Countdown for the ERN Conference 2022 – Sustainable Esports in the Digital Society

The Media, Management and Transformation Center (MMTC) at Jönköping International Business School will host next week's ERNC 22 conference. From 21-23 November, 120 people, including some of the world's most prominent researchers in Esports will gather in Jönköping to discuss, present, and engage. All combined with many keynotes and panels live streamed through Twitch.

Esports is a growing global phenomenon as part of the world’s most valuable entertainment industry, video games. In 2022, esports will have an audience of around 650 million enthusiasts worldwide with the covid pandemic having accelerated growth as people took to games and esports to connect with others during lockdowns.

Focus on sustainability

With sustainability being a main topic in today's society, the conference will focus on esports sustainability in terms of economic, social and environmental aspects. The ability of esports to keep developing and maintain the opportunities it presents for a better society. These range from the valuable digital skills this young audience can bring into their future careers to how esports can educate and engage around cyber citizenship and environmental issues. The conference will be held in connection to Dreamhack Winter 2022, and most attendees will join the event after the conference. Brian McCauley, Assistant Professor in Marketing at Jönköping International Business School and Vice Chair of ERN (Esport Research Network), is the chair for the conference and is happy to welcome all attendees to Jönköping.

"In line with ERN's goals"

"ERN aim to have their conferences in connection to game- and esports events to give people double value to engage with the industry. This is in line with ERN's goals of academia collaborating with practitioners. Jönköping is the city of Dreamhack. It is one of the world's biggest game festivals, especially for esports. Dreamhack is much about the grassroots perspective. A classic LAN party where you bring your own computers. But there will also be several esports tournaments. This is a great opportunity for those attending the conference to experience Dreamhack live", Brian McCauley says.

"A future lab for society"

As esports is proliferating, so is the number of researchers, shining light on the topics that matter most to esports stakeholders. The ERN network was created in 2019 by researchers from Jönköping University, Tampere University, and the University of Siegen. Today the network consists of over 400 researchers from all over the world. All with the common goal to gain rigorous insights into esports, foster sustainable growth for esports, shape its role in society and translate this knowledge to obtain cognition for the digitized world society is growing into. But it is not just the esports industry that this research will benefit.

"We can learn from esports in many areas. Esports is a future lab for society. It is driven by a young passionate, and digitally innovative audience who are goal-focused and change-orientated. There is value in understanding esports better and using it to help solve problems for a society that is becoming increasingly digitized," says Brian McCauley.