Ponderance

Christy Dena, one of the leading figures in Cross-Media Enterntainment in Australia, is coming to Perth. Thanks to AFTRS, Christy's running a series of events relating to cross-media, blogs, ARGs and the like. Some details:

Serious Games [at WestOne]
This is no laughing matter! Serious Games are created by the arts, education, academic, government, advertising, entertainment, military and public sectors. They all have a message besides just being fun: motivate to buy, sign-up, vote or protest; for skills acquisition, education and health. And they're popular too. America's Army, an online game created by the U.S. Army in 2002, has had over 17 million downloads and has over 6 million players. This seminar will provide an overview of the variety of serious game forms available and design considerations. It will be an a useful over view into current trends in serious games, and will be of interest to game makers, and those involved with simulators, military, education , the public sector and government people.

Date: Thursday, November 30, 2006, 6.30pm-9pm
Venue: WestOne Theatrette
WestOne- Leederville
164- 194 Oxford St, Leederville
Cost: $35
RSVP: Tom Lubin on 0410 416 799 or tom.lubin@aftrs.edu.au

Everything you every wanted to know about blogging in 60 minutes (but were too scared to ask)
Blogs about communicating with friends, reaching potential customers, having your say, engaging with associates, developing communities of practice, branding, standing on a soap box, making money. Its all of that. A blog is a website where entries are made in journal style and displayed in a reverse chronological order. Blogs often provide commentary or news on a particular subject, such as food, politics, or local news; some function as more personal online diaries. A typical blog combines text, images, and links to other blogs, web pages, and other media related to its topic, and are part of a wider network of social media.

Following the session will be refreshments.

Date: Friday December 1, 2006, 6:30pm-8pm
Venue: Australian Writers' Guild
196 Oxford St Leederville
Parking: TAFE Oxford St entrance.
Cost: FREE
RSVP: Tom Lubin on 0410 416 799 or tom.lubin@aftrs.edu.au

Alternate Reality Games [at the Innovation Centre]
What are the creators of The Blair Witch Project doing now? What do Microsoft, Dreamworks and Audi have in common? There'll all working on 'alternate reality games' or ARGs. This genre of entertainment is not only solving the riddle of how to have story and gameplay, but also how to get entertainment and marketing working together. Millions of players worldwide are spending hours, weeks and months with these elaborately written, directed and programmed stories that traverse websites, emails, faxes and phone calls. They have been called the 'Citizen Kane of online entertainment' (Internet Life). They are innovating audience interaction, the use of real-world devices, immersion and advertising in ways that you can utilise now. This half day seminar will show you just what they are, what advertising agencies think of them, how many are playing them and what you can take from them for your own properties.

Date: Saturday December 2, 2006, 9.30am-1pm
Venue: Innovation Centre WA, Enterprise Unit 3, 11 Brodie Hall Drive, Bentley [free parking]
Cost: $40 (lunch is included if you attend both Saturday sessions)
RSVP: Tom Lubin on 0410 416 799 or tom.lubin@aftrs.edu.au

Designing Cross-Media Entertainment [at the Innovation Centre]
This half day seminar will provide a primer for film, TV & emerging media practitioners and producers wishing to develop a cross-platform property. It is ideally suited for writers and producers who will be in the position of creating and managing the projects. The session will provide a tirade of information about innovative & commercially successful cross-platform properties in Australia and Internationally. What worked and what didn't will be explained, along with an insight into the design issues for creating such properties. Guidance on how to select platforms and formats according to target audiences will also explored. And for those that just have to know: examples of how marketing and entertainment have worked together to produce innovate and monetized content without selling out either of their respective values will be provided!

Date: Saturday December 2, 2006, 2pm-5:30pm
Venue: Innovation Centre WA, Enterprise Unit 3, 11 Brodie Hall Drive, Bentley [free parking]
Cost: $40 (lunch is included if you attend both Saturday sessions)
RSVP: Tom Lubin on 0410 416 799 or tom.lubin@aftrs.edu.au

OR: Attend all Christy Dena Events for $100 Save $15

For full details see Christy's AFTRS promotional PDF.

For those who are lucky enough to be attending the CyberGames 2006: International Conference on Games Research and Development on 4-6 December you can also hear Christy's paper "A Case-Study of miniARGs: Design Issues for Creating Alternate Reality Games for Professional Training and Education" and end the conference with one last workshop on "Alternate Reality Games and Cross-Media Entertainment: Low-tech, high-impact immersive experiences".

I must confess, I'm unlikely to be at CyberGames (mainly due to cost and other commitments; I'd certainly like to be there) but I'll be sure to catch a few of Christy's earlier AFTRS events (and I'm looking forward to seeing what sort of crowd attends the free blogging talk).

Hope to see a few Perth faces there!

[Tags: christydena | crossmediaentertainment | args | blogs | australia]