title: WebAL Comes of Age: A Review of the First 21 Years of Artificial Life on the Web.
abstract: We present a survey of the first 21 years of web-based artificial life (WebAL) research and applications, broadly construed to include the many different ways in which artificial life and web technologies might intersect. Our survey covers the period from 1994-when the first WebAL work appeared-up to the present day, together with a brief discussion of relevant precursors. We examine recent projects, from 2010-2015, in greater detail in order to highlight the current state of the art. We follow the survey with a discussion of common themes and methodologies that can be observed in recent work and identify a number of likely directions for future work in this exciting area.
authors.affiliation: University of York.
authors.forename: Tim
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Taylor
authors.affiliation: Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne.
authors.forename: Joshua E
authors.initials: JE
authors.lastname: Auerbach
authors.affiliation: University of Vermont.
authors.forename: Josh
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Bongard
authors.affiliation: University of Wyoming.
authors.forename: Jeff
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Clune
authors.affiliation: University of York.
authors.forename: Simon
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Hickinbotham
authors.affiliation: Michigan State University.
authors.forename: Charles
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Ofria
authors.affiliation: University of Tsukuba.
authors.forename: Mizuki
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Oka
authors.affiliation: IT University of Copenhagen.
authors.forename: Sebastian
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Risi
authors.affiliation: University of Central Florida.
authors.forename: Kenneth O
authors.initials: KO
authors.lastname: Stanley
authors.affiliation: Cornell University.
authors.forename: Jason
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Yosinski
mesh_terms: D020407:Internet; D019369:Life; D008954:Models, Biological; D012106:Research; D058615:Synthetic Biology
keywords: HTML5; WebAL; crowdfunding; crowdsourcing; open science; public outreach; web technologies