Good computer and video games like System Shock 2, Deus Ex, Pikmin, Rise of Nations, Neverwinter Nights, and Xenosaga: Episode 1 are learning machines. They get themselves learned and learned well, so that they get played long and hard by a great many people. This is how they and their designers survive and perpetuate themselves. If a game cannot be learned and even mastered at a certain level, it won't get played by enough people, and the company that makes it will go broke. Good learning in games is a capitalist-driven Darwinian process of selection of the fittest. Of course, game designers could have solved their learning problems by making games shorter and easier, by dumbing them down, so to speak. But most gamers don't want short and easy games. Thus, designers face and largely solve an intriguing educational dilemma, one also faced by schools and workplaces: how to get people, often young people, to learn and master something that is long and challenging--and enjoy it, to boot.

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What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy

From the Publisher: 
A Question of Identity 
Life on the Screen is a fascinating and wide-ranging investigation of the impact of computers and networking on society, peoples' perceptions of themselves, and the individual's relationship to machines. Sherry Turkle, a Professor of the Sociology of Science at MIT and a licensed psychologist, uses Internet MUDs (multi-user domains, or in older gaming parlance multi-user dungeons) as a launching pad for explorations of software design, user interfaces, simulation, artificial intelligence, artificial life, agents, "bots," virtual reality, and "the on-line way of life." 
Turkle's discussion of postmodernism is particularly enlightening. She shows how postmodern concepts in art, architecture, and ethics are related to concrete topics much closer to home, for example AI research (Minsky's "Society of Mind") and even MUDs (exemplified by students with X-window terminals who are doing homework in one window and simultaneously playing out several different roles in the same MUD in other windows). Those of you who have (like me) been turned off by the shallow, pretentious, meaningless paintings and sculptures that litter our museums of modern art may have a different perspective after hearing what Turkle has to say. 
This is a psychoanalytical book, not a technical one. However, software developers and engineers will find it highly accessible because of the depth of the author's technical understanding and credibility. Unlike most other authors in this genre, Turkle does not constantly jar the technically-literate reader with blatant errors or bogus assertions about how things work. Although I personally don't have time or patience for MUDs,view most of AI as snake-oil, and abhor postmodern architecture, I thought the time spent reading this book was an extremely good investment.

스크린 위의 삶 = Life on the screen : identity in the age of the internet

The configuration of developed countries has become today diverse and multiethnic due to international migration. A single coherent theoretical explanation for international migration is lacking. The aim of this discussion was the generation and integration of current theories that clarify basic assumptions and hypotheses of the various models. Theories were differentiated as explaining the initiation of migration and the perpetuation of international movement. Initiation theories discussed were 1) macro theories of neoclassical economics; 2) micro theories of neoclassical economics; 3) the new economics with examples for crop insurance markets futures markets unemployment insurance and capital markets; 4) dual labor market theory and structural inflation motivational problems economic dualism and the demography of labor supply; and 5) world systems theory and the impacts of land raw materials labor material links ideological links and global cities. Perpetuation theories were indicated as network theories of declining risks and costs; institutional theory cumulative causation through distribution of income and land organization of agrarian production culture of migration regional distribution of human capital and social labeling factors; and migration systems theory. The assumptions and propositions of these theories although divergent were not inherently contradictory but had very different implications for policy formulation. The policy decisions over the next decades will be very important and carry with them the potential for misunderstanding and conflict. Policy options based on the explicated models range from regulation by changing wages and employment conditions in destination countries or promoting development in countries of origin to changing structural market economic relations.

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Theories of international migration: a review and appraisal.

The field of information systems is premised on the centrality of information technology in everyday socio-economic life. Yet, drawing on a review of the full set of articles published inInformation Systems Research ( ISR) over the past ten years, we argue that the field has not deeply engaged its core subject matter--the information technology (IT) artifact. Instead, we find that IS researchers tend to give central theoretical significance to the context (within which some usually unspecified technology is seen to operate), the discrete processing capabilities of the artifact (as separable from its context or use), or the dependent variable (that which is posited to be affected or changed as technology is developed, implemented, and used). The IT artifact itself tends to disappear from view, be taken for granted, or is presumed to be unproblematic once it is built and installed. After discussing the implications of our findings, we propose a research direction for the IS field that begins to take technology as seriously as its effects, context, and capabilities. In particular, we propose that IS researchers begin to theorize specifically about IT artifacts, and then incorporate these theories explicitly into their studies. We believe that such a research direction is critical if IS research is to make a significant contribution to the understanding of a world increasingly suffused with ubiquitous, interdependent, and emergent information technologies.

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Research Commentary: Desperately Seeking the IT in IT Research--A Call to Theorizing the IT Artifact

This essay elaborates a critical geographical perspective on neoliberalism that emphasizes (a) the path–dependent character of neoliberal reform projects and (b) the strategic role of cities in the contemporary remaking of political–economic space. We begin by presenting the methodological foundations for an approach to the geographies of what we term “actually existing neoliberalism.” In contrast to neoliberal ideology, in which market forces are assumed to operate according to immutable laws no matter where they are “unleashed,” we emphasize the contextual embeddedness of neoliberal restructuring projects insofar as they have been produced within national, regional, and local contexts defined by the legacies of inherited institutional frameworks, policy regimes, regulatory practices, and political struggles. An adequate understanding of actually existing neoliberalism must therefore explore the path–dependent, contextually specific interactions between inherited regulatory landscapes and emergent neoliberal, market–oriented restructuring projects at a broad range of geographical scales. These considerations lead to a conceptualization of contemporary neoliberalization processes as catalysts and expressions of an ongoing creative destruction of political–economic space at multiple geographical scales. While the neoliberal restructuring projects of the last two decades have not established a coherent basis for sustainable capitalist growth, it can be argued that they have nonetheless profoundly reworked the institutional infrastructures upon which Fordist–Keynesian capitalism was grounded. The concept of creative destruction is presented as a useful means for describing the geographically uneven, socially regressive, and politically volatile trajectories of institutional/spatial change that have been crystallizing under these conditions. The essay concludes by discussing the role of urban spaces within the contradictory and chronically unstable geographies of actually existing neoliberalism. Throughout the advanced capitalist world, we suggest, cities have become strategically crucial geographical arenas in which a variety of neoliberal initiatives—along with closely intertwined strategies of crisis displacement and crisis management—have been articulated.

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Cities and the Geographies of “Actually Existing Neoliberalism”

Paths Towards T h e I n f o r m a t i o n a l Society: A Comparative Analysis o f the T r a n s f o r m a t i o n o f E m p l o y m e n t Structure i n the G-7 Countries, M a n u e l C as tells Y u k o Aoyama Working Paper 61 March 1993 Manuel Castells is Professor of Plnnning at the University of California, Berkeley, and a Senior Fellow at BRIE. Yuko Aoyama is i n the Ph.D. Program in the Department of City and Regional Planning, University of California, Berkeley. Research and work on this paper was supported by the University of California, Berkeley, Committee on Research. Dissemination of this paper is made possible by a grant from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

Paths Towards The Informational Society: A Comparative Analysis of the Transformation of Employment Structure in the G-7 Countries, 1920-2005

Innovation about Innovating

Fernando Cardoso - Head of the Chair for Political Science, University of San Paulo. Address: Caixa Postal 66281, 05311-970, Sao Paulo-SP, Brazil.Martin Carnoy - Professor of Education, Stanford University. Address: 450 Serra Mall, Stanford, CA, 94305-2004, USA.Manuel Castells - Head of the Chair for Communication Technologies and Society, University of Southern California. Address: Los Angeles, CA, 90089, USA.Stephen Cohen - Professor, University of California (Berkeley). Address: Berkeley, CA 94720, USA.Alain Touraine - Research Director, l’Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, University of Paris. Address: 47, Rue des Ecoles, Paris, Cedex 05, 75230, France.In January 1992, professor Manuel Castells advised the Russian government to organize consultations with leading foreign researchers on the prospects of the country’s social and economic development. At that time, M. Castells already had a reputation as one of the most renowned sociologists of his time. He was, as well, the director of the Institute for Sociology of New Technologies, a professor of sociology (urban and regional planning) at the Universidad Autonoma de Madrid and a professor at the University of California (Berkeley). Along with his great experience of scientific work and teaching, he was also highly recognized as an advisor and consultant to a number of governments across the world.Once the preliminary agreements had been reached, where M. Castells agreed to organize a group of experts for the consultations without asking for any compensation, Ovsey Shkaratan, a friend and consultant to the Russian government, communicated this information to the state secretary, Gennady Bourboulis, for further introduction to President Boris Yeltsin. Unfortunately, the negotiations took quite a while due to a rather sharp situation in Russia at that time. This is why the experts could only meet up in Moscow from the 27th of March to the 2nd of April, 1992.The group of experts, apart from M. Castells himself, consisted of four other highly recognized professionals in the field. One of them was professor Fernando Henrique Cardoso, who at that time was a Brazilian senator and would become Brazil’s president. He was one of the founders and leaders of Brazil’s social-democratic party. In his professorship, F. Cardoso taught in Stanford, Berkley, Cambridge, Paris-Nanterre and his native San-Paulo. From 1982-1987 he was the president of International Sociological Association.Professor Alain Touraine came to represent the elder generation of the most outstanding sociologists, political scientists and philosophers of the 20th century. He was a director for the French Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales and the chief editor of ‘Sociology of Labour’ journal. Professor A. Touraine worked as a visiting professor to a number of leading universities across the world and was well known for his opposition to totalitarianism, Nazism and any form of social oppression. He consulted and supported the Polish ‘Solidarity’ movement. A. Touraine is also one of the authors of the ‘post-industrial society’ concept.Stephen Cohen, a professor from Berkeley University, also joined the group of consultants to represent the economic side. He worked quite a lot as an advisor on foreign affairs and strategies to such organizations as the OECD, French, Italian and Spanish governments, the US White House, the US Congress Joint Economic Committee and a number of large corporations in the USA, Europe and Japan. His publications mostly concern the world economy and national models of economic development.The last, but not the least member of this group was Professor Martin Carnoy from Stanford University, who is well known for his research in the field of education and human resources. At that time, he was the chair of the Stanford International Development Education Center and a member of the National US Population Council. His books concerned the problems of education in the Third World, education and labor, economic modernization of China, etc.The results of the highly intensive work by this group of experts have been included in the final report to be presented as a an exclusive document to the Russian government in 1992. This document is being published in this issue to introduce the audience to an alternative version of reforms proposed by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. These were available, yet were unjustly disregarded by the government.

Report to the Russian Government of the International Advisory Group on the Social and Political Problems of Economic Reform and Structural Transition in Russia

Michel Wieviorka « Revolutions » dans plusieurs pays du monde arabe et musulman, mouvements d’ « indignes » dans de nombreuses societes du monde occidental. Qu’est-ce qui fait unite ou diversite dans ces luttes ? Manuel Castells Ce qui me semble significatif, et sur la base de mes observations empiriques, c’est que, tout en ayant lieu dans des contextes institutionnels et culturels extremement divers, ces pratiques presentent des traits communs fondamentaux. Nous sommes en face de nouveaux ty...

L’unité des grandes contestations contemporaines. Débat animé par Michel Wieviorka, à Paris, le 14 mai 2013

‘Urban problems’ are increasingly becoming a political issue as the socialisation of the means of production is accompanied by the increasing socialisation of the means of consumption, or, if one prefers, from the moment collective facilities begin to play a strategic role in the structure and rhythms of everyday life.

Manuel Castells

Papers

Paths Towards The Informational Society: A Comparative Analysis of the Transformation of Employment Structure in the G-7 Countries, 1920-2005

Innovation about Innovating

Report to the Russian Government of the International Advisory Group on the Social and Political Problems of Economic Reform and Structural Transition in Russia

L’unité des grandes contestations contemporaines. Débat animé par Michel Wieviorka, à Paris, le 14 mai 2013

Urban Renewal and Social Conflict