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Leena Saarinen : curriculm vitae

EDUCATION

• Doctoral studies in MediaLab, University of Arts and Design Helsinki. Since 2002    
• Master of Arts in New Media, University of Arts and Design Helsinki. Graduated 2001.
• Engineer in Information Technology (equivalent to B.Sc.), Helsinki Institute of Technology. Graduated 1994.
• Secondary school graduate, Meilahden lukio, Helsinki. Magna Cum Laude Approbatur. 1989.

Other studies

• Drama writing, Helsingin työväenopisto. 1998.
• Creative Writing, Helsingin työväenopisto. 1997.
• Numerous courses in Mobile technology, organized mainly by Nokia, Siemens and some other Telecom. companies. 1991-1998.
• Since late 90's I have participated several international workshops and conferences that have futhered professional development in digital culture, as well as built my peer-network both in design and research.

• 9/2008 -> Information Systems Specialist, National Library of Finland
• 1-3/2008: Designer (EC-project Salero), Medialab, University of Arts and Design Helsinki.
• 1-2/2007: Researcher, Medialab, helsinki University of Arts and Design.
• 1/2004 – 12/2006: Researcher in "Interactive narratives in cross-media systems (INiCS)" project at the University of Art and Design Helsinki, funded by Academy of Finland (104768).
• 2001-2002: Usability Researcher, Suomen Oujee Ltd. (now called Idean). I was doing usability research of Mobile and Internet services.
• 1994-1998: R&D Engineer, Nokia Telecommunications, NMT Switching department. I was programming and testing SS7-ISUP signalling on NMT mobile switch. Additionally I was an Interface Manager responsible for Voice Mail and Short Message System technical interfaces between Nokia and subcontractors.
• 1993: Trainee, Helsinki Institute of Technology. Main job was to set up a Siemens telephone switch on the institute's telecommunications lab.·       1992: Assistant, CSCE Helsinki Summit.
• 1991: Trainee, Helsinki Telephone Company (now called Elisa). Mainly I was managing and doing cross-switching installations but I was also installing telephone socets to houses.
• 1989-1990: Official, Loan department, Insurance Company Pohjola. 

Lectures and invited speeches

• Panelist 'The 411 on Mobile Content' session in nextMEDIA, Banff, Can. June 2007.
• Scripting for Participatory Television Drama at Bodies in Play summit Banff New media institute, Can. May 2005.
• Metadata synteettisen henkilön muistina?, I Kulttuurintutkimuksen päivät. Helsinki 2003
• Virtual Theatre, Outline + panelist in New Spaces, New Narratives, ITI-conference at Mindtrek, Tampere Nov.2003
• Teacher, chatterbot development, MUMMI Workshop, Medialab UIAH, fall 2003
• Teacher, Digi Media writing workshop at KUTU10 seminar, Oulu Oct.2003
• Interactive television drama and virtual communities, lecture at SAGAS Writing Interactive Fiction, Future TV Workshop, Oct.2003
• Accidental Lovers, opening of the year, UIAH, Sept.2003
• Between 2000-2003 I have given several lectures in MediaLab, UIAH, & University of Helsinki about interactive characters and virtual communities. 

Notable Projects 

Accidental Lovers (Sydän kierroksella, Crucible Studio, Finland. 2006) is an interactive, dark musical TV-comedy.  It premiered on the Finnish Broadcasting Company YLE TV1 as a mini series of 4 episodes on each Wednesday and Friday evening between Dec. 27, 2006 – Jan. 5, 2007. Altogether 12 different love stories were created, based on the mobile text messages that the audience sent during the shows. I invented the concept together with Mika Tuomola. In the production I worked as a scriptwriter & concept developer, I participated in creating technical requirements for the broadcast engine and productions tools.  Accidental Lovers is a pioneering work in the development of interactive storytelling genres. Having done it, I have got unique knowledge of cross-platform mobile entertainment and interactive content for Television.  During the production I also gained experience of large EC funded projects – international collaboration in R&D, and EC research reporting. 

I am a performer (mostly remote), co-writer, co-designer and programmer of Avatar Body Collision, a collaborative globally dispersed virtual performance group. I am a founding member form 2002 to 2007. In most of ABC’s work, three actors perform online, live, in real time, while one actor performs in the proximal space of the hosting venue. The remote performers appear projected on a screen, using web cameras and avatar world technologies. We have also developed UpStage, an open source performance platform.

Past events include following plays and performances:

• ABC Experiment’s cyberformance production for Wellington Fringe Festival, Feb 16-17, 2002;
• Lectures and presentations at Arts International and NYU, April 2002, New York; re:mote: International festival on remoteness, 2005; ADA emerge, NZ, 2005; DRHA2007 (UK); and monthly UpStage walkthroughs since 2004.
• Screen Save Her was performed, by ABC at 12-12 Festival of Time-based Media, Cardiff, May 2002, Riverside Studios London, May 2002;
• swim at Medialab South Pacific in Wellington, NZ, Oct 2002, Medi@terra, Athens, Greece, Dec 2002; ANET Festival, Belgrade, Yugoslavia, Dec 2002; City of Women Festival, Ljubljana, Slovenia, Oct 2003, Gender Changers, Belgrade, Serbia, July 2004, NZ Fringe Festival, Wellington, NZ, Feb 2005;
• Dress the Nation as part of Lysistrata Project, an international theatrical protest against war, online, March 3rd 2003;
• Lagging with the Lololols at Virtual Minds, Bremen, March 2004;
• DTN2 at Machinista Offline Festival, May 2004.
• Come & Go at  070707-festival, online & Wellington, NZ, 2007.
• Belonging at Intimacy seminar in Goldsmiths, London, 7 Dec. 2007; HTMlles festival in Montreal, on 17 October 2007.

Web Design. Since late 90's I have been involved in the design and implementation of several different types of webpages, wherein my role has varied from concept development and scriptwriting to graphical design and programming. These pages include:

• Turing Enigma chatterbot concept development and writing. 2008. www.taik.fi/turingenigma
• Sydän kierroksella (Accidental Lovers) TV-series introductory pages. Scriptwiter. 2006. http://www.yle.fi/sydan
• Minna Rimpilä – actor's home page. Designer & programmer. 2006. http://www.saunalahti.fi/riminna/
• kuutio. Programmer. 2005. http://www.kuutio.info/
• "Election Star" election engine, Crucible Studio & Almamedia production. Sciptwriter. 2004.
• UpStage home page. Designer & programmer. 2003 and 2007 versions. http://www.upstage.org.nz/.
• Avatar Body Collision. Co-desinger & programmer. 2003 & 2007 versions. http://www.avatarbodycollision.org/
• Crucible Studio homepage. Design, implementation and content editor. 2003. http://crucible.lume.fi/
• Vallattomat vaalisivut, election home-page for MP-candidate. Design & programming. 2003.
• A&ONET, corporate home page. Programmer & co-designer. 2003.
• Keskusvirasto demo, e-learning website for creative writing, Independet Production. One of the sriptwriters and concept designers. 2001.
• Concept for Mirdia - Virtual Villa -chat environment, independent production, Scriptwriter & Concept designer in Villa. 2000.
• Watch it! - e-learning website for image reading, developed in Mlab Helsinki with artist Eva Saro. Interaction designer. 2000.  http://mlab.uiah.fi/watchit/

• Peer-reviewed article, Comedy Machine: Interactive Comedy as Rule Based Genre. Journal of Digital Creativity. 2007, vol. 18, No. 3, pp. 143–150.
• Häikiö P. Saarinen L. and Tuomola M. 2005. Production-Description Part 7: Accidental Lovers. EC Report NM2 D2.3 – Deliverable. www.ist-nm2.org/.
• Saarinen L. 2005. Yllätä mut! Varaatiota Vahinkolaukauksista. Lume 5-vuotta juhlajulkaisu. Mediakeskus Lume: Helsinki.
• Häikiö P. Saarinen L. Accidental Lovers and the new genre for television. Lume 5-vuotta juhlajulkaisu. Mediakeskus Lume: Helsinki.
• Peer-reviewed article, Imagined Community and Death. Journal of Digital Creativity, Volume 13 No 1, Swets & Zeitlinger, 2002. 

Conference Proceedings

• Saarinen L. (2007). Accidental Lovers' Text Messages. Mobile Nation. Toronto, March 2007.
• Saarinen L. (2006). Developing New Genre for iTV, Case Accidental Lovers. CHI2006. Montreal, Canada, April 2006.
• Saarinen L. (2006). Scripting for Computational Drama. Peer reviewed extended abstract and poster proceedings  to EuroITV Doctoral Consortium, Jan 2006.
• Saarinen L. Interactive Comedy as Rule Based Genre. Abstract to Computational Narrativity proceedings. Feb 2006. 

Digital Publications 

• Häikiö P. Saarinen L. and Tuomola M. 2005. Production-Description Part 7: Accidental Lovers. EC Report NM2 D2.3 – Public Deliverable. www.ist-nm2.org/.
• Luokkajakoa Koulukaverit.comissa - Vanhaan kouluyhteisöön voi nyt palata internetissä, review, Mediumi 2.2. 2003.
• Näyttöruudut huurussa - Onko internetistä iloa erotiikannälkään?, review, Mediumi 1.2. 2002.
• Vekkulitamagotchi pussaa limat irti - Pumpui on virtuaalilemmikki tekstiviestin päässä, review, Mediumi 1.1. 2002.
• Leikkisää kommunikointia Hotelli Kultakalassa - visuaalisesta chatista kasvoi toimiva sosiaalinen ympäristö", review, Mediumi 1.0. 2001.
• Facing the unexpected - field notes from the limits of net discourse. Cultural Usability webiste. 2001. 

• Lovers Loop installation. Ars Electronica Campus Exhibition, Linz, Austria. 2006. 
• Chatterbots: Crash Test Dummies of Communication, MA-work and demo exhibited in Nordic Interactive Expo. Copenhagen, Denmark. 2001
• 10th City - Share Life. Produced by Katastro.fi. 10th city was part part of the Cafe9 which was a collaborative project between the nine European Cities of Culture for the Year 2000, and it was part of N2art). I worked as one of the concept developers. 2000.   

• Nominee in the 2007 Banff World Television Awards, category: Interactive Program Enhancement Accidental Lovers (Sydän kierroksella).
• The winner at Banff World Televison Festival with Accidental Lovers concept by Leena Saarinen and Mika Tuomola. Telefilm Canada presents The Banff Centre New Media CyberPitch competition. 2003.
• Nominee for the Future Visionary Challenge of Nordic Interactive with my MA final work: Chatterbots: Crash Test Dummies for Communication. 2001.
• Tiin@ tulee, Information Society Innovations for Women, Villa Mirdja - virtual villa, 2nd prize for Jaana Kokko, Riikka Pelo and Leena Saarinen. 2000. 

• AVEK, travel grant, 2007
• AVEK, kohdeapuraha, for Accidental Lovers' live moderation to Saarinen, Tuomola, Nurminen. 2006
• The Banff Centre for the Arts, Summit Scholarship. 2005.
• AVEK, training grant, 2004.
• AVEK, Scriptwriting grant for Accidental Lovers (Vahinkolaukauksia) by Leena Saarinen & Mika Tuomola. 2003.
• AVEK, Kansainvälistymistuki, for Accidental Lovers by Saarinen & Tuomola. 2003.
• Taiteen keskustoimikunta, Travel grant for 10th city – Share Life work group. 2000.
• AVEK, Scriptwriting grant for Villa Mirdia’s work group. 2000.