Katie Salen is a game designer and Director of the graduate Design and Technology program at Parsons School of Design. She has done game design work for clients such as Microsoft, SIGGRAPH, the Hewlett Foundation, XMediaLab, the Design Institute, gameLab, and mememe Productions. Co-author (with Eric Zimmerman) of Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals (MIT Press 2004), as well as the forthcoming Rules of Play Reader (MIT Press 2005), she is also member of Playground, design team focused on large-scale,experimental, real-world games and a former core-team member of gameLab. Katie recently partnered with screenwriter and director Hampton Fancher (Minus Man; Bladerunner) on a project for the XEN division of Microsoft to develop an animated storytelling experience distributed through Xbox Live, and has helped curate programs at the Lincoln Center, Cinematexas, ZKM, Exploding Cinema, and the Walker Art Center on machinima, the practice of creating animated films using game engines. She has lectured and published extensively on game design and game culture both nationally and internationally.