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<font size=3>About the White Paper, here is what I have been meaning to
write and just have not had time to put down. So I am giving up on
the longer tome and summarizing what we need to do:<br><br>
1) The discussion about methods for collaborating pretty much bogged
down. (I will reserve comment on the odds of a successful
conclusion on any topic to discussion of meta-issues.) We do have a group
of volunteers to work as a kind of committee for the project, plus we
have the entire group. So, let's just get started. <br><br>
2) In that spirit, I have set up a "White paper brainstorm"
page here:<br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/wiki/White_paper_brainstorm" eudora="autourl">
http://www.igda.org/wiki/White_paper_brainstorm</a><br>
Have a look, and get busy! And if you do contribute, please
consider adding yourself to the contributors page, which will then
identify our de facto editorial committee.<br><br>
3) IGDA has just opened up a fund for internal funding or
projects. In the next weeks, I will submit a proposal for a
modest level of funds to produce a print version of the white
paper. If we are both good and lucky, we may have this to
distribute at GDC 2009. If not, well, we'll find a way to get it
out there.<br><br>
4) Keep in mind: This first paper is a "call to arms"
effort. It will focus on goals, benefits, reasons for worrying
about this. We need passionate and compelling arguments, good
examples of positive efforts and painful losses, etc. We can get
into solutions with a second white paper on practices, which perhaps we
could finish for GDC 2010. However, if somebody would like to get
us started now on the second text, no reason not to -- just set up a page
for brainstorming!<br><br>
5) Feel free to muck around with the wiki pages I set up for us to get
started. That's what a wiki is for!<br><br>
Best,<br><br>
Henry<br><br>
At 03:45 PM 8/5/2008, Andrew Armstrong wrote:<br>
<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite="">So the month of August rolls
around. This is late coming due to posting a ton of new blog links from
me missing a week of content, but I wanted to try out the monthly
progress reports/articles posted links. Helps me at least keep myself on
track! :)<br><br>
<b>Preservation SIG Updates<br>
</b><br>
If anyone remembers, the
<a href="http://www.igda.org/wiki/Memorials">Memorials</a> project was
launched more officially in June. This has lead to a total of exactly
<i>no one</i> emailing Devin about it as far as I'm aware (boo!)
<i>however</i>, we're working on it ourselves (yay!). Contributions
welcome, there's a lot of Biographies to do. People who died in July
added to the project are
<a href="http://www.igda.org/wiki/Memorials/Randy_Pausch">Randy
Pausch</a> (Professor), and
<a href="http://www.igda.org/wiki/Memorials/Melissa_Batten">Melissa
Batten</a> (Xbox 360 Developer). Both are rather sad cases - Randy for
his inevitable death from cancer, and Melissa because of it being a
murder-suicide by her husband.<br>
<br>
I have been working on plans to update the SIG's information lists -
which are now outdated, and in fact were always incomplete. Starting
afresh is the
<a href="http://www.igda.org/wiki/Game_Preservation_SIG/Contributions">
Contributions</a> page, where museums and archives will be listed who can
accept material. I personally am working on emailing who I can, and in am
in contact in person with the <a href="http://www.tnmoc.org/">UK National
Museum of Computing</a> (which I
<a href="http://aarmstrong.org/journal/2008/07/27/the-national-museum-of-computing">
visited recently</a>). Contributions to this section or knowledge of
<i>any</i> computer museums welcome - I have only two USA museums to
contact at the moment, there must be more! :)<br><br>
Finally, as an aside project, I am gearing up my uploading efforts at the
<a href="http://www.archive.org/details/gamevideos">Internet Archive</a>,
despite my internet connection here being absolutely terrible for
uploads. I'm uploading more Kikizo and Fileshack material in bits and
pieces, and also the online gamer show Pure Pwnage, which is easier since
Wikipedia provides a nice description of the content :) - Henry and his
Standford groupies are doing some work in the
<a href="http://www.archive.org/details/virtual_worlds">Virtual
Worlds</a> section too!<br><br>
I might also be onto getting some older E3 videos/documentary stuff up
from someone who might be interested, we'll see - the E3 of yesteryear
isn't going to come back so soon, so it'll be interesting to put that
material up. There will also be some effort if I run out of everything
else to start uploading trailers and promo material. I'll link to
anything interesting, and try and root out some strange stuff for the
collection.<br><br>
<b>August Preservation SIG Work</b><br><br>
I have no idea how Henry is doing for workload - so I don't expect the
whitepaper will get started yet. I personally will try and finish in as
much as I can the contributions section before tackling the projects
& resources pages. Not much else to note that's of any interest,
maybe you guys are up to something good this month?<br><br>
I'm also currently reading "The A-Zof Cool Computer Games" -
giving me the thought to review it's contents for an updated
"Resources" section. You might well be asked for book lists,
reviews or anything else in the future once I get some templates up. I am
sure many of you have shelves of the annuals of time, it might be time to
dust them off for a little while if I can't find them online to index on
our site! :)<br><br>
<b>Preservation SIG Blog Updates / Links<br><br>
</b>Note: Have I missed anything? Then email it in. I really should get a
"Preservation newsdesk" email setup, there's a lot more I
simply don't know about which I keep missing. This is everything from
July (the August stuff is really from July or the very start of
August).<br><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/07/10_things_every.html">
10 things everyone should know about Space Invaders<br>
</a>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/07/interview_with.html">
Interview with Benoît Sokal</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/07/discworld_game.html">
Discworld Game Remakes</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/07/the_first_video.html">
The First Video Game Sequel with modding?</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/07/henry_lowood_on.html">
Henry Lowood on Machinima and the History of Digital Games</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/07/the_importance.html">
The Importance Of History In The Excellence Of Video Games</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/07/stanford_worksh.html">
Stanford Workshop: “Preserving Knowledge in Virtual Worlds”</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/07/gog_from_cdproj.html">
GOG from CD-Projekt to Offer Classic Games</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/07/somethingawful.html">
SomethingAwful Game Articles</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/07/defenderin_a_fa.html">
Defender...in a Favicon</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/07/the_good_and_ba.html">
The Good and Bad of Sport Videogames</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/07/making_tennis_f.html">
Making Tennis For Two On Modern Hardware</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/07/journal_startin.html">
Journal Starting "Historical Studies of Digital Entertainment
Media"</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/08/the_world_of_we.html">
The World of Western RPGs</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/08/word_play_the_e.html">
Word Play: The Evolution of Game Journalism</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/08/the_history_of_4.html">
The History of Video Games: The First Video Game?...</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/08/_a_history_of_g_2.html">
A History of Gaming Platforms: Atari 8-Bit Computers</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/08/simon_turns_30.html">
Simon Turns 30: The History of the Toy and Gaming's First Grudge</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/08/game_mag_weasel.html">
Game Mag Weaseling: Where to begin?</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/08/introducing_the.html">
Introducing the Stephen M. Cabrinety Collection Blog</a><br>
<a href="http://www.igda.org/preservation/archives/2008/08/lost_server_con.html">
"Lost Server Connection": The Last Minutes of a Virtual
World</a><br><br>
Simon did suggest pictures - I must start doing this, despite the fact
this version of Movable Type is rubbish for it (ie; there's no way to
upload pictures ;) ). The new IGDA site is not going to be here quick -
it's being redone, although I'm not sure I can divulge in what software,
and there is no timeline.<br><br>
<b>Final Thoughts</b><br><br>
The <a href="http://www.websitetoolbox.com/mb/brainygamer">Vintage Game
Club</a> started up last month, with Grim Fandango. Mine keeps crashing,
I'll have to tinker with it more, but the intro sure has me in the mood
for more despite the agonising cries of "illogical puzzles".
They're not doing a "Game a month" but instead seeing what
works, and who knows what will be done in the future? Might be worth
keeping an eye out on.<br><br>
This is also a trial. I'll stick this on the wiki, and all comments are
welcome on format/content.<br><br>
Thanks all,<br><br>
Andrew Armstrong<br>
IGDA Game Preservation SIG Site/Blog editor<br>
_______________________________________________<br>
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game_preservation@igda.org<br>
<a href="http://six.pairlist.net/mailman/listinfo/game_preservation" eudora="autourl">
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</blockquote>
<x-sigsep><p></x-sigsep>
Henry Lowood, Ph.D.<br>
Curator for History of Science & Technology Collections;<br>
Film & Media Collections<br>
HRG, Green Library, 557 Escondido Mall<br>
Stanford University Libraries<br>
Stanford CA 94305-6004<br>
650-723-4602; lowood@stanford.edu;
<a href="http://www.stanford.edu/~lowood" eudora="autourl">
http://www.stanford.edu/~lowood</a></font></body>
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