For the 30-second background, I tried to attend ARGFest two years ago, but had to drop out due to a small health-related conflict.² Then last year when ARGFest was held in Portland, I unfortunately needed (for work) to attend a different conference in Portland two weeks after ARGFest. Alas traveling to Portland twice in one month was not a possibility. Then this year, one of our key employees at Creatonomy is getting married on July 17 (and yes, that’s this Saturday, right in the middle of ARGFest 2010). The good news is that I’m here in Atlanta for the “professional” portion of the conference on Thursday and Friday, but the bad news is I’m catching a red-eye back home early Saturday to attend the wedding (and thus will miss the Game Festival on the weekend).

As someone who has played around trying to create things³ on the edges of Alternate Reality Gaming and transmedia, I’m looking forward to hearing and learning from the professionals — the practitioners who’ve been crafting these amazing immersive experiences since the very beginning.

Even though TomorrowSage.com is currently on hiatus,⁴ I’ll try to post and share some of what I learn over the next two days. Stay tuned!

1. ARGFest is the annual conference for Alternate Reality Game creators and players.
2. I ended up having major surgery scheduled — and done — the week before that year’s conference.
3. As well as just plain played
4. While I explore what direction it might take in its post-blog existence

Yesterday’s Encom press conference event involved actors from the film playing out complex scenes in character, while allowing the fans in attendance to literally become part of the story — several hundred of the fans playing the ARG were “coached” to conduct a protest at the press conference. Live events typically have been among the most effective ways for ARGs to fully immerse players in a game, and in this case Bruce Boxleitner’s in-character involvement further heightened the “reality” of the Encom press conference.⁴ And the press conference event and other elements of the Tron Legacy ARG continue to provide more layers to the upcoming film’s story.⁵

Kudos to the folks behind this particular experience. It will be fun to see what the next six months of the Tron Legacy ARG have in store for players and fans.

1. Alternate Reality Game
2. Tron Legacy doesn’t open until December 2010, meaning this ARG is designed to promote the film and build excitement for 18 months or more before the film’s actual release.
3. Based on all available evidence, the Tron Legacy ARG is from 42 Entertainment.
4. It’s unfortunate — based on what little we know of the film’s plot — that Jeff Bridges’ character from Tron Legacy can’t make an appearance before the film’s release, given Bridges recent Oscar win for Best Actor.
5. While it’s unlikely that this Encom press conference will in any way end up as part of the actual film, it would be nice to see the event video, as well other elements of this ARG, included as extras on the Tron Legacy DVD when it eventually is released.

That seemingly simple question started an ongoing discussion, generously peppered with deep thinking. We haven’t yet reached any definitive conclusions, but already have uncovered some interesting relationships.

The Background
Up until about six months ago, I had used the term “cross-media” as an adjective meaning “utilizing two or more media channels.” In all respects, it was a very functional definition. And using that definition, it would be accurate to say that cross-media has existed ever since there has been more than one media channel available to marketers and communicators.

Then last fall (without any real conscious thought on my part), I began substituting “transmedia” for “cross-media” when talking with coworkers, professional colleagues and others. In my mind, I was defining the two terms identically. I admit it — I probably changed my language in large part to capture the growing buzz associated with the word “transmedia.” But in my mind, I was still talking about the exact same thing, just with a shiny new label slapped on it.

The Comparison Begins
Stepping back to a wider vantage point, we see the ongoing push-and-tug (in gaming and entertainment, among other industries) to define the term “transmedia” as well as a host of other related terms.² But here’s the news flash … we’ve seen this all before.³

Beginning in the early 1990s, practitioners struggled and competed to define the term “integrated marketing.“⁴ Two decades later, the term is still around and in fact integrated marketing is almost universally accepted as the norm in marketing today. Different nuances still exist leading to multiple definitions of the term, but virtually all of the definitions share a common philosophical core.

Here’s where it gets really interesting …

The common kernel across most definitions of “integrated marketing” is the concept of an overarching strategy that governs the planning and execution of interactive, cross-functional communications. For example, a 2004 white paper on integrated marketing ⁵ examined various definitions and concluded that integrated marketing should:

• Be more strategic than executional
• Be about more than just advertising and sales promotion messages
• Include two-way communication (interactivity)
• Be results driven

Starting to see some parallels with transmedia communications?

I propose that transmedia communications and integrated marketing are more closely related than you may think at first glance. And ultimately after examining all the intriguing parallels and evidence (as well as hopefully starting a dialogue in both the marketing and transmedia communities), I want us to consider whether transmedia communications and integrated marketing are in fact different facets of the same thing.

What’s Next
There’s much more to this claim than can be addressed in a single article. Upcoming articles in this series will examine such things as:

• The similar histories of transmedia communications and integrated communications (including the times before a label was attached to either).
• The ways that transmedia communications professionals and integrated communications professionals plan and execute their respective projects.
• How transmedia communications and integrated communications each react when a new media channel or tactic is introduced.

In the meantime, what do you think of this claim? Outrageous? Thought provoking? A waste of pixels? Please weigh in and share your thoughts.

1. Creatonomy is the marketing agency where I’ve worked for the last four years. President and owner Priya Barnes founded the company in 2000.
2. He who defines it controls it? Or at least appears to be the expert on it?
3. “This has all happened before, and will all happen again.” — Sorry. Couldn’t resist.
4. Global professional services firm Accenture was among the first large organizations to push integrated marketing and CMO James E. Murphy was one of integrated marketing’s strongest early proponents. I worked in Accenture’s marketing organization from 1991 through 2006 and had a front row seat as both definitions and practical implementations of “integrated marketing” emerged.
5. Duncan and Mulhern, 2004

In my mind, what I created is an act of guerilla transmedia storytelling. Sort of a single freestanding act of street theater, but performed in a transmedia realm.

Like many people, I’ve played around the creative edges of nontraditional communication since I was a kid. In grade school, we played games using pay phones that allowed you to call them. Just before our high school graduation, we spray-painted the actual size floor plan for a proposed fine arts building on the parking lot where it was supposed to have been built.³ In college, we held staged and improv arguments in public spaces.⁴ In the mid 1990s, some of the first websites I built were for non-existent products⁵ or fictional historical events. But despite these examples, when it comes to communication, I’m far from the only one who occasionally decides to color outside the lines. (And I don’t rank myself among the most creative, most knowledgeable or most effective in that group.)

While Hollywood, digital advertising agencies, universities and others are busy codifying the concepts of transmedia communications and creating bigger and better transmedia properties, there will be others who are just following their artistic urges. After the very first commercial ARGs, we saw game-playing fans begin creating their own grass roots ARGs. We’re now beginning to see such grass roots creativity in other areas of transmedia communications. Meanwhile, the barriers to entry into the digital realm are low and trending down.

My advice? Watch the edges — that’s where the unexpected will arise and tomorrow’s Picassos and Hemingways will emerge.

Let me know what you think via the comments section below.

1. If you’re interested in taking a look, here’s an entry point.
2. Alternate Reality Game
3. For four years, our class raised funds for the construction of that building and we were told we would be the first class to graduate from its auditorium. For the record, I graduated from high school in 1981. The first class that did graduate from a new building was the Class of 2005, and that new building was a fieldhouse instead of a fine arts building.
4. In one case, a female friend and I pretended to be a couple, then had a loud “argument” in a video store where she accused me of sleeping with her sister.
5. Think Whacky Packs.

Chinese villagers build a bridge across a tributary of the Yangtze River.

So after burning up an appropriate amount of time and grey matter pondering how I could accomplish my vision for this website, I’ve realized I need to build something from the ground up that will turn TomorrowSage.com into much more of a canvas for conveying knowledge and stories. Or rather, a series of canvases upon which each article or story can be communicated in its own unique way.¹

Ultimately what I envision isn’t just a different approach to a website, but a different way tell stories (and ultimately for me, a broader creative experience).

I will do my best to bring about the new TomorrowSage.com as quickly as possible, but given other demands (professional and personal), it is likely to be a matter of weeks (or months) rather than days before everything goes live. And finally, while I don’t intend to provide any new posts on this site until after the reimagining is complete, I do promise to read and respond to any thoughts or comments you share below on this new direction. I’ll also remain active in my other online domiciles and quite possibly provide the occasional update about TomorrowSage.com in those locations. So please stay in touch at:

• twitter.com/tomorrowsage
• www.kevinabarnes.com

1. A quick clarification: When I say, “build something from the ground up,” I don’t mean lovingly code every line of every single web page. My intent is to develop a custom, highly-flexible content management system that will allow me to create and communicate in the way I envision. And no, I currently have no desire or intentions to sell the resulting tool — it is being designed and built for my unique needs and to meet my creative vision.