Matt Smith was born in the UK in 1967. He is Senior Lecturer in computing at the Institute of Technology Blanchardstown, Dublin, Ireland (http://www.itb.ie), specializing in interactive multimedia e-learning and web applications.
In 1980 (you do the math) Matt started computer programming (on a ZX80) and has been programming ever since. In 1985 Matt wrote the lyrics, and was a member of the band that played (and sang, sorry about that by the way) the music on the B-side of the audio cassette carrying the computer game Confuzion (wikipedia.org/wiki/Confuzion).
After receiving his bachelor's degree in business computing (Huddersfield University, UK), he started looking for more 'fun' in computing, leading to his masters in Artificial Intelligence (Aberdeen University, Scotland), and then his PhD in computational musicology (Open University, UK). Having run out of money after 10 years as a full time student he began his career as a lecturer and academic. He has now been lecturing in programming, artificial intelligence, web development and interactive multimedia for over 20 years, holding full time positions at Winchester University and London's Middlesex University.
In 2002 he moved to Ireland to his current college where he is now Senior Lecturer in computing at the Institute of Technology in Blanchardstown, Dublin, Ireland. In the last few years Matt has introduced Unity-based 3D game development and interactive virtual environments subjects to his computing and digital media students. His current academic work involves investigating the use of computer game technologies to support teaching and learning, in the emerging field of 'serious games'. Previously he worked on Java mobile phone gaming for the European SECASE project, and with a graduate student investigating mobile game multimedia content internationalization.
To keep fit Matt took up the Korean martial art of Taekwon-Do (he developed and runs his club's website at maynoothtkd.com), and a group of his BSc students are now developing a Unity-based Taekwon-Do interactive 'tutor' with Microsoft Kinect cameras. Some of his previous Irish-French student team games can be found and played at saintgermes.com (thanks for continuing to host these Guillem!). Matt was one of the two technical experts for a recent multimedia European project for language and cultural student work mobility (vocalproject.eu).
Matt is currently struggling to learn Korean (for his Taekwon-Do), and Irish (since his daughter Charlotte attends an Irish speaking school and he doesn't believe her translations of her teacher's report cards ...). In 2012 he started taking classical piano lessons again (after a 20 year gap), with a view to sitting exams sometime soon (once he gets his TKD black belt ...).
Matt is a documentation author for the Fungus open source interactive storytelling plugin for Unity (find soon on the Unity asset store and at fungusgames.com), and is in the process of joining the programming team for the open source RPG Sherlock game (see sherlock-thegame.tumblr.com). Matt also maintains a step-by-step open source introduction to Unity 2D and 3D game programming on his public Github pages (see https://github.com/dr-matt-smith/gravity-guy2D).
Matt's previous authoring includes contributions to Serious Games and Edutainment Applications (Springer 2011, ISBN: 1447121600), Musical Imagery (Routeldge 2001, ISBN: 9026518315), and he was also lead editor for Music Education: An Artificial Intelligence Approach (Springer 1994, ISBN: 0387198733). Matt was also a technical reviewer for Internet and World Wide Web: How to Program (3rd Edition) by Deitel, Deitel & Goldberg (Prentice Hall 2003, ISBN: 0131450913).
