User:Peach/peach-project

I have a general idea on what interests me and what I can focus my study on. It lies somewhere at the intersection of online culture, social media, access to information and politics. I'm interested in the way social media is used as a news outlet, especially in situations where mainstream news outlets are unreliable. I'm also interested in how fake news, as well as conspiracy theories spread. And I'm interested in the ways information is distorted on the internet, by trolls, brands, governments, people themselves. If I had to summarize all this, I think I would say "I'm interested in censorship and propoganda." This interest was a combination of growing up as a very online teenager and in a country where freedom of expression and access to reliable news was gradually eroding. I developed a sense of curiosity, and maybe also cynicism towards every new piece of information I came across on the internet. I understood the importance of fact checking first when I got clowned for not knowing what I'm talking about online and then on nationwide protests, where no major news outlets were doing any reporting and the only place to get accurate information that could keep one safe from pepper spray and police brutality was twitter, which was riddled with false information to incite chaos.

This is also the first project where I really delve into the intersection of politics and my field of study. I started my bachelor study as a visual artist, but when I graduated I was more interested in the social impact of design and the the profit oriented mentality in most design fields frustrated me. I'm obsessed with doing "useful" or "good" work,

September 22 - Session With Aymeric

-We discussed our projects, what we did in summer and why we chose the specific subjects.
-We also talked about the project proposal, which is due the end of 1st trimester.

• The proposal will determine if we have a solid foundation dor a master project.
• The proposal shouldn't get too speculative, and develop in parallel with prototyping and research.
• It's important to frame which direction we want to go as soon as possible. Setting a clear goal is important.

September 23

I'm thinking about possible mediums to work with and games are one of them. Interactivity can be a useful tool to get a message across. I really liked Depression Quest for the way it uses the medium of a text based adventure game to give the player an understanding of living with depression, and achieves this primarily through manipulation of basic principles of text based adventure games. Another game I like is 2:22 AM. It evokes the feeling of watching TV past my bedtime when I was a kid. It's not that related to my study but I think it's cool which is why I want to write it down here.

September 25 - Notes From Session With Michael

-Medium: I was going back and forth between factual documentation and interactive storytelling (like text based adventures as mentioned earlier) and now it's pretty clear to me that I want to work on an interactive medium.

-Recognition and empathy: An important aspect of my project is to familiarize people with the ways access to information is limited by governments. My aim isn't to expose the censorship of a specific country but expose the way censorship itself works, the way propoganda and misinformation is disseminated and hopefully make the audience more aware of these tactics in their own contexts. I also want to dispel the myth that some countries are ruled by oppressive regimes because of certain aspects of the public such as education level and therefore governments in developed countries would never intervene with the right of free speech.

-Connection through experience: I think role playing games can be an important tool for building empathy. There are games that attempt to put player in the shoes of people who experience hardship and convey the frustration through forcing the player to make hard decisions or making sensible actions unavailable, leaving the player with choices that will only make things worse for them in the long run. Depression Quest puts the player character in situations such as being invited to a party. The player can force themselves to attend to the party and feel very emotionally drained, or can go home and spend the night alone, comfortable but also isolated. The option to go to the party and enjoying it is also visible but not available. Grayscale is a game in the form of the inbox of a temp worker in the HR department of a company. The game forces the player to deal with sexual harassment and toxic a toxic workplace, forcing the player to choose between doing whats right and keeping their job. These simulations of real life experiences can be a much more effective learning experience than just reading statistics.

-Sincerity and relatability: A big concern for me in this project is relatability. I want to make a genuinely convincing and informative work and not something only for people of certain political alignment. I don't want the story to feel like a hyperbole and if there are to be hard choices I genuinely want the player to struggle with them.