Grand Text Auto

Although much of our research at Tiltfactor aims to increase the representation of women in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), our work also shines a light on the importance of the liberal arts. The students who work at Tiltfactor come from a broad range of majors–from computer science to studio art to psychology–and it is through this intersection of STEM, humanities, and social sciences that we are able to create and study games that can foster social change.

I’m writing now from the middle of a four-city book tour which I’m on with Rafael Pérez y Pérez and Allison Parrish – we are the first three author/programmers to develop books (The Truelist, Mexica, and Articulations) in this Counterpath series, Using Electricity.

I’m taking the time now to post a link to video of a short reading that Allison and I did at the MLA Convention, from exactly a month ago. If you can’t join us at an upcoming reading (MIT Press Bookstore, 2018-02-06 6pm or Babycastles in NYC, 2018-02-07 7pm) and have 10 minutes, the video provides an introduction to two of the three projects.

Mary is representing at the World Government Summit this February; it’s an annual event held in Dubai, UAE that brings together governmental and thought leaders across the disciplines for dialogue about government, the environment, and technology. Mary will be contributing to the Sustainable Development Goals aspects of the gathering.

Mary is representing at the World Government Summit this February; it’s an annual event held in Dubai, UAE that brings together governmental and thought leaders across the disciplines for dialogue about government, the environment, and technology. Mary will be contributing to the Sustainable Development Goals aspects of the gathering.

At the  recent annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, from January 23rd and 26th, Mary Flanagan offered her thought leadership on panels, dinners, and gave a presentation on games for impact. The panel “Putting Jobs Out of Work” had an excellent team of business leaders and academics; watch the video of  her solo talk, “Game Changers: Playing Games for Good” and read a (mostly) accurate description of the talk.

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At the  recent annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, from January 23rd and 26th, Mary Flanagan offered her thought leadership on panels, dinners, and gave a presentation on games for impact. The panel “Putting Jobs Out of Work” had an excellent team of business leaders and academics; watch the video of  her solo talk, “Game Changers: Playing Games for Good” and read a (mostly) accurate description of the talk.

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The exhibit Author Function, featuring computer-generated literary art in print, is now up in MIT’s Rotch Library (77 Mass Ave, Building 7, 2nd Floor) and in my lab/studio, The Trope Tank (Room 14N-233, in building 14, the same building that houses the Hayden Library). Please contact me by email if you are interested in seeing the materials in the Trope Tank, as this part of the exhibit is accessible by appointment only.

There are three events associated with the exhibit happening in Cambridge, Mass:

February 7, 6pm-7pm, a reading and signing at the MIT Press bookstore. Nick Montfort, Rafael Pérez y Pérez, and Allison Parrish.

This week our director Mary Flanagan joins leaders from business, government, media,  academia, and the arts in Davos, Switzerland for the World Economic Forum’s 48th annual meeting. Read more in the Dartmouth News.

Maanvi Singh has a piece about Buffalo on Code Switch, a race and culture outlet and a weekly podcast from American public radio network NPR. How awesome!  Also listen to her earlier piece for Weekend Edition. Singh plays the game and interviews experts about the possibilities of shifting mental biases through games. When it is not sold out, the game is available through our retail partner Resonym on Amazon!

We are excited to report that we have a new paper out! Published in Social and Personality Psychology Compass, our paper describes the potential of games as methods in social and personality psychology. We review the ways that games have been used in the past and provide a primer for researchers interested in making their own games for use in the psychology lab.

Freedman, G., & Flanagan, M. (2017). From dictators to avatars: Furthering social and personality psychology through game methods. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, e12368. doi: 10.1111/spc3.12368

There’s a new article by Matt Hongoltz-Hetling (@hh_matt) on Iowa farming strategies at the Weather Channel featuring some ideas from Professor Flanagan about motivating sustainable farming! There is other commentary from other faculty here at Dartmouth as well. Enjoy thinking about motivating sustainable behavior!! (Photo by Zach Boyden-Holmes).

A week ago, on October 2, we put Sentaniz Nimerik online. This is an electronic literature work, an example of digital storytelling and digital poetry, that is by Sixto & BIC and was facilitated by Michel DeGraff & Nick Montfort. It is in Haitian Creole — Kreyòl, as the language is called in the language itself. This language has a community of about 12 million speakers worldwide and is the language shared by everyone in Haiti. It is not the same as Haitian French or mutually intelligible with Haitian French (or any other kind of French).

Here are my slides from “C-Creativity: Cultural Creativity or, Why is there no middle C?,” the talk I just gave in Halifax. There are no text notes, and they don’t represent what I said very closely, but if they remind people who were there of my comments, that’s great. And if they provoke any questions, feel free to get in touch on the blog or by email.

Earlier this year we entered a Tiltfactor prototype game, Continental Drift, into the 2017 Board Game Geek Two-Player Print and Play Design Contest. This week we were excited to learn that, out of over 30 entries, Continental Drift was voted:

#1 Best New Mechanic
#1 Best Use of Language Independent Components
#1 Best Game to Play with Your Child
#2 Best Date Night Game
#3 Best Casual/Gateway Game
#4 Best Art/Graphic Design
#4 Best Game (Overall)

Whoa! We’re hoping to do something cool with this game, so stay tuned!

Tiltfactor has just started a local game development meet up –the Upper Valley Game Designers Meeting! Yes. First meeting is this Thursday, 6th July 2017, 6:30pkm at the lab, 245 Black Arts in Hanover NH.

Mary will be speaking in Delft next week, held jointly by ISAGA (International Simulation and Gaming Association) and SAGANET and at the Games for Change Festival in July!

“Renderings: Translating literary works in the digital age” by Piotr Marecki & Nick Montfort has been published, and is available online.

Typographers, fashionators, and makers of things most beautiful: Mary Flanagan and the Tiltfactor team are looking for an inventive new partner in design! We just posted an opportunity for an excellent graphic designer in our creative lab for social impact at Dartmouth College.

We do both print and digital projects, as you likely know, so we are looking for someone with a broad range of skills. Apply with your portfolio if you have inventive design chops and care about our mission. Remote work is possible, but for us to consider that, please be both an excellent designer and very organized.   The official posting is here!

I just gave a talk at the local demoparty, @party. While I haven’t written out notes and it wasn’t recorded, here are the slides. The talk was “Book Productions: The Latest in Computer-Generated Literary Art,” and included some discussion of how computer-generated literary books related to demoscene productions.

My minimal book Sliders has been published by my press, Bad Quarto. The book contains 32 poems, some of which are only one word long. In a break from tradition, they are not computer-generated.

Currently Sliders is only available for sale at the MIT Press Bookstore, 301 Massachusetts Ave, Cambridge, Mass.

This post is more technical than most of our blog posts.  If you’re not making computer games then this probably won’t be of terrible interest to you.

SALON 256 is a forum for presentation and discussion of very small creative computer programs. Such programs have featured in digital art and poetry, electronic literature, computer music, and the demoscene.

YOU are invited to present a tiny program of yours:

Monday May 1 . 5pm-7pm . MIT’s 14E-304

Presenters already confirmed:

• Mike “Dr.Claw” Piantedosi
• Angela Chang
• Sofian Audry
• Nick Montfort

Programs in an interpreted language are fine, as long as the code is 256 bytes or less; compiled programs with an executable file of 256b or less are fine, too.

Tiltfactor had the honor of hosting its first ever Game Jam in the lab as a part of the national Arctic Climate Game Jam (http://climategamejam.org). We had a great turnout, with creativity and free Thai food flowing through our participants’ veins. Esteemed Professor Ross Virginia, director of Dartmouth’s Institute of Arctic Studies, came and spoke to participants about the climate game jam and answered questions about climate change in general.

We split participants into 4 teams and they each will be creating games and coming back next week to present them. We will also be posting their projects on the blog next week. We can’t wait to see what they come up with!

The Trope Tank invites applications for a writer in residence during academic year 2017-2018, to start July 1 and with most involvement during the Fall, January, and Spring terms at MIT.

Our mission is developing new poetic practices and new understandings of digital media by focusing on the material, formal, and historical aspects of computation and language. More can be discovered about the Trope Tank here:

http://nickm.com/trope_tank/

Recent projects of the Trope Tank include Renderings: