Wednesday, January 03, 2007

Promises - promises...

I am still pondering my plans and promises for the New Year. Therefore I though of starting with OLD promises. Last year I promised to talk about youth and media culture at the "Next Phase of Information Society" (in Finnish) 10th of January. Even though the event is a part of Jyrki J. J. Kasvi's campaing for getting re-elected to the Finnish Parliament the program looks really interesting! I am happy to be there -- and I am sure I will learn a lot.

Another nice event is Forum Dynamo (in Finnish) on 27th January. I will be giving a talk about "social media and youth cultures" together with Marjo Laukkanen, a researcher from the University of Lapland. I am excited about this because we have prepared really excellent show for the audience but also because I have never met Mrs. Laukkanen! But it'll be a blast!

The third promise was to join a blogger-group coordinated by journalist Jussi Ahlroth. We shall write "online 'zine focused on digital games" (in Finnish). The challenging part is to actually reach the audience. At the moment finnish games journalism is based on reviews and game-geeks are interested in reading about the cool graphics, the AI and playing modes. The new blog-zine will skip all that and focus on phenomena, cultural embodiments, sub-cultures and-so-on of digital gaming. I really hope such blog-zine will reach its audience and will advance understanding and discussion on games and (digital) media culture in general.

Those interested (and Finnish-speaking) can follow the links provided. If you do not understand a word but would like to hear the highlights -- drop me a line :)

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