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I consider it obscure since I consider myself fluent in English and I experience media for decades now, and never ever encountered the term transmedia. What you describe sounds like multimedia. Or a multimedial approach to market a franchise - which is quite normal.

What is not done, is making it depend on each other. People do not like that. If you have to read the comics to understand the movies, or rather if you have to read and watch both, but also have to experience the audio play to get the narrative, that's just bad storytelling to my understanding. What sometimes is done is complimentary things. I remember reading a backstory comic for the Portal game. It was only a few pages that would lead up to the start of the game.

It just has no relevance - so making a jam about it is perfetly fine. Just do not expect people to understand it by the term transmedia alone. They might think of the t in lgbt when reading transmedia. There is not even a wikipedia entry for the term. Oh, they do have a redirect to transmedia story telling, but that article has several markings of non relevancy, original research and such things. It seems to be a descriptive phrase and "transmedia" does not carry the meaning all by itself.

Actually, when I think about it, a video game itself might already fulfill the criteria of this "transmedia" thingy. You can show images, show videos, play sounds, show text and even combine it with user input.

As an example, there are these rpg games where you would find ingame books and those would have a story. Elder Scrolls games have this a lot.

@Eldwood @donihunter

Thanks for the breakdown, both of you! That’s actually a super interesting point about how the platform categorizes AI Assisted vs AI Generated.

Eldwood, what you’re describing is basically the ultimate sign of the times: total erosion of trust. When people start assuming that untagged work is hidden AI, or that "No AI" tags are lies, it shows we’ve reached a point where the noise itself creates paranoia.

And donihunter, fair point on the search parameters! Even if we take the broader AI-assisted metric, it highlights exactly why this debate is so messy: "assisted" covers everything from someone using an LLM to proofread a dialogue line, to full-blown automated asset spam.

But whether the flood is 100% human-made noise or 50% AI-assisted production, the end result for the player is identical: cognitive overload and distribution chokeholds. That’s precisely the core of the problem we're unpacking.

(+1)

Read this thread /t/4309690/generative-ai-disclosure-tagging

There is no "vs." here. And how this is done changed within the last day. And it might change again.

If you want to, you can combine the sub ai filters by copying the url parts.

/games/ai-audio/ai-code/ai-graphics/ai-text/last-30-days That is 10k games.

/games/ai-audio/ai-code/ai-graphics/ai-text That is 22k games.

So almost half of the ai for everything games was uploaded in the last month. This is worrysome.

Thanks for linking that thread and breaking down the numbers with the sub-filters (ai-audio, ai-code, etc.). It actually maps out the exact reality we're navigating right now: the platform is flooded, and the line between assisted tools, automated workflows, and generated content is a permanent grey area.

That's precisely why a Jam like Humans VS AI matters. Instead of pretending the tools don't exist or getting lost in endless moderation metrics, we invite creators to step into the ring, take control of the medium—whatever they choose to use—and make something with a deliberate, conscious artistic stance.

On a broader note, I honestly think social platforms should take a page out of Itch.io’s Jam model. Right now, algorithms treat content like an endless conveyor belt. What we actually need is a return to curation, editorial lines, and physical print publishing.

Virtual museums and curated Jams act as an open invitation for crowds to gather and dialogue around a curator’s strong conceptual lens. Channeling the debate this way is their real added value: by establishing solid artistic foundations, they provide a grounding starting point from which infinite user perspectives and discussions can naturally diverge.

Generalizing the role of digital curators across creation platforms is the ultimate antidote to both human and AI slop. It shifts us away from algorithmic noise and puts human intention, critical selection, and artistic perspective back at the center. Always appreciate the sharp insights and the debate! 🚀

@donihunter

On the term "transmedia"—I totally get your point! Language evolves weirdly, and it can definitely sound like academic jargon or get confused with standard multimedia at first glance.

You actually nailed the difference in your own examples:

  • Multimedia is putting text, audio, and video inside a single container (like a standard video game executable or an RPG with in-game books).
  • Transmedia is about expanding a storyverse across different native environments—like the Portal comic you mentioned, or an ARG that uses real-world websites, audio logs, and forum games to build a world where each medium does what it's best at, without forcing people to digest everything to enjoy the core experience.

The goal of the Jam isn't to force people into heavy, frustrating homework where you have to read 10 comics to understand a game. It's about exploring how different media can complement each other intelligently instead of just stacking assets into one overloaded file.

Appreciate you pushing the debate on this! This kind of pushback is exactly what makes these topics worth discussing. 🚀

In fact, in Latin, multi means "multiple" and trans means "across" or "going through".

Multimedia stacks multiple formats inside one box; transmedia makes the narrative travel across different worlds and spaces.

(+1)

And media from latin means middle in English. So transmedia means through the middle. ;-)