Canadian Heritage Committee on Dec. 11th, 2012

[Brenda Gershkovitch]

I'm sorry that I can't speak to Gamercamp, having not yet attended, but I can tell you that in my experience from 2005 to now, it's changed dramatically. My biggest measurement is that when I first went to E3, which is one of our biggest events in the industry worldwide, I didn't have to stand in a lineup for a washroom, and the men's lineup was down the hall. Last year when I went, I had a good 20-minute wait, so I was glad to hear it.

It is changing somewhat, and we're doing something similar to Gamercamp, although not quite at the same scale. We've had girls' programming camps happening in Vancouver. It's something our studio is interested in doing as well, having more people come in and learn to code.

I agree that there's a tremendous need for video game literacy, as Mr. Woo described it, and particularly targeting that towards audiences that we've neglected in the past. Whether it be women, whether it be people from gay and lesbian backgrounds, whether it be people of colour, there is lots of opportunity for expansion.

[Jaime Woo]

It's actually quite important that we have a lot of inclusivity. As Brenda was listing off that thing, she was saying gay and lesbians; yes, I'm gay and I'm a person of colour, so this inclusivity matters to me because I want games to be for everyone. I don't want to be looking on from the outside in, especially since as a young child my memories of playing games were with my cousins and my family friends of both genders. It wasn't something that was seen as exclusively for boys. I think this is because it was more about whimsy when we were younger, and now it's more about male wish fulfillment, which has been a big change, and I think that's what's made certain populations feel excluded.

At Gamercamp we have about 20% to 25% female attendance, which isn't as high as the 45% of gamers out there, but it's certainly higher than at most events, and it's because we carefully make sure that we are putting out the right signals there. We do not use imagery that is male dominated or male coded. We use inclusive language. We go out there and try to program in a diversified way. If you put out the signal that your audience is everyone, more people will respond to that. I think this has been what's problematic: it's that a lot of times, without even realizing it, people code their language to make certain people feel not welcome.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

That's fantastic.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Moore]

Thank you, Ms. Sitsabaiesan.

We'll go to Mr. Simms for seven minutes.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Thank you for joining us.

I just want to get into one concept here. I'm not that familiar with the concept, but it's something I read about a short time ago. My assistant has helped me out with it as well, because he has more experience.

Mr. Gouglas, I think this goes to you first. Then I'll ask others to comment on it as well.

You talked about getting together as an industry. It seems that any contact we're having with the industry is from within Canada to the outside world, so it's a global conversation. We don't necessarily reach out to our own in Canada first. It seems that we could be more inclusive in this country—not to the exclusion of others, but I think you get what I mean—through the conventions, through the schooling, and that sort of thing. That's more of a comment than it is a question.

The question part deals with the interests of sharing IP, and I'm talking about open-sourcing here. Is there much more that can be done when it comes to open-sourcing, including old or unused IP, for that matter? I know you do a lot of work on certain games and that sort of thing, but a lot of it gets forgotten because it seems to be driven by the private sector.

In other words, are we not facilitating information for the sake of fostering new talent?

[Prof. Sean Gouglas]

We actually asked that question explicitly when we did the project funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council—namely, is there not a way we could create greater innovation through the release of companies' older IP to universities, for example, in order to let students see what they could do with it? The answer, universally, was that there was no such thing as old IP.

Look at the way in which game companies have rehabilitated all their old intellectual property. Atari, for example, has just launched an iPad version of their entire gaming collection. There really isn't any notion of old IP that can just be released. It's always something valuable that they can rehabilitate. Characters that were produced 20 years ago will get a new version. XCOM, for example, a game that was extremely popular years ago, has just come out.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

So Pitfall Harry's coming back, right?

[Prof. Sean Gouglas]

You can be absolutely sure he's coming back.

What I will say, though, if I can maybe speculate on another aspect, is that one thing the universities and industry don't do very well is build longer-term relationships. Many times relationships are formed on individuals; when people change companies or people change universities, that's lost, but if that relationship can be built over time, there can be in-kind contributions from gaming companies to universities in such areas as sharing of art assets or sharing of game engines. With Unreal, for example, there are relationships between companies and universities over the development of it.

It's a very complex problem. I would say that gaming companies tend to be extraordinarily protective of their IP, because it's not like it's a mine. The IP is everything, in many ways. Yes, the talent is of course important, but the development of the IP is essential, so it's a very finicky area when you're trying to understand how it can be used in a way that can be open source.

There are clearly open-source game engines and open-source tools that people use, and those are great, and in the modding community a company like Bethesda might release Skyrim, which allows open modding of that particular program. That's another issue—

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Right, because with all the social sites and that sort of thing, open-sourcing is it, right? That's what rules that area, and gaming is getting into that area as well, in addition to what I can buy in the store.

[Prof. Sean Gouglas]

Do you mean crowd-sourcing or open-sourcing?

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

I mean open-sourcing. The protection of IP in this industry is very tight, I gather: yes or no?

[Prof. Sean Gouglas]

Yes.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Okay. Because of that, don't you think that sharing more of that intellectual property with institutions like yours would help make a better institution for you, or make for better learning for those people who want to get into gaming?

It seems to me that you have to get a job in the gaming industry, as opposed to going to a particular school, in order to advance yourself as a top programmer.

[Prof. Sean Gouglas]

Not to mince words or anything, I think that's backwards. I think it's the other way that universities have to go.

The type of IP that's produced at universities can be useful to gaming companies, but it's particular. It tends to be very focused or require an immense amount of horsepower or something.

Game companies move too quickly and too iteratively to try to use it meaningfully if there are going to be complex licensing agreements with it. Universities need to open themselves up and give away that IP if they want to be partners in this industry. In exchange, they will get, hopefully, if trust is built up between industry and the university, access to some of the things you're talking about—the art assets, the game engines—that will allow their students to become high-tech, highly skilled workers.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

And that's more beneficial to the learning institution, as opposed to a particular company.

[Prof. Sean Gouglas]

I agree with that, and you would much more likely find that on a one-to-one relationship than you would in a national program, because trust is so important. The IP of gaming companies is held very closely.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Rather than change that, you cater to that institutional--

[Prof. Sean Gouglas]

I would argue that's the best way for universities to move forward if they want to wrap their curriculum and research in a gaming envelope.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

So when you look at trying to further Canada's case as being the place to be for investing in gaming, you do more things like what Mr. Woo was talking about—more conventions, more open events, having a TIFF for the video-gaming industry, which I think is an incredibly good point—because it seems that you're looking at a world that can be accessed by so many young people, and it's not turning itself inside out in order to attract the right qualified people into this industry. Would I be correct in saying that?

[Jaime Woo]

I'm sorry; can you rephrase that question for me?

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

You create what I would consider to be a greater tool for enticing people into this industry, people who normally wouldn't look at this area. You would have to have a convention—

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Moore]

This is your second shot at the question, but it's been seven minutes.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Would you like to try it for me?

[The Chair, Conservative, Rob Moore]

I think we have to move on, because we only have four minutes left in the meeting.

Go ahead, Mr. Hillyer, for three minutes.

[Jim Hillyer, Conservative, Lethbridge, AB]

With three minutes, I'll have a question that probably can't be answered that quickly.

If top programmers are such a hot commodity that they get recruited five times while going to coffee—and when I was involved in the education industry, it seemed like everyone in the world wanted to be in the gaming industry, and not just in the industry, but among those 20% to 25% of staff who are in programming—then why in the world aren't people banging on the door saying, “Let me work for you”? If they're getting paid so much, why do you have trouble filling these positions, and what can we do to help solve that problem?