Digital Campfires Press

Research Initiatives & Thoughts

John A. Grozik
DCF Founder & CEO

John is involved in several broad research and product development areas. Five that he is actively exploring are outlined below.   Please contact John via Email for additional information about these research initiatives and other opportunities being explored by a partner company, ROK Labs.

Virtual Communities: (web.alive, Second Life, Quaq, SLOODLE)
Electronic Ink & Programmable Paper: (Emerging Technologies)
Digital Campfires: (Mediated Communications)
Interactive Environments: (New Media in Public Spaces)
Ports & Portals: (Connectivity and Convergence)

Virtual Communities:
     This area of research is rapidly evolving. As avatar Docent Alturas in Second Life, John has been exploring the use of immersive technologies to enhance business collaboration. Contact John for a virtual tour of this exciting new medium.  Recent advances in supporting technologies will see immersive 3D worlds available through browser based interfaces.  Of course social media has become the new darling of the Internet world, and the impact of this medium continues to attract research and experimentation.  John's word for the synthesis of social networks and 3D space is "Web2.3D."  An emerging 3D technology called web.alive show additional promise.
     Augmented reality, made real by mobile computing (smart phones including the rather awesome iPhone and new competitors) is a point of research for DCP on several levels.
     Google's WAVE may ultimately be the big winner.  John's research includes developing a line of Thinklets that improve critical thinking and innovation, and embedding the extensions in the WAVE space. 
John calls it "Waves of Innovation".

Electronic Ink and Programmable Paper:
     Electronic ink is one of the more important new media inventions of the late 20th century that has had a dramatic impact on many communication technologies and content developers during the early 21st century. As a result, massive changes have occurred in industries and media conglomerates that support traditional print-based media.  Apple's recent introduction of their iPad adds their unique mix of media options to the eReader gene pool. 
     Digital Campfires Press has a business model that tracks societal acceptance of eReaders and their move into the mobile media market.  John is exploring ways to implement the technology in advertising displays, museums, public information spaces, and in fine art projects.

Digital Campfires Foundation:
     This research initiative focuses on human interaction and communication technologies. For the past few years, John has been involved in developing responsive interactive learning systems for distributed learning and public spaces.
      McLuhan stated that media and communication technology is simply an attempt by humans to extend their senses. At the time his ideas were poorly received. We now seem to be proving McLuhan right as we attempt to enhance and extend our presence through new media developments. Research into the effects of pervasive (and perhaps invasive) communication technologies on natural human communications is an exciting area. With broadband  bandwidth available to researchers and consumers, the potential to build truly human sensitive communications systems finally exists. Multi-institutional collaborations could use the increased bandwidth for real-time new media research. Companies involved in developing the new Internet are attracted to institutions that focus on the impact of these technologies on human interaction and the marketplace.
      John's interest in using communication technologies to enhance the human experience stems in part from his experience adapting distributive learning systems to more traditional educational processes. He has worked long enough in the emerging media arena to help give new media researchers a historical perspective! His personal collection of more than 3,000 16mm commercials from the late 1960's, is waiting for a graduate student who is interested in "old media."
      An extension of John's research interests involves the health care industry. Patients with life threatening or long term illnesses have special information needs. For the most part, the health care industry still does a poor job of meeting a patient's need for relevant information. During a three month on site consulting project for the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Research Center, it became apparent to John that new media technologies could better serve the diverse health care market. Issues relating to user interface ergonomics, cultural and racial differences, patient privacy, time/place sensitive data streams, CME/CNE pressures, and telemedicine provide a wealth of research opportunities.

Interactive Environments:
     As a result of John's experience in museum and trade show design, he continues to explore the design of people sensitive spaces that automatically adapt to changing audience demographics. By combining a number of new media technologies, and innovative programming, it is now possible to build environments that can "sense" the intellectual and emotional interests of the audience, and adapt messages to meet audience needs. Using programmable ink and RFI activated badges the system could display text appropriately sized for visually impaired visitors of all ages, adapt images and content to visitor age appropriate material, sense the ethnic, racial, and cultural diversity of the audience and modify the media. The interactive environment can get to "know" the visitor and begin to personalize information based on previous interactions.
      Further ideas suggest interactive murals and art galleries, interactive theater experiences, mutual realities (shared VR experiences), and enriched interactive new media content for the home audience. Commercial applications, industry collaborations, and grant opportunities are virtually unlimited.

Ports, Portals, and Social, Viral and Virtual Communities: (The convergence of new media technology, new media content, mobile technologies and social media communities)
     The Internet's breathtaking growth over the past few years has affected all mass communication technologies. The Internet is now a mass medium, and has validated the concept of a global village. This enhanced connectivity has spawned new models of content aggregation and media technology convergence. The "dot COM" phenomenon in the stock market has had a profound effect on investment strategies and the logic of price-to-earnings ratios. These changes are also having a profound effect on institutions of higher learning and corporations. Collaboration among institutions is rapidly changing to competition between institutions for student dollars. And that competition has become global in nature. Media enhanced education is the norm for adult students seeking advanced degrees or pursuing new career paths. To be well positioned to take advantage of an exciting array of new instructional and information technologies, institutions and corporations will need to be comfortable with video-on-demand networks,  social media options, personalized information systems, networked gaming, avatars, virtual worlds, augmented reality.   John's term...Web2.3D