This document discusses a student project to create a mobile game interpreting ruins and a glass house. It provides links to student blogs about the project. It includes screenshots from a prototype and discusses what elements of the project are significant - the student reports, storyboards, and reflections, rather than the app itself. It also discusses how meaning and significance can be found in artifacts and their documentation.

1. SIGNIFYING &
SIGNIFICANCE
REFLECTIONS ON A STUDENT PROJECT TO
INTERPRET RUINS AND A GLASS HOUSE IN
AS A MOBILE GAME

2. ARIS & MENOKIN:
NEW TECHNOLOGY FOR A
RENEWED HOUSE
A project by Laura Heiman & Caitlin Miller students in my
History and the Digital Age course. The course is a research
methods course for doctoral students at American university
and an elective for students in their Public History Master’s
program.
Caitlin Miller: http://www.dighist.org/2012/04/remembering-
rebecca-a-new-way-to-engage-with-historic-houses/
Laura Heiman :http://www.dighist.org/2012/02/aris-menokin-
new-technology-for-a-renewed-house/

6. SCREENSHOTS FROM
PROTOTYPE

7. SO
WHAT’S
SIGNIFICANT?
WHAT SHOULD WE KEEP AROUND? THE
APP, THE OS, THE GAME? THE
DOCUMENTATION? REFLECTIONS? THE
SCRIPT?

8. THE
APP IS
IRRELEVANT
AS FAR AS I’M CONCERNED ALL OF THE
THINGS THAT MATTER ABOUT THIS
PROJECT EXIST IN THEIR
REPORT, STORYBOARDS & REFLECTIONS

10. ON
MEANING &
MATERIALITY
IDENTIFYING WHAT MATTERS AND THEN
ATTENDING TO FACTS OF ITS EXISTENCE

11. WHAT IS THE
E.T. ATARI
GAME?
FROM IAN BOGOST’S ALIEN PHENOMENOLOGY: OR
WHAT IT’S LIKE TO BE A THING

12. THE E.T. ATARI GAME HAS AT LEAST 11
EXISTENCES, EACH OF WHICH ARE IMPLICATED IN
DIFFERENT ARTIFACTS
1. E.T. is 8 kilobytes of 6502 opcodes and operands,
2. E.T is also it’s sourcecode
3. E.T. is a flow of RF modulations that result from user input
4. E.T is a mask ROM, memory etched on a wafer.
5. E.T. is a molded plastic cartridge
6. E.T is a consumer good, a product packaged in a box
7. E.T is a system of rules or mechanics that produce experience
8. E.T is an interactive experience players partake in
9. E.T is a unit of intellectual property that can be
owned, licensed, sold
10. E.T is a collectible, an out of print scarce object
11. E.T is a sign that depicts the video game crash of 1983

13. 1. ARTICULATE
SIGNIFICANCE
WHAT MATTERS ABOUT THIS? WHAT DOES
THIS WORK REPRESENT? TO WHOM DOES
IT MATTER? WHAT ABOUT IT MATTERS?

14. 2. IDENTIFY
WHERE THAT
SIGNIFICANCE
DOCUMENTED?
EVIDENCE OF MEANING MAY EXIST IN THE
ARTIFACT, IN A WAKE OF OTHER ARTIFACTS, OR IT
COULD EXIST IN AN ARTIFACT YOU CREATE (EX.
VIDEO OR AUDIO RECORDING OR A PHOTOGRAPH)

15. 3. ATTEND TO
FORENSIC
MATERIALITY
OF THAT THING
ONCE YOU’VE IDENTIFIED THE THING THAT HAS IN
IT TRACES OF WHAT MATTERS DO YOUR BEST TO
BE SURE YOU ARE DOING AS LITTLE AS POSSIBLE
TO THE QUALITIES OF THAT THING.