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1. Interacting with Empathy: Migrant Narrative in the Context of Mobile Apps

   This paper explores two mobile app narratives that deal with the issue of
   perilous irregular migration, Survival (2017, Omnium Lab) and Bury me, my love
   (2017, The Pixel Hunt/Figs/Arte France). This paper explores the way in which
   the mobile app form lends itself to elevation of migrant narratives and explores
   the capacity of such works to generate empathy.

   The paper will analyse the way in which migration and its subjects are treated
   and placed into relation with the notion of the game. The paper will also address
   the comparison between game-style apps and other online modes whereby
   migrant experience is being represented, such as that of humanitarian
   photojournalism and portraiture as it arises in social media apps, such as
   Instagram.

   Scott Rettberg - 20.05.2021 - 11:52

2. From ‘Cinema Envy’ to Social Media Envy? The Changing Face of Videogame Characterisation in the Age of Platformisation

   It was in Summer 2020 that Seraphine - a ‘virtual influencer’ in the mould of Brüd’s Lil Miquela – began building an audience on Twitter, Instagram and Soundcloud. Each of her posts served to flesh out her persona: that of an anxiety-prone aspiring musician with an ‘adorkably’ girly personal style and a cute pet cat. In September it emerged that Seraphine was a new playable character in e-sports giant Riot’s League of Legends (Riot 2009), a free-to-play ‘multiplayer online battle arena’ funded by the sale of sale of ‘skins’ and cosmetics items that allow players to customise the appearance of their chosen characters. While the character proved highly popular, the launch was not without controversy, with some pundits finding Riot’s bids for ‘relatability’ clumsy and their portrayal of the Seraphine’s mental health issues ‘perverse’ and ‘offensive’ – especially when set against the backdrop of a worsening pandemic (Jackson 2020).

   Milosz Waskiewicz - 25.05.2021 - 14:14

3. Art of the Pan-Opt-in-a-Con: FarmVille and the Gamification of the Digital Landscape [Original: The Tyranny of Completion; Or, How Electronic Art Can Engage the Firehose]

   Toward the end of 2020, one of the most culturally impactful web games of all time shut down—at least, the original, Flash-based version did. FarmVille, by social game studio Zynga, was not outstanding for its gameplay mechanics nor for its imaginative qualities. In fact, social games like Farmville are defined by game designer and scholar Ian Bogost as “games you don’t have to play.” Rather, FarmVille was special because it tapped into 2009-era Facebook’s lax user-generated notification system, and its developers succeeded in creating a user-operated spam cannon disguised as a game. What made FarmVille a cultural phenomenon is best represented by the metanarrative about how it manufactured and sold compulsive behavior to a new audience. By targeting ludic luddites with its folksy facade and “freemium” business model, FarmVille ushered in a new era of games that encouraged users to exchange money for in-game effects.

   Milosz Waskiewicz - 25.05.2021 - 15:20

4. On Reading and Being Read in the Pandemic: Software, Interface, and The Endless Doomscroller

   A primary interface pattern of contemporary software platforms is the infinite scroll. Often used to deliver algorithmically-selected personalized content, infinitely scrolling feeds are one of many design decisions seen as responsible for compulsive use of social media platforms and other information-rich sites and apps. During the COVID-19 pandemic, a time marked by a substantive increase in time spent online, the infinitely scrolling feed has been implicated in a new negative pattern: “doomscrolling.” Doomscrolling refers to the ways in which people find themselves regularly--and in some cases, almost involuntarily--scrolling bad news headlines on their phone, often for hours each night in bed when they had meant to be sleeping. While the realities of the pandemic have necessitated a level of vigilance for the purposes of personal safety, doomscrolling isn’t just a natural reaction to the news of the day—it’s the result of a perfect yet evil marriage between a populace stuck online, social media interfaces designed to game and hold our attention, and the realities of an existential global crisis.

   Lene Tøftestuen - 25.05.2021 - 17:21

5. End Matter: Interactive Fiction and a New Linguistic Consciousness

   The possibilities for interaction in electronic literature (e-lit) are heavily shaped by the platforms on which that interaction occurs, yet audiences are rarely aware of the extent to which the digital interface may influence, if not define, their sociality. These limitations take the form of community moderation tools and explicit censorship (such as in the case of profanity filters), but also in the designs of emote systems and content popularity systems, and achievement and reputation systems, and even in gameplay design. Often players, users, and audience members must oscillate rapidly and continually between determining the affordances of the tools available to them and evaluating the capacity of those tools to provide the social aims they desire.

   Milosz Waskiewicz - 27.05.2021 - 17:14