Saturday, November 07, 2009

New Publication: World of Warcraft and Philosophy


Visit the publication's Facebook Page and leave your critical reader comments there ...

Overview:

This is an edited collection whose chapters deal with some aspects of World of Warcraft in relation to philosophy. While the focus is WoW, the book also touches on elements of the original games of the Warcraft franchise.

ON SALE FROM NOVEMBER 1ST 2009

Mission:

In the Zelda book, we focused (of course) on Zelda, but some of the topics were generalizable to console video games. Similarly, in the WoW book we focus on (of course) WoW but many of our topics can be generalized to MMORPGs and their philosophical implications.

CONTENTS:

Read a Philosophy Book (Introduction)

Apprentice Philosopher: Aggro Your Brain

[1] You Can Kill Your Friends but You Can't Save Gnomeregan

[2] Render Unto Caesar

[3] Finding Adam Smith in Azeroth

[4] A Meaningless World . . . of Warcraft

[5] A Mage in Motion

Journeyman Philosopher: The Sublime Experience of WoW

[6] Azeroth versus the Experience Machine

[7] Boredom, Power, and Self-Actualization in Azeroth

[8] World of Warcraft as Collector's Paradise


Expert Philosopher: Ethics, Dungeons, Raids, and PvP

[9] A Flourishing Revolt

[10] Ninja Ethics and the Virtual Theft of Virtual Goods

[11] Remaking Azeroth


Artisan Philosopher: Identity, Toons, and Roleplay

[12] Utopian Fantasy and the Politics of Difference

[13] Role Playing in World of Warcraft as Cathartic Social Performance

[14] He’s the Kind of Girl Who Wants Matching Daggers

[15] In-Game Identities and Meatspace Mistakes

Master Philosopher: Battle, Leadership, and Power

[16] The Machiavellian Guild Leader

[17] There is No War in Warcraft

[18] Game Developers, Gods, and Surveillance

Grand Master Philosopher: (Meta)Physics, Reality and Technology In and Out of Azeroth

[19] Bits of Ogres, Bytes of Orcs

[20] Future Pasts of Magic and Deceit

[21] Can I Have Unlimited Power in World of Warcraft?


Denizens of Azeroth

Tuesday, June 23, 2009

E/C Special Number 5: Computer Games between Text and Practice

Dear Friends & Colleagues

This is to let you know that the internationally peer-reviewed  Special Number 5 of E|C, the online review of the Italian Association  of Semiotic Studies (AISS), entitled: "Computer Games between Text 
and Practice" is now available online at the E|C website:


We would like to invite you to spread the word for us to any of your  colleagues or friends you feel may be interested in our publication.


Please note, too, that it will be possible to order hard copies of  the Special Number on paper - print on demand retail price: 10 Euro -  from our Italian distributors Nuova Cultura:  http://www.nuovacultura.it, by mailing them at the following e-mail  address: ordini@nuovacultura.it


It will also be possible as time goes on to order print on demand  copies via Internet Bookshop (IBS) at http://www.ibs.it


Any feedback or comments you might have regarding our publication  will be gratefully received.


Finally, please accept our sincere apologies for eventual double  postings of this message.

Best regards The Editors

Dario Compagno (University of Siena)
Patrick Coppock (University of Modena and Reggio Emilia)

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

[Reminder] Conference: The Philosophy of Computer Games 2009

Conference Announcement
(Please excuse multiple sendings)
THE PHILOSOPHY OF COMPUTER GAMES 2009

We are pleased to announce the fourth conference  on the Philosophy of Computer Games, to be held  in Oslo, Norway 13-15 August 2009.


The keynote speakers include Kendall Walton,  author of "Mimesis as Make-Believe: On the  Foundations of the Representational Arts"  (Harvard University Press, 1993), Miguel Sicart,  author of "The Ethics of Computer Games" (The MIT  Press, 2009) and Grant Tavinor, author of "The  Art of Video Games" (Wiley-Blackwell, forthcoming  in October 2009).


For the Call for Papers, registration and more details about the conference, please visit www.gamephilosophy.org.

Deadline for submission of abstracts is June 1.

The conference is a part of an effort to develop  discussions about philosophical issues that arise  in the study of computer games. The topics for  this years conference include fictionality,  definitions of computer games and ethical and political issues. 
The target audience is media researchers and  philosophers, but the conference is open to  anyone with with a professional interest in  computer games.


Nordic Game Research Network is organizing a  pre-conference workshop for Ph.d. students on  August 12.

With best regards

Olav Asheim
Miguel Sicart
Frans Mäyrä
Patrick Coppock
Sten Ludvigsen
Ole Ertløv Hansen
Stephan Günzel
Rune Klevjer
John Richard Sageng
Ragnhild Tronstad



Organizational partners:


Department of Philosophy, Classics, History of  Art and Ideas at the University of Oslo, Norway  (Main conference host)
Department of Media and Communication, University of Oslo, Norway
Digital Games Research Center, University of Potsdam, Germany
Department of Social, Cognitive and Quantitative  Science at the University of Modena & Reggio  Emilia, Italy
Nordic Game Research Network
Intermedia, University of Oslo, Norway
Games Research Lab, University of Tampere, Finland
Center for Computer Games Research at the IT-University of Copenhagen, Denmark
Philosophical Project Centre, Oslo, Norway
Department of Information Science and Media  Studies, University of Bergen, Norway

Monday, February 02, 2009

AI*IA 2009: preliminary announcement

AI*IA 2009: preliminary announcement

(We apologize for possible multiple copies)

A formal and complete call for papers will follow soon


Location and date

The XIth International Conference of the Italian Association for Artificial Intelligence will take place in Reggio Emilia (Italy) on december 9-12, 2009.

The conference will be hosted in the new building of the Department of Social, Cognitive and Quantitative Sciences and of the Faculty of Communication and Economics, located in the centre of Reggio Emilia (via Allegri 9)


Papers and posters

Papers are invited on original, and unpublished research on all aspects of artificial intelligence, including, but not limited to:

Search
Machine learning
Knowledge Representation
Knowledge Acquisition
Multiagent Systems, Distributed AI
Ontologies
Natural Language Processing
Information Retrieval and Extraction
Soft and Evolutionary Computing
Planning and Scheduling
Cognitive Robotics
Cognitive modeling
Mathematical Foundations
Constraint Satisfaction
Learning in adaptive systems
Reasoning
Knowledge Engineering
Information Agents
Semantic Web
Web and Data Mining
Human Computer Interaction
Uncertainty
Temporal Reasoning
Vision
AI architectures
Philosophical Foundations
AI applications
AI and digital entertainment

Regular accepted papers will be published as a volume of the Springer Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence series.

Accepted posters will be published on a conference CD-Rom with regular ISBN number

Papers and posters are due by April 30, 2009


Workshops

A full day will be dedicated to workshops. Proposals for these workshops are solicited. All the workshops are open to all the conference participants.

A reduced fee is available for those who wish to attend to the workshops only.


Conference fee

Attendance to the conference and to the workshops are limited to members of AI*IA (on site affiliation is possible).

Regular conference fee (early registration, includes participation to the workshops): 350 euro

Student fee (early registration, without social dinner, includes participation to the workshops): 130 euro

Attendance to the workshops only (allows participation to all the workshops): 100 euro


Invited speakers (list to be completed)

Confirmed invited speakers include

Shay Bushinsky
Marco Dorigo


Organizing committee (preliminary list)

Roberto Serra (chair)
Rita Cucchiara (co-chair)
Franco Zambonelli
Andrea Prati
Marco Villani


Program committee (preliminary list)
Khurshid Ahmad
Luigia Carlucci Aiello
Stefania Bandini
Roberto Basili
Ernesto Burattini
Marc Cavazza
Roberto Cordeschi
Rita Cucchiara
Walter Daelemans
Floriana Esposito
Salvatore Gaglio
Attilio Giordana
Marco Gori
Nicola Guarino
Evelina Lamma
Paola Mello
Andrea Omicini
Patrizia Paggio
Teresa Pazienza
Roberto Serra
Kiril Simov
Giovanni Soda
Steffen Staab
Oliviero Stock
Tokunaga Takenobu
Pietro Torasso
Roman Yangarber
Franco Zambonelli
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