Scholarship for Women and Minority Students

The Entertainment Software Association (ESA) has created a new scholarship program for women and minority students pursuing full-time undergraduate degrees related to game development (that’s both of the degrees in our GAIM program). They’re giving away 15 $3000 awards for next year. The deadline is May 15th.

More information: www.scholarshipamerica.org/ESAF

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Game developers on academic research

In the past month, I’ve had the pleasure of attending two conferences bringing together academics and the games industry. The first was I3D, the Symposium on Interactive 3D Graphics and Games, sponsored by ACM SIGGRAPH. The second was GSCSE, or Game Development in Computer Science Education. GDCSE was formerly the Microsoft Academic Days in Gaming Conference, but this year’s was co-sponsored by EA and held in cooperation with ACM SIGCSE. One of the most interesting things to come out of both was the perspectives of games industry veterans on the roles of university research in the games industry. Here are a few of my notes, from most researchy (I3D) to most industry focused (GDCSE).
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XKCD on E. Gary Gygax

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The iPhone is…?

Given the iPhone development kit yesterday, which will allow (among other things) programs using the accelerometers and 3D graphics with OpenGL ES. So, what is this “iPhone”?

• A phone with a nice web browser?
• A nice web browser that makes phone calls?
• A PDA?
• A tiny game platform
• A Wii-mote with a touch screen?

I’m not sure, but I’m pretty excited about what we’ll be able to do with it!

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E. Gary Gygax is dead

The co-inventor of Dungeons and Dragons died Tuesday morning.

AP obituary here.

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