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Ithaca College hosts panels and posters on MMO topics in Second Life
If you're a game theory/design nut, or you just really love talking about MMOs in an academic sense, or even listening to others talk about MMOs in an academic sense, then we've got the opportunity for you! This week is finals week for many universities around the country and Kim Chihuly's (real life's Kim Gregson) Games & Society class at Ithaca College is taking the opportunity to present their final posters and presentations inside of Second Life for the public. The presentations will cover a wide swath of topics from gold farming, to MMOs versus single player experiences, to Second Life versus Casual MMOs and much more. Each event will give the public the chance to ask the students questions and discuss their individual topics in an open forum. The the poster pavilion can be found here at this SLurl while the panel amphitheatre can be found at this link. Looking for the full schedule of events? We have it right after the break, or you can keep an eye on the Second Life Events page, under the heading of "discussion."
Nick Yee puts the Daedalus Project into hibernation
The Daedalus Project, for those who aren't familiar with this fantastic project by Nick Yee, is an in-depth look at the psychology of MMO gamers. As someone who plays MMOs, Nick has always taken a very fair and balanced look at the intricate worlds spanning the MMO genre, with results that were sometimes surprising. During the course of ten years of research, he's looked into everything from basic gender alignment questions to in-depth looks at genre, how emerging changes in game mechanics affect social interaction, and so very much more. To say it's been important, enlightening work is an understatement. In a recent blog posting, Nick has announced that he's going to be placing the Daedalus Project into 'hibernation' due to time constraints, the rigors of his everyday work, and his need to publish as a PhD. As anyone can imagine, running an enormous project like Daedalus has to take a great deal of time and effort. It would appear that rather than letting the quality of the work for this project of love suffer, he's opted to place it on hold for now. While it's definitely a loss for the MMO - and indeed educational - community, we can totally understand. All of us here at Massively would like to thank Nick for his unwavering dedication to bringing so many important things to light over the last ten years, and hope that all of his future challenges are equally as rewarding.
