There's a new website/blog created by Anders Tychsen from Swinburne University which will be of interest to those academics amongst us. From the blog..
The Games Down Under webblog is intented to faciliate communication between Australian/New Zealand games researchers (console-, pc-, board-, card- ...) and anyone else interested in games research and associated research fields.Efforts are currently directed at starting up an Australian games research network (we have funding!), which at some point in the future will be established with an independent website. This webblog is therefore temporary in duration and will be recreated as soon as we are up and running....
We encourage Australian and New Zealand-based researchers with an interest in games, from technology, to design, to culture and anything in between, to join online and share information about themselves and their research.
There's a recent discussion on the barrier between the games & simulation industry and the games academia, so if that topic is something you're passionate about, be sure to hop on over there and give your 2 cents worth!