Play Story Press™ is an open community publishing consortium of/by/for the field and our community. It is a diamond open-access academic publishing initiative in which contributors retain all their intellectual property. We work with our contributors in as timely a manner as possible so that we can share ideas that have impact and significance in our society.
Play Story Press is a culmination of 20 years of open-access publishing and collaborating with the community. Our founders started ETC Press in 2005 as an experimental open-access academic publishing imprint, and our success was a direct result of all the quality work written by our community. Inspired by this, Play Story Press is evolving to focus more on the community and field. The consortium comprises an exceptional group of partner organizations that will work together, shaping and supporting Play Story Press for the field and community. The following groups are committed to this endeavor (and we’re actively in discussions with more potential partners):
- Analog Game Studies
- Association for Computing Machinery
- Association for Research in Digital Interactive Narratives
- Broke the Game
- Connected Learning Alliance
- Digital Games Research Association
- Digital Storytelling Lab
- Game Arts International Network
- Game Genius
- Games for Change
- Games+Learning+Society
- Higher Education Video Game Alliance
- International Game Developers Association
- iThrive Games / History Co:Lab
- Joan Ganz Cooney Center
- Knowledge Commons
- Learning Games Network
- Meaningful Play
- Professors at Play
- Remake Learning
- Serious Play Conference
- Society for the Advancement of the Science of Digital Games
- Thriving in Games Group (formerly Fair Play Alliance)
What does all that mean in terms of publishing work?
Publishing with Play Story Press is a friendly, supportive and constructive process focused on encouraging the growth of quality scholarship in this field. Play Story Press is committed to publishing three types of work: peer-reviewed work (research-based books, textbooks, academic journals, conference proceedings), general audience work (trade nonfiction, singles, Well Played singles), and research and white papers. The common tie for all these is a focus on issues related to stories and play as they are applied across various fields. The concepts of story and play are broad and diverse—from entertainment and narrative to media studies and social studies, games and technology to health and enjoyment, education and learning to design and development, and more. Our authors come from a range of backgrounds. Some are traditional academics. Some are practitioners. And some work in between. Their ability to write about the impact of play and story and their significance in society is what ties them all together.
To distinguish our books, Play Story Press has five imprints:
- Play Story Press: our traditional academic and peer-reviewed publications;
- Play Story Press: Single: our short “Why it matters” books that are roughly 8,000-25,000 words;
- Play Story Press: Signature: our special projects, trade books, and other curated works that exemplify the best work being done;
- Play Story Press: Report: our white papers and reports are produced by practitioners or academic researchers working in conjunction with partners; and
- Play Story Press: Student: our work with undergraduate and graduate students
In keeping with our mission, the Play Story Press uses emerging technologies to design all of our books and Lulu, an on-demand publisher, to distribute our e-books and print books through all the major retail chains, such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, and Apple. We work with The Game Crafter to produce tabletop games. We don’t carry an inventory ourselves. Instead, each print book is created when somebody buys a copy. Since the Play Story Press is an open-access publisher, every book, journal, and proceeding is available as a free download, and we’re partnering with the open-access supporters to host our online repository. We’re most interested in the sharing and spreading of ideas. Authors retain ownership of their intellectual property. We release all of our books, journals, and proceedings under a Creative Commons license:
Play Story Press™ is an independent non-profit organization powered by input and involvement from the consortium, our contributors, and the community at large. This continues our innovations in publishing, and we invite people to participate. Together, we can explore and create the future of open academic publishing, sharing and spreading ideas and knowledge that can help change the world for the better.