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Sari Gilbert

Associate chair, interactive design and game development

Education

  • M.F.A., motion media design, Savannah College of Art and Design
  • M.A., instructional technology/media, Columbia University
  • B.A., history, University of California, Berkeley

Credentials

  • Associate chair, interactive design and game development, 2024–present, Savannah College of Art and Design, Savannah, GA
  • Professor, interactive design and game development, 2002–2024, Savannah College of Art and Design, Savannah, GA
  • Consultant/UX & design, 2016–present, Contract Wrangler, San Mateo, CA
  • Co-founder/chief creative officer, 2009–2013, Kin Valley, Inc., Austin, TX
  • Co-founder, 2001–2002, Notiora Inc., San Diego, CA
  • Chief creative, 2000–2001, RedLeaf Innovations, RedLeaf Venture Capital Group, San Francisco, CA
  • Founder/CEO, 1998-2000, GoMo Technologies, San Francisco, CA
    • Founded, built, ran, and sold a rich-media e-mail marketing technology company targeting the youth market, whose clients included Capitol Records, Mountain Dew, ShowTime and DreamWorks.
    • Built company from the ground up, hiring executive management team as well as technical, creative and operational staff. Raised $2.8 million in two rounds of financing. Managed daily operations of company.
    • Worked with senior engineering team to conceptualize and develop ASP Java-based, thin-client server-side e-mail marketing technology to enable rich-media communication for corporations and consumers.
    • Oversaw design, production, and implementation of all company's products and product lines.
    • Responsible for all product innovation, including automation tools for rapid production and deployment of company's core e-mail marketing products. Worked with engineering, marketing, and sales to anticipate and meet client needs.
  • Executive producer/designer, 1995–1998, Disney Online, North Hollywood, CA
    • Participated in founding of Disney's online service for children and families.
    • Built product strategy, designed and managed development and deployment of all content, games, and activities for Disney Online's most visited site on the web.
    • Built and managed department of engineers, web developers, artists, animators (character and Flash), sound designers, producers, and writers.
    • Created content, games, applications, and activities utilizing then nascent technologies, such as Flash, Java, and Javascript, as well as Macromedia's Director to build a cutting-edge, interactive online experience that was the first of its kind.
    • Worked extensively with all Disney brands and characters maintaining the strictest style and character guidelines in the business to translate these brands into the online world.
    • Collaborated on several research and development projects, including helping to design an interactive television show teaching early reading concepts with the Disney Channel and working with Alan Kay's Squeak Engineering group to develop a constructivist tool to help children learn principles of programming.
    • Developed and managed usability testing for entire online division.
  • Producer and designer, 1994–1995, Knowledge Adventure, Glendale, CA

Awards, recognitions, and honors

  • Designed and produced top-selling educational JumpStart titles.
  • Consulted as product strategist for multiple clients including ask.com, Knowledge Universe, bonus.com, and Strauss Communications.
  • Teach and mentor graduate and undergraduate students in user experience (UX) design, interactive design, information architecture, gamified system design, game design, design thinking, entrepreneurship and project management.

Organizations

  • International Game Developers Association
  • Women's Caucus for Art

Publications and presentations

  • Co-authored two patents, both for sharing and communicating data over the Internet.
    • Storyline security for verifying content to share digital objects on computer-based social networks
    • Method and apparatus for communicating graphics data between a source and a recipient over a network. Cited in Patents by Philips Electronics, Research in Motion, Deutsch Technologies, and Microsoft.
  • A gateway strategy board game based upon a recently re-discovered 17th century Chinese trading map found in the archives of Oxford University’s Bodleain Library, the Selden Map. Players take on the role of merchant Chinese families, sending their ships out along the routes of the map to trade goods and gain influence before the Manchu invasion of 1644. Successful Kickstarter raised $45,000 for production. Game: Fujian Trader, 2015.
  • A gamified system design that leverages crowd-sourcing to help the Department of Natural Resources obtain the capacity to identify, map, and manage endangered and invasive plants. Partners include the University of Georgia's Center for Invasive Species and Ecosystem Health (CISEH), i2STEMe Institute at Georgia Southern, the Georgia Department of Natural Resources, and regional schools. Game: Forager, 2012–2013.
  • Co-author: Storyline security for verifying content to share digital objects on computer-based social networks. Non-exclusive license to Kin Valley, Inc., for ensuring COPPA (Children's Online Privacy Protection Act) compliance. Patent filing, 2011.
  • Co-author: Method and apparatus for communicating graphics data between a source and a recipient over a network. Cited in patents by Philips Electronics, Research in Motion, Deutsch Technologies, and Microsoft. Patent filing, 2000.

Books

  • Designing Gamified Systems: Meaningful Play in Interactive Entertainment, Marketing and Education, Focal Press Book, 2015.

Exhibitions

  • Pulse Art and Technology Festival, Fujian Trader, Telfair Museum's Jepson Center for the Arts, Savannah, Ga., 2014
  • Pulse Art and Technology Festival, Fujian Trader, Telfair Museum's Jepson Center for the Arts, Savannah, Ga., 2013
  • Juried exhibition, From the Center: Now, By Hand, judged by Lucy Lippard for the Woman's Caucus of Art, Chicago, 2010
  • MTWork, Mare Liberum, Big Sky Documentary Film Festival, Missoula, Mont., 2009
  • Juried exhibition, Ever Present and in Motion, SCAD faculty celebrate the college's 30-year anniversary, River of Lost Memory, Pei Ling Gallery, Savannah, and the Woodruff Center for the Arts, Atlanta, 2009
  • Like Water for Rock, juried group exhibition of the Jewish Women's Art Network, 2009
  • Ready to Wear, Art Network Venues: Platt/Bornstein Galleries, Los Angeles, The Finegood Art Gallery, West Hills, Calif., and the Gotthelf Art Gallery, La Jolla, Calif., 2009
  • Ready to Wear, Georgia Southern University's Zach Henderson Library, Statesboro, Ga., 2009
  • Yom Hashoah, Ready to Wear, Jewish Educational Alliance, Savannah, Ga., 2009
  • NoYxZ: Explorations in Visual and Acoustic Space, Stele, Indigo Sky Gallery, Savannah, Ga. 2008
  • Juried exhibition, Electoral College of Artistic Insight, Indigo Sky Gallery, Savannah, Ga., 2008

Public artist talks

  • "Ladies of Industry" podcast, BTA.com, 2015.
  • "Three-minute pitch," Fast Pitch, Savannah, Ga., 2015.
  • "Academic Games Program Panel," Indiecade East, Astoria, N.Y., 2015.
  • "Entrepreneurship and Educational Games," One Million Cups, Savannah, Ga., 2015.
  • "Best Business Practice for Young Designers," SCAD's Game Developer's Network, Savannah, Ga., 2015.
  • "Exhibiting Artist Panel," Jepson Museum of Art, Savannah, Ga., 2014.
  • "Leadership in New Industry," talk at LEAD conference, Savannah College of Art and Design, Savannah, Ga., 2013.
  • "Historical Game Design: Fujian Trader," talk at Mystic Seaport Museum, Mystic, Conn., August 2012.
  • "Gamification and STEM learning," consultant, coordinator, and speaker for State of Georgia Department of Education STEM teacher workshop, Savannah, Ga., 2012.
  • "Historical Game Design," co-coordinated for SCAD Interactive and Game Design Workshop, Savannah, Ga., 2011.
  • "Designing a Social Media Environment for Families," talk at SCAD's Game Developer's Network, Savannah, Ga., 2011.
  • "Upside, Inside, Downside: A Story of Start-ups," talk at SCAD's Game Developers eXchange, Savannah, Ga., 2010.
  • "Archives in Motion," talk at Georgia Southern University, Statesboro, Ga. 2010.
  • "The Art of Documentary Film," panel participant at Big Sky Documentary Film Festival, Missoula, Mont., 2009.
  • "Representing the Holocaust in Contemporary Art," talk at Armstrong Atlantic University, Savannah, Ga., 2009.