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Reposted

Jaakko Stenros @jaakkostenros.bsky.social · 16d

New Games and Culture! I especially want to highlight Leland Masek's piece on identifying playfulness. His work on playfulness is foundational! (I'm his supervisor, so I may be slightly biased.)

Frans Mäyrä @fransmayra.bsky.social · 17d

New issue of the Games and Culture journal is out:

journals.sagepub.com/toc/gaca/20/...

Sage Journals: Discover world-class research

Subscription and open access journals from Sage, the world's leading independent academic publisher.

journals.sagepub.com

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Reposted

Richy Srirachanikorn @srirachanikorn.bsky.social · 17d

#Cfp: Call for Book Chapters - #videogames, #gamedesign, game communities, & playthings that trouble what we mean by #nostalgia

“ #Games and its Nostalgia for the Future” is edited by yours truly and likely published with Play Story Press.

Abstracts due Nov 3, 2025

Full CfP: shorturl.at/NCkzU

CfP: Nostalgia for the Future Book

Nostalgia for the Future? Any books on this? No? Let's write one, together.

shorturl.at

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amayer.bsky.social @amayer.bsky.social · 20d

Meet me next week in Bochum (Germany) speaking about the concept of virtuality from the perspective of my own research, somewhere inbetween virtual prototyping and sensing.

SFB 1567 Virtuelle Lebenswelten @sfb1567.bsky.social · 21d

#NextWeek
The ECF conference, »Reflecting Virtuality«, will take place on September 24 and 25 at Ruhr University Bochum.
Registration information: www.virtuelle-lebens...

Poster for the ECF conference, "Reflecting Virtuality," including the conference program.

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Digital Humanities in the Nordic and Baltic Countries @dhnb.bsky.social · 24d

📍 CFP DHNB 2026: Lost in abundance: Encounters with the non-canonical

Submission deadline: October 15th
Conference date: March 9-13, 2026
Location: Aarhus, Denmark

Please spread widely! 🎉

#digitalhumanities #glam #digitalculture

Call for Papers: DHNB 2026, Aarhus – DHNB

dhnb.eu

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Reposted

Nicolle Lamerichs @nicolleness.bsky.social · 24d

Reading the special issue on Fans in M/C Journal. The essays are very accessible and readable and diverse, do have a look! #fans #fandom journal.media-culture.org.au/index.php/mc...

Vol. 28 No. 3 (2025): fan | M/C Journal

M/C Journal - a journal of media and culture, founded in 1998.

journal.media-culture.org.au

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Reposted

Christian Hardmeier @chrha.bsky.social · 28d

I'm hiring a postdoc at ITU Copenhagen with experience in NLP, who is keen on improving citizens' experience of health emergency triage in an exciting project with the Danish emergency helpline and the University of Copenhagen. Knowledge of Danish is helpful. candidate.hr-manager.net/ApplicationI...

Citizen-Facing Bidirectional AI for Emergency Triage

The IT University of Copenhagen invites highly motivated individuals to apply for a two year Postdoc position starting in November 2025 or soon thereafter. We i

candidate.hr-manager.net

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Reposted

Olivia Guest · Ολίβια Γκεστ @olivia.science · Sep 6

Finally! 🤩 Our position piece: Against the Uncritical Adoption of 'AI' Technologies in Academia:
doi.org/10.5281/zeno...

We unpick the tech industry’s marketing, hype, & harm; and we argue for safeguarding higher education, critical
thinking, expertise, academic freedom, & scientific integrity.
1/n

Abstract: Under the banner of progress, products have been uncritically adopted or
even imposed on users — in past centuries with tobacco and combustion engines, and in
the 21st with social media. For these collective blunders, we now regret our involvement or
apathy as scientists, and society struggles to put the genie back in the bottle. Currently, we
are similarly entangled with artificial intelligence (AI) technology. For example, software updates are rolled out seamlessly and non-consensually, Microsoft Office is bundled with chatbots, and we, our students, and our employers have had no say, as it is not
considered a valid position to reject AI technologies in our teaching and research. This
is why in June 2025, we co-authored an Open Letter calling on our employers to reverse
and rethink their stance on uncritically adopting AI technologies. In this position piece,
we expound on why universities must take their role seriously toa) counter the technology
industry’s marketing, hype, and harm; and to b) safeguard higher education, critical
thinking, expertise, academic freedom, and scientific integrity. We include pointers to
relevant work to further inform our colleagues.

Figure 1. A cartoon set theoretic view on various terms (see Table 1) used when discussing the superset AI
(black outline, hatched background): LLMs are in orange; ANNs are in magenta; generative models are
in blue; and finally, chatbots are in green. Where these intersect, the colours reflect that, e.g. generative adversarial network (GAN) and Boltzmann machine (BM) models are in the purple subset because they are
both generative and ANNs. In the case of proprietary closed source models, e.g. OpenAI’s ChatGPT and
Apple’s Siri, we cannot verify their implementation and so academics can only make educated guesses (cf.
Dingemanse 2025). Undefined terms used above: BERT (Devlin et al. 2019); AlexNet (Krizhevsky et al.
2017); A.L.I.C.E. (Wallace 2009); ELIZA (Weizenbaum 1966); Jabberwacky (Twist 2003); linear discriminant analysis (LDA); quadratic discriminant analysis (QDA).

Table 1. Below some of the typical terminological disarray is untangled. Importantly, none of these terms
are orthogonal nor do they exclusively pick out the types of products we may wish to critique or proscribe.

Protecting the Ecosystem of Human Knowledge: Five Principles

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amayer.bsky.social @amayer.bsky.social · Sep 5

niiice, congrats! ^^

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Reposted

Brendan Keogh @brkeogh.bsky.social · Sep 4

BOOK ANNOUNCEMENT! @mahliann.bsky.social, @marcuscarter.com, and myself have combined our collective brains and written a wide-reaching introduction to the complex and interdisciplinary field of Game Studies in this forthcoming book for Polity. www.politybooks.com/bookdetail?b...

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Reposted

Joleen Blom @jjol33n.bsky.social · Sep 1

For my fellow colleagues working in the Dutch game sector and interested in game development & design, the Stimuleringsfonds has a call for funding proposals you might be interested in:

www.stimuleringsfonds.nl/en/grants/op...

Open Oproep Game Sector Professionalisation and Practice Development | Stimuleringsfonds

For individual game professionals, game designers, game developers, or (temporary) collectives working within the Dutch games sector who wish to make their practice or studio future-proof.

www.stimuleringsfonds.nl

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Reposted

Lukas Daniel Klausner @l17r.bsky.social · Sep 1

We are still looking for interviewees working on and with open-source software, especially from thus far underrepresented groups (people with little to medium experience working on OSS, those in mid-career stages (10–20 years on the job), women and nonbinary people, people over 45 years old).

The call for interviewees in picture form, containing more or less the same information (and a bonus drawing of a cat at the bottom left)

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Reposted

Dr. Helle Strandgaard Jensen (she/her) @sesamescholar.bsky.social · Aug 29

📚💻💰📝
If you are thinking about applying for an ERC grant and want inspiration, I've updated my paper where I tell how I got mine.

It now includes the application (B1+B2), the manuscript for the presentation I gave at my interview, the slides, and the nine peer reviews.

pure.au.dk/portal/en/pu...

How I got an ERC Consolidator Grant. Idea, application, interview, and reviews.

pure.au.dk

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Reposted

Weizenbaum-Institut @weizenbauminstitut.bsky.social · Aug 27

Who is really fueling your #AI? 🤔 It's not just code & algorithms. Behind every LLM are millions of people, often in invisible roles. Join us, @dataworkersinquiry.bsky.social, @milamiceli.bsky.social @superrrnetwork.bsky.social & on Sept. 17 to hear directly from data workers!
🔗 buff.ly/2ug32Bx

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Reposted

Carolin Puckhaber @caroleinx.bsky.social · Aug 27

The Center for Islamic Theology and the Department of Religious Studies and Intercultural Theology are hosting the conference „The Role of Islam and Christianity in Public Space – Perspectives from Indonesia and Germany“ at @uni-muenster.de from 26 to 28 September. uni.ms/gkil1

Conference-Poster The Role of Islam and Christianity in Public Space – Perspectives from Indonesia and Germany

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Reposted

Max Ryynänen @maxryynanen.bsky.social · Aug 21

Trying Out New Paths in Aesthetics, a book I edited with Zoltán Somhegyi for Brill, is OUT any moment! My article focuses on aesthetics of martial arts, but great authors from Saumya Suyal to Rodrigo Duarte, Myriam Ávila and Yvonne Förster discuss e g. virtues, AI & myths.

brill.com/display/titl...

Trying Out New Paths in Aesthetics

"Trying Out New Paths in Aesthetics" published on 18 Dec 2025 by Brill.

brill.com

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Reposted

Robert Houghton @robehoughton.bsky.social · Aug 7

There's another very kind review of The Middle Ages in Computer Games out on @gamevironments.bsky.social from @markusmindrebo.bsky.social. There's also a bunch of important articles on peripheral religions in games in this issue which are well worth a look. doi.org/10.48783/gam...

Review of Robert Houghton's The Middle Ages in Computer Games: Ludic Approaches to the Medieval and Medievalism (2024) | gamevironments

doi.org

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Reposted

gamevironments @gamevironments.bsky.social · Aug 20

We recently published a special issue on Peripheral Religions and Games, guest edited by @caroleinx.bsky.social, @amayer.bsky.social and Knut Wormstädt! Four brand new articles exploring the topic, one report, two reviews and, of course, an introduction.

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amayer.bsky.social @amayer.bsky.social · Aug 20

i think so! the aspect that might change or modify the aspect of "having" marginally, is that it's also potentially about "making something yours", as in creating additional emotional value through specific practices like dressing toys up, modifying them, etc.?

amayer.bsky.social @amayer.bsky.social · Aug 20

the gifting/trading that is there seems to be more limited to accessoires tho (clothes and such), but the meeting culture is still there, just..different? (still not sure how to actually define that "different" 😅)

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amayer.bsky.social @amayer.bsky.social · Aug 20

the meetup and community-internal sharing maybe is still present to some extent (eventho more in virtual space), but with no trading and more about showing what you got maybe? but then there is a lot of this "knowledge trading" for e.g. DIY customization...still not sure how it fits into it all

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Reposted

Lukas Daniel Klausner @l17r.bsky.social · Aug 18

Do you regularly work with or develop open-source software? Then we would love to talk to you!

We are conducting research on how people think about OSS quality and how they evaluate OSS projects. We want to interview people to gather all kinds of perspectives. /1

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Reposted

Joleen Blom @jjol33n.bsky.social · Aug 15

Happy to let you know I'm one of the invited speakers to gachacon in February '26, organised at the CityU in Hong Kong. 🌸

This year's theme will be Genshin Impact. The event is free to attend, no registration fee!

Leon Xiao @leonxiao.com · Aug 11

We’ll be hosting GachaCon 2026, a hybrid academic conference on gacha games with Genshin Impact as the theme, on 12–13 February 2026 at the School of Creative Media, City University of Hong Kong. 🇭🇰🇨🇳

Call for Papers: tinyurl.com/gachaconcfp

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Reposted

Jaakko Stenros @jaakkostenros.bsky.social · Aug 15

The book Challenging Contemporary Thinking on Play came out yesterday. Edited by Victoria de Rijke and Rebecca Sinker the book explores play through a series of interviews/conversations. I'm one of the people who participated. link.springer.com/book/10.1007...

Challenging Contemporary Thinking on Play

This book challenges and criticizes over-used or lazy applications of play and offer the possibility into the arena of culture in conceptual reference.

link.springer.com

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Reposted

amayer.bsky.social @amayer.bsky.social · Aug 7

Happy to share that our Special Issue for @gamevironments.bsky.social is out now! Check below for the link and a brief run-through of the authors and topics!

Carolin Puckhaber @caroleinx.bsky.social · Aug 7

📯PUBLICATION NEWS📯
@amayer.bsky.social, Knut Wormstädt and I are happy to announce that our @gamevironments.bsky.social special issue Peripheral Religions and Games is officially out now! Here's the link, but we want to talk about every article and report for a minute: tinyurl.com/2txajt3m

No. #22 (2025): Special Issue "Peripheral Religions" | gamevironments

tinyurl.com

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amayer.bsky.social @amayer.bsky.social · Aug 7

Happy to share that our Special Issue for @gamevironments.bsky.social is out now! Check below for the link and a brief run-through of the authors and topics!

Carolin Puckhaber @caroleinx.bsky.social · Aug 7

📯PUBLICATION NEWS📯
@amayer.bsky.social, Knut Wormstädt and I are happy to announce that our @gamevironments.bsky.social special issue Peripheral Religions and Games is officially out now! Here's the link, but we want to talk about every article and report for a minute: tinyurl.com/2txajt3m

No. #22 (2025): Special Issue "Peripheral Religions" | gamevironments

tinyurl.com

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