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Toys and Online
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Online Games & Virtual Worlds
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At-A-Glance
Online Games and Virtual Worlds - Track Schedule
Online games and virtual worlds provide the ultimate in user
engagement. Whether it is flash games on a web site, a massively
multiplayer online game (MMOG) or a 2D or 3D virtual world,
users stick around longer and build a relationship with the
game, world or brand. Content owners and brands can leverage
this engagement and monetize users. This track provides the
latest techniques for keeping users coming back to online games
and virtual worlds.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
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8:00 am
9:00 am
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Registration for Expo and Conference Attendees
Networking Breakfast - Conference Attendees Only |
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9:00 am
10:00 am
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 Keynote: The
Evolution of Entertainment, A Toy's Place
Will Wright, Founder and
Chief Executive, Stupid Fun Club
Creator of Spore and The Sims
Will Wright's presentation will will look at toys, play, and the product
development process from a new perspective going forward. Through his
SimCity, The Sims, and Spore game franchises created at Electronic Arts,
Will generated over $1 billion dollars of value. At Stupid Fun Club, a
design studio Will maintained throughout his career as chief designer at
Maxis Studios and Electronic Arts, advanced toy designs are among Will's
primary focus.
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10:00 am
10:15 am
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Networking
and Exhibit Hall Break |
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10:15 am
11:15 am
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Virtual Worlds and Games by the Numbers: A Look at Market
Research
Understand the market opportunities for brands online by drilling
down on the numbers, the demographics, and the trends. Who is
playing online, which properties and online activities are the
stickiest, and what monetization models are driving the lion's share
of revenues? This session will present new data that will help you
identify the trends driving online worlds today -- and help you
develop essential strategy for your company going forward.
Anita Frazier, Industry Analyst, Toys & Video Games, NPD Group
Nic Mitham, CEO, KZero Worldswide
Michael Cai, Vice President of
Video Games, Interpret
Barry Gilbert, VP & Research
Director, Strategy Analytics
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11:15 am
12:00 pm
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Monetization Strategies: What's Working Today
The old business models are out. No longer can one rely
solely on a bricks and mortar retail channel, a subscription model
online, or banner ads to drive revenue. But what are the new ways
that businesses are monetizing customers online? What are the
options and how are customers reacting? How do kids, youth and even
parents today approach spending -- what increments are best, what
pay options work, how do payment strategies stack up? This session
will compare and contrast proven ways to monetize an engaged
customer: subscriptions, virtual goods, premium services, ads, and microtransactions will be among the strategies discusses.
Teemu Huuhtanen, Executive
VP, Sulake Corp., President, North America, Sulake Inc.
Guy Bendov, Head of Business
Development and Marketing, Shidonni LTD
Michael Gold, CEO, Electrotank
John Cahill, President &
CEO, Meez
Michael Cai, Vice President of Video Games,
Interpret (moderator)
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12:00 pm
1:00 pm
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Lunch and
Exhibit Hall Break |
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1:00 pm
2:00 pm
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 Keynote:
Lane Merrifield
Executive Vice President, Disney Online Studios
Co-Founder and General Manager, Club Penguin
Since Club Penguin's inception, Lane has led the
management, operations and business strategy for Club Penguin out of
the studio’s headquarters in Kelowna, British Columbia, Canada. In
addition to Club Penguin, Lane also oversees the development for all
of The Walt Disney Company’s virtual worlds including
Disney's Toontown Online,
Disney Fairies Pixie Hollow,
Pirates of the Caribbean Online and the
upcoming Disney/Pixar The World of Cars Online. |
2:00 pm
2:30 pm |
Networking
and Exhibit Hall Break |
2:30 pm
3:30 pm |
Tapping into the Emotional Triggers of Consumers
Kids and teens who grow up online -- playing in virtual worlds,
texting, emailing, creating and uploading videos -- no longer see a
difference between playing online or off. Today's continuous play
patterns mean a seamless continuum between the room and the screen.
And whether its plastic or pixels, so long as an emotional
connection can be made between the consumer and the play mechanic,
share of time and share of wallet will follow. This session will
look at consumers from a psychographic perspective to discover how
their plugged-in lifestyle, increasing need to customize and add
personalization, and desire to connect with strong characters and
story both influences and is influenced by their personalities,
values, and attitudes -- and, ultimately, how those factors
determine what we all want to get out of play.
Nicole Lazzaro, Founder and President,
XEODesign, Inc. (moderator)
Nathan Pearce, Director of Skunkworks, Sony
Online Entertainment
Susan Wu, CEO & Co-Founder, ohai
Mattias Miksche, CEO,
Stardoll
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3:30 pm
4:30 pm
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Adapting to Customers'
Preferences and Business Needs:
Best Practices for Keeping Your Online World Running, After You've
Launched
Going digital has its benefits, chief among them the ability to
adapt to user preferences and changing business needs, even after
your product has launched. But instrumenting a game -- implementing
changes to the play mechanic, managing a game or virtual world's
reward system and difficulty level, adding partners, and even
changing a pricing strategy -- is a relatively unknown area of
product management. In the traditional toy world, once the product
has shipped, little change is possible. With your online product,
going live is just the mid-point in a product's lifespan. Sony
Online Entertainment will reveal the nuances of collecting player
metrics, data mining, and other areas of online analytics as well as
customer communication strategies, resulting in a step-by-step
approach to maintaining and improving a live online game. Understand
the second, third, and fourth chance you get with online and make
the most of the web's ability to instrument your customer's online
experience as well as your company’s ongoing revenue streams.
Laralyn McWilliams,
Creative Director, Free Realms,
Sony Online Entertainment
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4:30 pm
6:00 pm
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Conference Reception - Conference Attendees Only |
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
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8:00 am
9:00 am
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Registration for Expo and Conference Attendees
Networking Breakfast - Conference Attendees Only |
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9:00 am
10:00 am
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 Keynote:
Natalie Hornsby
VP of
Marketing
Cepia LLC - Creators of Zhu Zhu Pets
How does a brand new toy go from obscurity to phenomenon in
half a year? As the Vice President of Marketing at Cepia, the
company that makes the toy, 24-year-old Natalie has been the driving
force behind the marketing and branding of Zhu Zhu Pets.
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10:00 am
10:15 am
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Networking
and Exhibit Hall Break |
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10:15 am
11:15 am
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Engaging Through Narration, Character Development, and Story
Understanding the art of storytelling is the first step
toward developing a blockbuster hit among kids and tweens -- in any
medium. But knowing what stories resonate, which character traits
secure traction, and how the narrative arts can elevate a ho-hum
property into a full-on hit is the province of only a select few.
This session will present a panel of storytelling experts who
understand the touch points that motivate kids and tweens to stay
engaged, why kids develop loyalty and ongoing connections with
in-game characters, what feature-set elements are essential to
developing an online property with legs.
Sherry Gunther, Founder, Masher Media,
MyMiniPeeps
Jordan Weisman, CEO and Founder, Smith and
Tinker
Sam Lewis, System Design,
ZeniMax Online Studios
Warren Buckleitner,
Publisher, Children’s Technology Review (moderator)
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11:15 am
12:00 pm
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Television and Online: Giving
a Successful TV Brand its Virtual World Legs
Virtual worlds allow animators, production houses, and networks
the opportunity to create interactive iterations of their franchises
and more fully engage fans. This immersion in a narrative
environment online extends and solidifies brands, and speaks to kids
in what is fast becoming their new common language -- the language
of interactivity and virtual worlds. This session will explore these
new creative models, the business relationships that support those
models, new revenue opportunities that surround online properties,
and what elements are needed to create a successful brand extension
into the digital realm.
Amy Pritchard, CEO, Metaverse Mod Squad
(moderator)
Jeffrey Fleishman, Assistant VP, Business Development, Sesame Workshop
Matt Cullen, Marketing
Manager, National Football League
Minard Hamilton, Chief
Executive Officer, Six Degrees Games, Inc.
Daniel Buelhoff, Head of
Business Development & Community Management, sMeet
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12:00 pm
1:00 pm
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Lunch and
Exhibit Hall Break |
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1:00 pm
2:00 pm
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Keynote: Tor Sirset
Vice President of Marketing
Girls/Preschool
Bandai America Incorporated
Bandai is expanding its dominance in the boys market to the girls
category. Core to that effort is the integration of online elements into
the majority of these toys. Core to that effort is the integration of
online elements into the majority of these toys. In an
engaging onstage interview, Tor Sirset will discuss the strategy behind this rollout
and how the Internet plays an increasingly important role in the
crafting and marketing of toys.
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2:00 pm
2:30 pm |
Networking
and Exhibit Hall Break |
2:30 pm
3:30 pm |
Success Case Study
Two
special case studies analyze business partnerships between toy
manufacturers and online game companies
LEGO/NetDevil - LEGO Universe
NetDevil and LEGO provide a look the collaboration required
to create LEGO Universe.
Mark Hansen, Director of Business Development,
LEGO Group & Project Lead,
LEGO Universe
Ryan Seabury, Creative Director, LEGO
Universe & Founder, NetDevil
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3:30 pm
4:30 pm
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Safety in Online Worlds: How the Federal Trade Commission
Sees It
In March of 2009, Congress mandated that the Federal Trade
Commission study the types of content available in online virtual
worlds -- paying close attention to explicit sexual and violent
content -- and the mechanisms those worlds use to manage access by
minors. In this unique session, the Commission's senior most
attorney assigned to the 2009 Virtual Worlds Report to
Congress will present results and discuss the agency's
recommendations for strengthening access controls to virtual worlds
while allowing free expression to flourish online. This first-ever
analysis of virtual worlds by the FTC will be discussed by senior
attorney Phyllis H. Marcus who heads the Commission's children's
privacy program and is responsible for enforcing the Children's
Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA). Marcus expects this session
to be the first detailed public reveal of her division's nine-month
study of virtual world content. She will present data, offer
recommendations, and participate in a lively one-on-one interview
with virtual world child safety advocate and online community
activist Izzy Neis.
Phyllis H. Marcus, senior attorney, Div of Advertising Practices, FTC's
COPPA lead
Izzy Neis, Senior Community Safety Lead, Gazillion Entertainment
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4:30 pm
5:00 pm
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Conference Concludes
Networking and Exhibit Hall
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Tracks:
Schedule At-A-Glance
Toys and Online
Online Games & Virtual Worlds
Virtual Goods
Technology Platforms
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