http://mashable.com/2015/01/19/super-mario-artificial-intelligence/
A team of German researchers has used artificial intelligence to create a “self-aware” version of Super Mario who can respond to verbal commands and automatically play his own game.
Artificial Intelligence helps Mario play his own game
Students at the University of Tubingen have used Mario as part of their efforts to find out how the human brain works.
The cognitive modelling unit claim their project has generated “a fully functional program” and “an alive and somewhat intelligent artificial agent”.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/30879456
Can Super Mario Save Artificial Intelligence?
The most popular approaches today focus on Big Data, or mimicking humansthat already know how to do some task. But sheer mimicry breaks down when one gives a machine new tasks, and, as I explained a few weeks ago, Big Data approaches tend to excel at finding correlations without necessarily being able to induce the rules of the game. If Big Data alone is not a powerful enough tool to induce a strategy in a complex but well-defined game like chess, then that’s a problem, since the real world is vastly more open-ended, and considerably more complicated.
http://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/can-super-mario-save-artificial-intelligence
Games in the library
bibliography and research
http://scottnicholson.com/pubs/index.html
Playing in the Past: A History of Games, Toys, and Puzzles in North American Libraries
Author(s): Scott Nicholson
Source: The Library Quarterly, Vol. 83, No. 4 (October 2013), pp. 341-361
Published by: The University of Chicago Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/671913
demonstrate the different ways in which libraries have used games, toys, and puzzles over the last 150 years through bothcollections and services
p, 342 Defining games –
p. 348 Games as the Subject of Collections\
p. 350A significant shift in academic libraries is a focus on providing services to students. Since agrowing number of academic publications both current issues and back volumes
are ac-cessible online through library subscriptions, the physical space of academic libraries is notneeded for collections of periodicals. The concept of the “learning commons”has become
popular on US campuses in the past decade; it combines traditional library resources and
the availability of library staff members with group work spaces, computer access and assis-
tance, and writing assistance to provide one place where students can get assistance with
course work. In addition, many of these learning commons also include cafes, social spaces,
and other support of the social lives of students, and it is in this role that academic libraries
provide access to collections of games.
p. 357 Another upcoming area of gaming in libraries is gamification. Gamification is the application of game design elements to a nongame setting ðDeterding et al. 2011Þ.
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Nicholson, S. (2013, June). Exploring Gamification Techniques for Classroom Management. Paper Presented at Games+Learning+Society 9.0, Madison, WI
The concept of meaningful gamification is that the primary use of game layers is not to provide
external rewards, but rather to help participants find a deeper connection to the underyling topic
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More on games in education in this blog
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/?s=games
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/?s=gaming
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/?s=gamification
MOOC and Libraries
http://explore.tandfonline.com/content/bes/moocsandlibraries
New ACRL Discussion Group—Library Support for MOOCs
Libraries in the Time of MOOCs
http://www.educause.edu/ero/article/libraries-time-moocs
issues related to MOOCs, such as intellectual property rights, privacy issues, and state regulations.
MOOCs have arrived on the scene at a time when many institutions of higher learning are in extreme financial crisis
OCLC conference, “MOOCs and Libraries: Massive Opportunity or Overwhelming Challenge? http://www.oclc.org/research/events/2013/03-18.html
The MOOC movement might change this copyright-ownership contract between university and faculty.
Stephens, M. m., & Jones, K. L. (2014). MOOCs as LIS Professional Development Platforms: Evaluating and Refining SJSU’s First Not-for-Credit MOOC. Journal Of Education For Library & Information Science, 55(4), 345-361.
http://login.libproxy.stcloudstate.edu/login?qurl=http%3a%2f%2fsearch.ebscohost.com%2flogin.aspx%3fdirect%3dtrue%26db%3dllf%26AN%3d99055676%26site%3deds-live%26scope%3dsite
xMOOCs. Using centralized learning platforms (e.g., Coursera),they emphasize individual learning usingautomated assessment tools.In contrast, cMOOCs stress the relationship between course content and a community of learners. Social learning, in thecase of cMOOCs, is emphasized through uses of distributed tools (e.g., a combination of a course site, student blogs, andsocial etworking sites) to build networks of knowledge and learners. Unlike their xMOOC counterparts, the role of an in istructor in a cMOOC is to be a “guide on the side,” a facilitator of the knowledge making process who uses connectivist learning theory (Siemens, 2004; Siemens,2012)
Learning 2.0 programs, also known as“23 Things,” have offered online technology-focused professional development for library staff and could be considered an early version of LIS-focused MOOCs (Stephens, 2013a). Utilizing concepts such as self-directed learning, play, and an emphasis on lifelong learning, these programs have been offered for individual libraries as well as consortial and state level iterations to reach thousands of library staff.
The course structure of the MOOCversion of the HL incorporated content updated from the SLIS course by the coinstructors. Ten modules were scheduled over a twelve-week “semester.” Students
could earn a certificate of completion, if they finished three of five artifact-based assignments of their choosing, in addition to blogging and participating in an end-of-course virtual symposium. The weekly schedule is available in Appendix A, and assignment descriptions are available in Appendix B
utilizing concepts such as self-directed learning, play, and an emphasis on lifelong learning, these programs have been offered for individual libraries as well as consortial and state level iterations to reach thousands of library staff. Benefits to staff include increased comfort with emerging technologies and an increased desire to continue learning (p. 348).
Please have a list of free and SCSU hosted resources for lecture capturing:
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/2013/10/31/mnscu-mediaspace-aka-kaltura/
http://media4.stcloudstate.edu
http://www.techsmith.com/jing.html
Other free, shareware and paid sources in our former IMS blog entry:
https://blog.stcloudstate.edu/ims/2013/10/24/whiteboard-screencasting-apps-please-enter-your-choices-and-suggestions/
The Awesome Power of Gaming in Higher Education
EDUCAUSE 2013 welcomes Jane McGonigal and considers the potential of games in education.
http://www.edtechmagazine.com/higher/article/2013/10/awesome-power-gaming-higher-education
The University of Washington’s Foldit game enables anyone to contribute to scientific research through virtual protein folding. The university’s game developers posit that human gamers’ propensity to not give up on a gaming task – resiliency – make them much more adept at solving complex protein structure prediction and design than supercomputers. And in some ways, they’ve already proven that to be so. Foldit game participants have been named in several published scientific journal articles, including one that describes how a protein structure could be solved and used in the treatment of HIV.
The rich, interactive universe of Grand Theft Auto was the inspiration for this game, developed for The World Bank as a way to teach Sub-Sahara African youths to solve social problems in ways that also could provide a sustainable living. The platform is free and available online and can be used by schools to teach social entrepreneurship. A graphic novel serves as the game’s centerpiece, and players build out their gaming profiles as a comic or graphic novel might retell a superhero’s origin story. Participants complete projects in real life to solve real problems, such as securing a community’s food supply or establishing a sustainable power source, then progress through levels of the game. Those who successfully complete their 10-week missions ultimately earn certification from the World Bank Institute. In 2010, 50 student participants saw their entrepreneurship models funded by the World Bank, including Libraries Across Africa (now Librii), a franchise operating in Ghana.
Not all games must be played out in a virtual space. This game – developed by McGonigal with Natron Baxter and Playmatics – combines real-world missions with virtual clues and online collaboration, resulting in young people working together overnight in the New York Public Library to write and publish a book of personal essays about what they learned.
“The game is designed to empower young people to find their own futures by bringing them face-to-face with the writings and objects of people who made an extraordinary difference.”
Participants spend a night wandering throughout the library’s stacks and research materials, scanning QR codes to prove they found and interacted with the objects of their clues or missions. One 2011 participant, upon discovering the library’s early draft of the Declaration of Independence wrote an essay called a “Declaration of Interdependence.”
More on Jane McGonigal on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZjSVo8N31r4
http://www.ted.com/talks/jane_mcgonigal_gaming_can_make_a_better_world.html
http://www.ted.com/talks/jane_mcgonigal_the_game_that_can_give_you_10_extra_years_of_life.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5t3y7EeBhxg