I’m blogging about it because it told me to.

At least, this is the conclusion I reach in my review of McKenzie Wark’s Gamer Theory, published as part of my Off the Grid column on Joystiq. Wark developed the hypertext version of Gamer Theory first, later including the first round’s comments and criticisms into a print-based version published by Harvard University Press. In tandem with the dead-tree issuing, he also introduced Gamer Theory Version 2.0, which re-opens the commenting system for the digital text.

The result of this dual-publication is the inevitable comparison between the two mediums. In my opinion, hypertext clearly comes out on top. The text is made stronger by its original format, and the accompanying commentary serves the text better when offered simultaneously, rather than being pushed to an endnotes section.

Arguably, however, the hypertext version is stronger because the content was originally conceived as hypertext. And Wark has already commented on my review, stating that “are supposed to be different reading experiences. The former stresses the role of the comments more while the later ‘hides’ them a bit to produce a more linear reading feel.”

Still, I do wish that Wark experimented more with the print medium, rather than intentionally working within convention. His decision though. Wark’s (hopefully) coming to Bard toward the end of the month for a small conference on games and conflict. I look forward to meeting him.

Also, the senior project is done. I plan on posting some of the material on my site in due time. I’ve already looked into installing MediaWiki, and my host doesn’t support it (yet).

Here’s something I’d like to add to this site, once my Bard senior project is good and done: The Scottypedia.

What is the Scottypedia? Well, to explain it best, here’s a quote from me:

The Scottypedia is a MediaWiki encyclopedic website, in the style of Wikipedia, and editable only by me, Scott Jon Siegel. Rather than articles being objective, they will instead be entirely subjective, based solely on my opinion of various topics, such as games, music, television, technology, and family and friends.

There you have it. On a more intellectual level, the project would an undertaking in a personalized encyclopedia, a unique method of recording and presenting biographical information about me on the internet. On a less intellectual level, it’s a totally self-important, egotistical endeavor, which will likely never get off the ground due to (oh, I don’t know…) minor technical issues with getting MediaWiki to run on the server.

Has this been done before? Probably. Will I do it this time? Maybe. Either way, I’ll keep you posted. Back to sproj I go.

In a haze of clicking around, I stumbled across Khoi Vinh’s web site, and his post on a talk given recently at SXSW in Texas. The focus of the talk was the use of grids in visual design. I started reading it without realizing that Khoi’s the guy responsible for this recent redesign. That just made me read closer.

His post (which was so good I’m linking to it twice) talks about a theoretical redesign of yahoo.com using grids, and he includes the slides from his SXSW presentation on the topic. A lot of what he talks about is working within certain constraints, such as an average display resolution, and the various ad units which have to be taken into consideration in the design. He says the following:

Ad units complicate things, but they’re actually very helpful because they serve as fixed constraints.

Constraints are the mother of design invention.

How awesome is that?! His slides were awe-inspiring, and have already taken root in my brain. I love when stuff does that.

It’s true. I’ve become one of those people that has a del.icio.us account and incorporates it into their blog. I’m one them, now.

I have to say that, apart from any gripes to be had with the complexity of the URL (”del, icio, us” is how I remember it), del.icio.us is one the most useful pieces of web tech that I’ve ever used, which is most likely why it’s so famous and stuff.

If you’re unaccquainted with the site, allow me to give a brief rundown. del.icio.us is one of several “social bookmarking” sites, or what I call “aggregate” sites. Aggregate sites cull their content entirely from their users, making them 100% dependent on community. If an aggregate site does not have a community of users publishing, then it has no content, and therefore no readership. In order to quickly overcome this hurdle, Netscape.com — old site, new aggregate — decided to pay top bookmarkers from other sites to begin bookmarking for Netscape instead. Other sites, such as Digg, Reddit, and my buddy del.icio.us, have relied on word-of-mouth to build wide-reaching communities of “social bookmarkers.”

Though the aesthetic and implementation may differ, the basic idea of social bookmarking is always the same. Users submit websites, articles, or basically any URL of interest to them, often associating it with a number of categories, or “tags.” The more users that link to a specific URL, the more likely it is that that specific URL will appear on the aggregate’s main site. In this way, featured news is determined by popularity. Sites with hierarchical membership (read: older, or well-respected users are better than newer ones) often rely more heavily on high-level users (like Netscape’s “Navigators”) to determine what stories will appear on the front page.

The term “social bookmarking” suggests that aggregate sites are a community-based evolution of the browser-based bookmarks, which is accurate. Now, instead of adding an interesting link I found to a pile of bookmarks that I’ll never look at again, I tag it and throw it on my del.icio.us site. Tagging allows me to organize the list of links by a number of topics (games, gamedev, gamedesign, play, bunnies, etc.). Because it’s online and public, my bookmarks can easily be seen by my friends and family (and anyone else who happens upon my site). At the same time, it preserves a list of topics of interest to me, allowing me to go back to them over time. Kevin Slavin refers to his del.icio.us account as “his virtual brain,” and at this point I’m inclined to agree.

If you’re a fan of aggregating (or you think newspaper clippings are cool but outdated), you should look into setting up a del.icio.us account. It’s free, and is surprisingly fun. And be sure to check out my del.icio.us links in the left sidebar and on my del.icio.us site.

There. That is the last I will mention of it.