“Demo Day is always a delight because we get to see the extraordinary creativity of our students and faculty. Each year demo day expands into new areas: This year, students are including work with mobile devices while continuing their exceptional efforts in interactive games and other areas” stated Janet Murray, Professor and Director of Graduate Studies, in the School of Literature, Communications and Culture (LCC).

More than 30 displays showcased the work of graduate students and faculty in LCC at this fall's IDT Demo Day, December 14. The students in the IDT program continue to stretch the limits of new media as they investigate the commercial, artistic, and educational possibilities of developing technologies.

Some demonstrations explored the potential for additional uses for cell phones. One of these was “Telegotchi”, an electronic pet based game for your mobile device. However, unlike traditional e-pet games, the emotional state of your pet is linked to the physiological state of other players. An e-pet personality is based on the stress and activity levels of the corresponding pet player. This concept is being geared toward the elderly who live alone and family members can watch their loved ones movements or lack thereof. Another demonstration was the “Global Classroom: Gallery Design”, a web gallery in which users can explore students' global classroom projects. Through this gallery, users can review and compare students' understanding of each other's cultures, communication styles, linguistic similarities and differences, and rhetorical strategies which address cross-cultural and communication issues.

Other presentations included the creation of an online digital edition of “Casablanca” that will be a prototype for a larger linked collection of American Films. Georgia Tech Enhanced Television (eTV) prototyping group, in collaboration with American Film Institute's Digital Content Lab and History Channel's World War II series, has created an eTV prototype to enhance the presentation of historical documentaries on television. Such projects will provide content for the video-on-demand environment that merges the rich content of television with the interactivity and archiving capabilities of the Internet.

Michael Mateas, an assistant professor with a joint appointment in LCC and the College of Computing, was advisor for nine of the students' presentations. Murray noted that Mateas' courses are very popular in spite of being very demanding. This year students in his The Computer as Expressive Media course were assigned to design new writing tools, and students came up with programs that are entirely new and charming variations on this very simple idea.

For more information about IDT Demo Day or LCC's graduate programs, please visit http://idt.gatech.edu/.