New Media

Mondays 16:15-17:45
Instructor: Dr. Emily Lutzker

Class website: http://emilylutzker.com/newmedia

This course is a theoretical overview of the history, current status and future possibilities of new media. It is an attempt to contextualize game creation within the larger scope of media creation. As media creators getting a better understanding of the things we see and the choices we make are of the utmost importance: How do we make something relevant to our world, and how do we make something unexpected or new within this context?

Each week a different topic is discussed pertaining to new media. This class is held in English primarily via video conferencing on the OOVOO platform. If you cannot make it to class, please log in remotely.

Grades are based on class participation, assignments and one final project.

The topics for the class sessions are subject to change depending on the possible guest speakers who include:

Amy Davila (independent Sci-Fi and Comic Book writer), Eyal Fried (of the Interaction Design Lab), Vincent Baker (CTO The Rubin Museum of Art), Veronique Brossier (Game Designer for NickJr.com), Kyra Reppen (SVP, Nickelodeon Networks) Paul de Laubier (CEO, the Designists), Dawnja Burris (Acting Assistant Chair, New School Media Studies Program), Mark Reiley (Interactive Designer and Developer, NYU), Hiroshi Ito (Consultant for IBM), Wolfgang Schirmacher (Director of EGS Department of Media and Communication), Samantha Longoni (Owner, Neurotika), Chaim Gingold, (designer of Spore).

Please consult the class website often.

Class 1: October 19^th

When did games become “media”?

The Level: creating balance between the relevant and the unexpected.

Assignment: Bring in your Media Profile

Class 2: October 26^th

A short history of old media and new media and some propositions about the future of media.

Assignment: Bring us one “innovation in new media” a cool website, great video, etc. be prepared to talk about why you think it’s new.

Class 3: November 2^nd

Looking to the Future: what are the future trends in new media and technology? What are the future’s problems? How can we address them in games?

Assignment: Read this:
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/09/28/090928fa_fact_specter

Watch These:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BM0AW9Mn1Fc&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gsSCu6Dqg9Y&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2i9BjClEX8&feature=fvsr

Class 4: November 9^thSci-Fi: What images of the future tell us about our imaginings of the present.
Guest: Amy Davila, "The Future is Now"

Class 5: November 16^th in person

Inside Outside Upside Down: We Live in Public.

The theatricality of Identity, drama and personae through media.

Assignment: Read Walter Benjamin's essay “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction”

Class 6: November 23^rdin person

“The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction”

An analytical view at visual communication.

Class 7: November 30^th

Applications of the Brain-Computer Interface with Eyal Fried

Class 8: December 7^th

Aclarism and issues of Security and Privacy with Eyal Fried

Assignment: Read this:
excerpt from Allucquere Rosanne Stone (aka Sandy Stone)'s The War Between Desire and Technology at the Close of the Mechanical Age

Class 9: December 14^th
The Cyborg, the Android, the body Electric and Electronic. Implants, wearable computing.

Assignment: Read this:

excerpt from Joseph Heath and Andrew Potter's Nation of Rebels

Class 10: December 21^st
Introduction to Artificial Intelligence...

Class 11: December 28^th
Introduction to Counterculture, the Avant-garde, Fringe culture. The Geek shall inherit the Earth.

Class 12: January 4^thGuest Speaker: Ido Hartogsohn

Class 13: January 11^th

Renard teaches...

Class 14: January 18^th

Wiki’s, books on demand, and the new “authorship” -- The desire to write, more than to read.

The Economics of New Media: How money is changing in the digital world.

See Chris Anderson’s “The Long Tail”

Some possible future topics or suggestions for papers:
Architecture in the 20^th Century and Beyond. Smart homes. Ambient computing.
or

The Hero and Humanity. How the hero has changed in the digital age.
or

Consumerism and Objects of Desire: The Fetish
or
The History of Graphic Design
or
Character Development in Video Games
or
Spiderman, Batman (or another super hero) as they have changed.

Final Paper:

Pick one icon or subject: i.e. Superman, Mickey Mouse, Graphic Deisgn, etc. And discuss how it has changed through the history of media and imagine how it will change into the future.

Write 5 pages, double spaced. Use references: at least 2 NOT from the internet. Use footnotes. Only one page can be supporting images.

Some notes on Research Papers

Required Reading:

• Walter Benjamin “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction”

• The Death of the Author by Ronald Barthes

• At least one of these Sci-Fi novels:
Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash or
Neal Stephenson’s The Diamond Age (best for Educational Games)
Margaret Attwood’s Oryx and Crake.

• Joseph Heath and Andrew Potter Nation of Rebels

Recommended Reading:

Excerpt from Scott Bukatman's Terminal Identity
James Canton, The Extreme Future

Kevin Kelly, Out of Control

Adam Grenfield, Everyware

Janet Horowitz-Murray, Hamlet on the Holodeck: The Future of Narrative in Cyberspace

Byron Reeves and Clifford Nass, The Media Equation: How People Treat Computers, Television and New Media Like Real People and Places