research topics?

[Nikos Batalas]

Hi all,

It would be interesting to hear what the members of this list think are the research questions relevant to the demoscene.
I'd love to have your thoughts on the subject.

all the best,
Nikos

[Anders Carlsson]

I've written about chipmusic and a bit about the scene as a
communication network. Personally, I think it would be interesting to
see more 'hands-on' research -- get statistics together and visualize
them. How about a text analysis of every scroll text ever written? :)

What's your topics of study?

-a

> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
> "Demo Research" group.
> To post to this group, send email to demore...@googlegroups.com.
> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to
> demoresearch...@googlegroups.com.
> For more options, visit this group at
> http://groups.google.com/group/demoresearch?hl=en.
>

[Marq]

On Feb 20, 2:57 pm, Nikos Batalas <amoivi...@gmail.com> wrote:
> It would be interesting to hear what the members of this list think are the
> research questions relevant to the demoscene.

There would be sooo many directions to take :) Personally I'd be
interested in the dawn of the demoscene (how crackers emerged), the
changes in scene artifacts and practices throughout the years,
demomaking as content production (tools, groupwork), migrations from a
platform to another, visual composition of demos, rhetorics of
demoscene discourse, the effect of hardware and software on demo art,
the experience of being in the scene, scene girls and the depiction of
women, group dynamics, and the process of joining/quitting the
community.

[Nikos Batalas]

On Sun, Feb 20, 2011 at 4:49 PM, Anders Carlsson <in...@goto80.com> wrote:

I've written about chipmusic and a bit about the scene as a
communication network. Personally, I think it would be interesting to
see more 'hands-on' research -- get statistics together and visualize
them. How about a text analysis of every scroll text ever written? :)

What's your topics of study?

I do not have anything solid on the matter. I would consider it however interesting to view the scene as an instance of a collaborative context and see if there is a concrete way to conduct studies in relation to this perspective.

[Antti Silvast]

Hi Nikos and others,

It would seem that there are many different approaches to our humble
scene. :) My PhD dissertation is not at all on the demoscene, but the
program I'm in has got lots of sociology of finance, science and
technology. From this, some interests:

- As a rule, demos are not sold. At the same time, the scene is surely not
without competition and striving for better products. One interesting
research question for me: What are demoscene 'markets' like? What are
their common 'currencies'? Which feats are competed about, and which not?
How do the sceners strive for perfect competition? Can we say that people
in the demoscene amass 'social capital'?

- Second more general question: what would technology uses be like if all
technology users were like the demosceners?

Best,

Antti

[robotski]

> I've written about chipmusic and a bit about the scene as a
> communication network. Personally, I think it would be interesting to
> see more 'hands-on' research -- get statistics together and visualize
> them. How about a text analysis of every scroll text ever written? :)

Anders, if I ever get to hold the chair in demoscene studies at our
university, first thing to do would be to employ a research assistant
for full-time extracting all demo scroll texts with a monitor. :) But
seriously, it would be a marvelous research basis to have them
accessible in a searchable database...

Nikos, my own thesis had the focus on the visual side of demos and the
way the scene deals with the computer as an artistic material.
Still I am most interested in the process of defining artistic quality
within the scene. For example I think it would be rewarding to
approach the scene from the perspective of game theory. Being both
socialized by computer technology and computer games, demosceners
don't behave much like free individual artists, but chose to play "by
the rules of the game", like self-set restrictions regarding tools,
filesizes and platforms. And they have always been able to adapt the
rules to keep the game going on. Maybe this would be a fitting
addition to Marq's diffusion of innovation theory? :)

[Antti Silvast]

Hi all,

Anders, I am fully in agreement with the need for hands-on studies: the
gathering of data, the making of conclusions, and the development of
methods. On the latter side...

First, about the text analysis of scroll texts. The database of these
would be a great resource. Is it too optimistic to think that the data
gathering might be, at least to extent, automated? I would think it is
possible identify text strings from demos' source code/data files, then
extract those to a database. Although it would probably still require a
lot of tinkering by a researcher, which would be a reason to hire a
research assistant as Daniel proposes. :)

On Nikos's ideas of demoscene as an instance of a collaborative context:
maybe one way to study it, though time consuming, would be to become a
practitioner in a demo group yourself. And/or discuss with people who are
novices to the scene. Then try to document the knowledge and practices
related to the collaborations. I think an ethnographic diary of that would
make for some interesting reading. The idea would be that a novice sees
these things kind of differently than a routinized scener...

Best regards,

Antti