Clark Aldrich
As a simulation designer, Clark Aldrich has created some of the most effective, celebrated, and innovative "soft skills" simulations of the past decade, including SimuLearn's Virtual Leader global product line (for which he was awarded a patent, is the most popular leadership simulation in the world, and was the winner of the "best online training product of the year"). SimuLearn's Virtual Leader (and the updated vLeader) is currently used in hundreds of corporations, universities, and military installations and has been translated into multiple foreign languages.
He is the author of two award-winning books, Simulations and the Future of Learning (Wiley, 2004) and Learning By Doing (Wiley, 2005); and columnist and analyst. His next book, The Complete Guide to Simulations and Serious Games - How the Most Valuable Content Will Be Created In the Age Beyond Guttenberg to Google, will be available in Spring, 2009.
Ian Bogost
Dr. Ian Bogost is a videogame designer, critic, and researcher. He is an Associate Professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology and Founding Partner at Persuasive Games LLC. His research and writing considers videogames as an expressive medium, and his creative practice focuses on games about social and political issues. Bogost is author of Unit Operations: An Approach to Videogame Criticism (MIT Press 2006), recently listed among “50 books for everyone in the game industry,” of Persuasive Games: The Expressive Power of Videogames (MIT Press 2007), and co-author (with Nick Montfort) of Racing the Beam: The Atari Video Computer System (MIT Press 2008). Bogost’s videogames about social and political issues cover topics as varied as airport security, disaffected workers, the petroleum industry, suburban errands, and tort reform. His games have been played by millions of people and exhibited internationally.
Mia Consalvo
Mia Consalvo is the Associate Director of Graduate Studies and Associate Professor in the School of Media Arts & Studies at Ohio University. She is the author of Cheating: Gaining Advantage in Videogames (MIT Press, 2007), and is currently co-editor of The Blackwell Handbook of Internet Studies with Charles Ess and Robert Burnett, to be published in 2009. Her research focuses on the hybrid character of the global games industry, as well as gender and sexuality as related to digital gameplay. She has published related work in The Video Game Theory Reader 2, as well as the journals Game Studies, Games & Culture, Television & New Media, and The International Review of Information Ethics.
William Crosbie
Bill Crosbie is coordinator of the game development major and a full-time faculty member in the department of computer science at Raritan Valley Community College. He is (slowly) working towards his terminal degree at Teachers College, Columbia University and vows to put more time in to it once this current serious game project goes gold.
Drew Davidson
Drew Davidson is a professor, producer and player of interactive media. His background spans academic, industry and professional worlds and he is interested in stories across texts, comics, games and other media. He is the Director of the Entertainment Technology Center – Pittsburgh at Carnegie Mellon University and the Editor of ETC Press. http://waxebb.com/
Simon Egenfeldt-Nielsen
Simon Egenfeldt-Nielsen (PhD, Psychologist) is CEO of Serious Games interactive with a strong research background. He did a PhD on the educational use of computer games and after that led a 2 years long research project within the same field. He has studied, researched and worked with computer games for more than 10 years.
He has served on the Digital Game Research Association Board for 3 years, co-founded Game-research.com and authored three books on video games with one more in the pipeline. He regularly gives talks around the world.
Melinda Jackson
Melinda (Mindy) Jackson is the Director of Instructional Design at Enspire Learning (http://www.enspire.com ) an industry leader in creating exceptional learning experiences to address strategic business and training challenges. Mindy's professional interests are to better understand the impact and influence of new interactive technologies and digital content to enhance human performance and to improve the social good. She has presented widely on topics of games, simulations and other interactive electronic environments for learning. Mindy is published in books, journals and magazines including E-Learning Magazine, On the Horizon Journal, Journal of Educational Computing Research, and Lies About Learning.
Donna Leishman
In 2004 Donna Leishman completed a practice-led PhD in interactive narrative at the Glasgow School of Art and is principal of 6amhoover.com. Her Masters in Design (1999-2000) produced the darkly romantic Little Red Riding hood, which has been widely acclaimed. Donna has worked commercially in both Scotland and New York (with Bullseyeart.com) during the latter she was an Emmy award nominee for her work on the Rosie O'Donnell Show. Her responsive animations have also been showcased in both the New York Times and the Guardian Online and have been exhibited internationally. At present Donna is the graduate supervisor for Communication Design and runs the BA (Hons) in Illustration at Duncan of Jordonstone College of Art & Design, Dundee, Scotland, where she continues her research into image, narrative and interaction.
Michael Mateas
Michael Mateas' research in AI-based art and entertainment combines science, engineering and design into an integrated practice that pushes the boundaries of the conceivable and possible in games and other interactive art forms. He is currently a faculty member in the Computer Science department at UC Santa Cruz, where he runs the Expressive Intelligence Studio, and where he helped launch UCSC’s game design degree, the first such degree offered in the UC system. Prior to Santa Cruz, Michael was a faculty member at The Georgia Institute of Technology, where he founded the Experimental Game Lab. With Andrew Stern, Michael released Facade, the world’s first AI-based interactive drama in July 2005. Facade has received numerous awards, including top honors at the Slamdance independent game festival. Michael’s current research interests include game AI, particularly character and story AI, ambient intelligence supporting non-task-based social experiences, and dynamic game generation. Michael has presented papers and exhibited artwork internationally including SIGGRAPH, the New York Digital Salon, AAAI, CHI, the Game Developers Conference, ISEA, AIIDE, the Carnegie Museum, and Te PaPa, the national museum of New Zealand. Michael received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from Carnegie Mellon University.
Marc Prensky
Marc Prensky is an internationally acclaimed writer, speaker, consultant, and designer in the critical areas of education and learning. He is the author of Digital Game-Based Learning (McGraw-Hill, 2001), Don’t Bother Me Mom – I’m Learning (Paragon House, 2006) and Partnering With Your Students: How To Teach Digital Natives, Even If You’re A Digital Immigrant (Corwin 2009). Marc is the founder and CEO of Games2train, whose clients include IBM, Bank of America, the US Department of Defense, and the L.A. and Florida virtual schools. He has created over 50 software games, including fast-action videogame-based training tools and world-wide, multi-player, multi-team on-line competitions. He was named as one of training’s top 10 “visionaries” by Training magazine. He holds graduate degrees from Harvard and Yale. For Marc's essays, see www.marcprensky.com/writing
Scott Rettberg
Scott Rettberg is associate professor of humanistic informatics in the department of linguistic, literary, and aesthetic studies at the University of Bergen, Norway. Prior to moving to Norway in 2006, Rettberg directed the new media studies track of the literature program at Richard Stockton College in New Jersey. Rettberg is the author or coauthor of works of electronic literature including The Unknown, Kind of Blue, and Implementation. Rettberg cofounder and served as the first executive director of the Electronic Literature Organization. Rettberg is a contributor to the collaborative digital culture weblog Grand Text Auto. He is currently working on a book about contemporary electronic literature in the context of the twentieth century avant-garde.
Kurt Squire
Kurt Squire is an associate professor of Educational Communications and Technology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Director of the Games, Learning, and Society Initiative. Squire is the author of over 50 scholarly articles and publications and the co-founder of joystick101.org.
David Thomas
David Thomas is a nationally syndicated videogame journalist, critic and teacher. He co-authored the Videogame Style Guide and Reference Manual and blogs about games and architecture at www.buzzcut.com. He teaches courses covering the history of digital media, videogame studies and a unique class that uses games to teach students about urban planning. His interest in virtual places and leisure spaces led his to study as a PhD student in the college of architecture and planning, where he focuses on the question of "What makes a place fun?"
Siobhan Thomas
Siobhan Thomas is course director of London South Bank University's Game Cultures program and in her spare time designs pervasive games for learning. Her academic research is focused on the play activities of not just two-legged mammals, but also furry and feathered animals: her current research project looks at human-pet relationships, play and technology.
Jill Walker Rettberg
Jill Walker Rettberg is an Associate Professor of Digital Culture and Humanistic Informatics at the University of Bergen. She is the author of the book Blogging which was published by Polity Press in 2008, and co-edited an anthology of scholarly articles on the popular online game World of Warcraft which was published by MIT Press, also in 2008. Jill began blogging in 2000, and still blogs at jilltxt.net. Her current research is on social and participatory media, online narratives and digital culture, and she also gives frequent talks on these topics to general audiences.
Jenny Weight
Jenny lectures in networked and programmed media at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in Australia. Previously Jenny worked as an editor and a multimedia producer. Jenny researches ethnographic and theoretical aspects of networked and programmed mediums including the Internet, mobile phones and computer games and their implications for media pedagogy. Jenny is also an artist and creative writer, and under pen name geniwate has created several works of hypermedia.