John Beck Captures Our Minds and Hearts
March 26th, 2006 by Beth Gallaway
I was taking notes on my Palm, because I wasn’t able to sit near a plug and my laptop battery was drained (again), and when I tried to save my file, it CRASHED. My notes are gone. Will you take my word for it that John Beck gave a brilliant and entertaining overview of differences in attitudes about concepts like global awareness, competition, risk-taking, and multi-tasking between those born before and after 1970?
If not, library school student Jami Schwarzwalder took excellent notes, posted on the YALSA blog.
It was a presentation very similar to the one he did at the OCLC symposium at the 2005 ALA Midwinter Conference
(notes: http://www.plablog.org/2005/01/name-that-tune.html, http://www.plablog.org/2005/01/gaming-continued.html).
A few highlights from this year:
- 80% of those under age 34 , surveyed for Got Game? said they played video games.
- 81% of teens say they play games onlinem in a recent Pew Internet & American Life report.
- 100% of teen on the Harvard campus (theoretically the best & brightest young minds of the time) know the theme song to Super Mario Bros.
- games led to reading for his son, who used cheat codes to get through Tony Hawk’s Underground
- Gamers don’t like level bosses - librarians must learn to be strategy guides
- The best games, best ads, best LIBRARY SERVICES command all six attention types
- Try Brain Age for the Nintendo DS - SUnday paper style games that are mental calisthenics
Questions from the audience raised concerns about violence in games, games and literacy, and game ratings; a member of the LibGaming listserv invited attendees interested in continuing the conversation about games & libraries to meet up at the Sheraton bar at 8:30 on Thursday night. over 20 people showed up, including vendors, to exchange ideas, concerns and success stories.
More resources for libraries interested in gaming:
Game On! Games in Libraries Blog
Gaming in Libraries (symposium schedule for December 3-5, 2006)
LibGaming Listserv
Library Success: A Best Practices Wiki
Manga, MP3s, and MMORPGs, Oh My! Simmons GSLIS CE class
The Video Game Librarian
“Video Games as a Service: Hosting Tournaments at your Library” by Erin Helmrich and Eli Neiburger (VOYA, February 2005)
YALSA Gaming Discussion Group log in with ALA # & password, then access through Divisions/YALSA/
Tags: conferences, PLA, PLA2006
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