Soapbox

I'll be in Boston for a few days where I will give a presentation at the Sandbox Symposium about the debate in the game development community about whether to work on military-funded projects that support the war in Iraq. More generally, I'm interested in how government-funded videogames and virtual reality simulations, particularly those that receive a lot of publicity in the mainstream media, such as Tactical Iraqi and Virtual Iraq, may have rhetorical as well as pedagogical or therapeutic characteristics. The issues are relatively complicated but worth talking about, so if you are in town for SIGGRAPH or just in the area, check it out. One of the program co-chairs is Doug Thomas of Games and Culture, so it should be a good line-up. Kurt Squire, who often collaborates with Henry Jenkins, will also be speaking.

And speaking of games, check out the selection of recent newsgames covered by Water Cooler Games that target Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah. Certainly, with civilians dying, it's no laughing matter, but it's interesting to see these cartoonish depictions of the Israeli offensive against strongholds in Lebanon.