Sponsored by J-Lab: The Institute for Interactive Journalism.
Supported by the Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation.
When does a news “experience” tell the story better than a news “story”? This daylong workshop focuses on what’s happening in the world of news games – from election, budget, environmental and other exercises. We’ll look at the creation, usefulness and ethics of news games and searchable databases. And we’ll hear from both the journalists and the programmers who build the games.
Agenda:
9:00-9:30 a.m. If We Can Do It, So Can You
Long before the Gotham Gazette got a Knight Challenge grant, it was creating news games on NYC issues. Here how and why they do it.
Gail Robinson, Editor. Garbage Game, Budget Maze, Who’s Running for What?
9:30-10:15 a.m. Loop d’ Loop
American Public Media, home to Marketplace, Minnesota Public Radio, A Prairie Home Companion and Gather.com, has learned that games not only educate news consumers, they inform journalists, too.
Joellen Easton, Public Insight Analyst. Consumer Consequences, Budget Hero/Budget Balancer, Idea Generator
10:15-10:30 a.m. Short Break
10:30-10:50 a.m. Educational Exercises
KQED in San Francisco has revived its successful You Decide, an online devil’s advocate that enables users to dig deeper and to clarify their positions on hot-button political issues.
Meghan Laslocky, Interactive Producer.
10:50-11:30 a.m. Predicting the News
PlaytheNewsGame.com is an online interactive game uses real news footage and invites players to predict the outcome or events in the news and decide what they think should happen.
Eric Brown, CEO, ImpactGames.
11:30 a.m.-12:00pm Learning from Gamers
Eyetracking research can provide clues to how we use games, what turns us on and turns us off.
Nora Paul, Institute for New Media Studies, University of Minnesota, Knight NewsChallenge recipient.
12:00-1:00 p.m. Luncheon Keynote Speaker: Ian Bogost
Author, “Persuasive Games: The Expressive Power of Video Games,” Creator of “Fat World” for ITVS, watercoolergames.com.
1:00-1:30 p.m. Augmented Reality Games
What happens when news organizations take games from the virtual to the real world?
Josh Sheldon, MIT Center for Future Civic Media on TIMELAB2100, an augmented reality game.
1:30-2:00 p.m. Games for Social Change
Some of the best news games are being produced by media on a mission. A quick tour of the non-profit, public interest and social issue gaming world.
Suzanne Seggerman, GamesforChange.
2:00-2:15 p.m. Short Break
2:15 to 3 p.m. Ethics of Gaming
Does gaming lead to advocacy? Does that improve or compromise their journalistic value? Are turning news into voyeuristic entertainment? In a world of serious challenges, is it wrong to have fun? Are some issues too grave for gaming?
PANEL DISCUSSION: Jan Schaffer, Ian Bogost, Nora Paul,
Eric Brown, Joellen Easton, Gail Robinson, Meghan Laslocky,
Josh Sheldon.
3 p.m. Adjourn
Videos
Speaker Bios
Gail Robinson is editor-in-chief of Gotham Gazette, an award-winning online publication on New York City policy and politics published by Citizens Union, a good government group. Robinson received a 2007 Knight News Challenge grant to develop news games. Gotham Gazette currently features 20 news games and quizzes online. Prior to joining the Gazette, she was executive editor of World Press Review, oversaw political coverage for United Media, a major national newspaper feature syndicate, and covered the environment, education and local government for various publications.
Joellen Easton is currently a public insight analyst at American Public Media. She divides her attention among supporting APM’s sustainability coverage and Marketplace’s entrepreneurship and Washington desks, tackling business technology needs and developing journalism games for the Center for Innovation in Journalism and training CIJ’s partner stations in the use of Public Insight Journalism (PIJ). Easton is a key producer of “Consumer Consequences,” a game about the environmental impact of personal choices, and has been involved with both the “Budget Hero” game and “Idea Generator” exercises. Minnesota Public Radio has been honored with Knight-Batten Awards for Innovations in Journalism for both PIJ and its Budget Balancer game.
Meghan Laslocky is the interactive producer for KQED’s “You Decide” and for “Jean-Michel Cousteau: Ocean Adventures” on PBS.org. She has worked extensively on other PBS sites including China from the Inside and FRONTLINE/WORLD. She has also produced events in Second Life. Laslocky is also a freelance writer and has had articles published on an array of subjects for publications including The San Francisco Chronicle and Salon.com. “You Decide,” the grand prize winner of the 2004 Knight-Batten Awards for Innovations in Journalism, was recently redesigned and relaunched for the 2008 elections.
Eric Brown co-founded ImpactGames to create compelling interactive experiences around current events. PeaceMaker, a video game simulation developed by ImpactGames on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, has been sold in over 60 countries, featured in media outlets around the world and has won several international awards. ImpactGames’ newest product, “Play the News,” addresses the shifting online news media industry and its changing news consumption from passive reading to active engagement. Playthenewsgame.com features new games nearly every day.
Nora Paul is director of the Institute for New Media Studies at the University of Minnesota. She is the recipient of a 2007 Knight News Challenge grant to create a toolset for news simulation games. Paul was previously at the Poynter Institute teaching news library management, computer-assisted research, and new media leadership. Paul is the co-author of “Behind the Message: Information Strategies for Communicators.” Her work at the Institute focuses on evolving digital storytelling forms, eye tracking research and news game development.
Ian Bogost is a video game designer, critic, and researcher. He is an associate professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology and a founding partner at Persuasive Games, LLC. His research and writing consider video games as an expressive medium and his creative practice focuses on games about social and political issues. Bogost’s video games cover topics as varied as airport security, disaffected workers, the petroleum industry, suburban errands and tort reform. His games have been played by millions of people and exhibited internationally.
Josh Sheldon is a project manager at MIT’s Scheller Teacher Education Program, where, in conjunction with MIT’s Center for Future Civic Media, he works on TIMELAB 2100 and other Outdoor Augmented Reality software, game development and research. Prior to MIT, Sheldon worked in Web development and science and technology education. He was a Web editor/producer at Physicians for Human Rights, a senior content producer at the JASON Foundation for Education, and a science teacher at Cape Cod Academy.
Suzanne Seggerman is president and co-founder of Games for Change, a group that provides support, visibility and shared resources to individuals and organizations using digital games for social change. G4C recently joined forces with Parsons The New School for Design and the MacArthur Foundation to create PETLab, a public interest game design and research laboratory. Before moving to G4C, Seggerman was a director at NYC-based think tank Web Lab where she oversaw a variety of cross-media projects. Her background in online media includes community-oriented interactive environments and the design of non-traditional games, which earned her awards from New Voices New Visions and Communications Arts.
Jan Schaffer is executive director of J-Lab: The Institute for Interactive Journalism and one of the nation’s leading thinkers in the journalism reform movement. She brings more than 30 years of journalism experience to her work. Schaffer is a former Business Editor and Pulitzer winner for The Philadelphia Inquirer. J-Lab helps journalists use digital technologies to develop new ways for people to participate in public life with projects on innovations, entrepreneurship and citizen media.
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