Participation at the Global Game Jam: a bridge between consumer and producer worlds in digital entertainment

Abstract

The Global Game Jam (GGJ) is an event in which aspiring game developers with different expertise, meet together in order to and prototype complete games over a limited time. Initially targeted to game developers only, GGJ has become over the years a new collective ritual to strengthen practice communities and share videogame culture, open to the participation of more subjects even when qualified as simple players. What is happened in these years? Our sociological study primarily wants to understand this evolution from “event for developers” to “prosumerism age”. Even for the small number of investigation on GGJ, our research has a descriptive purpose to define new profile of GGJ Participants.

Keywords

• cooperative learning
• punk-capitalism
• communities of practice