Justin Hall
justin@bud.com

PROFESSIONAL PROFILE

Justin Hall creates and explores stimulation and intimacy in digital culture. Active on the Internet since 1988, he began publishing his web site Justin's Links from the Underground in January 1994. Hall translated an enthusiasm for participatory technology into a career promoting social engagement with electronic media. His articles covering independent digital production, fringe interactivity, and ethics in new media have appeared in publications including New York Times, Rolling Stone, Wired Magazine, the South China Morning Post, and Salon. Hall has spoken on issues in digital culture to audiences in Europe, Asia and the Americas, including the Rand Corporation, Lollapalooza, the Canadian Film Center and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. Hall spent much of 2001-2003 living in Tokyo, expanding his understanding of electronic entertainment in Korea and Japan. Today, Hall is a regular contributor to a number of digital culture and gaming publications. In 2004, he enrolled in the first game design class at the University of Southern California's School of Cinema-Television, Interactive Media Division. There he is working to build the mythology of the near future onscreen.

EDUCATION

University of Southern California School of Cinema-Television, Los Angeles, CA

Interactive Media MFA

2004-2007 (projected)

Swarthmore College, Swarthmore, PA

Bachelor of Arts; self-designed special major: "Meaning, Context and Media"

Graduation date: June 1998

Activities: Created and taught "Web Ethics" class, lead "Sinners" web publishing tutorials, four year disk jockey and one year head of promotions at the college radio station, created "Two Fisted Features" unofficial film society, contributed articles to school newspaper, contributed poems and essays to student literary magazines, choreographed and performed an interpretive dance about the internet, held leadership positions in the college computer society, created "Meet the Prez" outreach program for the college's president.

Francis W. Parker High School, Chicago, IL

Graduation Date: June 1993; Valedictorian

EXPERIENCE

Freelance Writer (1995 - Present)

Articles, essays and interviews for a number of publications; highlights included in the publications section below.

The Creative Artists Agency, Beverly Hills, CA (2005-2006)

CAA is a leading talent agency.

New media research specialist; special projects and skunkworks.

TheFeature.com, Espoo, Finland (2000 - Present)

TheFeature.com is a Nokia-sponsored research site covering the mobile internet.

Columnist covering mobile entertainment: mobile phones, camera phones, and mobile game devices, with a special focus on games and mobile media technologies from East Asia.

Gamers.com / GX Media, Berkeley/Richmond, CA, (August 1999 - January 2001)

Gamers.com was a web portal covering both video games and traditional games.

Playstation Editor: researching game content and links, writing articles, interviewing gamers, game designers and game industry executives.

ZDTV, San Francisco, (April 1998 - October 1998)

ZDTV was the first North American cable television channel devoted to technology.

On-Air TV Host, "Web Workshop," weekly HTML tutorial and web education segment airing on national cable television. Wrote weekly articles for ZDTV web site.

Electric Minds, San Francisco (July 1996 - January 1997)

Started by author Howard Rheingold, Electric Minds was a virtual community portal - one of the ten best web sites of 1996, according to Time magazine.

"Keeper of the vision": researcher, columnist, web site design and production, online promotions, virtual community hosting.

HotWired, San Francisco (September 1994 - January 1995)

HotWired was Wired Magazine's web site, and the first large scale commercial web magazine.

Editorial Assistant: fact checking, net surfing, interfacing with contributors, assistant to Executive Editor Howard Rheingold, web site design and production duties, online promotions.

Wired Magazine, San Francisco (June 1994 - August 1994)

Wired Magazine was the self-proclaimed official media organ of the digital revolution during the mid-1990s.

Internship in the online department: web site design and production.

Justin's Links from the Underground (January 1994 - Present)

Composed one of the early successful personal web pages on the internet; featured in The New Yorker, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and in the documentary Home Page, shown at Sundance. A more extensive list of print and academic citations for Justin's Links is available online at www.links.net/re/print/.

PRESENTATIONS

Dozens of presentations for audiences in Europe, Asia and the Americas. Some highlights include:

• Panelist, "Design and Ethics," Industrial Design Society of America conference, San Francisco, April 2004
  
• Guest Lecturer, Global Communications class, New York University, February 2004
  
• Panelist, "Youth and Technology Symposium," Qwest Communications, New York, February 2004
  
• Moderator, Panel: "Game Gems from Asia," E3 Expo, Los Angeles, May 2003
  
• Keynote, "How has inventory management in computer role-playing games affected the way I pack?" Austin Game Developers, Austin, Texas, 10 March 2003
  
• Keynote, "A Life in Games," Nokia WinterConference, Gstaad Switzerland, January 2003
  
• Guest Lecturer: "Law in Virtual Worlds" class, Stanford Law School, California, Spring 2003
  
• Presenter, "I-Mode and Asian Mobile Culture," South by Southwest, Austin, March 2002
  
• Keynote, "A Life Online," Reboot 4.0, Copenhagen, May 2001
  
• Moderator, Panel: "Gaming: A Cultural Legacy," E3 Expo, Los Angeles, May 2001
  
• Keynote, "Game Forms: A Cultural Study of Electronic Entertainment," Interactive Arena, Canadian Film Centre, February 2001
  
• Festival Curator: "Consolizing the Web," Digital Storytelling Festival, Crested Butte, September 1999
  
• Emcee, Webzine '99 - Independent Online Publishing, San Francisco, July 1999
  
• Instructor, "Five Day Digital Storytelling Workshop," Space Invaders Digital Academy, Copenhagen, May 1999
  
• Film presenter, Sundance Film Festival, Park City Utah, January 1999
  
• Keynote, "HyperTextBooks," Links98 Education and IT Conference, Stockholm, Sweden, October 1998
  
• Panelist, "Youth and Media" for 20 goes 2000, UNESCO Conference, Modern Museum, Stockholm, Sweden, March 1998
  
• Participant, "New Media, New Landscapes," San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, February 1997
  
• Presenter, The Lab/Third Stage, Lollapalooza, San Francisco, August 18, 1995
  
• Presenter, SIGKids Digital Circus, SIGGRAPH, Los Angeles, August 8, 1995
  
• Speaker, "Journalist of the Future," News Industries & Journalism/Preparing for 2010 Think Tank, Rand Corporation, June 13, 1995

A full list of presentations is available at www.links.net/share/speak/ .

PUBLICATIONS

Dozens of articles for online and print publications. Some highlights include:

23 November 2004 - Gamasutra - The State Of Church: Doug Church on the Future of Gameplay

Former Ultima Underworld co-creator and System Shock and Thief contributor, Doug Church, discussing exactly where the PC gaming market is heading, as well as the precise difference between entertainment and play in this console-heavy era.

1 April 2004 - TheFeature.com - Second Generation Location-Based Gaming

Real and virtual have finally met in fun - reporting on Mogi, the brilliant location-based online multiplayer experience in Tokyo.

March 2004 - Mobile Entertainment Analyst - Nintendo's Wireless Strategy

Nintendo created modern mobile gaming with the GameBoy. What do they intend to do with short and long range wireless technologies? An extended analysis for a mobile entertainment industry journal.

15 October 2003 - Gamasutra - Event Wrap-Up: Tokyo Game Show 2003

A report on Japan's premier video game event for the web site of Game Developer Magazine, focusing on the state of game development in Japan, including interviews and commentary from a range of experts and participants.

7 July 2003 - Wireless Gaming Review - Mobile No Candle to Console

Turning the unturned stones in mobile phone entertainment - what hasn't been done?

10 April 2003 - Online Journalism Review - Ethics in Video Game Journalism

Examining the ethics involved when video game enthusiasts write about video games.

April 2003 - Wired Magazine - The Fantasy Life of Coder Boys

Coverage of independent video game development, including profiles of three game developers, talking about games they would make if they had their druthers.

4 January 2003 - The New York Times - Today's Visions of the Science of Tomorrow

There's plenty of money for military industrial training video games; how about a funded game to teach citizenship skills? A Times Op-Ed piece, under the heading "Professor PlayStation" - exerpted from a longer essay.

21 November 2002 - TheFeature.com - From Weblog to Moblog

What happens when weblogs go mobile? Searching reality for friends and information.

2 November 2002 - South China Morning Post - HK hopes of gold and games glory depend on speedy Shing

Coverage of the Hong Kong Age of Empires team battling it out at the World Cyber Games in Daejeon, South Korea, for an English-language daily newspaper based in Hong Kong.

18 May 2001 - Salon.com - Battle of the gaming giants

Meditations on the body language of the senior VPs of the three largest game hardware makers. (Salon won the rights to print this article in an EBay auction).

13 February 2001 - Feed.com - Counter-Strike

Video game players grow up seeing footage of real men with real guns storming into houses and buildings and fields. Television made that veracity attractive. Minh Le made it interactive. Coverage of the most popular online multiplayer shooter in the world.

18 September 2000 - Gamers.com - Senate Hearings on Marketing Violence to Youth

Coverage of United States Senate hearings on violence in media marketing, particularly video games.

19 August 1999 - Rolling Stone Magazine - Where The Geeks Are

Profile of the two core young men responsible for Slashdot, a major technology community site. An exploration of the best geek news site on the eve of their purchase by Andover.net.

A full list of publications is available at www.links.net/share/write/ .

CHAPTERS IN BOOKS

• J. Goldstein & J. Raessens, Handbook of Computer Game Studies, MIT Press, 2005: Chapter on "Future of Games: Mobile Gaming."
  
• T. Fullerton & C. Swain, Game Design Workshop, CMP Books, 2004: Sidebar/chapter on "The Indie Game Jam."
  
• A. Scholder & E. Zimmerman, Re:Play: Game Design + Game Culture, Eyebeam/Peter Lang, 2003: extensive game term and game history glossary running throughout the text.
  
• V. Burnham, Supercade: A Visual History of the Videogame Age, MIT Press, 2001: Essays on the Apple ][, Burger Time and Spy Hunter.

PROFESSIONAL MEMBERSHIPS

• Member, International Game Developers Association (IGDA)
  
• Non-Resident Fellow, Stanford Law School Center for Internet and Society
  
• Member (Inactive), Foreign Correspondents Club of Japan (FCCJ)
  

LANGUAGES / SKILLS

• Extensive HTML experience, rudimentary CSS
  
• Extensive experience with Movable Type online publishing, including plug-ins
  
• Extensive Macintosh and Windows hardware/software experience, some Unix
  
• Rudimentary spoken and written Spanish and Japanese

EXTRACURRICULARS

Japan

Post-graduate study of the Japanese language at University of California Berkeley. Lived in Japan for 18 months in 2001-2003, studying culture, history and media technology. Editor of Chanpon.org, a web journal about foreign-Japanese cultural mixing. Member of the Foreign Correspondents' Club of Japan, sitting on their ITPC (Information Technology, Personal Computer) committee. Developed personal weblog for venture capitalist Joichi Ito.

Travel

Extended stays in Honduras, Japan, South Korea, Ireland, Nebraska, France and Scandinavia. Shorter visits to Mexico, Morocco, Egypt, Russia, Thailand, Nepal, Italy, France, England, Canada. A Greyhound bus trip across North America in 1996 staying with people met on the internet.

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