Click on the Video Below and Sample a Session from a previous Digital Hollywood event. For Additional Video Sessions, Click Here Digital Hollywood Events at CES Sunday, January 6th 1:00 PM – 2:00 PM Track II- GP3 - Game Power Virtual Worlds and the Massively Multiplayer Gaming Explosion - the PC, the Console and Mobile While virtual worlds and the massively multiplayer game are not technically the same thing, their similarities are striking and in this session we will take a look at a broadband and mobile universe that is growing into a full-fledged digital society of friends and distant strangers who are creating, living, game-playing and otherwise immersing themselves in alternate human or non-human environment. In today’s advanced graphical broadband and mobile world, it is easier to understand how daily life in an all-digital environment – be it entertainment, work, adventure, travel or alternate lifestyle could become as real and accepted as real life. In this session, we will open a discussion of what our 2nd lives are all about. Dr. Lars Buttler, CEO, Trion World Network Bob Ferrari, Executive Director, Business Development & Sales, Turbine Inc. Ian McNaughton, Senior Product Manager, AMD Don L. Daglow, President and CEO, Stormfront Studios Inc. Steve Goldstein, Director, Business Development, General Counsel, Flagship Studios Kris Alexander, Product Line Director, Akamai David Christensen, VP Business Development and International Operations, Sony Online Entertainment Michael Rowe, Manager, 3D Internet and Intraverse Department, IBM Research Group, Moderator Dr. Lars Buttler is a Founder and the CEO of Trion World Network, Inc., the publisher and developer of original entertainment and games for the broadband era. Dr. Buttler helms strategy and business direction for Trion as the company sets out to define the future of entertainment. Under his leadership, Trion develops groundbreaking new capabilities and content for broadband, the greatest entertainment and mass media platform. Prior to founding Trion, Dr. Buttler was the Vice President for Global Online at Electronic Arts, the world’s largest independent developer and publisher of interactive entertainment software. Dr. Buttler led EA’s strategy for online games and services and ran EA’s Online Studio, home to the pioneering Ultima Online MMOG franchise. Before EA, Dr. Buttler served as Vice President for Leveraged Buyouts at the Carlyle Group, the premier global private equity firm, focusing on large-scale investments in entertainment, media, and telecommunications. Prior to Carlyle, Dr. Buttler served as President of Wingcast Europe, a joint venture of QUALCOMM & Ford Motor Co., and a leading wireless in-vehicle media platform & interactive service network. He holds a Ph.D. in Engineering from Dortmund University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and earned an M.B.A from Harvard Business School. Don L. Daglow has served as president and CEO of Stormfront Studios since founding the company in 1988. In 2003 he received the CGE Award for “groundbreaking achievements that shaped the Video Game Industry,” and Electronic Games has called him “one of the best-known and respected producers in the history of the field.” Stormfront's major titles include the action-adventure The Spiderwick Chronicles, The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (based on the film by Peter Jackson), EA Sports’ NASCAR Racing and Madden NFL Football, and the original Neverwinter Nights on AOL. Prior to founding Stormfront, Don served as director of Intellivision game development for Mattel, as a producer at Electronic Arts, and as head of the Entertainment and Education division at Broderbund. He designed and programmed the first-ever computer baseball game in 1971 (now recorded in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown), the first mainframe computer role-playing game ("Dungeon" for PDP-10 mainframes, 1975), the first sim game (Intellivision Utopia, 1981) and the first game to use multiple camera angles (Intellivision World Series Major League Baseball, 1983). Don co-designed Computer Game Hall of Fame title Earl Weaver Baseball (1987) and the first massively multiplayer online graphic adventure, the original Neverwinter Nights for AOL (1991-97). He was elected to the Board of Directors of the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences in 2003 and again in 2007. He also is a past winner of the National Endowment for the Humanities New Voices playwriting competition. Don holds a BA in Writing from Pomona College and an Ed.M. from Claremont Graduate University. Steve Goldstein is the Director of Business Development and General Counsel for Flagship Studios, Inc. In his role at Flagship, Steve has negotiated all of its co-marketing and ancillary properties agreements, including deals with Microsoft, Nvidia, Weta Workshop, TOKYOPOP!, Dark Horse Comics and Simon & Schuster, among others. Additionally in his capacity with Flagship, Mr. Goldstein co-founded and serves as President, Americas & Europe for, Ping0, LLC, a digital publishing joint venture between Flagship and Hanbitsoft, Inc. which will provide the network infrastructure, hosting and support for Flagship’s games, including the highly-anticipated Hellgate: London. Prior to joining Flagship in July, 2005, Mr. Goldstein was an associate at the law firm of Stubbs, Alderton & Markiles, LLP, where he represented independent videogame publishers and developers, film studios and technology companies, including Flagship, NovaLogic, Inc., 1C Company, High Moon Studios, Revolution Studios, Interplay Entertainment, and Skype Technologies, S.A. Robert Ferrari, Executive Director, Business Development & Sales, Turbine Inc.: Robert Ferrari joined Turbine, Inc. in early 2004 and serves as executive director of global business development & sales. Mr. Ferrari has over fifteen years of corporate development, sales and marketing experience leading emerging technology companies in the entertainment, consumer, and technology sectors. At Turbine, he is responsible for building the business through a wide range of strategic partnerships that drive domestic and international publishing, licensing, physical distribution, digital distribution, online subscription revenue, and technology partnerships. Before joining Turbine, Mr. Ferrari held senior executive roles leading the business efforts of diverse start-ups and fortune 500 companies on a global basis. As a veteran of the digital media and online entrainment industries, Mr. Ferrari has been active in pioneering new technologies, products, and services in the B2C and B2B industries. His senior executive tenures include; VP Sales & Marketing at Philips Electronics, EVP Sales & Marketing at Merinta Entertainment Software, VP Websurfer Inc, and Managing Director of Convergence Ventures. As an experienced and knowledgeable industry speaker, Mr. Ferrari has been an active participant at high profile convergence events including; the International Consumer Electronic Show, Digital Hollywood, Digital Media Summit, Game Market Watch, CTIA Mobile & Entertainment, Digital Media’s Game & Mobile Forum, Jupiter Media’s WiFi Planet, and I-Wireless Forum. Kris Alexander is the Product Line Director for Akamai, responsible for Software and EdgeSuite Delivery, Electronic Gaming, Download, and Storage services for businesses such as Sony Playstation, Nintendo Wii, Microsoft, EA, Apple iTunes, MTV, Fox, Gamespot, Starz Encore, and Turbine. Mr Alexander has more than 10 years of experience in the gaming and digital media industries. He has spoken at E3, CES, Digital Hollywood, Streaming Media, iHollywood, NextGen Games, CeBit and Internet World on the subjects of Digital Distribution of Games and Next Gen Game Platforms. Mr. Alexander has also served on the boards of Themis Group and WarCry Network. He is a contributing author of the Causal & Online Game Whitepaper for IGDA and the Themis Report. Ian McNaughton, Senior Product Manager – AMD Athlon™ 64 FX Processor line: Ian joined AMD in 2006 as Senior Product Manager for the AMD Athlon 64™ FX processor line. Previously Ian held Senior Marketing and Product Management roles with such companies as ATI and Mitel Corporation. While at ATI Technologies, Ian managed multiple complex product launches as well as ATI’s HL2 GTM program. Working closely with the developer community has enabled Ian to foster key industry relationships that he continues to enjoy today at AMD. While at Mitel Corporation, Ian was responsible for Corporate Marketing which included a worldwide corporate re-brand in over 20 countries. Mitel now exists as Zarlink Semiconductor. Born in Ontario, Canada, Ian currently resides in Austin, Texas with his family. He is passionate about technology and especially the gaming industry. Well known throughout the hardware and software community, Ian is widely considered a legitimate expert in the computer and gaming fields. Whether it is console or PC, the platform doesn’t matter; Ian is dedicated to evangelizing enthusiast products. Michael Rowe, Manager, 3D Internet and Intraverse Department, IBM Research Group: Michael Rowe (AKA - Ultravox Freeman in Second Life) has been a gamer since the days of Pong. As a member of IBM's 3D internet and Virtual Worlds team, Michael is building the strategy for IBM's growth in the 3D Internet. Michael has spent the last 3 years working in Virtual Worlds including Second Life, There.com and others, assessing how to best leverage this technology for business and collaboration. Importantly, he recently facilitated assessments on new technologies for IBM's CEO and other members of the senior leadership team (IBM announced a multi-year plan for significant investment in 3D technologies and social networking last year). Prior to joining IBM, Michael has been a radio disc jockey, semi professional light opera singer, and the leader singer of a Blues Band. He graduated from the Grady School of Journalism with a degree in Telecommunications, focused on video Journalism and production. He spent 10 years working in healthcare, designing field data collection devices for home health nurses. He records a popular internal podcast on new technology, and has been a champion of the 3D internet and virtual worlds for 3 years. Michael also has an MBA from Duke University's Fuqua School of Business. David Christensen, VP Business Development and International Operations, Sony Online Entertainment: Trivia: David's all-time favorite video game: Kaboom (Atari 2600). Quotable Quote: "At my mom's house in the midwest," he says, "I still have several hundred Hulk comics wrapped in plastic." His story: Huge gamers as a kid. Had the biggest collection of Atari 2600 cartridges on his block (total: 56). Has extremely fond memories of playing games with his dad and sister. All-time favorite game: Kaboom. Grew up just outside of Chicago. Attended Univeristy of Illinois. Then went to law school at John Marshall. Also studied Taxation at the Georgetown University Law Center. Began his career as a tax consultant for Deloitte & Touche LLP which David describes as "super, super boring work." "I'd meet someone who would say that they were a teacher," David says. "And I'd say, 'Oh, I see, you nurture and teach the future generations of America. Neat . . . I save big companies money on their taxes.' Very noble." David wanted something a bit more rewarding, so he quit the firm and became a founding member of the talent agency, R.E.D. His focus: repping game developers. This was his first step into the video game world. From there, David wanted to get more involved on the publishing side of the business. He worked on a deal with Universal Interactive (who owned The Incredible Hulk IP). David represented the development house Radical who was chosen to make The Hulk game that would be a tie-in with the release of the 2003 movie. For David, being part of The Hulk video game was a dream come true. "At my mom's house in the midwest," he says, "I still have several hundred Hulk comics wrapped in plastic." David told Universal Interactive's president that since they were becoming a true publisher, they needed a biz-dev person internally. So they hired him. "That's how I made the transition from agent to starting my publishing career," he says. From there, Universal was acquired by Vivendi which later published a second Hulk game; the well received The Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction ("It's what they wanted the first game to be," he says). Then he left Vivendi. Worked in the cellphone game market for a while, finding some success there. After that, he wound up working with IGE, which David describes as "probably the most hated company in the MMO game space." IGE, for those not in the know, is a hundred million dollar company that basically buys and sells virtual items inside MMO games. Summer of '06, S.O.E. had lost its VP of International Business Development. They reached out to David. But because of David's work with IGE, S.O.E. was leery of bringing him on. They agreed to do a no-strings six month consulting agreement. "We did a couple of good deals during the six months," David says. In January of '07, S.O.E. not only brought David on board, they also expanded his role to include domestic business development and International Operations as well. As for David's downtime away from the office, the only gaming he's been doing lately is poker. "I've been going to casinos and doing a lot of reading on poker," he says. David says that there are a fair number of S.O.E. employees who play poker. In fact, he plays live games with some of his coworkers. "Andy Zaffron plays," David says laughing, "but all I hear about are his ‘bad beat’ stories."