INplay 2011 Featured Speakers and Sessions
Interactive Ontario has announced the speaker line-up for the second annual INplay Conference, which takes place at the Liberty Grand in Toronto on May 17th and 18th. With its three major topic streams of Investment, Inspiration and Insights, the conference will examine the world of interactive entertainment and education for children. Registration for INplay is still open, so get your ticket now if you haven’t already.
New at the conference this year is the Canadian Interactive Showcase. Interactive Ontario has partnered with the Canada Media Fund to create an exclusive opportunity at INplay to showcase Canadian talent. The Canadian Interactive Showcase presented by CMF will provide Canadian companies with a chance to share their interactive project, product or service with an audience of investors, potential partners and peers.
INplay also gives registered delegates a chance to sit down with one of our event speakers or other featured participants for a 10 minute speed-dating style conversation in 1×1 Meetings.
Here are some of this year’s featured speakers:
Warren Buckleitner, Ph.D., Editor, Children’s Technology Review • Founder, Dust or Magic conference, author & children’s technology expert
Gever Tulley, Co-Founder, Brightworks • TED speaker, author of Fifty Dangerous Things (You Should Let Your Children Do)
Russ McLeod, Chief Operations Director, Me To We • Audience favourite and key player in youth inspiration events
Rupert Harris, Series Producer, BBC Children’s • Series producer for the BBC smash hit TV show and website: Bamzooki where you can create your own virtual Bamzooki creature.
Julie Sun, Senior Director of Digital Marketing, Nickelodeon • Sets the strategy and implementation methodologies for the internationally acclaimed kids network, Nickelodeon.
David Merrill, President and Co-Founder, Sifteo • Entrepreneur, Ph.D. & TED speaker with a vision for the future of kids games – Sifteo Cubes: 1.5 inch computers with full colour displays that sense motion, sense each other, and wirelessly connect to your computer
Some of the Featured Sessions:
* Inspiration Stream – creativity and content stream featured session: I <3 / H8 Transmedia
Back in the day, having an interactive component to a property was something of a novelty. Now, most would agree that all consumable media should be developed with interactive in mind. So, does this make the term Transmedia moot? This session will explore successful cross-platform projects via case studies, followed by a charged discussion about one of the industry’s most hated buzzwords.
* Investment Stream – business stream featured session: Cross Merchandising – The Chicken or the Egg?
What comes first? The video game, toy, TV show or iPad application? This panel of industry experts will discuss various merchandising and licensing opportunities. What are the benefits to licensing your property to a 3rd party? When is the right time to start to build your brand around merchandising?
* Insights Stream – research and e-learning stream featured session: Bye Bye Textbooks, Hello Learning by Playing
From human/primate evolutionary behavioral parallels, to classroom archetypes, this session considers the very specific question of how computer based gaming will likely change the look and feel of education forever. The core point being that current educational materials are deeply connected to the peculiarities of the printing press – which we are no longer bound to. What are the implications of learning materials being technology-based?
