Author: Jane Doh (Page 2 of 9)

Staff Writer

Jane Doh is the online gaming persona of an otherwise ordinary person. Jane has a particular love for grassroots and independent projects, especially those run out of basements and breakfast nooks, and is working on several creative projects of her own.

Snow Town Library: Beware the Librarian

February 19, 2011 / Jane Doh

Wow, you really can’t let those library due dates slide. Imagine my surprise when I received not just one, but four overdue library notices from the Snow Town Library in Snow Town, Maine. I must have had snow on my mind when I took out The Snow Man by Hans Christian Andersen, Blizzard by George Stone, The Maine Woods by H.D. Thoreau,Â and Winter of Our Discontent by John Steinbeck. Surely this is a mistake!

But at a fine of 2 cents per day for four overdue books (never mind the two cents the library has added for the expense of sending me each notice), I just can’t afford to let the fines go. So, I called the Snow Town Library to rectify the situation but was too intimidated by the voicemail greeting asking me to leave a message.

Terrified, I quickly hung up the phone. It’s been years, no decades, since I’ve interacted with anyone of the “school-marm” type, and I was having flashbacks. Searching around, I came upon the Snow Town Library website. There, Snow Town Librarian Ruthie Randolph seems to be ruling with an iron fist, keeping library patrons in line, and organizing the library’s book club. Her argyle sweater strikes terror in the heart.

Although there isn’t a great deal of information to go on, there’s just something fishy about this place, and it seems like the Snow Town Library might be the setting for a new alternate reality game just getting started. For information, check out the Snow Town Library website and sign the guestbook . . .Â if you dare!

Update 2/21: Since this article was published, participants have uncovered a great deal of new information about the Snow Town Library over at Unfiction.

Strong Arm Your Way into the Ring of Dishonor: Q&A with Master Thief Mike Selinker

February 12, 2011 / Jane Doh

As previously reported on ARGNet, Wired magazine and Lone Shark Games have created a special “Underworld Exposed” issue to delight and confound puzzle-solvers and would-be thieves eager to join the nefarious Ring of Dishonor, a special place for the craftiest of puzzlers. Frustrated by the secret ciphers hidden in the magazine, available both in print and on the iPad, I cornered master puzzle-maker and president of Lone Shark Games, Mike Selinker.

Let’s see if he’ll crack under the interrogation lamp:
Continue reading

Lone Shark Games and Wired Want You to Join Their Ring of Dishonor

February 3, 2011 / Jane Doh

In this month’s Wired, Lone Shark Games is presenting a unique challenge to puzzlers, techies, and . . . thugs? Promising “A Guided Tour of the Dark Side,” this special “Underworld Exposed” issue includes fascinating articles about real-world crime and other things hidden from plain sight. Along these lines, the magazine, available both in print and for the iPad, contains secret codes that, when deciphered, will provide an email address. When contacted at a certain time and date, Decode will confer upon you a most dubious honor and a place in the ultra-secret puzzling society, the Ring of Dishonor.

The Ring of Dishonor is a darker, scarier version of Decode’s regularly featured Ring of Honor puzzles. How do you get started on your criminal puzzle-solving career? Check out this trailhead puzzle, involving the now-extinct language used by Chinese women to communicate without being watched. Using this puzzle as a launching pad, nine other secret languages are being revealed in quiz form at Decode to supplement the print magazine (iPad readers have all the secret languages available already). Somehow, through the magazine, these secret languages will bring enthusiastic seekers “behind the door,” so to speak, if they’ve got the puzzle-solving chops to figure it all out.

A Look Back at Lewis Hamilton’s Secret Life

January 22, 2011 / Jane Doh

As reported previously at ARGNet, sexy Formula 1 racer Lewis Hamilton had been leading a double life: when heâ€™s not out leaving his competitors in the dust, heâ€™s recovering stolen art and returning them to their rightful owners. According to Hamilton, he just canâ€™t “resist a challenge,” and after his first recovery heist, he was hooked. Soon he assembled a crack support squad, including logistics expert Anna Chao, professional lookalike Lenny Rose, and his trainer Joe . . . and about 637,000 enthusiastic players from all over the world.

Lewis Hamilton: Secret Life was the epic international game created byÂ nDreams for Reebok. Building on nDreams’ experience creating theÂ Xi,Â the highly regarded alternate reality game for the PlayStation Home,Â Secret Lewis ran from March to November 2010, included numerous online assets, and entertained players from London to Abu Dhabi. Based on the reactions of players, some of whom flung themselves full-speed into the game world, Secret Lewis was one of the most engaging, interactive, and exciting games of 2010.

But what accounted for this success? Looking over the whole campaign, this article will try to figure out what made the game tick and explore how Secret Lewis can serve as a model for future alternate reality games.

Media Theorist Douglas Rushkoff on Alternate Reality Games

December 27, 2010 / Jane Doh

Author, media theorist, teacher, and winner of the first Neil Postman award for Career Achievement in Public Intellectual Activity, Douglas Rushkoff is well-known for his insightful books and documentaries about how cultures, people, and institutions shape values in the digital age. Since his 1994 observational book Cyberia, Rushkoff has often been at the forefront of digital counterculture. His latest book, Program or Be Programmed: Ten Commands for a Digital Age, provides clear, actionable ways to master technology before it masters us.

Recently, Rushkoff collaborated with games production companyÂ Smoking Gun Interactive to create an experimental alternate reality game (ARG) and graphic novel “proof of concept,” Exoriare. After chatting very briefly about ARGs at the eBook Summit last week in New York City, I thought our readers would enjoy a more focused e-mail interview with Rushkoff about his experience with Exoriare, ARGs, and play.

The Elephant in the Room: Talking Transmedia at the eBook Summit in NYC

December 17, 2010 / Jane Doh

This week, I attended the eBook Summit, an event organized by Mediabistro, GalleyCat, and eBookNewser, here in New York City, aiming to usher in the “New Era of Publishing” with a program of experts through a one-day extravaganza of digital publishing. Although geared more toward professionals in the “traditional” book publishing industry, a few overarching transmedia, digital, and storytelling themes emerged from talks by excellent mix of speakers, from agents to publishers to app developers, including Jason Ashlock of the Movable Type Literary Group and NYU Journalism professor and contributor to Fast Company, Adam Penenberg.

I was particularly enthralled by media theorist Douglas Rushkoff’s talk, “Ten Commands for the Digital Age,” giving an overview of his latest book Program or Be Programmed. He discussed the generational shifts in how people relate to their technology, making the point that the younger generation of so-called “digital natives” are not necessarily jumping into the industry as producers. So what bearing would this have on the future of consumption? To bring in an important first call to action in his book: “In the emerging, highly programmed landscape ahead, you will either create the software or you will be the software. It’s really that simple: Program, or be programmed. Choose the former, and you gain access to the control panel of civilization.”