Library Game Lab of Syracuse

American Libraries article on Games in Libraries

The Jan/Feb 2009 issue of American Libraries has this cover:

The cover story is about games in libraries! I’ve been working very closely with the ALA on aspects of gaming in libraries, and it’s great to see that it’s making a difference. One page of the article is about the 2008 Gaming Census that I did.

You can read this article at:

http://site.ebrary.com/lib/ala/document/display.jsp?docID=10268897&page=42

ALA President Jim Rettig’s Connections Salon with Scott Nicholson

Open to All:
Friday, December 19, 2008 at 2:00 p.m. Eastern Time, 1:00 Central, noon Mountain, 11:00 a.m. Pacific, and 7:00 p.m. GMT/UTC/Zulu:
ALA Connections Salon: Gaming Connections with Special Guest Scott Nicholson

The December installment in the series of ALA President Jim Rettig’s ALA Connections Salons will be a free informal online discussion with Scott Nicholson an avid expert on gaming in libraries. Nicholson is an Associate Professor in the School of Information Studies at Syracuse University and the Chief Scientist of the Library Game Lab of Syracuse. In addition to gaming, Scott’s interests include the assessment of library services through data mining and participatory librarianship. Nicholson is also the host of the Board Games with Scott video series, the On Board Games podcast and the Gaming in Libraries podcast.

Like European discussion salons, the ALA Connections Salon provides a relaxed environment (online, of course) where ALA members can participate in formal and informal discussions centered around a timely topic.

Host: American Library Association

Location: ALA OPAL 100-Seat Online Room

More information at http://www.opal-online.org/index.html

Editorial about National Gaming at your Library Day event

Nov. 15th was National Gaming at your Library Day. The Library Game Lab has been working with the ALA to assess the impact of the event.

There was an editorial in the Roanoke Times where a correspondent went to the event. It captures well the reasons and flavor of the event:

http://www.roanoke.com/editorials/trejbal/wb/185187

Talks at Gaming, Learning, and Libraries conference

Scott will be giving two talks at the upcoming Gaming, Learning, and Libraries symposium.

On Sunday, Nov. 16th, Scott will be talking about the 2007 Gaming Census data, comparing it to the data from 2006.

On Monday, Nov. 17th, Scott will be joining Chris Harris and Brian Meyer to do a Late Night Talk Show about games. Scott will be the Big Game hunter with ways to catch a gamer.

Scott’s Stuff about the Game Lab and Rock Band 2

Here’s an episode of Scott’s Stuff showing the Game Lab in action and a little about Rock Band 2:

Scott’s Stuff video about the Library Game Lab

I do a regular video blog called Scott’s Stuff where I talk about various aspects of my life - games, libraries, academia, travel, etc.

Here’s a 6-minute video that is an introduction to the Library Game Lab project:

Games in Libraries Podcast, August 2008

The August 2008 episode of the Games in Libraries podcast has been posted. You can find it at the Games in Libraries site at

http://www.gamesinlibraries.org/?p=9

Article in the New Times

There was an article about gaming at the Fayetteville, NY library with some discussion of the Library Game Lab work at

http://www.syracusenewtimes.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2135&Itemid=147

2007 Gaming Census Survey announcement

—Please distribute to other lists as appropriate–

Announcing the 2007 Gaming Census!

This is an annual survey done by Dr. Scott Nicholson, associate professor at Syracuse University’s School of Information Studies, and is designed to collect information about gaming programs run in libraries in 2007. This can be any type of game (board, card, video, chess, puzzle) at any type of library (public, school, academic, or special). The focus is on gaming programs, where the libraries schedule an event of some type featuring games, and on gaming programs that were run sometime during the 2007 calendar year.

You can take this survey at

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=64bf17n2mW5s4QdKL6ctxg_3d_3d

until the end of July.

Data from last year’s census has been valuable in helping us to understand how libraries are using gaming and to get funding for other gaming programs. Adding data about your institution to our census will help us better understand how libraries are using data. You can see the publications that have used this data at http://gamelab.syr.edu/publications/ . The results from this survey will be presented at the 2008 Gaming, Learning, and Libraries Symposium.

Questions? Contact Scott Nicholson at srnichol@syr.edu

Recording of Games and Gaming MIG available

I was the convener of the Games and Gaming MIG at ALA Annual, and recorded the meeting. You can listen to an edited version of that recording at

http://www.gamesinlibraries.org/?p=7