Fascinating new blog find (via Christy) – the Extratextuals, a group blog defined as the following:

This is a blog about the media. However, with other blogs on television, film, and the media in general, we wanted to carve out a specific niche. So our blog will focus primarily on the extratextuals that surround the media. By this, we mean everything but the show itself: previews, merchandising, industry buzz, branding, interviews, posters, spatial context, temporal context, related websites, ARGs, spinoffs, spoilers, schedules, bonus materials, transmedia extras, games, YouTube clips, etc. But we’re interested in these things not to be arcane or eccentric; rather, we believe that the extratextuals often make the show what it is. Hence this blog is about the mediation of media.

In hunting for the term extratextual I also came across a wonderful study by Marianne Cantwell, all about fan knowledge and participation in the extratextual.

Next week the NMC is running an entire weeks symposium on “Creativity in Second Life” There are a number of strands: Machinima, Fashion, Sculpture and Modeling, Virtual Photography, and Teaching Environments, social / arts events, and lots of practical and interactive sessions. I am involved in three sessions, all at (sort of) Australian friendly times. Here are the details of these sessions (in Second Life time):

Fri Aug 17 7pm – Fri Aug 17 8pm

Teaching On the Second Life Stage: Playful Educational Strategies for Serious Purposes

Location: http://slurl.com/secondlife/NMC%20Conference%20Center/64/193/22

Angela Thomas (aka Anya Ixchel), University of Sydney

Kim Flintoff (Kim Pasternak), Edith Cowan University

Theatrical spaces have historically been places used to teach, purge and shape culture. For over a decade, virtual reality has offered a new kind of theatrical space; now, with the rise of social networking spaces, many more people are using the potential of the web to perform, critique and comment on cultural issues. Second Life provides a new and exciting space where students can explore issues that are both personal and global in significance. Teaching strategies which incorporate dramatic and theatrical components are perfectly suited in the Second Life environment for engaging students in playful but meaningful reflection on such issues. This session will involve participants in role-playing, reflection and discussion. Participants will also be encouraged to brainstorm the possibilities of incorporating such strategies into their own educational programs.

Sat Aug 18 4pm – Sat Aug 18 5pm

No More Business Suits Please: Creative Identity Play in SL

Location: http://slurl.com/secondlife/NMC%20Conference%20Center/185/136/43

Angela Thomas (aka Anya Ixchel), University of Sydney, Australia

Second Life offers a unique opportunity to refashion one’s self and to play with fictional identities. Yet many of us who work inside Second Life feel trapped in our offline identity roles and conform to traditional discourses of femininity, masculinity, appearance, beauty and fashion. Professionals wear business suits, educators cry out for more modest clothing, and artists wear funky coloured skins. In some contexts, people who resist these discourses are discriminated against. This session explores how we might be able to leverage one of the greatest affordances of Second Life—the avatar—for personal, community and professional agendas.

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Sat Aug 18 5pm – Sat Aug 18 6pm

Panel Session: Reflections on Creativity in Second Life

Location: http://slurl.com/secondlife/NMC%20Conference%20Center/214/18/51

Moderator: Alan Levine (aka CDB Barkley), The New Media Consortium
Lori Bell (aka Lorelei Junot), Alliance Library System
Jo Kay (aka Jokay Wollongong), Illawarra Institute TAFE, New South Wales
Hilary Mason (aka Ann Enigma), Johnson & Wales University
Troy McConaghy (aka Troy McLuhan), ISM Corporation
Nick Noakes (aka Corwin Carillon), Hong Kong University of Science & Technology
Beth Ritter-Guth (aka Desideria Stockton), Lehigh Carbon Community College
Angela Thomas (aka Anya Ixchel), University of Sydney

I thought the new Simpsons movie had done some great pre-release marketing but The Dark Knight (thanks Andy for the correct title!) tops all, complete with all sorts of teasers and even an ARG style game that occurred via whysoserious.com.

I just came across this press release …

All Things Considered, June 21, 2007 · The MacArthur Foundation board announced Thursday it will fund a $1.1 million grant for a brand new middle- and high school in New York. The curriculum revolves around teaching kids to make video games.

The MacArthur Foundation says video games and the dynamic systems they use will be key to information management in the future.

Wow!

Alan’s write-up of my talk is on the NMC blog here – thanks so much!

And here is the line-up for our panel session at the ECAR conference:

Yay! Here is my final book cover!!!

And here is one of the endorsements:

How lovely of Len Unsworth to write such kind words.

I was fortunate enough to listen to Christy Dena today presenting a truly stimulating lecture on Multi-Platform Art versus Commodity Intertexts.  Her point of departure was a quote from Henry Jenkins about transmedia storytelling, which she interrogated by tracing the history of cross-media art forms, from pre-internet media such as Twin Peaks to new forms of 3D animation storytelling/art inside Second Life.  She discussed the relationship and tensions between what is transmedia art and what is marketing, and invoked her own theorisation of the features that genuinely characterise transmedia storytelling.  She raised some really provocative questions about perceptions of what is art, and how some forms are revalued as aesthetic only when somebody renames them as such.  I am guessing Christy will be publishing some of her work so I don’t want to pre-empt that and discuss her theories before she is ready, but you can read more on her blog.  It has certainly helped crystallise some of my own thinking.

This is the proposed book cover design for my book!!!  Yay!!!  Finally its *almost* here.  I am very excited now to be this close