July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Amazon launched its first digital currency today with a giveaway: 500 free Amazon Coins for every Kindle Fire customer. The coins, which are worth $5, can buy games, apps, and in-app purchases.

Kindle Fire customers who wish to buy apps or make in-app purchases can purchase Amazon Coins at a rate of 100 for every $1, but they can also get up to a 10 percent discount. Buying 10,000 coins earns you the full discount, and will cost Amazon customers $90.

One caveat: Amazon Coins are only available in the U.S. right now.

“Today is Day One for Coins,” Amazon VP of apps and games Mike George said in a statement. “We will continue to add more ways to earn and spend Coins on a wider range of content and activities.”

Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/olivepress/6348546698/

Amazon Kindle Fire

Amazon announced the virtual currency back in February, when the company also said it would give away tens of millions of dollars worth of free Coins to customers. That’s a hint about the number of Kindle Fires sold — 10 million Kindle Fires would account for $50 million in free coins — as Amazon has never given device sales figures.

Virtual currencies can be useful for gift purposes, for children’s allowances, and for, perhaps, making it easer for customers to spend actual money since they may feel they are only spending virtual money. However, it is another layer of complexity, both for people and for the company issuing the currency, and mobile competitors Apple and Google have not released virtual currencies.

One of Amazon’s biggest goals is expanding the sale of digital content.

A full 12 of the 15 business highlights the company chose to include in its first-quarter 2013 annual earnings release were digital-content related. And that’s what Amazon Coins is all about: increasing the sale of virtual goods, which don’t have to be warehoused, packaged, mailed, and delivered.

As Mike George said:

“We are giving Kindle Fire owners $5 worth of Coins to spend on new apps and games, or to purchase in-app items, such as recipes in iCookbook, song collections in SongPop or mighty falcon bundles in Angry Birds: Star Wars.”

One important point for developers: They’ll receive their full 70 percent revenue share when customers buy items with Amazon Coins, even if the users earned a 10 percent discount on their initial coin purchase.

Image credit: Brian Sawyer/Flickr

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Apple announced a countdown to 50 billion app downloads today, signaling that iOS downloads are north of 49 billion already.

“Apps have revolutionized the way we play video games, consume news, do business, educate, communicate, create art, and so much more,” Apple says.

And as Apple has done before for major app store download thresholds, it’s giving away a $10,000 App Store gift card to the lucky iOS user who downloads the 50 billionth app, plus a $500 gift card to the next 50 people to download an app.

Currently, the countdown is at 49,216,610,939, and increasing by about 1,000 every two seconds, so there’s perhaps two and a half days until the download counter crosses the 50 billion mark, assuming the rate stays the same.

In addition, Apple revealed the top 25 free and top 25 paid apps of all time. Facebook owns three of the top 16 free apps, and Google has four of the top 25. The original Angry Birds is the most downloaded paid app of all time, and an astounding three more editions of Angry Birds — Seasons, Space, and Star Wars — are in the top 18 downloaded apps of all time.

Image credit: Rovio

Pincus took to the stage this afternoon at the NewSchools Venture Summit, a major ed-tech conference. He revealed that Zynga will offer startups “innovating around games and the classroom” access to office space, game designers and product managers.

The accelerator has already lined up several companies to participate, including Kidaptive, LocoMotiveLabs, and Motion Math. Social learning startup Edmodo will also be joining as a charter partner.

“Everybody at Zynga is passionate about having a positive world impact,” said Pincus. “We want to help these companies leave the nest.”

Together with the NewSchools Venture Fund, Zynga will offer funding to the five or six startups in the inaugural class. To support this initiative, Zynga.org has provided $1 million in funding for the accelerator’s first year.

“We’re proud to partner with Zynga.org on this project, which brings together the world’s leader in social gaming, the top K-12 education impact investor and an initial cohort of all-star entrepreneurs,” said Ted Mitchell, CEO, NewSchools, in a statement. “Together, we are excited to push the boundaries of how students learn through educational games.”

At the conference, Pincus drew a comparison between the new program and Y Combinator, the elite technology accelerator program for startups.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

“The world around you is not what it seems,” says Ingress, the virtual game that uses the real world as its gamespace. And, perhaps, when Google’s semi-independent division Niantic Labs is finished with its mission, we humans won’t be, either.

Google’s mission is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and usable. Note carefully that Google says nothing about the Internet in that statement.

In the last few eye-blinks of human history, we’ve created virtual worlds: cyberspace, virtual reality, the World Wide Web … places that exist in our devices, on our computers, in our servers, on the internet, and in our heads. But there’s also a space in which we live and walk and eat and breathe. Realspace. Meatspace. IRL. The real world, so we say, that we can touch and taste and smell.

Google’s trying to bring those world together, partly through the work of Niantic Labs.

Augmented reality is nothing new, of course, with marketing-focused companies like Layar building connections between physical and virtual reality and Ikea’s most-downloaded branded app of 2012 doing similar things. Other startups have explored AR capabilities as well, such as Caterina Fake’s Findery, which invites people to leave geo-tied notes that others can discover and read.

But when a company with the resources of a Google tackles the problem, and has a tool in Google Glass that seems destined for significant developer (and probably user) penetration that can actually create interconnections between the real and the virtual perhaps more efficiently than any other previous product, you’ve got something interesting. And potentially huge.

So a couple of weeks ago, I chatted with the man who’s leading that effort.

John Hanke: the missionary of mapping

John Hanke is vice president of product for Niantic Labs, the year-old Google-but-not-Google division of just a few dozen engineers that brought us Field Trip, the app to explore the world around us with a virtual docent. And, of course, the virtual/real game Ingress.

Source: LinkedIn

John Hanke

Before Niantic, Hanke ran Google Maps, Google Earth, and other geo areas, and before Google, he was the cofounder and CEO of Keyhole, the innovative geo-mapping and visualization company. Google bought Keyhole in 2004, which brought Hanke in the search engine’s fold to lead the its maps, earth, street view, and local divisions.

Now, he told me, rather than let him leave to scratch his entrepreneurial itch yet again and do another startup, Google gave him a semi-autonomous group to, as his LinkedIn profile suggests, experiment at the “intersection of mobility, real world, and the Internet.”

“We set up Niantic as a group that could explore new types of mobile apps with ubiquitous always-on features,” Hanke said. “And we’re set up to act like a start-up.”

Virtual + physical = field trip

Field Trip was one of Niantic’s first creations, and while on the surface it’s an app that helps you find cool stuff, ultimately it’s a tool to merge metadata and data and then present them together. While you’re in the physical world, Field Trip pulls data about that experience from digital sources, feeding you that information, and changing — deepening, enriching — your experience of place. Layering with with history, perhaps, or science, or culture.

Because, after all, one rock is very much like another rock, but if this is the precise rock where Geronimo attacked Mexican soldiers armed with only a knife and his courage, that changes our experience of this particular place. And the merging/melding/layering of virtual and physical makes it more real, in a sense — hyperreal.

Source: John Koetsier

Google’s Field Trip app helps you explore “reality.”

Enabling that, of course, requires extensive virtual enhancement of the what-you-see-is-what-you-get world.

“One of the things that we’re trying to evangelize is the concept of geo-tagging everything,” Hanke told me. “I would have expected eight years ago that it would be ubiquitous now, but it’s still not. But I think we’ll get there.”

Geotagging everything digital is a key intersection point between virtual and real. If this blog post is written here, and not there, that adds flavor and nuance to the information. And if a particular historical fact is geotagged to a specific mapped location, that adds depth and dimension to our experience of that place.

“We’re applying some of the same techniques we currently use in standard web search, and the same kind of discipline, to pull really interesting, really good places up from everything else,” Hanke says. “The model is that you’re walking through an unfamiliar neighborhood, but with a friend who is telling you the best things around you. You enjoy it just like before, but you’re a little more informed.”

AR + MMO + IRL

Depth and dimension are definitely core components of Ingress, another Niantic Labs app/experiment/game. Ingress is a — take a deep breath — augmented reality massively multiplayer online video game.

The real world is real, but it’s fought over virtually by two shadowy groups: the Enlightened and the Resistance. Niantic has filled the Earth with virtual portals, usually coincident with actual physical landmarks or monuments, that players need to capture in order to gain territory. Capture territory with large numbers of people (aka “mind units”) and your faction gets more powerful.

Clearly, the massive integration of Google mapping technology with a sophisticated gaming engine is required. And the result is another intersection between the real and the virtual.

“Ingress is a massively multiplayer online game designed for mobile, with real location-based connections,” Hanke told me.

You play with everyone in your faction, and you might meet up with other players in real life, or you may just know them virtually as team members in another area. Along the way, Google learns an awful lot about how you use your mobile devices, about mapping physical locations, and about overlaying cyberspace on meatspace.

Source: Google

Ingress’ field of play is the world, layered with virtual data.

All of that knowledge is going to come in very handy with Google Glass.

Endgame: Google Glass?

Hanke is cautious when speaking about Google Glass, as is the PR handler who is copiloting our conversation. Even already public information is a question mark as we chat: Google is definitely being Apple-like in the control and distribution of Glass and its future.

But something tantalizing tidbits do come out.

“We definitely kinda had Google Glass in mind when we started work on apps at Niantic,” Hanke says. “We need mobile devices that are less intrusive than the phone is.”

Source: Google

A model demonstrates Google’s new Project Glass technology.

And we need devices with different input/output modalities, he says. After all, it’s not easy to play Ingress running around holding an expensive and fragile device in front of you like a window ripped from its frame. And yet you need that portal from the physical to the virtual. For instance, while Field Trip is great to open the doors on human context for the world around us, it threatens to detract from our experience of the world by redirecting our eyes from the ultimate big screen of reality to the small screen of our mobile device.

Google Glass, on the other hand, sits unobtrusively on our foreheads, leaving our hands free and providing data as an overlay on top of the physical world rather than an alternative to the physical world. That model of layering, mixing, and intersecting is top-of-mind for Hanke.

“It just can’t be the case that people are walking around heads down tapping on a screen,” he says. “That just can’t be the future of the human race.”

Cyborg me now

Which, of course, is exactly what’s at issue: the future of the human race. Or, at least how we ingest, consume, and reconstitute digital data. And analog data. And meld the two into one harmonious whole of knowing.

That’s perhaps a little metaphysical for a small division of Google that focuses on maps and games and apps.

But the web has rewired our brains in a decade or so of virtually ubiquitous Internet access, and the smartphone has rewired our behavior in five years, taking us from creatures who look up to to see others to beings that look down at any opportunity to see small bits of plastic and glass and metal in our hands.

So is it really too much to expect from a transformation that brings us from clear divisions between what is real and what is virtual to an elegant blend of the two?

“This is not psychosis or some cognitive break, but an actual takeover of the mind,” Google’s introductory video for the Ingress game says ominously.

Art imitates life, I suppose, and life, in turn, imitates art.

MinoMonsters is a mobile gaming startup that released major updates to its game today and shared some news surrounding the company’s progress. MinoMonsters is a Pokémon-inspired game in which players collect, train, and battle “minos.” The popular app is No. 75 on the top grossing charts in the Apple App Store, now has more than 2.5 million players, and generates millions in revenue.

Today, MinoMonsters also announced that it acquired a small HTML5 gaming startup, signed a kids’ book deal to help transform into a bigger brand, and is now under representation of WME, one of Hollywood’s biggest talent agencies. Founder and CEO Josh Buckley said that the company is starting to ramp up their licensing into toys, trading cards, TV, movies, and so on … and next week, MinoMonsters will launch animated shows on YouTube.

“We’re creating one of the biggest kids brands in the world,” Buckley said in an email. “Big brands used to start out as TV shows or movies; however, now the model is changing. Hollywood is approaching us. The next Disney is going to start out as a character-driven mobile game, and we’re at the forefront.”

Buckley went through Y Combinator at the age of 18, the youngest founder in the program at the time. After graduating from the spring 2011 class, he raised $2 million from Andreessen Horowitz, SV Angel, General Catalyst, Ignition Partners, and Alexis Ohanian.

This whiz kid from Kent, England began freelance programming at the age of 11. He built a series of applications and sold Menewsha, a community for people to create avatars, for six figures when he was just 15 years old. He then became a young angel investors and went on to create MinoMonsters in 2010. His ultimate vision is to be a cross-channel brand that extends beyond the gaming world.

At first, MinoMonsters was paid-for download, but now it is free with the addition of in-app purchases. Buckley also changed the focus of the game away from an exploration to battle. The new update lets players battle anybody in the world, and new animations will be released next week.

Photo credit: MinoMonsters

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Todd Greene is CEO of PubNub.

Mobile, web, and desktop online apps can be split into two categories: “static” or “real-time.”

Static apps represent the bulk of our online usage today: these are solitary, single-user experiences where content changes only when the user clicks a button, requests a new page, or does a “reload.”  New information is presented only when the user asks for it.

Real-time apps are infinitely more engaging.

These apps mimic behaviors we’re used to having in the real world: content is pushed to us “as it happens.”  Real-time applications let you edit docs together, battle your online buddies, find the closest taxi, and see when your friend is typing an “iMessage.” They let musicians perform from home and interact with adoring fans. Real-time apps make sure citizens know about critical safety issues as they happen. And real-time technology enables people to follow friends on a map, chat, share, and collaborate in a more natural, real-world, manner.

World of Warcraft, Facetime, WebEx, ETrade’s MarketCaster, and Facebook’s live “Ticker” may seem completely unrelated, but they all represent real-time apps, connecting users instantly with the real world. Another thing they have in common is that each cost tens of millions to design, build, deploy, and scale!

Real-time technology has always been complicated and expensive. But that’s changing.

Real-time networks emerge

New trends in consumer software are almost always driven by a sudden ubiquitous availability of an enabling technology. In the 90s, the launch of app servers moved websites from glossy brochures to destinations for online banking, travel, and commerce.  A decade later, open source software stacks help kickstart massive social networks operating on a shoestring budget without writing big checks to Oracle and IBM.

Today, a new enabling technology has emerged that’s driving an explosion of real-time apps. “Real-Time Networks” like PubNub, Pusher, and Firebase offer the core building blocks for real-time, globally distributed, and offered on a pay-as-you-go model.   (Full disclosure: I’m the CEO of PubNub, but we’re not alone in pioneering this movement).

The core building blocks of real-time

These real-time networks operate by establishing (and maintaining) a dedicated network socket connection to every device.

Until recently, this was an expensive proposition, roughly analogous to keeping a connected phone line open to all of your users, all the time.  Thanks to the elasticity of the cloud and some innovative technologies, the costs of these dedicated connections has now dropped substantially. 

But the magic happens once you have that connection.  A real-time network offers high-speed delivery of data, targeted to individual devices or broadcast to everyone simultaneously.  Presence-as-a-service provides an easy way to detect (and be notified instantly) when users go on/offline.  Data streams can be stored for future use, and even played back like a DVR for data.  Real-time audience visualization and out-of-the-box encryption comprise more of these core real-time building blocks.

As real-time networks become more commonplace, they are becoming adopted by new MMO games, business collaboration, and telecom companies.  But their availability is also driving completely new kinds of real-time apps. 

Real life enhanced by real-time data

Transportation is one of the earliest areas where we can see real-time technology changing our day-to-day behaviors.  What was once a tedious, horribly unreliable experience, ordering a taxi, is now becoming easy, predictable, and even fun.  Companies like GetTaxi, Sidecar, Uber, Lyft, and others let us order cabs with a single tap, and watch online as the cab approaches our location. 

But it’s not just transportation that’s getting a facelift.

ClassDojo uses real-time technology to give teachers a way to incentivize classroom behavior, using smart phones to provide instant feedback to the student and his/her parents. Soon, mobile apps will show real-time queue length for each restroom or concession booth.

Digital advertising evolves

Brands are using real-time in digital campaigns to drive audience engagement.

Coca-Cola enhanced the American Music Awards red-carpet show by letting online viewers manipulating the video in real-time for their friends’ enjoyment, and powered live voting during the Superbowl. Louis Vuitton created a global, live, online fashion show with online viewer interaction synchronized with the video.  Nike, Honda, Audi, Doritos, and Budwieiser are a few more examples of leading brands invested in their own real-time, user participation campaigns. Real-time in advertising is quickly becoming as popular as CGI was to TV ads in the 90’s.

The emergence of an online audience

Things get really exciting when apps are designed around the “audience experience”, instead of the “user experience.” Companies like TopHatter now offer a true real-time auction e-commerce platform, with avatars representing the bidders and auctioneer, complete with the sound of a gavel ending each auction.  Stageit brings the live concert experience online: audience members make requests, cheer (virtually), and even tip the performer online.

Social TV offerings from Viggle, Yahoo!, Applicaster, and others have taken a similar approach to nationwide TV audiences with online voting, predictive games, and real-time trivia.

Real-time goes mainstream

Real-time networks let app developers focus on their core competencies like better UI, richer experiences, and more creative features, instead of worrying about the massive investment and ongoing maintenance required to deliver real-time services. The cloud made massive storage and processing available to everyone.  Akamai solved the problem of globally scaling websites with content delivery networks.

Now, real-time networks have democratized real-time, you don’t have to be Facebook or Activision to deliver a real-time experience.

The real-time apps we see today are just the beginning — expect radically new possibilities in the way we shop, communicate, travel, work, educate, and experience the world.  The Lego pieces are now all in place; it’s now up to the creative folks to change the way we interact online.

photo credit: Office of Governor Patrick via photopin cc

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Only 20 percent of American consumers’ time on mobile devices is spent on the web. A massive majority, 80 percent, is spent in apps: games, news, productivity, utility, and social networking apps.

Turns out, it’s an app world, after all.

According to app analytics firm Flurry, which tracks app usage on a staggering 300,000 apps on over a billion active mobile devices, we spend an average of 158 minutes each and every day on our smartphones and tablets. Two hours and seven minutes of that is in an app, and only 31 minutes is in a browser, surfing the old-school web.

A big chunk of that 158 minutes is taken up with games — 32 percent — but it’s almost shocking to see how much time a single app and a single company eats up. Eighteen percent of all the time that Americans spend on their phones is spent in the Facebook app, a figure that by itself dwarfs all other social networking apps.

Combined, the others only take up six percent of our time.

There was a time when developers thought HTML5 would kill the mobile app, with experts like Mike Rowehl saying things like: “We’ll forget that we even passed through another era of native apps on the way to the mobile web.”

In an interesting twist, however, HTML5 is actually being used more as a tool for cross-platform native app development. In fact, it’s now the number one choice for developers building apps for multiple platforms.

Flurry also says that people are now using more apps than ever, launching 7.9 per day in the last part of 2012 versus 7.5 per day in 2011 and 7.2 per day in 2010. Consumers are continuing to try new apps as well, with long-term users adding new apps regularly to their existing stack.

“We believe that with consumers continuing to try so many new apps, the app market is still in early stages and there remains room for innovation as well as breakthrough new applications,” Flurry says.

Is the mobile web dead?

Not necessarily — we’re only five years into this ongoing mobile revolution. But today, people are talking with their taps, and they’re overwhelmingly choosing apps.

OMGPOP founder and Zynga New York GM Dan Porter is out at Zynga. He’ll be replaced by VP of mobile games Sean Kelly. More to come.

— Betabeat (@betabeat) April 2, 2013

At the time of Zynga’s acquisition, OMGPOP had 20.5 million daily active users and 37 million installs, and was the most-tweeted game ever. Of course, since, Zynga stock has cratered, OMGPOP’s chief revenue officer left, and the hits have not been fast and furious.

Zynga COO David Ko confirmed the departure in an email to VentureBeat, saying:

“Developing and launching games is a team effort, and we’re proud of the great work the Zynga New York team has done with Draw Something 2.

Our follow up to the original hit is even more social and engaging, and we’re excited to get it into the hands of our players globally.  We thank Dan Porter for his efforts in making the Draw Something franchise a success and wish him well in his future endeavors.

We’re proud to see talent like Sean Kelly take a bigger leadership role as the Head of our New York studio and lead the team to the global launch of Draw Something 2.”

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Mobile app analytics source App Annie announced today that it is adding Amazon Appstore statistics to its existing Google Play and iOS analytics solutions. The service is currently in beta release.

And what the data shows is that the top apps on Amazon are very, very different than Google Play.

All of Amazon’s top 10 paid apps are games, including three Disney titles: Where’s My Water and two versions of the super-popular Temple Run app (Oz and Brave). And while Mojang’s popular Minecraft game is near the top in both stores, the key difference is that Google Play’s top 10 selling apps include seven utilities, including Swiftkey Keyboard, the top-selling app in the U.S.

When it comes to free apps, social networking and communications apps dominate Google Play: Facebook is the top app, Instagram is at number three, Facebook Messenger is at five, and Skype and Twitter are at eight and nine. On Amazon, Facebook barely cracks the top 10, and no other social networking or communications tool comes close.

One of App Annie’s goals, of course, is to show developers where the big opportunities are. Based on the early returns, the main thing Amazon customers want from the company’s app store is games.

Analytics for the Amazon Appstore are important, since Amazon’s Kindle family is almost certainly the best-selling Android family of tablets in the world. Amazon doesn’t release Kindle sales statistics, but the Kindle Fire HD 7-inch dominates web use by Android devices, and ABI Research has calculated the total number of Kindle tablets in the market as of January as up to 12.5 million.

Distimo, which also provides app store analytics, already includes Amazon Appstore numbers in its privately available data.

Image credit: Blake Patterson/Flickr

Developers hungry to start creating apps for the Pebble smartwatch will be both excited and dismayed come the second week of April. The company announced today that it is releasing its software developer kit at that time, but it will only include tools that let developers create “watch faces.”

Eric Migicovsky, the creator of the Pebble watch, uploaded a video to his Kickstarter campaign — which has made over $10 million — today, updating backers as to the company’s progress and the upcoming SDK. He explained that the this is a “work in progress,” and also promised that 99 percent of the application programming interfaces (APIs) within the SDK will change at some point in the future as they build out support for developers.

“It’s an important step for us to get something out there and really show you, potential developers, that we’re shifting our focus from the initial getting-started period of Pebble to supporting developers as the write applications for Pebble,” said Migicovsky in the video.

The SDK focuses on “watch faces,” or the interactive home screens that, well, tell time. It’s mostly buttons-oriented, which means developers could be clever and create games based on those button interactions. Migicovsky showed off some of the creations from the company’s beta test of the SDK, which included a dragon that winks on the minute, a Mario who gets a coin every minute, and a “Snake ala Nokia” game that is just like it sounds.

Pebble is otherwise equipped to handle multiple running apps on the watch, but will likely release support for that in future iterations of the SDK.

Migicovsky went on to say that Pebble thus far has been really focused on simply delivering the goods — getting the smartwatches into the public’s hands. Because of that, Pebble has not been as communicative as it would like with developers and hopes that the launch of this SDK will change that relationship.

Update 34 – Pebble Watchface SDK in April from Pebble Technology on Vimeo.

hat tip Slash Gear; Pebble image via Devindra Hardawar/VentureBeat

This sponsored post is produced by StackSocial.

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July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Lei Zhang is the US General Manager of CocoaChina, an international mobile game developer based in China.

Flurry Analytics announced in June 2012 that China had surpassed the US in iOS and Android device activation, and the market has continued growing since. But while the rest of the mobile gaming world is entranced by iOS as the main platform for revenue, China’s mobile market is forging a different path.

To be successful in China, game developers will have to learn to embrace the Droid.

Pocket presence: mobile market share in China

Experts have long assumed that it was only a matter of time before Apple conquered China’s mobile phone market, predicting in January of 2012 that key partnerships could lead to sales of 40 million units. As of the second half of 2012, however, some reports showed that iPhones accounted for only 7.5% of the Chinese smartphone market. The prevalence of third-party Android stores alone (at last count there are at least 200) demonstrates Android’s market dominance.

While iOS devices continue to be a status symbol for white-collar demographics, Android phones are quickly snapping up market share from the bottom up. iPhone’s less-than-10% market share is a stark contrast to bitter rival Samsung, whose phones account for more than 20% of the Android market alone.

Misfit for a polluted environment?

The problems Apple faces in China are far more than price point alone.

Fraudulent credit card payments have long plagued China’s mobile app ecosystem. Apple’s response was to limit the total amount of in-app purchase spending on the App Store by a given user within a short period of time. While effective, this practice also capped spending by legitimate users.

Android also has an advantage in download speed. It is typical for an average Chinese consumer to wait for more than 20 minutes to download a 30 MB app from Apple App Store in China, compared to two minutes for the same sized app from a 3rd party Android marketplace. Apple users generally stay with the platform only because of loyalty.

Revving up revenue

In the past, industry analysts thought that the fragmentation of the Android market in China made profitability outside of advertising impossible. New statistics, however, suggest otherwise.

The Fishing Joy franchise, CocoaChina’s most successful title, is currently generating $4,000,000 USD of gross revenue per month, driven mostly by in-app purchases on Android devices with ultra-broad coverage and carrier-billing. These numbers are not unique — other developers have reported revenue on a similar scale from Android games.

Driven by the wide availability of more affordable phones and the commitment of Chinese carriers to fuel the Android ecosystem, Android is expected to seize an estimated 80 percent of the Chinese mobile game revenue. Given that in 2013 the total Chinese smart device gaming market is expected to be worth 5 Billion RMB ($793 Million), it’s clearly an attractive platform.

The path ahead

For foreign developers hoping to make a splash in China, Android has the audience, thanks to the devices’ proliferation. Developing for the platform is not without its challenges, however.

Setting aside language and culture, developers must understand the large number of Android markets and payment options, plus the problems of copycat games and unlicensed distribution. While Western games can be successful in China, developers who want to capitalize will need to have the technological capability to publish across the entire spectrum of Android devices, and secure a local partnership to drive both marketplace inclusion and localization (not to mention help set up a bank account to get paid).

As the Chinese mobile market continues to grow, building those capabilities is certainly an investment every game developer should consider.

Lei Zhang is the US General Manager of CocoaChina, an international mobile game developer based in China. Lei runs all aspects of US operations for CocoaChina, including establishing developer partnerships and managing game localization.

photo credit: dcmaster via photopin cc

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Does advertising always have to operate within a pay to play model? PaeDae doesn’t think so, as it’s just announced a new platform called Bartr that developer can use to start advertising their mobile apps or games without spending a dime.

Bartr operates on a series of credits. Developers that run ads within their own apps and mobile games will earn credits, and they can use these to advertise in other applications at a targeted demographic.

“The great thing about Bartr is that we’re able to transform advertising into a resource for developers, rather than just another cost of marketing,” PaeDae cofounder and CEO Rob Emrich said in an interview with VentureBeat.

Bartr works off of the idea that developers need a high volume of people using their apps before they can really start making money. The problem with most advertising models is that you have to spend a lot to get the word out about your application or mobile game and hope that it brings in new users. If it doesn’t, then you’ve spent a lot of money and have nothing to show for it. Bartr removes the need to spend lots of money just to generate new users.

The new Bartr service is part of PaeDae’s overall strategy to create a deeper relationships with developers, which will hopefully entice them into using the startup’s core rewards/prize business. PaeDae makes money when advertisers (brands and businesses) pay to offer rewards available to users of mobile- and web-based games. PaeDae shares the revenue from these deals with developers. The reward service are all white-label, so it adds value to the app, providing something unique to its customers. The startup’s clients include Amazon, 1-800 Flowers, P&G, and StyleMint.

“[With Bartr], we’re starting with games, because that’s what we know,” PaeDae co-founder and VP of business development Sam Kim told me. He added that Bartr is set up to enable developers of all applications to participate, but that initially game developers would have a strong presence.

Right now it’s only available on iOS apps, but support for Android should roll out in the need future. Bartr itself won’t launch until March, but developers can download the SDK now via PaeDae’s website.

Founded in 2012, the Santa Monica, Calif.-based startup has raised over $1 million in seed funding and is seeking to raise a Series A round of funding in late 2013. PaeDae, which has 12 employees, faces competition from Kiip and a handful of others.

Jennifer Schulz is the global head of commerce at Visa.

Nearly one in 10 Americans has purchased a digital good in the past year. Today’s gamers have an unprecedented range of platforms, payment options and preferences to choose from, and there is little doubt that the digital goods economy will continue to grow.

If you’re an online game developer or publisher, there are a lot of questions to answer to determine how to best monetize game content — what platform is best suited to the game environment, how to attract and convert players in different countries, what types of goods will gamers purchase and what fee should be charged for these items? While there’s no single answer, the recent growth of global and local payment options have at least made transactions easier to facilitate.

With this in mind, PlaySpan took a deeper look at four key payment trends that will have a positive impact on the future of game development.

1) Gamers are using multiple channels to make payments

In a recent Magid survey sponsored by PlaySpan, gamers purchasing virtual goods indicated using a wide variety of payment methods. Traditional payment options like credit or debit cards continue to be popular, but alternative payments have increased in popularity and are now being used by a much wider audience of gamers. It’s not surprising considering how “global” online games have become and the myriad of payment options that people are comfortable with around the world.

In the survey, closed loop prepaid game cards, smartphone payment apps, and electronic transfers from personal bank accounts proved to be equally popular to traditional payment methods with more than 10 percent of respondents. In-game credits and virtual currency were also popular payment methods, ahead of services like PayPal.

The data shows there’s no single alternative payment method that stands above the rest. With such broad payment preferences among gamers, developers should be careful not to limit themselves to a single currency type. Without multiple payment options, publishers risk turning away gamers who might not have access, the means or desire to pay with a particular tool.

2) Alternative payments offer appealing features and benefits to gamers

There is already a significant number of gamers who are using alternative payment options, but that number is expected to increase sharply.

The survey data indicates gamers prefer to use alternative payment methods that allow them to pay without entering credit card information each time they make a purchase. Some of the advantages uncovered in the survey results include: alternative payments gave gamers easy access to perks such as loyalty points and rewards, they eliminated the risk of lost or stolen cards and offered easy access to tickets for things like movies, buses and airlines.

More than half of all respondents to the survey revealed they were either “interested,” or “very interested” in these features, which bodes well for greater adoption among mainstream consumers.

3) In-app purchases dominate the growing mobile platform

When smartphone and tablet games began to move into the mainstream, mobile apps fundamentally changed the pricing structure of the gaming industry. In many cases developers could earn more charging $1.99 for a single game than they had charging $10 in the past. However, this model is quickly eroding.

Currently, on the iPhone App Store, of the top 10 highest-grossing games, only one (Angry Birds) is not free to play. And according to Newzoo, a gaming industry market research firm, in-app purchases make up a staggering 91 percent of Android and iOS game revenue (not counting advertising).

Thanks to the growth of the mobile games market, it’s projected that revenue from in-game purchases will increase from the 2011 global total of $2 billion to almost $5 billion by 2016. By then, integrating in-app purchases will be a necessity for any developer wanting their game to succeed financially.

4) Digital wallets gain acceptance, but there are strong differences between genders

Along with other forms of alternative payments, gamers are showing a growing acceptance towards digital wallets and payments made by smartphones. In fact, research shows that 77 percent of gamers are now open to the idea of using digital wallets like V.me by Visa, whether for purchases online or at the point-of-sale.

There are notable differences however when it come to the sexes and the appeal of digital wallets. Awareness of digital wallet payments is almost 50 percent higher among men, and among non-digital wallet users, men showed that they were much more likely (41 percent) than women (31 percent) to adopt them in the future.

What do these trends signify for game developers?

Mobile, PC and console platforms are converging, and there’s no longer a single, one-size-fits-all solution. As consumers move between games, devices and environments, they need their payments to move seamlessly with them and work reliably from any device. Preferred methods of payments are as divergent as players’ interests and tastes in games themselves. As player behavior evolves, so too must developers tailor their games to target these users. In the adoption of new technologies, gamers have historically offered a fertile testing ground for developers. Now developers have the power to capitalize on this trend and provide the choices necessary to help more effectively monetize game content.

With alternative payment methods and digital wallets growing in acceptance, especially for those games with a global appeal, it’s important for game developers and publishers to consider adapting an open payment platform approach.

Jennifer Schulz is the global head of eCommerce for Visa, responsible for the strategic direction and management of Visa’s global eCommerce business and driving Visa’s product innovation strategy.   

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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So, you’ve got a new tablet — now what? Most app stores make it easy for you to find popular apps, but plenty of impressive tablet apps still fly under the radar.

In my experience, the best apps take full advantage of what makes tablets unique: their gorgeous touch-enabled screens. A new computing design demands an entirely new way of thinking about user interfaces.

(Still need help choosing a tablet? Check out our tablet gift guide.)

If you’re new to tablets, you’ll likely find yourself adapting to touchscreen interfaces quickly (and wishing every screen was touch-enabled). But even if you’ve been following the tablet market closely from the beginning, new apps are always appearing that push the boundaries of design, functionality, and usability.

Comics by Comixology

Tablets are a comic reader’s dream come true, and from what I’ve seen, Comixology is the best app for building and reading a digital comic collection. It includes titles from Marvel, DC, Image, and plenty of independent labels, and since it’s cloud-based, you can access your collection on your smartphone as well. Comic fans will find a lot to like (I particularly enjoy zooming into intricate artwork). But it’s also the perfect way for newcomers to check out comics and graphics novels without being judged by your local comic book guy. 

Various prices for iPad or Android

Infinity Blade II

More than a year after it first appeared, Infinity Blade II remains one of the most graphically advanced games on the iPad. Infinity Blade II builds upon its dungeon-crawling predecessor with more enemies, weapons, and console-quality graphics. (And yes, it’s optimized for the Retina Display.) 

$7 for iPad

Flipboard

Flipboard has been a mainstay recommendation for tablet news junkies since it launched. Two years later, it remains one of the best news-reading apps thanks to its slick digital magazine-like interface and its constantly improving story engine. You may find yourself actually reading more news because Flipboard makes it all look so good. 

Free for iPad or Android

Google Chrome

Yes, Google Chrome. The best desktop web browser is also the best browser on smartphones and tablets. It’s ideal for heavy browser users because it offers the best interface for juggling multiple tabs on tablets, and it can sync with other devices (so bookmarks from your desktop version of Chrome show up on your tablet, and vice versa). Android users get the most out of this app since they’ll actually get to take advantage of its fast browsing engine. On the iPad, you’ll be able to use Chrome’s interface, but you’re stuck with Apple’s slower browsing engine. 

Free for iPad or Android 4.0 and above

Google Earth

Google Earth is a kick on desktops, but on your tablet it’s like a digital globe from the future. It’s a fun and educational app for kids, but even adults will enjoy zooming into nearby and far-off places. This app literally puts the world at your fingertips.

Free for iPad or Android

Panna

A gorgeous cooking magazine for the iPad, Panna offers recipes from master chefs with simple instructions. Thanks to high-quality preparation videos, it’s like diving into your favorite Food Network show. While Panna is helpful for preparation, it’s also a fun app to browse as you’re looking for inspiration for your next party or just for something different to make for dinner. 

$5 per issue or $15 per year for iPad

Showyou

Chances are good that you’ll end up spending more time staring at your tablet than your TV, so you’ll want a simple way to explore the endless world of online video. Showyou collects the videos shared by your friends on social networks, and it also highlights other videos that may interest you. With its most recent update, ShowYou lets you easily sit back and watch online video as easily as you do TV.

Free for iPad or Kindle Fire (not other Android tablets)

StumbleUpon

It shouldn’t be much of a surprise that StumbleUpon adapts itself well to tablets. It has risen to popularity as a fun and simple way to find new content online on the desktop. By simply clicking a button, you’re instantly rewarded with a new, interesting thing to look at or read. On a tablet, where you’re entirely focused on a single app at a time, StumbleUpon’s ingenious mechanic is downright addictive.

Free for iPad or Kindle Fire (not other Android tablets)

Xbox Smartglass

If you have an Xbox 360, this app is a must-have. It works as a “second screen” experience for Microsoft’s console, allowing you to easily search for content as well as interact with media playing on the Xbox 360. And, of course, you’ll also be able to tap into Xbox Live and see what your friends are up to. It’s surprising how much a simple app can make a seven-year-old console seem fresh and new.

Free for iPad, Android (not optimized for Android tablets), Windows 8 and RT

The Walking Dead: The Game

What starts out as a traditional adventure game quickly turns into the most memorable game experience of the year. I’d recommend Telltale’s The Walking Dead on any platform, but if you have an iPad, it’s an even more intimate experience. Structured like a five-episode TV series, the game offers a bit of action, but really, it’s all about the tension and forcing you to make some of the most difficult moral decisions of your gaming life. And as you face off against the hordes of the undead, just remember, it’s all for Clementine.

$5 per episode or $20 for the whole season for iPad

Wordament is a real-time competitive word-finding game. Players find and trace out words in 4 x 4 tiles of letters, competing globally with other players for the most and best words in two-minute mini tournaments.

This is Microsoft’s first foray into extending its game universe on to Apple mobile operating system. Once users download and install the app, they can sign in to their Xbox account — or any Hotmail, SkyDrive, or Windows  account — and start playing. Using your Xbox account will help you earn up to 50 Gamerscore from 10 in-game achievements, and will give you access to your Xbox friends.

Apple, of course, has set up its own gaming hub for iOS for friends, achievements, and leaderboards, called Game Center. Launched in 2010, it still has not really found its way — with industry experts calling it “years behind industry standards,” and an outage a month ago hardly drew any notice.

So extending the Xbox gaming ecosystem to iOS is an interesting move by Microsoft. Realistically, of course, for now it is simply a toe in the water, from which Microsoft will gather data, gauge interest, and plan next moves.

Regarding the game itself, it’s the same game that is already available on Windows Phone and Windows 8, accessing the same game servers, and featuring the same players. Wordament is available for English, French, Italian, German, Spanish, Dutch, and Swedish, with puzzles in five more languages.

You can find and download the game here.

Image credit: Wordament

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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2012 was a great year for gaming. Many of the best-selling games of the year provided plenty of high-octane experiences and unforgettable moments.

This year saw the release of blockbusters such as Call of Duty: Black Ops II, Halo 4, Fay Cry 3, and Mass Effect 3, while it also gave birth to quirky gems such as Journey, Fez, and FTL: Faster Than Light.

Check back with us soon for GamesBeat’s picks for the best games of the year. But in the meantime, check out the video above for a two-minute retrospective on some of the biggest gaming moments of 2012.

YouTube user Malcolm Klock, who put the video together, describes it as such:

2012 has been another amazing year for gaming, with blockbuster AAA titles and innovative indie games galore. Developers this year tested the boundaries of the medium. This is a salute to their work and all the terrific interactive experiences we had in 2012.

These are by no means the only great games from 2012, but they are great. Your favorite game isn’t missing because I don’t think it’s great, more likely it just didn’t edit together well with the rest or had to go to keep it under 2 minutes. I also tried to give some screen time to overachieving indies that deserve the attention, rather than trying to cram in every major release.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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Raspberry Pi announced the Pi Store today on its blog, saying that the app store will make it easier for newbies to get into the Raspberry experience, and will also provide the ability to for people to share their creations … maybe even making a little money on the way.

The tiny computer from the non-profit Raspberry Pi foundation first shipped in April of this year, but only reached volume in July. The Pi is a tiny computer that fits in the palm of your hand, but contains a 700 MHz processor, 512 GB of RAM, and Ethernet, HDMI, USB, and audio ports. It runs a version of Linux — including one titled “Raspbian wheezy” — stored on a SD card, like one in your camera.

Raspberry Pi app store

Current apps on the store include Freeciv, an open source sim game, Iridium Rising, a 3-D space fighter game which is also free but not open source, and LibreOffice, a full Office-compatible productivity suite. 23 titles were announced this morning, and two more have already been added today.

Developers who want to submit apps or content to the Pi Store can upload compiled binaries, raw Python code, or simply pictures, audio, or video. Pi owners will find that the store’s recommendation engine will show them the best content that, over time, will become more customized to their likes and dislikes.

The Pi Store is visible online here, and is built into updated versions of the latest Raspberry Pi operating systems. Technically capable people can also add it to existing installs by jumping into the command line and typing a Debian-style command: sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install pistore

Adding apps to Pi will definitely make it more usable and useful … and could make the operating system as beautifully functional as some have made their Raspberry Pi cases.

Unfortunately for those who want free games, his site is down.

Justin Angel posted the instructions on his personal site yesterday. Today, the page is displaying a “server offline” message … either because it’s too busy or because he’s been shut down.

However, there is such a thing as Google cache. And I did find the instructions.

Angel shows how to hack Windows 8 in not one, not two, but five different ways, showing users how to:

1. get free in-app purchases by modifying encrypted IsoStore files
2. crack trial apps and get paid versions for free
3. remove in-app ads from free games
4. reduce the cost of in-game paid items
5. unlock paid levels by script-injection techniques

Justin Angel’s website, this morning (December 11)

In the first case, he proof-of-concepts the hack by giving himself a million free gold in Soulcraft THD — worth over $1,000 at in-app purchase prices. To demonstrate the second hack, Angel cracks Meteor Madness, a $1.50 game with a free trial. For the third, he edits XAML data files to remove ads from Microsoft’s own Minesweeper game.

The purpose of all this cracking? Angel, who says he wants developers to get paid for their hard work, claims he’s doing this to help developers by exposing weaknesses in Windows 8:

“We were able to show that the majority of ways games and apps developers would make money aren’t secure by default on Windows 8,” he writes in his post.

“The games appearing in this article are awesome and you should buy them and give them money,” he adds. The games he featured in the security tests included Soulcraft, Meteor Madness, Minesweeper, Ultraviolet, Dawn, and Cut The Rope.

Windows 8 does not have a secure location to store data files, and makes it relatively easy to decrypt trial apps and trivial to edit XAML files to remove ads. It’s also fairly simple to edit game data files, Angel says, and inject Javascript code into the IE10 process for a Windows 8 store app.

The kicker for Angel?

We’ve seen a myriad of issues and offered potential fixes to them all. Any mildly competent developer can productize these security attack vectors into shipping products. If Microsoft doesn’t take it upon itself to fix these security attack vectors it’s not because it couldn’t, it’s because it chooses not to.

Here are the instructions Angel provided:

Hack Windows 8 Games

Image credit: Ultraviolet app on Windows Store; hat tip: The Verge

In a bid to make its virtual currency platform more useful for Android game developers, Pocket Change has opened up its platform, allowing devs to give players rewards for any actions they’d like.

Previously, Pocket Change only rewarded players for interacting with an app once a day. Now, developers can give additional Pocket Change rewards for completing a level, inviting a friend to download an app — just about anything.

“Pocket Change is a currency. One of our thesis points from day-one is that what makes a currency interesting is that it has a built-in incentive system,” said Ari Mir, Pocket Change’s founder and chief executive, in an interview with VentureBeat.

With more control over how they can reward their users, developers can tap into Pocket Change’s true potential as a loyalty platform. Additionally, the company has also added an “Earn” tab to its in-game user interface, allowing gamers to see specifically what they need to do to get more points. Naturally, Pocket Change also offers analytics to let companies see how players are interacting with their rewards.

Pocket Change has been operating in stealth mode since Aug. 1, and it only emerged from stealth about a month ago. So far it has rewarded points to more than 12 million users across more than 400 apps. Mir claims that it reaches 1.5 million users a day, and it’s doubling its growth every week. Pocket Change competes with outfits like SessionM, which let developers add gamification features to apps, but differs with its focus on games.

Mir sees the company’s loyalty program as a better alternative to incentivized app installs, which he says “doesn’t help anyone out.” The company is “going to do more incenctivized actions that help the publisher, not just the advertiser.”

Pocket Change’s platform currently only works on Android , but Mir says it may land on iOS in the “near future.”

“What we’re seeing already is that people want more Pocket Change and they’re willing to do all sorts of things to earn it,” Mir said. “We view currency as a platform … where you can launch all sorts of things.”

Pocket Change has raised around $6.4 million from investors including Google Ventures, First Round Capital, and Baroda Ventures. Most recently, it raised $5 million from Google Ventures in its first round.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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Sony announced today on the PlayStation blog that the PS3 is the number one home entertainment device people use to watch Netflix on their TVs. That’s impressive.

Almost any device, it seems, can stream Netflix these days. Netflix is available on the Wii (and the new Wii U), Apple TV, Tivo, Boxee, numerous Blu-ray players, Roku digital players, smart TV platforms from multiple vendors, and, of course, the Xbox 360.

To lead that pack is quite an accomplishment.

“PS3 is our largest TV-connected platform in terms of Netflix viewing, and this year, at times, even surpassed the PC in hours of Netflix enjoyment to become our number one platform overall,” Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said in a statement.

Part of that lead is because PS3 is a very successful mass-market console despite the fact that Xbox has outsold it for 23 consecutive months. Part of it is because PS3 had Netflix early, in 2009, was the first console with 1080p and 5.1 surround sound, and has consistently been on the cutting edge of what’s available, technologically, to control your Netflix viewing.

But part of it is probably also because the Xbox 360, while it offers Netflix, has a wider range of entertainment possibilities, with Microsoft working on original video content, major network TV, YouTube, live TV, and more.

Two newer innovations that Sony has brought to PS3 and Netflix include a new voice user interface system, dubbed “Max,” that is currently in testing, and the ability to pause a Netflix movie on your PS3-equipped TV, and restart it seamlessly on another device, such as your PlayStation Vita.

Innovations like that — and perhaps a breakthrough new console for the coming 2013 updates — might keep PS3 in the lead.

photo credit: CowGummy via photopin cc

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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The holiday sales spike was very kind to Microsoft as the console manufacturer sold loads of hardware and software.

Consumers picked up 750k of the Xbox 360 console, which launched seven years ago. That’s compared to 400k Wii U consoles that Nintendo announced selling in the same time frame. Of course, that’s comparing apples to pomegranates that are out of season and are difficult for consumers to find at the store.

Xbox Live Gold subscriptions also saw a boost during the post-Thanksgiving shopping spree. Microsoft sold 50 percent more subscription cards compared to the same week in 2011. The online service hosted over 14 million concurrent players on Sunday, November 25.

Software sales were supposedly brisk as well, but Microsoft would only say that Halo 4′s Black Friday performance “exceeded expectations.”

We will have to wait for Sony’s numbers on its PlayStation 3, but if that 750k units sold holds as the month’s highest for hardware, this will mark the 360′s 23rd consecutive month as the best-selling console.

Even taking into consideration any production difficulties, Microsoft is likely happy to trumpet that it’s aging hardware outsold the Wii U by a nearly 2-to-1 margin.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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Believe it or not, this week was a win for Microsoft. It released Windows 8 to a huge audience, blowing Apple’s iPad announcements out of the water — quite the undertaking.

Just in case you missed them, we’ve included two of our favorite Windows 8 stories below. And don’t worry, we’ve got something for those of you a little sick of those jewel-toned windows as well.

Should we leave you craving for more awesome tech tales (try not to get drool on your keyboard, laptops are expensive), our Editor’s Picks tag is happy to serve.

Now, let’s get on to the stories you need to read:

Windows 8 stuns, amazes, and sometimes lets us down (review)

It seems like ages ago when Microsoft simultaneously dazzled and puzzled the hell out of the public when it showed off Windows 8 for the first time in June 2011. Since then, we’ve seen Windows 8 evolve and slowly change perceptions about how it works and what devices it’s meant for. Finally, the OS is now available for purchase.

10 New York City startups we’re crazy about

VentureBeat’s been taking a close look at the New York City startup scene. You’ve seen our top New York City technology influencers, but we also want to spotlight the top 10 most interesting startups the city has to offer.

Tips and tricks for getting started with Windows 8

You’ve read all the pre-release coverage and maybe a few reviews, and you’ve decided to take the plunge into Windows 8. You’ve got a freshly upgraded (or new) machine, and that Metro interface is just taunting you with its fancy tiles while you’re struggling to find all the options you’re used to. You click on Internet Explorer and everything looks different. Perhaps you start to wonder how you’re going to survive without a Start button.

How three Dubliners created F.ounders, a ‘Davos for geeks’

You don’t often find U2′s Bono, economist Larry Summers, and Wael Gnomin, the Google marketeer whose Facebook page helped spark the Egyptian revolution, at the same event. You certainly don’t find them being sent on a pub crawl around Dublin. But that’s what happens at F.ounders, an invitation-only gathering of the founders of 150 of the world’s top tech companies and other luminaries.

Game developers say iPad mini will be good for gaming

Game industry executives say that the iPad mini will be good for gaming because it expands the audience to new kinds of players and introduces a device that may be more comfortable in the hands of gamers. By and large, the iPad mini fits into purses and man-bags. That will help it reach a broader audience.

Top image via Shutterstock, Windows 8 images via Sean Ludwig/VentureBeat, New York City image via Devindra Hardawar/VentureBeat, iPad image via Dean Takahashi/VentureBeat

Zynga’s stock has been in a freefall since its initial public offering, with tech pundits and press watching with gleeful schadenfreude as it continues to drop. Zynga is now worth essentially nothing: Its market capitalization of $1.82 billion is roughly equal to the value of its cash and real estate holdings, even with yesterday’s announcements of real money gambling and a $200 million stock buyback.

How can a company that brings in $1.2 billion a year, and recently cut costs in order to achieve profitability, be worth nothing?

It doesn’t make sense. Here’s why Zynga is undervalued — provided it does the right thing next.

Zynga is actually sitting on three widely-known and popular potential gaming franchises: Farmville, Poker, and With Friends. Each of these titles is well known, has broad distribution, and an audience at least willing to check out a new iteration on the franchise. For instance, Farmville 2 just garnered 50 million users shortly after its launch. And each of Zynga’s potential franchises targets a different audience: Farmville for middle-aged women, Poker for middle-aged men, and With Friends for the lucrative under-30 market.

What Zynga needs to do is expand its franchise strategy.

The gaming industry, much like Hollywood, is all about franchises. It is easy to churn out another Spiderman movie or Call of Duty title, because there is already an audience for the content, which is a huge part of the hurdle in terms of success. Once you have a guaranteed audience, you can focus on the content.

Rovio, the makers of the Angry Birds franchise, is worth a reported $9 billion. Angry Birds is a great, fun, casual game that has successfully implemented distribution onto emerging smartphone mobile platforms, but in many ways Angry Birds is simply the Tetris of this generation of computing. In effect, Angry Birds is a single-player, traditional game that doesn’t leverage the social graph, multiuser gaming, and advanced graphics. It barely even takes advantage of touch screens.

Still, it’s hugely profitable because Rovio has truly turned Angry Birds into a game franchise. Rovio has leveraged every possible gaming channel from iPhone to Android to even the Google Chrome App Store, added Star Wars editions, and signed cross-industry deals for everything from stuffed toys and lunch boxes to theme parks. Previous to Angry Birds, Rovio had 51 failed titles. It is now promoting Bad Piggies, a new title that is actually a spinoff of its Angry Birds franchise.

Franchises are not necessarily a guaranteed result, as titles can run over budget and fail at the box office. However, from a business perspective, it is a lot better to get a 50 percent headstart than starting fresh and rolling the dice with new content.

It is easy to see Zynga as a pure-play social gaming company that is struggling to shift into mobile, while social gaming becomes increasingly difficult to monetize. Yes, social channels have dried up after Facebook’s shift to Timeline stymied potentially viral newsfeed user acquisition (aka spam). And indeed the Zynga game playbook has gotten tired now that Facebook is no longer a new platform and expectations of game mechanics have matured.

But in reality, Zynga sits on three potential franchises, each of which could be huge.

Right now, Zynga’s most popular titles are stuck in their existing channels. Farmville and Poker are only available for Facebook users. With Friends games are only available on mobile. Each of these titles could easily go cross-channel, to Wii, Xbox and Playstation. Why not play Zynga Poker on Xbox Live?

Building deep, franchise-driven titles for multiple platforms takes time and investment. However, it is a proven monetization model.

In addition, Zynga’s announcement yesterday of real-money gambling is also potentially lucrative, especially in context of its ability to deliver the gambling audience of its Zynga Poker gaming franchise.

The technology industry, particularly its intersection with Wall Street, can be very herdlike, and it is hard to shift the herd perspective on companies like Zynga that are in flux. Still, a herd mentality can be an opportunity for clever investors to make a bet against the crowd.

In the midst of writing this article, I was having dinner with a hedge fund manager in London, who usually invests in things like mines. He had just bought Zynga for his personal portfolio, despite the fact that Piper Jaffray, Credit Suisse, and BMO Capital all downgraded the stock. The pure hedge fund perspective is to bet against the market, especially when the market is not acting on fundamentals.

And while this hedge fund guy usually invests in physical mines, even he has noticed that Zynga is sitting on a potential gold mine — one that is definitely worth a whole lot more than nothing.

Peter Yared is the CTO of CBS Interactive and has founded four e-commerce and marketing infrastructure companies that were acquired by Sun, VMware, Webtrends and TigerLogic. You can follow him at @peteryared. 

This story originally appeared on CNet.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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While the average app store developer might make under $10K a year from his or her apps, Joe Kaufman has managed to generate millions of downloads on iOS and Android of his hit Lost City and Secret of Grisly Manor apps, generating massive revenue and making him a self-made millionaire.

Kaufman is a true indie — with only one partner, he handles all the design, art, and animation for his apps. And the success has been remarkable.

Source: Fire Maple Games

A scene in the The Lost City

Grisly Manor has been downloaded 4 million times, and Lost City has been downloaded well over 3.5 million times, reaching #1 paid game status in over 30 countries … without ads, and without in-app purchases.

It’s probably fair to say Kaufman is right where a lot of other app developers want to be. I wanted to chat with him to learn how he’s done it.

VentureBeat: You’re a super-successful indie app developer. How’d you get there?

Kaufman: I started out in the mid-1990s as an artist/animator for a popular screensaver software called After Dark. From there I became a Flash animator working on various CD-ROMs and websites. I started Fire Maple Games five years ago so I could focus on making games exclusively.

In 2010 I hired my friend to help me start making classic point-and-click adventure games. I have been playing adventure games since the late-1970s, and they are my all-time favorite genre of games. At the time, there weren’t any adventure games made specifically for mobile devices. Some of the larger companies were porting over their mouse-based computer games to the mobile market, but they always felt a little forced to me. I wanted to create an adventure game that was specifically designed from the ground up for touch interfaces and the smaller screen sizes. That game is called The Secret of Grisly Manor and it has since been downloaded over 4 million times.

My latest game, The Lost City, was released in February 2012 and has received over 3.5 million downloads to date. I was able to build The Lost City 10 times faster using Corona SDK, an awesome cross-platform tool for mobile development. Corona uses a lightning-fast scripting language called Lua that is really fun to use and lets me focus all my energy on the game play — without having to deal with all the inconsistencies between devices.

Source: Fire Maple Games

Inside the Grisly Manor

VentureBeat: When you’re looking for a new game or app idea, where do you get your inspiration?

Kaufman: We generally try to think of a few fun objects and game mechanics, and then try to build an interesting theme around them. The game is constantly shifting as we rip out different ideas and try to replace them with stronger ones, which in turn changes the game’s map and locations around. It is a pretty intense juggling act!

Another answer to that question is that I really don’t know! I have no idea where ideas come from — or where they are going to come from — a pretty daunting notion to build a business around.

VentureBeat: What are the factors that make up a successful app (if you need a specific category, let’s do games)?

Kaufman: It sounds a little cheesy, but I would say love. I can usually tell if the developer loves what they have made and want to share it with others. I think it shines through every aspect of a game. On the other hand, I can usually tell if an app was made just to try and get a quick buck, designed for some marketing campaign, or trying to rip off kids with a zillion micro-transactions.

VentureBeat: What do you do for marketing? What should a newbie developer do for marketing?

Source: Fire Maple Games

Once more in the Grisly Manor, this time outside

Kaufman: I don’t really do any marketing. I don’t submit the games to review sites or anything like that. The only money I spend is for a $20 press release. I have been lucky that my games spread by word of mouth, good reviews, etc. I think that is a more powerful way to learn about apps anyway. It is how I buy all of my apps. If a friend recommends it, I buy it. I generally don’t believe television commercials, magazine ads, banner ads, etc., and I don’t know how effective they are. I think the main thing is just to keep making games. If people enjoy one of your games, they will generally enjoy the others too. Building up a nice collection of games is critical for this.

VentureBeat: Freemium, paid, advertising … what’s your favorite monetization model and why?

Kaufman: The only model I kinda like is the original one — make games that people actually would want to pay for. Video games are an art form to me, I don’t like to be distracted by advertising of any kind when I am immersed in a game. This goes for movies, TV shows, books, etc.

VentureBeat: Do you need to be on the top 20 list in your category to make any significant money? 

Kaufman: Yes, I would say so. You at least need to be visible on the App Store of the device itself. The higher up the better. It’s an incredibly steep exponential curve. The difference between the Top 10 and the Top 50 is pretty staggering.

VentureBeat: Are you an artist/designer as well? If not, how did you get the graphics for your game done?

Kaufman: Yes, I do all of the design, art, and animation for the games. In addition to being a great game designer, the friend I work with is also an amazing photographer. He takes thousands of photos for each game, which I then build upon to create the final graphics.

I also do all of the programming with Corona SDK. It was through working with Flash that I gradually started learning game programming and interactivity. I really enjoy working on the art, animation, and programming at the same time. It gives me greater control of the overall feel of the games.

VentureBeat: Have you had any offers to buy the rights to your apps?

Kaufman: I have, yes. Not really interested. In addition to being our livelihood, this company is my special place to be creative. From the art, animation, programming, and business side as well, it is our place to create anything we want and to nurture those creations. I’m very protective of it.

VentureBeat: Anything else that you think is important for indie app developers to know?

Kaufman: I recommend checking out software that makes development easier, quicker, and more fun. For me personally, I love working with Corona SDK because I believe it’s important to reach as many people and devices as possible. Corona has allowed me to build for the App Store, Google Play, NOOK Apps, and Amazon Appstore, so lots of people get to enjoy my games. But basically just make great things that you love. And work with people you respect and enjoy working with. You will never burn out and will always enjoy your work! Plus, I want people to make me more great games to play!

photo credit: Jorge Quinteros via photopin cc

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Ed-tech company Duck Duck Moose collected $7 million for its educational apps for children. The company designs and develops original apps that have met with impressive success amongst parents, children, and investors.

The interactive games incorporate creative visuals, stories, music, and expertise in child development to teach kids important early educational skills. The team consults with teachers and students to make sure the user experience is engaging and constructive.

There are options to suit every childhood inclination. Draw and Tell lets kids tell stories using digital crayons, paint brushes, colored pencils, and stickers. Projects can even be animated, with voice recordings added in. On Word Wagon, Mozzarella the mouse leads simple vocabulary games, while Blue Bear guides young ins through basic math on a playground. I was dangerously close to downloading Princess Fairy Tale Maker… for “my niece.”

Thus far, the company’s 14 paid apps have been downloaded 2.4 million times. The products have also won dozens of awards, including three additional Parents’ Choice Awards this month.

With this first round of investment, Duck Duck Moose will expand its team in order to add more apps into its library. The funding was led by Sequoia Capital and Lightspeed Venture Partners, with participation from Stanford University.

Read the press release.

Card-based gaming companies covered large areas of display space, showing off their collectible card games — which have come a long way since the 1990s, when Magic: The Gathering and Pokémon established this subgenre of gaming. While these booths were considerably smaller than the bombastic bloat of, say, the Sony or Alienware display areas, the passion of both vendors and attendees were in evidence in many spaces around the convention center in which the expo was held.

Enthusiastic groups gathered at tables, benches, and other spontaneous spots to dig into card games purchased at the conference from the very same booths. Here’s a look at eight of the games that caught my eye, along with some extra information and links out to the creators’ web pages.

Penny Arcade: The Game — Gamers vs. Evil , created by Cryptozoic Games, is a deck-building game with cards that feature the characters from the Penny Arcade webcomic. Players choose a hero, build a deck, and play across two rows of cards in the middle of the table, as well as in player vs. player battles. The goal is to build a stronger and stronger deck and end up with the highest number of victory points at the end. It costs $44.99, and an iOS version is coming soon.

The Big Bang Theory Party Game is also by Cryptozoic Games. It retails for $29.99 and uses cards to relive funny scenes from the TV show. One player serves as a Referee, while two others try to describe the scene from the show with a specific category. The Referee hands out points, and the players compete for the best retelling of the scene. Categories (with names like Space Poop, Super Powers, Goth Chicks, or Horny Engineer ) can switch mid-tell, however, so players must be flexible and willing to switch tactics at a moment’s notice.

A third Cryptozoic card game at the show this year was Hot Rod Creeps ($45). This has players constructing racetracks and then racing cars using the cards from the deck. Players choose one of six teams: Epic Battle Wizards, Monsters, The Underworld, Food Fighters, Aliens, and Rockabilly. Each team and associated deck has specific strategies and powers to use on the way to the finish line.

Privateer Press was showing its science fiction-themed Level 7 [Escape], which is set in a dystopic future universe. It’s only available as a preorder (for around $42), but its tables were full every time I went by them. Described by Privateer as a “semi-cooperative, story-driven survival-horror board game for 1 to 4 players,” Level 7 [Escape] may be the next big thing in card gaming, if the amount of people interested in it at PAX are any indication.

The cooperative card game Sentinels of the Multiverse was introduced in 2011. Players manage a team of comic book heroes, battling villains across four different area. Greater Than Games is the publisher, and it just finished a successful Kickstarter project focusing on an expansion to the game, Infernal Relics, as well as an Enhanced Edition, which retails for $39.95.

Heap is a wacky-looking card game from Privateer Press that involved goblins and customizable derby cars retailing for $21.99. The point is to descend upon large piles of discarded car parts and weaponry to trick out your own vehicles and then battle the leaders of each gang with their enhanced cars in an arena battle.

The UFOlogy card game takes on the fringe science of extraterrestrial life, tasking players to research, collect evidence, and build a case for the existence of alien life on this planet. The game is currently looking for funding on IndieGogo, a Kickstarter-like crowdsourcing website. It’s also has a print and play lite version which lets you try it out before committing to the full game. The game is currently on offer at Cave Banana Games for $35 donation level on IndieGogo.

Pixel Lincoln, another Kickstarter-funded game, is a deck building card game based on the upcoming Nintendo DS title of the same name. It features a 16-bit pixel art version of President Abraham Lincoln, who must travel through time and space to fight wacky enemies with his beardarang. Yeah, it’s really that odd, and it’s available at the $25 and up donation level on Kickstarter.

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GamesBeat 2013 is our fifth annual conference on disruption in the video game market. You'll get 360-degree perspectives from top gaming executives, developers, and analysts on what’s to come in the industry. Our theme this year is “The Battle Royal.” Check out full event details here, and grab your early-bird tickets here!

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This year’s Olympics earned the nickname “Socialympics.” It has inspired huge waves of tweets, brought down the reputation of old media giants, and earned athletes millions of new followers in weeks.

Since the Beijing Olympics four years ago, the use of Facebook and Twitter has exploded. In 2008, there were only 6 million people on Twitter. Now, the network has rocketed past 600 million. Athletes can engage directly with their fans; social media marketing and analytics companies can track shifts in public opinion and serve real-time advertising; and for the first time, London’s tech startups have benefited from an influx of tourism.

In the spirit of a little friendly competition, we’re evaluating the dollars earned and headlines won to anoint the real winners of the 2012 Socialympics.

Gold Medal: #NBCFail

Social media monitoring companies have been tracking the eruption of chatter on Twitter and Facebook like hawks. It’s favorite meme? #NBCFail. NetBase, a social media analysis tool, found that there were a whopping 93,000 #NBCFail posts this month, which generated nearly 148 million impressions. View an infographic here with more social data from the world’s first social Olympics. 

Topsy Labs, a Twitter tracking tool company, claims its algorithm can pinpoint the most important Olympics-focused tweets in seconds. The company tracked the #NBCFail tag throughout the Games, and served up real-time reports to media companies like the Washington Post and Mashable.

“This is the first time we have seen something like this,” said Duncan Greatwood, Topsy’s Labs’ CEO. “When a race or story around the Olympics catches the public’s attention, we can help advertisers and the media react fast.”

Steven Marx, an occasional Twitter user who first used #NBCFail on a whim, achieved more acclaim during the Olympic Games that the fallen television network. PeopleBrowsr, another social media analysis tool tracking the Olympics, revealed Marx as the originator of the hashtag.

According to PeopleBrowsr, on July 27, the day of the ceremony, there were just 212 #NBCFail tweets. By July 28, there were 6,000 and by July 29, the number had risen to 20,000.

NBC walked away with its tail between its legs, but #NBCFail proved to be a true money-maker for social media and analytics companies.

Silver Medal: Michael Phelps

Phelps left London a decorated hero with 22 medals. But he also received a new honor: one million new Twitter followers and 800,000 Facebook fans, according to social media monitoring tool, Starcount.

The Olympics has been the ideal venue for these athletes to communicate with fans. We hung on Phelps’ every tweet during the Olympics, mostly congratulating fellow athletes and retweets of inspiring quotes.

Others didn’t fare quite so well. Two athletes were expelled from the Games for their racist tweets. Serena Williams failed to issue a single tweet to her 1.15 million Facebook fans.

Bronze Medal: Usain Bolt

The American swimmer’s popularity was very nearly eclipsed by Jamaican sprinter, Usain Bolt. Before the Olympic Games, Bolt had 7.6 million Twitter followers and Facebook fans; after his gold-medal Olympic record in the 100 meters, he’s eclipsed 8.5 million.

When Bolt won the 200-meter final, the Twitter ecosystem went nuts. Bolt also set records for how many tweets per minute contained his name. ”Record alert!” Twitter tweeted. “(at)usainbolt sets a new Olympic Games conversation record with over 80,000 TPM for his 200m victory.”

This Olympics has been a testing-ground for athletes to build a brand on social media. In future, their accounts will likely be controlled by managers and agents. But for now, we enjoyed getting a look into the uninhibited thoughts and feelings of the athletes, most especially Usain Bolt.

Special mention: London’s Tech Startups 

“The best thing the Olympics has done for startups in London is brought wider attention and validity to our existence in the East End of London,” said Ben Reyes, a London-based entrepreneur and programmer.

In East London, where the majority of the city’s tech companies reside, government organizations like the TCIO have organized a series of events for local startups to strategize how they can benefit from the Olympics.

Michelle You, cofounder of Songkick, explained that startups like hers have been networking and partnering with Silicon Valley tech companies in town for the Olympics.

One Fine Stay, a Clerkenwell-based startup, has benefited from the influx of tourists. According to founder, Greg Marsh, this summer has been the startup’s busiest season since it was founded in 2009.

Phelps Image via Shutterstock

In Family Village, players create a virtual world with members of their actual family. Players use the names of their family members and can upload relevant documents and photos. From there, players then design avatars based on their ancestors’ physical attributes and the time period in which they lived. These characters can then build businesses and homes, move across country, change jobs, get married, have children, and so on.

The game adapts to each era and generation. Avatars in the 1920s sport flapper dresses, while ancestors from the colonial era will wear breeches and tricorn hats. The game’s scenarios are as historically accurate as possible and uphold the apparel, architecture, and social mores of any given time period. The players, on the other hand, can stick to documented events or rewrite history as they choose.

It’s like the Sims hacked your family tree.

The game is also a way to discover more about your ancestry. Family Village has access to over 3.6 billion records and players can earn historical documents about their family as rewards.

“Our objective was to create games with a social objective outside of the game environment,” said CEO Jeff Wells. “It is a feel good game that brings the family together. One of the biggest issues in our society is that the family unit is dissolving. We are connecting people with their past and bringing families together.”

The game has taken 18 months to build because it involves researching and implementing a tremendous amount of historical data. Funium raised $1.2 million in 2011 to build the game, which became available in pilot mode in June. Today’s injection will help bring deploy the game. It’s designed for gamers and grandmas alike.

The investment was led by Family Odyssey with participation from angel investors. Funium is based in Utah.

July 9-10, 2013
San Francisco, CA

Early Bird Tickets on Sale

Activision Blizzard is taking mobile games as seriously as major console titles, and it’s proving that today by licensing Swrve’s technology for analytics and A/B testing for mobile apps.

Activision has already integrated Swrve’s technology — which allows for real-time testing, extensive analytics, and monetization triggers — into the recent hit mobile title Skylanders Cloud Patrol. The company will rely on Swrve as it works to bring its popular IPs to the mobile arena.

“I think we’re pretty unique in our approach,” said Swrve CEO Hugh Reynolds in an interview with VentureBeat yesterday. The company’s technology focuses on acting proactively and making changes to apps as soon as possible, rather than the passive analytics of some competitors (including Apsalar, Flurry, Kontagent, and Mixpanel).

Reynolds’ team has been working with Activision in the form of different companies over the past 10 years. The two companies formed a similar licensing agreement back in 2002, when Reynolds was CEO of the game physics engine company Havok.

Activision recently announced that it would be staffing up internal mobile game capabilities, the VP of mobile Greg Canessa told VentureBeat. The Swrve partnership is the latest sign that mobile is an aspect major publishers have to focus on.

Reynolds tells me that Swrve is now handling about a billion game events a day. With the Activision partnership, he expects that number to explode soon.

Swrve has raised $4.7 million in funding to date from SV Angel, Mantis Group, and Intel Capital. Among Swrve’s 20 customers are PlayFirst, XMG Studio, 5th Planet Games, and Breaktime Studios.

Photo: Dean Takahashi/VentureBeat

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Big Data and Predictive/Real-time Analytics startups: Are you looking to jumpstart development & accelerate market traction? Sign up for the SAP Startup Focus program to receive technology, support, resources and community to help you develop new applications on SAP HANA, a cutting edge database platform. Get started here, and enter promo code “VB2013″ on the form.

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