Mobile Social Technology & Alternate Reality Gaming (ARG)

A presentation to the Australian Film Television and Radio School

Mobile Social Technology & Alternate Reality Gaming (ARG)

Bob Hitching

Director of Technology, Xumii

22 April 2009Twitter: @hitching

Story or technology?

• The story comes first• However, “the medium is the message”

– New stories become possible using new media

• So let’s look at some mobile social technologies that will enable new forms of narrative– My objective today: convince you that some of your time

should be invested in keeping an eye on emerging mobile social technologies

• Then: my personal journey into an ARG– Why I have been sending pictures of sheep to strangers

in Paris using Twitter

Twitter - http://twitter.com

• Twitter is the simplest way for anyone to publish stuff– A Tweet is a 140 character update via SMS originally, then web, IM, email, iPhone

• Other users follow your tweets if they value your content. Tweets get published out to followers in real-time (originally by SMS)

• The hockey stick surprise is that many people are now sourcing lots of their information in this way• Old media is struggling to keep up. E.g. Susan Boyle, Ashton Kutcher, Oprah.

Truth or Fiction?

• Big challenge for old media• Big opportunity for ARGs?

There's a plane in the Hudson. I'm on the ferry going to pick up the people. Crazy.

Steve Jobs was rushed to ER after severe heart attack

Twittervision

• One example of a real-time publishing medium• Adds geography, but lacks any narrative threading

twitpic• Adds

pictures & credibility to Twitter

• Mostly mobile

• Extract GPS position from EXIF data

• 450k views of Hudson River plane crash

iPhone accelerometer

• Adds roll, pitch and yaw

Photosynth

• 2007: a Microsoft Labs demo that many thought was smoke and mirrors

• 2008: it actually works

Google Latitude

• Adds user location• Adds lots of privacy issues and

controls

Xumii - mobile social networking platform

• Plugs you into all your social networks (Facebook, MySpace, Windows Live, Google Talk, Yahoo Chat, more soon)• … and lets you real-time chat and share stuff (photos, gifts, videos, more soon) with all your friends using your

phone (Nokia, SonyEricsson, Motorola, iPhone, Android, Blackberry)

Video - 12seconds.tv and Qik.com

• 12seconds.tv does what it says on the tin• Qik.com is real-time mobile video streaming

Video synth

• Synthesis of multiple user generated videos into a single coherent visual thread

• … probably coming sooner than you might think– Remember the surprise of Google Earth, and

Google Maps Street View?

Checkpoint

• The medium is the message– Keeping an eye on emerging mobile social technologies

will allow us to create new forms of narrative

• Now, my personal experience with StarTrekARG– The narrative is still surfacing as I write this slide– My interpretation of characters and events is possibly

totally wrong, and probably influenced by me writing this presentation

– I’m now addicted so don’t take the piss– Let’s focus on how the technology has influenced the

story so far

Star Trek Dance Party

• Photos posted on the internet

http://thecobrasnake.com

• Some photos have been airbrushed to include website addresses, e.g. 01001111.com

http://01001111.com

• This website plays a flash movie of mostly static, but including some imagery from the upcoming movie

• and codes: Fe Ca Si Al which translate to more websites

Ca = http://0100001101100001.eu

• Variants of the flash movie, including an encrypted message which resolves to the IP address of another website …

http://97.74.158.186/

• This site (after a few days) displays a chat room conversation

• PHPChatUser2 mentions an intersection in Paris

PHPChatUser1: テスト中、テスト中。誰かいる？僕が時間より早いのはわかってるんだけど、誰か応答もらえた？ ____PHPChatUser1 has disconnected____ PHPChatUser2: Carrefour de la Rue de la Fédération et Rue de Presles ____PHPChatUser2 has disconnected____

http://bit.ly/2387-42• Someone called

Malak0 posts on LePost.fr that he has found a strange device at that precise location

• Bob’s contribution: it’s all about Kronenbourg lager (my link got 1,200 clicks over 3 days)

http://lepost.fr Lost & Found

• Malak0 asks for the owner to email him to arrange the return of the device• Emails reveal Malak0 could be playing the character of The Little Prince• Bob’s contribution; according to the Twitter API, Malak0 has a Twitter

account @MaLaK0 created at the same time, and is a student at Boston

Meanwhile, @aliceforrest700

• Character is Alice through the Looking Glass• Twitter seeded with hashtag #StarTrekARG• Bob’s contribution: if an ARG agency wanted to create some viral (and

measurable) buzz around a movie in Q1’09, of course they’d use Twitter!

http://97.74.158.186/ updated

• @PHPChatUser5 is common Twitter syntax• PHPChatUser1 … 5 are found to have Twitter accounts• Talk of posting locations and time … real-time mobile geo social

PHPChatUser5: I’ll post locations as I find the key fields. I’ll need you to go them exactly when I say.…PHPChatUser5: Pictures are tough here, but we must start sending each other the access points - @PHPChatUser5. Not sure yet how to get Ca’s – but the input site will soon be live for all our fixes, hopefully generates something that works.

Some observations

• Truth of Fiction: is Malak0 in-game or OOG?• Audience struggling with “old new media” forums

for communication– Signal / noise ratio is not good– Setting up wikis– Setting up live chats to talk faster

• Bob’s contribution: suggesting everyone move the conversation to Twitter– Actually FriendFeed would be better but Twitter is a

good first step into real-time social media

Game moves inside Twitter

• Game characters talking to each other on Twitter• Profile image contains an image of Johann Christoph Bayer, plus a

watermarked QR code which decodes to the message “APUS01:05”• APUS is a constellation of stars discovered by Johann Bayer

Audience moves inside Twitter• Game characters talking

with audience

• Massive viral distribution

• Measurable

• Potential for pictures, video, mobile, geo, etc.

• New forms of narrative?

[updated 22 April 8am]MaLaK0 posts a video of the device on YouTube

• The device has a QR code visible underneath…

Mobile Social Technology & Alternate Reality Gaming (ARG)

Bob Hitching

Director of Technology, Xumii

22 April 2009Twitter: @hitching

That’s all for today – any questions?Stay connected by following @hitching and #StarTrekARG