The Milky Way Project & Green Lantern (yes!) create interactive tool for playing with the universe!

Media_httpstudytheski_aanio

From the site:

"WELCOME

Welcome to the Universe

Brought to you by the Milky Way Project and Green Lantern, this is a tool that shows you pictures of space never before seen by humans and lets you help scientists understand what they show.

Watch a tutorial on how to get started here and start drawing bubbles."

Media_httpstudytheski_ixeie

From the site:

"WELCOME

Welcome to the Universe

Brought to you by the Milky Way Project and Green Lantern, this is a tool that shows you pictures of space never before seen by humans and lets you help scientists understand what they show.

Watch a tutorial on how to get started here and start drawing bubbles."

Very Nice Post from Andrea Phillips on Time and Transmedia - Deus Ex Machinatio

Time and Transmedia

Transmedia narratives have a distinct problem with chronology, and the more fragments you break a story into, the harder it becomes to manage. The problem is on two fronts: How you expect your audience to consume the narrative, and the timeline for your actual story. I've been mulling over the passage of time and its implications for transmedia a lot lately, and thought I'd share where I am so far.

Expected Vectors

West Coast Hollywood-style transmedia tends to exist as a series of inter-related snapshots, each existing at a single point in a story universe's chronology and presented to the audience in single, finished pieces -- often a single tentpole piece of media that spawns a sequel, and then another, and then spins out from there.

One begins the Star Wars experience by watching Star Wars, the movie. Right? One can safely assume that anyone reading any Star Wars novels or comic books, or playing any video games, has already seen the films. That means that as a creator, you can use a sort of shorthand for knowledge you can reasonably expect a reader to have -- you don't need to explain what a Jedi is in every book, or who Darth Vader is, or the fact that Coruscant is where the senators all hang out. Your audience will remember.

Except that there is a generation of kids whose first contact with Star Wars comes from Clone Wars, the animated series. Which means their path into the universe could be completely different, and if a Clone Wars viewer were to pick up a copy of Tatooine Ghost... they might be a little lost. Context is everything.

The solution for this

read the full post on:

http://www.deusexmachinatio.com/blog/2011/5/31/time-and-transmedia.html#

How Handy! Grazie to Scott Walker for Creating a Running List of Global Transmedia Groups/Events

A collection of links for the meetups, groups, and conferences focused to transmedia. Please contact me if I missed one, or you notice an error!

Ongoing Meetups/Groups
Australia
  • Victoria et al
  • Transmedia Victoria (Google Group)
    Founder: Christy Dena
    (note: this site is an online extension of the Transmedia Victoria conference held on 27-28 Jan, 2011 and is being used to help others connect at various transmedia meetups)

    Canada
    • Vancouver

    Transmedia Vancouver (Meetup)
    Founder: Lucas J.W. Johnson

    England
    • London

    Transmedia London (Meetup)
    Co-Founders: Adrian Hon and Rachel Clarke

    France
    • Paris

    Lost in Transmedia (Google Group)
    Co-Founders: Karine Halpern and Tom Maillioux

  • Paris
  • Transmedia Ready (Meetup.com)

  • Provence Alpes Côté d’Azur
  • Transmedia PACA (Facebook Group)

    New Zealand
    • Auckland

    Transmedia A:M

    USA
    • Atlanta, GA

    Atlanta Transmedia (Google Group)
    Founder: Brooke Thompson

  • Los Angeles, CA (USA)
  • Transmedia Los Angeles (Meetup.com)
    Transmedia Los Angeles (Google Group)
    Co-founders: Jay Bushman and Scott Walker

  • New York City, NY
  • Transmedia New York Meetup (Meetup.com)
    Transmedia New York Meetup (Google Group)
    Founder: Aina Abiodun

  • San Francisco, CA
  • Spoilrr (Meetup.com)
    Founder: Robert Pratten

    Conferences/Single Events
    • 10 June, 2011

    Global Media Connect (France)

  • 10-12 June, 2011
  • X | Media | Lab: Global Media Ideas (Australia)

  • 14 June, 2011
  • Transmedia Workshop (Brazil)
    (part of the 12th Forum Brasil International TV Market)

  • 20 June, 2011
  • FITC’s Storytelling X.1 (Canada)
    (speakers include Jill Golick, Andrea Phillips, Mike Monello, and Siobhan O’Flynn among others)

  • 30 June – 2 July, 2011
  • Storyworlds across Media | Mediality – Multimodality – Transmediality (Germany)
    [Johannes Gutenberg-University Mainz is also conducting a call for papers]

  • 18-21 August, 2011
  • ARGFest-o-Con 2011 (USA)

  • 13-14 September, 2011
  • iStrategy Atlanta 2011 (USA)
    (keynote from WCN Transmedia Group’s Jay O’Conner)

  • 30 September, 2011
  • TEDx Transmedia (Italy)

  • 27-28 October, 2011
  • Merging+Media Conference & Masterclass (Canada)

  • 31 Oct – 2 Nov, 2011
  • StoryWorld Conference + Expo (USA)

  • 11-12 November, 2011
  • Futures of Entertainment 5 (USA)
    (MIT’s Convergence Culture Consortium will release more details in the near future)

  • 17-18 November, 2011
  • stART11 TRANSMEDIA STORYTELLING (Germany)
    (Google Translate)

  • 11-13 January, 2011
  • Forum Blanc (France)

    – Archive –
    • 27-28 May, 2011

    Transmedia Living Lab (Spain)
    (speakers include Lance Weiler, Gonzalo Martin, Alison Norrington, and Rebecca Denton)

  • 27 May, 2011
  • Web 3.0 Film and Transmedia Workshop from Future Artists, LTD (Newcastle, UK)

  • 24-25 May, 2011
  • Transmedia Next 2010 (United Kingdom)

     

    Funniest Software Ever: PawSense helps you catproof your computer.

    Media_httpwwwbitboost_gjvfg

    From the site:

    "When cats walk or climb on your keyboard, they can enter random commands and data, damage your files, and even crash your computer. This can happen whether you are near the computer or have suddenly been called away from it.

    PawSense is a software utility that helps protect your computer from cats. It quickly detects and blocks cat typing, and also helps train your cat to stay off the computer keyboard.

    Every time your computer boots up, PawSense will automatically start up in the background to watch over your computer system.
    Even while you use your other software, PawSense constantly monitors keyboard activity. PawSense analyzes keypress timings and combinations to distinguish cat typing from human typing. PawSense normally recognizes a cat on the keyboard within one or two pawsteps.
    If a cat gets on the keyboard, PawSense makes a sound that annoys cats.
    This teaches your cat that getting on the keyboard is bad even if humans aren't watching.

    Once a cat has been recognized, PawSense blocks the cat's keyboard input. This keeps the cat from entering lots of commands to your programs or operating system...."