At the International Toy Fair in Nuremberg, the Game Designers Association welcomed its 500th member, a game author from Berlin. In the days that followed, a number of further membership applications were submitted. We are pleased about this continuous growth, which speaks for our successful work as a consistent representation of our interests. This growth is not limited to the German-speaking countries but takes place internationally. In this context, the group in Italy (SAZ-Italia), which has been in existence for over a year and now has nearly 50 members, deserves special mention.

We take this as a motivation to continue our all-round commitment to the interests of game authors and in particular to support our members in word and deed. We will also use our growing weight in order to further push the political topics we have initiated in cooperation with the publishers, the German Cultural Council and the Game of the Year jury as well as other participants in the business. This includes the demands for the inclusion of games in the collection catalogue of the German National Library as well as for equal value added tax on all cultural assets and artistic achievements – including games of course.