PCHCLS (Post Continental-Hopping Conference Lobotomy Syndrome)
I've had all the best intentions of blogging more about my DAC experiences. But I've simply been too tired to go over the somewhat off-key attempt at a conference dissection I wrote at an altitude of 10.000 meters, somewhere over Siberia (meanwhile scaring the life out of Jill and Susana, my travel companions sitting a few seats behind me, because I sneaked my way into "Economy Extra" to do it, and thus appeared to have vanished mysteriously from my seat). So it will rest in peace. Three days back in Denmark, I am still severely jetlagged and I have spent most of the day today sleeping, since it is a national holiday and thus defendable to spend an entire day doing nothing...

Furthermore, I have suddenly been forced to focus on a lot of other stuff: students had to be supervised because tomorrow is project deadline,Tuesday I learnt that seemingly my ph.d. thesis has passed and been approved for defense and it is about 99% sure that I will defend it on June 20, less than a month from now (arghh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!), indeed a passing of information which suddenly made my adrenaline levels soar to new and unexpected hights on top of my serious lack of melantonin, the strange mix of which in the end resulted in me feeling even more exhausted....And we suddenly have to come up with ideas for the layout and text for the bookcover of the anthology, I'm editing with colleague Engholm. If we make the deadline early next week, it means that the anthology will hit the bookshelves of Danish booksellers in late January 2004, which is wonderful news, but it also means I have a lot of serious editing in front of me in the very near future.

I showed all the nice photos Susana and I took with the digital camera in Tokyo and Melbourne to the BF. "It doesn't look like you were very many people at the conference", he commented. Hmmh. But true enough, according to the pictures. Next to the conference presentation shots, most of them depict Susana, Torill, Jill, Nick and Noah, Hanne-Lovise, Anne-Mette and me in various social situations, supplemented by the odd Australian. Darshana, a nice local Melbourne "Game Boy", at some point commented that people at the conference were rather cliquish. Perhaps we were at times (luckily his Australian companion didnt agree), but I think part of the reason is also that these are people that I only see at conferences once or twice a year or even less, and the fewer DAC conferences, unfortunately the less the chances to be with them. They are all fun and smart people to be with, none the less because they are by now "old friends" which I have known since the DAC 1999/2000 conferences.

Hanging out with "the clique" didn't mean that it was not nice to meet and hear presentations from a number of new faces. By pure chance (really!) I particularly enjoyed those in the session, I myself chaired: Jane Mcgonical talking about "immersive gaming" and the Beast Game following the A. I. movie, Andrew Hutchinson on interactive narratives and Tiffany Holmes on Art Games and I also got to talk to them more before and after about their projects and work. I really liked the presentation by Mary Flanagan and also enjoyed getting to know her a little bit more "backstage" (*grin*) at the performance evening. I had a short, but interesting talk with Brett Nicholls, the New Zealander, who together with Simon Ryan presented an interesting paper on Jet Set Radio Future, and who aired their ideas of a game research event next year in their country. And presentations by local Australians, Ben Hutchinson and Darshana Jayemanne, also had some interesting potential and ideas to think with, though I did not agree completely with their "readings". It was also refreshing to see the way Darshana stood up and pointed to the fact that he was one of the very few people of the conference with Asian origins. I suspect it has something to do with the sad fact that it is because it is mostly Europeans and Americans who can afford to and have easy access to enjoy and study digital aesthetics and games at this point in time (even though, as we saw in both Tokyo and Melbourne, asians play games like mad, at least in the arcades...).

Sorry, just have to go sleep again. But will upload links later. Checkout conference impressions by Nick and Torill.
# posted by Lisbeth at: 19:05