Background More than a million health and well-being apps are available from the Apple and Google app stores. Some apps use built-in mobile phone sensors to generate health data. Clinicians and patients can find information regarding safe and effective mobile health (mHealth) apps in third party–curated mHealth app libraries. Objective These independent Web-based repositories guide app selection from trusted lists, but do they offer apps using ubiquitous, low-cost smartphone sensors to improve health? This study aimed to identify the types of built-in mobile phone sensors used in apps listed on curated health app libraries, the range of health conditions these apps address, and the cross-platform availability of the apps. Methods This systematic survey reviewed three such repositories (National Health Service Apps Library, AppScript, and MyHealthApps), assessing the availability of apps using built-in mobile phone sensors for the diagnosis or treatment of health conditions. Results A total of 18 such apps were identified and included in this survey, representing 1.1% (8/699) to 3% (2/76) of all apps offered by the respective libraries examined. About one-third (7/18, 39%) of the identified apps offered cross-platform Apple and Android versions, with a further 50% (9/18) only dedicated to Apple and 11% (2/18), to Android. About one-fourth (4/18, 22%) of the identified apps offered dedicated diagnostic functions, with a majority featuring therapeutic (9/18, 50%) or combined functionality (5/18, 28%). Cameras, touch screens, and microphones were the most frequently used built-in sensors. Health concerns addressed by these apps included respiratory, dermatological, neurological, and anxiety conditions. Conclusions Diligent mHealth app library curation, medical device regulation constraints, and cross-platform differences in mobile phone sensor architectures may all contribute to the observed limited availability of mHealth apps using built-in phone sensors in curated mHealth app libraries. However, more efforts are needed to increase the number of such apps on curated lists, as they offer easily accessible low-cost options to assist people in managing clinical conditions.
Beyond the dominant North American and Japanese console manufacturers and multinational publishers, the global videogame industry is fragmenting. New audiences, distribution platforms, and development tools are expanding the videogame industry into an ecosystem that is at once broadly global and intensely localised. Taking advantage of this nebulous environment are increasingly visible fringes of hobbyists, amateurs, students, and artists that are pushing videogame development in new directions in terms of aesthetics, design process, and distribution channels. The activities of these fringe creators represent a critical but undertheorised aspect of the videogame industry. This article builds on Lobato and Thomas's notion of 'informal media economies' to suggest that the work of these fringes can be usefully considered as informal videogame development practices. It provides a historical look at the videogame industry that demonstrates how it transitioned from a period of aggressive formalisation through the 1980s to the early 2000s into a more intense intermingling of formal and informal actors and processes in the early 2010s. In doing so, this article traces the shifting conduits of creative practice, commerce, and power that these emerging informal practices represent so as to more fully account for the contemporary global videogame industry.
of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Beyond the blockbuster studios and multinational publishers of North America, Western Europe, and Japan, videogame production happens in a range of contexts, at a variety of scales, and for a number of reasons. While “the videogame industry” as a sector of the economy accounts for the flow of capital between corporate actors and global markets, as a concept it is insufficient to account for the spectrum of cultural activities and identities that constitute videogame production. In this article, I instead follow Bourdieu to consider videogame production as a cultural field. The videogame field is locally situated and constituted by a contested range of activities and identities implicated in interrelated economic, cultural, and social forces. Drawing from empirical research with videogame makers in Australia, this article’s conceptualization of the videogame field provides ways to better account for the plurality of ways videogames makers navigate economic stability and creative autonomy.
of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
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