innovation, from pioneering CD-ROM's beginning in the 80's, to web sites and on-line learning communities in the 90's. Current new projects include working with Millennium Central on the one-eMail-per-pupil project (11 million email addresses!), advising on the construction of the School of the Future in the Millennium Dome and working with Tesco and Xemplar on the Computers in School Millennium Project. Stephen has a long list of general TV appearances. Most recently his short vision of the School of the Future was well received on Channel 4. Ultralab http://www.ultralab.anglia.ac.uk/ speakers
J.C. Herz joystick@interport.net I got used to technology at an early age, starting with videogames, which my brother and I would play for hours. This was my first impression of high tech. What's not to like? At the time, my uncle was working for Texas Instruments, and he used to bring us microchips. And although they all looked like little robot caterpillars, exactly the same, each one contained a different game. So it was obvious, even to a little kid, that the videogame lived on a microchip - not in the console, or the controllers, or the television, or even the cartridges, but on this little piece of silicon. Which, in retrospect, was an important thing to realise. After writing Surfing on the Net, I decided to write a book about video games. This wasn't triggered by any kind of catalytic event. I got the idea in the shower, where all the good ideas happen. Many phone calls and arcade tokens later, voila, Joystick Nation. For a more serious explication of authorial intent, read the prologue. It's more heartfelt and analytical. But it doesn't include the shower part. Before and during the books, I have also written for Wired, Rolling Stone, Playboy, GQ, Us, Allure, The Miami Herald, The Houston Chronicle, and The Boston Phoenix. I'm 26 now. I live in New York City. No day job in sight. Hotwired Hotseat http://www.hotwired.com/synapse/hotseat/97/37/transcript2a.html speakers
Danny Hillis Danny Hillis has a bachelor's degree in mathematics and a Ph.D. in computer science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He pioneered the concept of parallel computers that is now the basis for most supercomputers. He co-founded Thinking Machines, the first company to build and market such systems successfully, and holds some forty patents. Earlier this year Danny Hillis joined the Walt Disney Company as Vice President of R&D at Walt Disney Imagineering and as the first member of the Disney Fellows Program. Danny Hillis is also an editor for several scientific journals and a member of the science board of the Santa FŽ Institute, the Clock Library Foundation, the external advisory board of the Institute for Biospheric Studies and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. The Long Now http://www.longnow.org/foundation/DannyH.html speakers
Jan Willem Huisman Jan Willem Huisman (1967) obtained his M.A. in 1996 in interaction design at the Royal College of Art, London. Together with two fellow students he founded IJsfontein in 1997, a company specialized in interaction design. At IJsfontein Jan Willem's work consists of conceptualisation, project management and non-linear scripting. IJsfontein made a flying start creating a children's game the Meesters van Macht which was published in Holland november 1997 and will be available worldwide in the Autumn of 1998. At this moment IJsfontein is working on a purely educational project for children in the agegroup 4 to 6, entitled Water. Ijsfontein is also preparing a television/ internet/multiuser game for children, commissioned by the VPRO, to be broadcasted next year. In the approach towards interaction design IJsfontein creates a shift from the purely functional to the emotional. The rules of play are used to intensify the engagement of the user. speakers
Toshio Iwai Toshio Iwai was born in Aichi prefecture, Japan, in 1962. As an interactive media artist, Iwai began making experimental animations in 1981, moved on to working with pre-cinematic 'toys' such as flip books and zoetropes, and since 1986 has been interested in the computer game as a 'visual music system'. In 1987 he graduated from the Plastic Art and Mixed Media master's course of the University of Tsukuba, Japan and in 1992 he finished the Artist-in-Residence Program at the Exploratorium, San Francisco. His pieces, Well of Lights and Music Insects, are now in the permanent collection of the Exploratorium. Iwai became a cult figure in Japan with his computer generated virtual sets for the science news show Einstein TV (1990-91) and his virtual sets and characters for the immensely popular daily interactive children's show for Fuji TV, UgoUgo Lhuga. He is currently working on an advanced version of his Music Insects for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. Iwai Main http://www.iamas.ac.jp/~iwai/iwai_main.html speakers
Yasmin Kafai Yasmin Kafai is an Assistant Professor at the UCLA Graduate School of Education & Information Studies. Before coming to UCLA, she was a Postdoctoral Fellow and Research Assistant with Seymour Papert and Idit Harel at the Epistemology & Learning Group at the MIT Media Laboratory for five years and worked with Elliot Soloway in the Advanced Technology Laboratory at the University of Michigan and at Yale University. She holds degrees from Harvard University (M.Ed. and Ed.D.) and from the Technical University Berlin (Germany). Kafai studies computational learning and design environments for young children. Her current research projects focus on young children as designers of artificial worlds and builders of digital archives for science learning, both projects funded by the National Science Foundation. Further projects include the study of video games as learning environments in children's homes and schools via the WWW. She has recently published and edited two books, "Minds in Play: Computer Game Design as a Context for Children's Learning" and "Constructionism in Practice: Designing, Thinking and Learning in a Digital World" (with Mitchel Resnick), and various articles in the fields of education, developmental psychology, computer and information science. Yasmin Kafai http://www.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/kafai/KafaiIntro.html speakers
Alan Kay Dr. Alan Kay, Disney Fellow and Vice President of Research and Development, The Walt Disney Company, is best known for the idea of personal computing, the conception of the intimate laptop computer, and the inventions of the now ubiquitous overlapping-window interface and modern object-oriented programming. His deep interest in children and education was the catalyst for these ideas, and it continues to be a source of inspiration to him. Kay, one of the founders of the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center, led one of the groups that in concert developed these ideas into modern workstations (and the forerunners of the Macintosh), Smalltalk, the overlapping window interface, Desktop Publishing, the Ethernet, Laser printing, and network "client-servers." Prior to his work at Xerox, Dr. Kay was a member of the University of Utah ARPA research team that developed 3-D graphics. There he earned a doctorate (with distinction) in 1969 for the development of the first graphical object-oriented personal computer. He holds undergraduate degrees in mathematics and molecular biology from the University of Colorado. Kay also participated in the original design of the ARPANet, which later became the Internet. Dr. Kay has received numerous honors, including the ACM Software Systems Award and the J-D Warnier Prix D'Informatique He has been elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and the Royal Society of Arts. A former professional jazz guitarist, composer, and theatrical designer, he is now an amateur classical pipe organist. speakers
Dragan Klaic Dr. Dragan Klaic has been Director of the Netherlands Theater Institute in Amsterdam since 1992. Prior to coming to Amsterdam, he was Professor of Theatre History and Drama at the University of Arts in Belgrade, Yugoslavia. Educated in Belgrade and at Yale University, where he took his doctorate in drama literature and theater criticism, Klaic has lecturing widely in Europe and USA, held visiting professorships in the USA and participated at many international congresses and symposia. Previously he worked as a drama critic for the major Yugoslav papers and as a dramaturg and consultant with professional theatres and festivals. Dragan has created two documentary TV series, co-founded and co-edited EUROMASKE, The European Theatre Quarterly, and published numerous articles in production dossiers, collections of essays, lexicons and many periodicals in several languages. Dragan Klaic http://www.kit.nl/kvc/klaic.html speakers
Brenda Laurel laurel@purple-moon.com Brenda Laurel, a renowned computer games pioneer and 20-year software industry veteran, masterminded an exhaustive, four-year gender and technology research project that led to Purple Moon's creation. As vice president, design, Laurel drives the conceptual and creative direction of Purple Moon's products toward its mission to be meaningful in all aspects of a girl's life. Laurel joined Purple Moon after serving as a research staff member for Interval Research Corporation, Purple Moon's parent company. In 1990, Laurel co-founded Telepresence Research, Inc., an R&D company developing virtual reality and remote presence technology and applications. Previously, Laurel acted as a consultant in interactive entertainment and human-computer interface design for companies such as Apple Computer, Lucasfilm Games, Sony Pictures and Paramount New Media. Prior to that, she served as product development director at Activision, and as a research scientist, manager of software marketing and software design specialist at Atari. Laurel began her interactive entertainment career in 1977 as a computer game designer and programmer at CyberVision. Purple Moon http://www.purple-moon.com/ speakers
Ranjit Makkuni makkuni@parc.xerox.com speakers
Bruce Mau brucemau@web.net Bruce Mau is President and Creative Director of Bruce Mau Design Inc. and Bruce Mau Editions Inc. In 1985 he formed his studio, Bruce Mau Design, and began to design the Zone books series. Presently he is the design director of Zone books, and an editor, with Sanford Kwinter and Jonathan Crary, of Swerve Editions, a Zone imprint. Bruce Mau has gained international recognition for his design work which has been featured in international publications including Eigen Huis & Interieur, Print, Metropolis, and Graphis. From 1991-1993, Mau served as Creative Director for I.D. Magazine. Bruce Mau designed and conceived the award-winning and critically acclaimed S,M,L,XL with architect Rem Koolhaas. S,M,L,XL is one of many collaborative partnerships between Bruce Mau Design and artists and architects including Frank Gehry and Claes Oldenberg. In 1998, Arc en rve centre d'architecture organised an exhibit of Bruce Mau's work in Bordeaux (France). The exhibit, entitled Reading, was shown concurrent with Living, an exhibit of work by OMA/Rem Koolhaas. Mau for Zone http://160.111.7.240/organiza/museums/design/exhib/mixingmessa ges/essay/publish/p_a.L3.7.html speakers
Caroline Nevejan nevejan@waag.org Caroline Nevejan studied Science of Adult Education and Political Science at the University of Amsterdam (UvA). She worked as a visiting lecturer at the Drama School of Amsterdam and the Julliard School in New York. As a producer and editor she was involved with film and video productions, theatre and photography. In 1988 she joined the staff of Paradiso to manage the programmes on Politics and Culture. In this capacity she initiated a.o. The Galactic Hacker Party (on hackers and society, 1989), The Sero Positive Ball (the alternative event of the seventh World Aids Congres, 1990) and the Next 5 Minutes (on tactical broadcasting, 1993). In 1994 she founded The Society for Old and New Media together with Marleen Stikker. Society for Old and New Media http://www.waag.org Towards an European Media Policy http://www.dds.nl/~p2p Reading Table wins Designprize 1997 http://www.rks.nl/designprijs/97/25e.html speakers
Bas Ording ording@worldonline.nl Bas Ording was born in 1973 in the Netherlands. In 1992 he started the four year course Interaction Design at the Utrecht School of the Arts. During the course he developed design skills as well as programming skills. In 1997 he graduated from the Master of Arts course in Interactive Multi Media, where he worked in a multidisciplinairy team on a CD-ROM for the Dutch Aids Foundation. From 1994 he worked as a freelance HCI-designer for various multimedia companies. This made for a nice balance between free-research and applied design. The projects varied from visual database representations to Shockwave games for the web, company presentations and interactive educational CD-ROMs. In most of the projects he was involved in both concept development as well as production. On an autonomous/experimental basis he develops prototypes and demos of new interface elements and styles. His work is focused at, what he calls `Dynamical User Interfaces' (DUI), where `movement', `timing' and `feel' are very important aspects. He has a great interest in the `behavior' of the interface and how this can improve usability and add more `fun'. From September 1998 he works at Apple Computer in the Human Interface Group. speakers
Jogi Panghaal panghaal@hotmail.com, jogi@panghaal.com Jogi Panghaal graduated in Product Design from the National Institute of Design (NID) in Ahmedabad, India in 1977. He co-founded Lifetools in New Delhi to provide product design and communication design services to communities, both rural and urban that needed design help. Projects done include product design work with rural artisans and disabled children and communication design work with rural and urban communities, particularly women in the areas of health and HIV/AIDS. Mr. Panghaal has been a visiting teacher at NID, at Les Ateliers Paris and at the School of Planning and Architecture, Delhi. He has research interests in the area of cultural identity and design and has conducted educational programmes around this theme. In a parallel project he has been involved in the study of food and identity issues. In fact both these projects have informed each other over time. Present intereommunities and resource institutions to establish mutually useful relationships with each other through the help of information technologies. speakers
Rick Prelinger footage@well.com Richard Prelinger is president of Prelinger! Associates Inc., New York, which owns and operates the Prelinger Archives holding over 33000 ephemeral (advertising, industrial, educational documentary and amateur) films and over 30000 cans of unedited footage. Mr Prelinger is publisher of Footage 89: North American Film and Video Sources, a guide to archival and production collections and Footage 91, its supplemental volume on CD-ROM. He is a consultant to motion picture and television producers, archives and collections. His areas of expertise include archival business development and management, perspectives on new and emerging media and intellectual property evalution and appraisal. Prelinger has furnished archival footage to thousands of productions in all media, including motion pictures, television programs, interactive programming, educational and documentary productions, independent/experimental films and videotapes and corporate/institutional shows. Prelinger! Associates Inc. is currently producing (with the Voyager Company) Our Secret History, a series of CD-ROMs featuring archival films, text, still images and other material relating to the hidden history of the twentieth century. Secret Century http://www.secretcentury.com speakers
Mitchel Resnick mres@media.mit.edu Mitchel Resnick, associate professor at the MIT Media Laboratory, studies how new technological tools can help bring about deep changes in how children play, think, and learn. Resnick has developed a variety of 'computational construction kits,' including LEGO/Logo and Star/Logo. He is co-founder of the Computer Clubhouse, an afterschool learning center for youth from under-served communities. Resnick earned a BA in physics at Princeton University (1978), and MS and PhD degrees in computer science at MIT (1988, 1992). He worked for five years as a science/technology journalist for Business Week magazine, and he has consulted widely on the uses of computers in education. Resnick was awarded a National Science Foundation Young Investigator Award in 1993. He is author of the book Turtles, Termites, and Traffic Jams, published by MIT Press in 1994. Toys for Tomorrow http://toys.media.mit.edu/ speakers
Jez San Jez San is Founder and Managing Director of the Argonaut Group Games and Technology company. He founded Argonaut as a software consultancy firm in the early 80's and is the majority shareholder and chairman of the Argonaut Group board. At the age of 18 he co-wrote his first book ('Quantum Theory') and programmed Argonaut's first game, 'Skyline Attack' on the Commodore 64. In 1986, Jez developed Argonaut's first 16-bit title, 'StarGlider', the title's success financed Argonaut's expansion and is said to be the first popular 3D computer game. Jez was also involved in establishing Argonaut's relationship with Nintendo which lead to the production of popular games such as 'StarFox'. He was also directly involved in designing the best selling 3D and RISC microprocessor, SuperFX ship, licensed and sold by Nintendo. Jez is widely quoted in the industry and is considered one of the leading experts in interactive games and the associated technologies. Argonaut Software http://www.argonaut.com speakers
Johannes Schadé speakers
Barbara Stafford bms6@midway.uchicago.edu Barbara Stafford is William B. Ogden Distinguished Service Professor in the Department of Art History at the University of Chicago. Educated at Northwestern, the Sorbonne, the University of Chicago and the Warburg Institute, London, before assuming her current post in Chicago, Professor Stafford has held assistant and associate professorships at Loyola and the University of Delaware, and has been honored by John Simon Guggenheim, Alexander von Humboldt, and Getty Center fellowships. Among her books are Voyage into Substance: Art, Science, Nature and the Illustrated Travel Account, 1760-1840 (MIT Press, 1984); Body Criticism: Imaging the Unseen in Enlightenment Art and Science (MIT Press, 1991); Artful Science. Enlightenment, Entertainment and the Eclipse of Visual Education (MIT Press, 1994); and Good Looking: Essays on the Virtue of Images (MIT Press, 1996). She has lectured recently on such subjects as light and shadow, scientific necromancy, computers and writing, learning in museums, and educating digerati. speakers
Marco Susani susani@domac.it speakers
Gong Szeto gong@io360.com Gong Szeto received his B.Arch in Architecture from the University of Texas at Austin School of Architecture and Planning. His work with the Charles Moore Studio includes the Washington State History Museum, the Kansas State University Art Museum, and the EuroDisney Housing Master Plan. He also designed the offices of Leers Weinzapfel Associates Architects in Boston, as well as the new i/o 360 studio in New York, where he is now Creative Partner. i/o 360 digital design, inc. is a New York-based design studio specialising in design in technology mediated- environments. Gong has lectured at the Magazine Publisher's of America Conference, the AIGA, Netherlands Design Institute, and has taught at the Philadelphia College of Art and Design. URL's of Szeto's work include: www.sothebys.com, www.viacomnewmedia.com, www.vg.com, www.dowjones.com, www.usastudios.com. i|o 360 http://www.io360.com speakers
John Thackara First Perceptron of Doors of Perception (aka "director") speakers
Nobuyuki Ueda nueda@kcn.or.jp Nobuyuki Ueda is currently a professor in the Human Relations Department at Konan Women's University in Japan where he is teaching and developing the concept of learning designs. In 1990 he founded the neoMuseum. There, he has conducted nearly fifty experimental workshops on learning, media, and design. When he studied at Harvard University Graduate School of Education, he was greatly stimulated by the research and design environments of Sesame Street and the Boston Children's Museums, and the Logo constructionist learning environments at MIT's Media Lab. He is currently a member of the Concept Advancement Committee of the Kobe International Multimedia & Entertainment City (KIMEC), a project which is aiming to develop a city of the future. His main publications include: Japanese Children's Personal Theories of Intelligence: A Developmental Study; A New Learning Environment: The neoMuseum/Children's Media Museum Prototype and Designing Learning Environments. speakers
David Vogler DavidV3249@aol.com A graphic artist gone interactive, David Vogler has for the past several years immersed himself in the creation of online animation and entertainment. David recently rejoined Nickelodeon as the Vice President, Creative Director of Nickelodeon Media Works. He is responsible for a variety of new media initiatives including Nickelodeon Online as well as special telefusion projects within MTV Networks. In 1995 Vogler joined Disney Online as Vice President of Kids' Content, where he named, designed and packaged the acclaimed 'Daily Blast' web site. During this period, he also created and produced original non-Disney content, including the wildly popular 'D-Toy' franchise. Prior to his Disney days, Vogler was Executive Producer for Nickelodeon Online. Vogler launched Nickelodeon and Nick at Nite’s original sites on America Online, and created Nick at Nite’s first landings on the World Wide Web. Nickelodeon Online has won numerous design awards and continues to be the most popular online hangout for kids. Vogler was also the creative force behind many of Nick's popular consumer products. He was responsible for such notorious and award-winning creations as the flatulent 'Ren & Stimpy' plush toys and 'Gak', a garishly-colored goo which literally became the hands-on manifestation of the Nick Brand. David has worked as a freelancer and at various studios designing projects for Jim Henson Productions, Children’s Television Workshop and Marvel Comics. Mr. Vogler's background includes art direction of print humor that includes work for SPY Magazine. Vogler has received the highest awards from The New York Art Director’s Club, The Society of Publication Designers, AIGA, Graphis, BDA, PRINT and Communication Design. His work has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, HOW, PRINT, I.D. Magazine, WIRED, Digital Kids, Steven Heller’s Designing for Children, The Digital Designer and a few other publications he’d just as soon not mention. In his spare time David has taught at Pratt Institute, lectured at the American Film Institute and co-created the TV series 'Monkey's Uncle'v for Saban Entertainment. An avid collector of rare editions of MAD, Vogler devotes an inordinate amount of his spare time to the ingestion of juvenile humor and junk food. David's work can be sampled at http://www.davidvogler.com speakers
Hillel Weintraub Hillel Weintraub is Director of Communication Center at the Doshisha International Jr/Sr High School in Kyoto, Japan. I have been thinking about the design of learning spaces ever since first grade when I spent many hours exiled under the teacher's desk. My own teaching experience has been with a wide range of learners in various places - on Borneo with people who had been headhunters; in Chinatown, New York with people literally just off the boat; in the Pacific Trust Territories on an atoll; on rainy Hawaii Island among bees, ducks, avocados and sugar cane; and in Kyoto, where for the past 15 years I have been working with students who have lived a good portion of their lives outside of their native country. Over the years I've spent some time with people who had been labeled as handicapped or psychotic. These interactions have led me to develop an awareness of the arbitrariness of definitions and boundaries - of sanity, of intelligence, of physical and spiritual wellness, indeed of all language. This has led me to my own postmodern view of media and learning design as I discovered the importance of standing things on their head. After more than 50 years of hanging around schools, I have the conviction that the more we can integrate playful and serious communication into the design of our learning spaces, the more our children and adults will be to create more equitable and human societies for all peoples. To this end, my colleagues and I have just designed a new Communication Center which we believe has many aspects of a powerful and convivial learning space. speakers
Femke Wolting femke@vpro.nl Femke Wolting (1970) graduated from the School of Journalism in Tilburg in 1991. She has attended master courses in Literary Theory at Tilburg University, and in 1994 graduated cum laude in Film and Television Studies from the University of Amsterdam. She's programme advisor of the International Film Festival Rotterdam and curator of Exploding Cinema in the International Film Festival Rotterdam. 'Exploding Cinema' deals with the boundaries of the moving image and beyond: cinema outside the traditional filmtheatre featuring new media, music/media live events and performances, lectures, film and videoscreenings. Femke has several jobs at VPRO, a Dutch broadcasting organisation: Editor and researcher of 'Laat op de avond na een korte wandeling', a weekly documentary series on arts, media, technology and new thinking. Staff member at VPRO-Digital, a research department focusing on the effect of information and communication technology on production, distribution and consumption of media within the context of VPRO. Editor-in-chief of 'Lifesavers' for the VPRO website. Lifesavers is a project in which a new generation of mediamakers and artists is invited to create innovative interactive programs for the Internet. Femke is also contributing editor of Skrien, a monthly magazine on film/television and new media. VPRO http://www.vpro.nl International Film Festival Rotterdam http://www.iffr.nl speakers
Sarah Woods sarah.chesters@unitedkingdom.ncr.com Sarah is a Research Fellow at NCRs Financial Services Knowledge Lab, London. Her research, since joining the Lab in 1997, has been concerned with future artefacts arising from the convergence of computing, networks and everyday things, particularly fashion and household objects, and its application to future channels in e-commerce. Before joining NCR Sarah was a senior designer at Philips Research Laboratory where she worked on many projects including Products with Personality. Prior to this Sarah was a researcher at Interval Research, San Francisco where she explored the convergence of computing, play and musical instruments. She has also worked at Voyager, Paris on producing a CD-ROM for children. Sarah has a BA in Three Dimensional Design from Middlesex University and an M.A. in computer related design from the Royal College of Art. Her RCA research on interactive toys, combining play with music, won critical acclaim and was featured in The New Scientist. Knowledge Lab http://www.knowledgelab.com speakers
Tim Wright timw@noho.co.uk Tim Wright is editorial director at NoHo Digital, London, where he has co-produced such acclaimed products MindGym, Blizzard, Movies&Shakers, Virgin.Net Fortune Cookie, the Private Eye web site, and most recently XmasPresenT, a connected adventure game designed to wile away the days leading up to the new millennium. Prior to signing up as a partner at NoHo, Tim was the launch editor of LAN magazine and consulted for Reed, Dennis, EMAP and VNU publishers. He's been an editor for such journals as Building Service & Environmental Engineer, Heating & Air Conditioning, and Which Computer? and has written regularly for national newspapers and magazines about technology, the computer retail industry, games and music. A Cambridge University graduate, he once provided the Englishman's viewpoint of the World Series for the Boston Globe, and was librettist for student composers at Oberlin University. Under sources that have inspired, he lists a children's book, 100 Great Card Games, and Harry Golombek's Grandmasters of Chess. NoHo http://www.noho.co.uk/ speakers
Will Wright Wwright@maxis.com Will Wright, Maxis's Chief Designer, co-founded Maxis with Jeff Braun in 1987. Wright Began working on what would become SimCity-The City Simulator in 1985. SimCity was released in 1989, and within a few months became a hit. The game has since won 24 domestic and international awards. With Fred Haslem, Wright co-designed SimEarth-The Living Planet in 1990, a simulation of a planet based on the Gaia theory of James Lovelock. In 1991, Wright and Justin McCormick designed SimAnt--The Electronic Ant Colony, a scientifically-accurate simulation of an ant colony. SimCity 2000 and SimCopter, a helicopter flight game, are Wright's most recent releases. Wright has had a lifelong fascination with simulations. His interest in plastic models of ships and airplanes during his childhood in Georgia eventually led to his designing of computer models of cities, ecosystems and ant colonies. Currently he is working on a computer game which simulates a family in a house. The game involves designing the house (with simple architecture tools), furnishing it with objects (with money that is earned by the family) and then managing the day to day lives of the characters (by having them interact with objects, neighbors and other family members). It is really more of a simulation than a story-driven game. One of the modes of play allows a gamer to input their real house and family and in essence make a model of their life in a very simple way. Maxis http://www.maxis.com speakers
John Wyver john@illumin.co.uk John Wyver is a writer and producer in London with the independent production company Illuminations. He is Chairman of the company, which he co-founded in 1983. His numerous productions for the BBC, Channel Four Television and other broadcasters include 'The Net', a magazine series about digital culture, and 'Tx.', a strand of creative documentaries about the contemporary arts. 'The Net' has pioneered a number of innovative link-ups between television and the Internet, including the award-winning shared social space, 'The Mirror', created with British Telecom, Sony and the BBC. In 1997 John also produced the world's first live television broadcast from within a shared social space, 'Heaven and Hell - Live'. He has written and lectured extensively about broadcasting and new media technologies. Illuminations http://www.illumin.co.uk/illumin/biog/john.html speakers
Eric Zimmerman eric@flat.com Eric is Co-Founder and Director of Product Development at Flat, a New York-based computer game developer focused on multiplayer email games and games that utilize artificial life technology. Before helping to create Flat, Eric worked for three years as Senior Game Designer at R/GA Interactive where he directed the development of a number of interactive entertainment titles, including the award-winning CD-ROM Gearheads, published by Philips Media in Spring, 1996. He is currently an Adjunct Professor at New York University's Interactive Telecommunications Program, where he teaches Game Design and Interactive Narrative. Eric has lectured widely on these topics, recently at the University of Jyvaskyla in Finland, the Association of Multimedia Professionals in Lisbon, Banff Center for the Arts, Carnegie Mellon University, Brown University, ISEA, and Parsons School of Design. Eric is a published author on the topic of interactive entertainment, with recent articles appearing in 21C, Zed, and I.D. Magazine. He will publish his first boardgame in January 1999 for Flesh Eating Technologies, a project of Semiotext(e) Press and Banff Center for the Arts. Eric is currently authoring a book on the history of video games for Melcher Media. He has also exhibited non-computer game projects in the Sara Meltzer Gallery in New York City. Flat Inc. http://www.flat.com |
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updated 22-9-1998 |