Design Competition to Select Best Examples of Architecture and Public Places in Cyberspace

NEW YORK, September 19, 2005 --- While simulating acts of destruction may be the whole point for quite a few video game players, many gamers—specifically, those who participate in massively multiplayer online role-playing games, or virtual worlds—actually take great pleasure in building and designing things. Often, this pleasure lies in assuming the role of architect and building a house, terraforming a virtual landscape, or designing public space to be enjoyed by other participants. These virtual-world designers and architects are now invited to take part in a competition that will select the best examples of public spaces and structures in virtual worlds.

The State of Play Virtual Public Space Design Competition is sponsored by the State of Play, the annual conference on law, video games, and virtual worlds, presented by New York Law School’s Institute for Information Law & Policy, Harvard Law School’s Berkman Center for Internet and Society and Yale Law School’s Information Society Project. As part of this year’s conference, taking place on October 6–8 at New York Law School, a panel of professional architects, architectural theorists and game designers will select the designs, spaces and structures that best foster civic engagement, promote civil society, and strengthen the public sphere, while at the same time demonstrating artistic and aesthetic vision.

The judging panel includes Harvard University’s Nathan Glazer, renowned public intellectual and author of The Public Face of Architecture; Anne Beamish, architect and professor, University of Texas; Yehuda Kalay, architect and professor, University of California at Berkeley; Edward Valaukas, editor in chief, First Monday; and Helen Stuckey, curator, Australian Centre for the Moving Image. Submissions will be showcased at the State of Play III: Social Revolutions conference in October and form the centerpiece of a panel on public architecture in the metaverse.

Winning submissions as judged by the panel of experts will receive cash prizes and featured publication both on the State of Play Web site and in First Monday, the renowned Internet journal that in 2004 received more than six million hits. Details of prizes and the rules of entry are available on the State of Play Design Competition Web page here.

Makena Technologies, the company that created the virtual world There, has announced that it will match the cash prize amount if any of its Thereians wins a prize in the competition.

Entries are due on or before September 28, 2005.

The State of Play Web site can be found here.

Any questions concerning the competition rules should be directed to stateofplay@cyber.law.harvard.edu.