Game of Thrones Transmedia Case Study

HBO needed to raise awareness for it’s new show "Game of Thrones", an adaptation of George RR Martin’s epic fantasy novels. To do this, Campfire brought the world of Westeros to life through a series of interactive experiences based around the 5 senses. The novels already had a passionate and connected fan base, so our strategy was to activate those fans and have them broadcast their excitement to a wider audience.

Campfire worked with HBO to raise awareness for it’s new show "Game of Thrones", an adaptation of George RR Martin’s epic fantasy novels. To do this, Campfire brought the world of Westeros to life through a series of interactive experiences based around the 5 senses. 

The novels already had a passionate and connected fan base, so the strategy was to activate those fans and have them broadcast their excitement to a wider audience. The campaign managed to atract a large audience to the show, which where then surprised by the many unexpected storytelling twists and turns ultimately leading to that audience reading the books. 

There was a time when pretty much everyone I knew was reading the many thousands of pages that are the novels and all conversations began with a review of progress to ensure no spoilers were shared accidentally.

The second season begins on April 1, and looks to be equally enthralling.  

For more on transmedia do not miss our comprehensive summaries of The Futures of Entertainment conferences FoE4 & FoE5 featuring panels with Campfire staff. 

All Hallow's Read: A (new) old tradition by Neil Gaiman

Neil Gaiman, author of things, explains All Hallow's Read, a Tradition that was just waiting to happen. Full Details at www.allhallowsread.com. Nobody was actually killed during the making of this video. And give someone a scary book at Hallowe'en.

All Hallow’s Read is a Hallowe’en tradition. It’s simply that in the week of Hallowe’en, or on the night itself, you give someone a scary book. Not instead of candy, oh no, candy stays, but in addition to all the Trick or Treating, give someone a scary book. 

Scholars have traced its origins as far back as this blog post. 

The Sacrifice of Going From Scroll to Codex to Screen

But so far the great e-book debate has barely touched on the most important feature that the codex introduced: the nonlinear reading that so impressed St. Augustine. If the fable of the scroll and codex has a moral, this is it. We usually associate digital technology with nonlinearity, the forking paths that Web surfers beat through the Internet’s underbrush as they click from link to link. But e-books and nonlinearity don’t turn out to be very compatible. Trying to jump from place to place in a long document like a novel is painfully awkward on an e-reader, like trying to play the piano with numb fingers. You either creep through the book incrementally, page by page, or leap wildly from point to point and search term to search term. It’s no wonder that the rise of e-reading has revived two words for classical-era reading technologies: scroll and tablet. That’s the kind of reading you do in an e-book.

...

God knows, there was great literature before there was the codex, and should it pass away, there will be great literature after it. But if we stop reading on paper, we should keep in mind what we’re sacrificing: that nonlinear experience, which is unique to the codex. You don’t get it from any other medium — not movies, or TV, or music or video games. The codex won out over the scroll because it did what good technologies are supposed to do: It gave readers a power they never had before, power over the flow of their own reading experience. And until I hear God personally say to me, “Boot up and read,” I won’t be giving it up.

via Lev Grossman at nytimes.com

William Joyce, Ex-Pixar Designer, Creates Astounding Kids' Book For The iPad

"The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore" is like a well-written bedtime story and an immersive animated movie at once. Every page has some delightful, hidden feature embedded into it.

Part of why the book works so well is its top-shelf creative pedigree: author William Joyce is also an accomplished illustrator and animator who's published New Yorker covers, won a bunch of Emmys, created character designs for some of Pixar's first animated classics, and worked on many others for Dreamworks and Disney. With his cohorts at Moonbot Studios, he created an interactive book-app around the story and a standalone animated film -- so you can experience "The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore" however you like.

via fastcodesign.com

Truly delightful and beautiful book/app/experience. 

Inspired, in equal measures, by Hurricane Katrina, Buster Keaton, The Wizard of Oz, and a love for books, “Morris Lessmore” is a story of people who devote their lives to books and books who return the favor. "The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore" is a poignant, humorous allegory about the curative powers of story. Using a variety of techniques (miniatures, computer animation, 2D animation) award winning author/ illustrator William Joyce and Co-director Brandon Oldenburg present a hybrid style of animation that harkens back to silent films and M-G-M Technicolor musicals. “Morris Lessmore” is old fashioned and cutting edge at the same time.

The following are part 1-4 of The Making of "Morris Lessmore" with the final parts coming soon. 

Gaming the library: holding books hostage and seeing who comes to free them

A couple of weeks ago while reading Jerome Lettvin’s obituary I noticed this gem:

“At MIT, his office in Building 20 was crammed with books, most overdue from the college library. Dr. Lettvin claimed he did not return them because the library would send him the students who wanted those books, and he would interview them as potential assistants.”

Jerome was gaming the library. He was holding onto resources that like-minded individuals desired in order to make professional connections. Cool.

via librarylab.law.harvard.edu