Class 5 – 10/13/17; “Connecting Ourselves: Gamer Vulnerability in Virtual Realities” + “Sex, violence & videogames”
In the website introduction to last weeks video (where my presentation had no audible sound) and slides, I said that “Usually there is one glitch a year”. I distinctly remember wondering whether fate was being tempted in that act. Well, whatever believe, this weeks video had some incomprehensible glitches that are still being investigated technically. The bottom line is that is that more than half of the front end of my talk is missing but at least the big finish is there 😉 Also note that Charlotte Chamberlain’s slides are here too.
Video & slides below.
Jon
Class 4 – 10/6/2017; “Right to CreaTE or Rights to the Creation” + “Books, Games, and Virtual Futures”
We had a fluky confluence of events where I forgot to turn on my microphone and the usually reliable back-up desk microphone wasn’t working either. The result is that there is virtually no audio until Rob’s presentation which is clear as a bell. My talk is for lip-readers only I’m afraid. Usually there is one glitch a year. Hopefully this is ours.
Jon
Crafting Effective EULA’s & ToS’
On Friday June 9, 2017 in Toronto I gave a talk on the strategic essentials of drafting End User License Agreements and Terms of Service to a program on Video Game Law put on by the Ontario Bar Association’s Entertainment, Media & Communications Law, and Information Technology & Intellectual Property Law sections. My original slides are above, as my final set of slides are too large to post even when compressing the graphics as much as PowerPoint allows.
Jon
“Old Media v. Social Media: Some Observations”
In Toronto on April 26, 2017 I participated in The Law Society of Upper Canada’s 2017 Entertainment & Media Law Symposium. The panel I was part of was entitled “#BraveNewWorld: How to Practice Social Media Law.” Being far and away the oldest of the panellists, I proved my age by through my topic “Old Media v. Social Media: Some Observations”. If you reflect on video games deeply enough you can see that they represented a form of social media long before that term became fashionable. In that context most of what I had to say could be applied equally to game forums and in-game communications.Slides above.
Jon
“Trusting Ourselves: Freedom of Thought in Virtual Realities” @ More Than Just A Game lll, April 6, 2017, London U.K.
Again this past April I was honoured to participate in my wonderful colleague, Professor Gaetano Dimita’s outstanding annual international “More Than Just a Game” conference, in London, U.K. The conference was fittingly put on at historic Stationers’ Hall by the Centre for Commercial Law Studies, Queen Mary University of London, aided and abetted by a group of excellent and generous sponsors. My talk focussed on when and how the law could intervene when virtual reality becomes so convincing that our freedom of thought becomes compromised.
Above is a video of my talk, then the slides related to it and finally a link to video of all of the panels at the conference.
Here’s to the 2018 edition of “More Than Just a Game”, and to many more thereafter….
Jon
Legal Contradictions Manifest in Video Game Worlds: Copyright through the Post-Structuralist Looking Glass
In the spring I was invited by my colleague Gaetano Dimita (http://www.law.qmul.ac.uk/staff/dimita.html) of The School of Law, Queen Mary University of London to participate in the second edition of an academic conference he organizes called “More Than Just A Game: Interactive Entertainment & Intellectual Property Law”. The conference, which took place on April 8, 2016 was a great success, and I presented on “Legal Contradictions in Video Game Worlds: Copyright through the Post-Structuralist Looking Glass.” My core message was that video game mods should be presumptively legal. I explored the reasons why and suggested some possible mechanisms to, in the words of Captain Picard, make it so.
In preparation for my London adventure I was privileged to present a draft iteration at a Faculty Seminar at the Allard School of Law, UBC on March 16, 2016. Thanks to Natasha Affolder and Janine Benedet for the invitation, and Joe Weiler for moderating. Thanks as well as to everyone who came, asked questions and helped me “sharpen the saw” through their questions.
There was no video of the QMUL conference while the Allard Faculty Seminar was recorded and edited thanks to Dan Silverman. As a result, below you will find the slides from the final presentation in London, video from Vancouver, and some bonus memorabilia from both.
jon