Bart Simon and Jennifer Whitson are editing a special issue of Surveillance & Society on surveillance, games and play. The deadline for submissions is September 15th, and the issue will be published this spring. They hope DiGRA members will contribute and help shake up the surveillance literature. Please contact either Bart or Jennifer if you have any questions, (or hunt them down at DiGRA 2013 in Atlanta). The journal also accepts art pieces, so if you’ve created any games dealing with surveillance themes, let them know.
CFP Surveillance, Games and Play
This theme issue is dedicated to balancing two very different sides of surveillance: surveillance as a technology of corporate governance and surveillance as a technology of pleasure and play.
Possible research areas might include (but are not limited to):
- The role of surveillance in enabling play and games
- The role of play and games in normalizing surveillance
- Surveillance as gameplay or surveillance as a game mechanic
- Playful surveillance applications
- Playful representations of surveillance
- Playful resistance to surveillance
- Issues of identity, anonymity and pseudonymity in online games and virtual worlds
- Online visibilities and the relationship between game publishers and user populations
- The implications of using data gathered in-game for non-game applications
- The use of surveillance and the representation of surveillance in online games, virtual worlds, and/or gamified applications, including topics such as:
- Games that educate users about privacy and surveillance
- End-User Licensing Agreements, Terms of Service, and awareness of surveillance
- Applications of social networking services, locational data, and GPS devices in games and play
- Uses of data gathering services, screen-capture tools, and recorded gameplay sessions
- The surveillance of children and youth in virtual worlds and games
- State and police use of in-game data for surveillance, tracking, behavioral profiling etc.
- Surveillance and the competitive, professional e-sports gaming industry
- Data mining, game metrics, and targeted advertising in the game industry
This is not intended to be an exclusive listing of possibilities for this edition. Other possibilities are welcomed and encouraged and can be discussed in advance with the guest-editors: Jennifer R.Whitson and Bart Simon.
All papers must be submitted through the online submission system no later than September 15th 2013, for publication in March 2014. Click here for further information on submissions..