John Banks Speaks

User Co-Creation Relations: Emerging Social-Network Markets

In this presentation, Dr John Banks will draw from his recent research with Auran Games on their forthcoming massively multiplayer online game, Fury (http://www.unleashthefury.com) to discuss user co-creation relationships as emerging social-network markets. John will consider how the choices that participants make in negotiating these relationships can be understood as emerging competencies for navigating the opportunities, risks and uncertainties associated with these networks. He will argue that far from being duped or exploited, users are often quite canny and knowledgeable participants in the making of these relationships.

About the speaker Dr John Banks is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Federation Fellowship program, ARC Centre of Excellence for Creative Industries and Innovation, Queensland University of Technology. His research interests focus on the interface between media corporations and consumer co-creators in participatory culture networks. From 2000-2005 John worked in the video games industry (Auran Games) as an online community manager, facilitating the development of user-led content creation networks within the context of game development projects; he has published widely on research grounded in this industry background. John’s current research continues to work at the interface of game developers and gamers as they negotiate these emerging co-creation relations. He is currently collaborating with Auran on the propagation of social networks around their forthcoming, MMOG Fury.

Details When: 12.30pm-2.00pm, Wednesday 25 July 2007 Where: AFTRS Melbourne, level 1, 1010 La Trobe St, Docklands, Melbourne More info http://www.aftrs.edu.au/