Adding this to the syllabus for the Project Management and Ethical Collaboration for Humanists (aka #DHRPG) class.

Love the power of a zine game! #DHmakes

I put a lot of thought into how to model these power dynamics / moves for the #DHRPG. (With an extremely good roll, power could flow in the opposite direction too, e.g. through student newspaper articles!)

And yet -- even when offered explicitly -- no player in power has ever chosen to use it. ❤️

You know, this gets me thinking that one of the characters in the #DHRPG this year should be an external vendor and spend several months on paperwork.

Neither assistant prof PI in the #DHRPG has had a successful tenure roll so far. 🫣 Maybe 2026 will be the year.

Spent a long time catching up with a delightful former student who's found an alt-ac dream job thanks in part to the #DHRPG class. Turned around and wrote a note to a former professor with some updates on interesting things I've been up to. Everyone needs that kind of joy right about now.

Two dice trays at Games of Berkeley

Red and teal, and purple and teal dice

Me: No #DHRPG dice until I finish my syllabus. I'm just showing @sararribas.bsky.social around Games of Berkeley. I will be good.

Me 10 minutes later: These obviously are the necessary dice for this class. I will write the syllabus around these dice. Clearly I must take them home.

Screenshot with the following text: "Introduction The last time this class was taught was winter 2020, and the last session – and the all-important final dice rolls for the RPG component – took place on Zoom. Where last time the class was framed as simply “project management and ethical collaboration”, it is impossible to attempt the same now, without acknowledging the ongoing instability and uncertainty that shape a world in which we continue to do projects and collaborate, even though the rules, expectations, and needs around us keep changing in ways that have a meaningful impact on the people and even the materials we work with. From the COVID-19 pandemic and its regular aftershocks, to institutions navigating “return-to-office” policies and how that intersects with precarious labor conditions, to devastating wars that have upended lives on-site and in diasporas, to the anxiety and possibilities unleashed by AI, to cyberattacks that have destroyed key cultural heritage infrastructures, to the challenges of aligning work with ever-changing university priorities, doing a collaborative digital project is hard in ways that were less prominent before. In this class, we will grapple with all the pieces of doing a collaborative, digital scholarship project that aren’t technical (though we may touch on some technical bits as well). For the person running a project, these issues can easily take up most of their time working on the project. It’s not what gets people excited about the project – it’s administration, not scholarship as such – but it’s important to approach it with thought and care in order to have a project that runs in a way that you can feel good about, regardless of the tangible outcome. To accomplish this, we will be learning about project management and ethical collaboration through readings and in-class discussion, but more importantly, we will actually be trying to put these concepts into practice."

Sitting down to assemble the syllabus for the 2026 #DHRPG and... wow, in 2024 I didn't mince words about how doing a digital project well was harder than ever due to systemic problems and constraints. And that was back when federal grant programs still existed! 🫠

In the #DHRPG, everyone gets one "randomness die" as part of any roll. You get a 1, you have to roll a D20 and something unexpected happens.

You get another "randomness die" for every child your character has, which can mean that all plans may blow up with every single roll. That phone call. 😈

Pre-ordered with an eye towards my winter digital humanities project management #DHRPG class. 💖

On the left, my blue and rainbow hope dice. On the right, my red and black fear dice. #daggerheart #metaldice #dhttrpg #dhrpg

Congratulations on the replacement for the Worst Dean Ever being an actual force for positive change!

I don't know where this year's #DHRPG is going to go, but Worst Dean Ever eternally lives in my back pocket as a mean DM character.

At this point, I'm not encouraging my faculty to apply for things, and I'm going to have to radically rethink my #DHRPG class in the winter since the final assignment (and a lot of the written work, honestly) was built around applying for an NEH grant.

Even though a lot of elements are now broken (so much for writing an NEH grant as the final assignment!) I'm looking forward to teaching the #DHRPG class in the winter, and thinking about how to foreground those care pieces (eg negotiating credit like it's consent) even more.

I'm absolutely assigning this in the first couple weeks of next year's #DHRPG class! 😍

Take five minutes to fail at running a DH center by angering different constituent groups. Trust me, it's fun.

We get into part of this with the #DHRPG class: what is a department chair's job actually? What motivates librarians to get involved with digital projects? What does meaningful credit look like for an undergrad, grad student, librarian, pre-tenure faculty member?

Oooohhh... this is fascinating. And gets me thinking about infrastructure for future classes.

At least I've got some time. Next year is the #DHRPG class, no code needed for that one.

I've been thinking of @walshbr.bsky.social and @seabrightmessenger.bsky.social and last summer's #DHRPG adventures as I've been sewing these!

Also, what's left of your Clippy is going to a delightful middle school enby whose elementary school graduation spech was basically those quotes, politely.

In the last round of the #DHRPG, a character who was spending a lot of time on Tinder brought credit and consent into useful conversation with one another. It can be awkward, even when everyone means well! Practice talking about it -- including specifics -- really does help you get better.

Working on
>Dropout Game Changer style data puzzles game show
>Heart cardmaking metadata activity
>GMing @quinnanya.me's #DHRPG
>GMing a home grown LARP an LLM board game
>DHy games special collections showcase
>Historical games - parchisi mancala
>Meme your data journey activity
#DHGames
#DHMakes

I really like this idea, though I suspect the awkwardness will make it a challenge to broach the topic. In my #DHRPG class we stumbled across the idea that negotiating credit has a lot in common with negotiating consent. Even more so here, I'd think. There's more vulnerability.

In addition to being right on point for the #DHRPG itself, I really love these examples of people thinking through how other parts of their life shape their experience of DH. In our game in the winter, a character's Tinder strivings ended up yielding insights around negotiating credit in DH.

I am so adding this to the #DHRPG syllabus.

Quinn wearing a dress with the text, in Ukrainian and Welsh, "You didn't see me, I'm just the person who solves problems." Also a gray and purple data shawl, black and white mask, and black hat.

Well, it didn't take long for my #DHRPG doppelganger dress to go from conference event costume to legit work wear for a consequential meeting. But it is just what the occasion calls for. #DHmakes #DHsewing

Some might say it's... #DHLARP part of #DHRPG 🫡

Brandon you're very kind! I'll find my way over soon

Brandon, Paige, and Quinn in matching outfits and black hats and rainbow masks. Paige holding a dice box with a face.

The #DHRPG workshop, people in chairs in a room facing towards the camera

All my #DH2024 submissions ended up conflicting with ADHO meetings (where I'm secretary) but @paigecmorgan.bsky.social played a very convincing Quinn with help from @walshbr.bsky.social. I got choked up when I dropped by their #DHRPG session debrief. It was beautiful to see it happen despite it all.

Quinn wearing a black hat, gray and purple shawl, blue t-shirt that says "no metadata no future", asymmetric glasses and a blue and green mask.

Geeky data t-shirt? Check. Dataviz shawl? Check. Giant suitcase of supplies for #DHmakes? Check. Scary dice box and matching outfits for #DHRPG? Check.

Time to hit the road for #DH2024. Almost makes me wish I had a small connector flight to play "find the digital humanists" on.

Junior assistants are always a great addition. Could introduce a new #DHRPG game mechanic: +1 on a roll if you make the baby giggle, but everyone currently rolling gets -5 if he's crying.

Fabric including many sided dice, some illegible text, and words like "embrace fun" and "tracking our travels in yarn"

24 hours until my flight to #DH2024 in DC, and I'm sewing up something for a Quinn Dombrowski to wear to the #DHRPG session on Monday. #DHmakes

I would have to miss any pre conference events due to my schedule, but I'm curious to learn more about the #DHRPG thing -- could you say more about that?