GTFO The Movie

A scene of gamers from GTFO

GTFO, the movie, premiered at SXSW in 2015 and is now available from a number of outlets. Created by Shannon Sun-Higginson, the documentary takes a look at sexual harassment in gaming.

The description of the film is,

Sparked by a public display of sexual harassment in 2012, GTFO pries open the video game world to explore a 20 billion dollar industry that is riddled with discrimination and misogyny. In recent years, the gaming community has grown more diverse than ever. This has led to a massive clash of values and women receive the brunt of the consequences every day, with acts of harassment ranging from name calling to cyber vandalism and death threats. Through interviews with video game developers, journalists, and academics, GTFO paints a complex picture of the video game industry, while revealing the systemic and human motivations behind acts of harassment. GTFO is the beginning of a larger conversation that will shape the future of the video game world.

You can buy or rent GTFO on iTunes, Vimeo, BitTorrent, Google Play, Xbox, Playstation, and Vudu. The film is available for educators at the movie web site, which has resources for women who are being harassed.

Time Magazine interviewed Sun-Higginson in Meet the Woman Helping Gamergate Victims Come Out of the Shadows. It’s worth reading.

That sense of loss

SXSW

SXSW swag bags by Virginia DeBolt

I just let go of something I love that has been important in my life for many years. I stepped down from the SXSW advisory board. I am sad about it. I know, come next March, I’ll be kicking myself in the butt.

It was an honor and a privilege to be on the advisory board. It was a thrill to attend the event each year. I feel I’m saying goodbye to an old friend. Dear SXSW, I’ll miss you.

My appreciation goes out to Hugh Forrest for inviting me to be on the board and letting me keep on with it year after year. SXSW  informs and enlightens thousands of people. I’m happy to have had a small part in making that happen.

Carry on, SXSW, and continue to be awesome.

Dear City of Austin Traffic Gurus: an open letter

Traffic is a mess during SXSW. Everyone knows this. Part of the problem is not the traffic but the pedestrians. Pedestrians are everywhere! This is a good thing because the foot traffic is not auto traffic. But the foot traffic is impeding the progress of the auto traffic.

I drive to the convention center when I’m at SXSW, because my daughter lives in the Austin area and I stay with her rather than at a hotel. One morning I sat on Cesar Chavez through 7 light changes on Cesar Chavez and Brazos and never moved an inch.

Another morning a very irritating man in a state trooper vest waved me off from using the perfectly good Brazos entrance to the parking structure and made me go around the block to use the San Jacinto entrance. It took me 15 minutes to go around the block.

That’s a lot of sitting still in traffic, polluting the air and burning gas unnecessarily. The reason? Pedestrians use the same traffic lights as cars. When a light turns green, mobs of people hit the crosswalk and cars cannot move. As soon as the walkers clear, the light is red again.

So here’s my advice, City of Austin traffic gurus. (I know you are trying to find ways to reduce congestion.) Change the light set up. Have a green moment in every direction for pedestrians from any corner to any corner. No cars, just people. Then have a green light for cars – no pedestrians allowed in the crosswalks during that time. The people move, the cars move. Everyone gets a turn all their own. It would help.

A few useful links I gathered at SXSWi

Anna finds nonprofit projects to support for Groupon

Did you know Groupon works with nonprofits to help them fund projects? I did not. I met @annaholombe, who is in charge of such programs at Groupon.

Jeremy Keith

I talked a bit with Jeremy Keith, who gave out cards promoting his talk at SXSW rather than promoting his own site or blog. Interesting idea, that.

young blogger and her dad

I chatted with a very young woman who has a blog at bleucloud.com. She was there with her dad in tow and had her nose buried in her iPad just like all the adults around her. She’s from North Dakota and is definitely someone to watch as she blogs her way into adulthood.

Jen Simmons

Jen Simmons gave a great session and says the best place to find her is 5by5.tv/webahead, where she does a weekly podcast about the future of the web.

SXSWi 3/10/2012

Great schedule at SXSW today with a panel starting at 9:30 that was one of the best I’ve ever seen in 16 years of attending SXSW: Tech Superwomen: Mentors and Mentees, FTW. Chris Mills gave a great talk on HTML5 and CSS3, Baratunde Thurston was inspiring, Andy Hume talked about how to make modular CSS that works on large scale sites.