Village Gamer

Vancouver – I will be honest – in the weeks leading up to GDC Canada, I had my reservations about what type of event it would be. I had heard that not many people would be attending and that there would be very little in the way of exhibit booths. I imagine that a large part was played by the current economy in keeping businesses and attendees away, but it didn’t take me very long once I had arrived at GDC Canada to feel that it was going to be a great event. Even though there wasn’t an abundance of exhibit booths, there was a good many people present – early estimates put the number at about double the attendance of 2008’s VIGS – the previous incarnation of GDC Canada.

The conference organizers – Think Services and Reboot Communications, along with their staff, volunteers and the Advisory Board are to be congratulated on a very good inaugural event. I feel that GDC Canada will continue to grow in the future, and I know that more than just a few of us are hoping to see more features added to next year’s conference – especially a Canadian version of the GDC Game Awards.

Overall, I think that Vancouver Digital Week has been thus far a great success. Today we will be dropping in on Digital Kung Fu which is taking place at the Great Northern Way Campus, followed by the Wired Woman seminar about computer forensics. I have loads of notes and photos to post from GDC and all of the accompanying events, but unfortunately it looks like I won’t have the time to do them all justice until tomorrow – but that just means you have more new and informative content from Village Gamer to look forward to.

I do want to send a shout-out to one of our regular readers whom I had the pleasure of meeting at GDC, so “Hi!” to Ryan Arndt from Certain Sound – I hope you had a great time at GDC Canada, and thank you for letting me know that you find our site to be a useful source of information.

Vancouver – The New Media BC PopVox Awards were held last night at  Workspace on Water Street.  While Village Gamer did not attend the Awards due to conflicting events, we’ve heard reports that the Awards were a lot of fun and that a good time was had by all.

The winners for 2009 are:

Best Digital Animation: Pride of Frankenstein – Jibber Jabber

Best Digital VFX: Inside Out – Switch Interactive

Best Digital Learning Initiative (Technology): The Film Lab – thesubstream
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Vancouver – Aftercad Software is pleased to announce the Version 2 release of its ground breaking Visual Workspace.

The Aftercad Online Visual Workspace is a Software as a Service (SaaS) offering that allows businesses to upload, view, mark-up, manage and publish large and complex 2D & 3D CAD files onto the web, without the need for proprietary viewers, providing easy and instant access to project information by non-CAD professionals.

“With the release of Version 2 we have achieved our goal of bringing a complete online file system to our customers so that they can collaborate on all project documents alongside stunning visuals” said Chris Boothroyd, CEO of Aftercad. “The Goal of the Visual Workspace is to quickly centralize and visualize what it is you are trying to sell so that your clients can come to decisions faster and easier. Each Visual Workspace has its own secure online file system, event notification and sharing tools so that you can easily invite clients or partners to collaborate with you on a project.”
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Mission BC – Click Media Works, a small plain-language communications house specializing in clear and clever writing for real-life people in real-world business, is happy to announce that Rick Rake and John R. Laing have joined its team.

Rick Rake

A seasoned newspaper writer and editor, Rake has more than 30 years in print journalism, the last 10 as managing editor of an award-winning broadsheet newspaper in B.C.’s Fraser Valley. As Click’s media relations specialist, he provides no-nonsense writing and editing as well as a keen eye for typography and photography.

Laing, a noted “grammar hound,” brings a wealth of business acumen and technical writing experience to Click Media Works. His background in sales, marketing, and manufacturing, along with his passion for green building and sustainable forestry, make Laing the ideal technical writing specialist for almost any project.

Both are excited to provide effective on-time and on-budget communications to government, industry, small business, and non-profit organizations

Markham – Showcare Event Management Inc. announced today that they have developed the online photo identification card software used for ESCA’s new national badge program ESCA WIS. This national database was recently launched by the Exhibition Services & Contractors Association (ESCA) in order to streamline the identification of conference and exhibition workers at various convention facilities nationally. The Georgia World Congress Center was the first venue to adopt the program with more coming on-board in the near future. The exhibition Worker Identification System (WIS) online database provides a unique ability to manage worker data and capture photos from anywhere in the world. Upon entering worker data, the system allows administrative users to capture a photo of the employee using an attached webcam in real-time or upload an approved image from an offline digital camera. In addition, the employer can choose to order and pay for the identification cards all in one simple and secure process. Once completed a bar-coded color photo ID card will be issued to the employer so that it can be distributed to the individual worker for identification and tracking onsite.

“Showcare is very excited to be partnered with ESCA in this program” said Craig Giles, Vice President, Operations at Showcare Event Management Inc. “With ESCA’s vision and understanding of the need for a unified exhibition industry identification system along with our technology and badge fulfillment expertise, the benefits and opportunities for conference venues could be endless.”
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Vancouver – Sierra Wireless today announced that the robust ALEOS™ embedded intelligence platform will be available on the MP line of rugged in-vehicle mobile routers for the first time. With the addition of ALEOS, which enhances the intelligence and feature set of the MP product line, all AirLink™ gateways and routers from Sierra Wireless will share a common firmware platform, simplifying device management and support. The new release of ALEOS, version 4.0, also includes feature enhancements such as improved security and routing functionality, as well as embedded ACEmanager, the new browser based configuration and management utility in the ACEware™ remote management suite.

AirLink MP mobile routers have a rich history with public safety organizations due to their rugged form factor, reliability and multiple interfaces, and have become the industry benchmark for rugged in-vehicle communication gateways. The addition of ALEOS will serve to further cement the reputation of the MP as the product of choice for law enforcement, fire and rescue, and emergency field services organizations.
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Waterloo – Open Text, a global leader in Enterprise Content Management (ECM), today announced that it has been awarded a 2009 SAP(R) Pinnacle Award as the Regional Software Solutions Partner of the Year, EMEA. SAP Pinnacle Awards were granted to leading SAP partners that have excelled in enhancing the customer experience, addressing critical issues such as accelerating co-innovation and improving return on investment. Winners were selected based on over 300 nominations, twice the amount in 2008, received from partners and SAP employees. Open Text received the award at a special awards ceremony held on the eve of SAPPHIRE® 2009, SAP’s international customer conference being held in Orlando, Fla. May 11-14

“The SAP Pinnacle Awards reflect the continued success we are seeing both in EMEA and around the world helping customers connect their enterprise content with SAP solutions,” said Patrick Barnert, Vice President, SAP Solutions at Open Text. “We are especially pleased to have won an SAP Pinnacle Award two years running and look forward to even greater success in the coming year. By working closely with SAP, we are helping our joint customers lower costs, boost productivity and increase compliance.”
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Toronto – Breakthrough Films & Television and its distribution company Breakthrough Entertainment have signed a co-production and broadcast deal with History Television (Canada) and Discovery Communications for Greatest Tank Battles (10 x 60’) a military, CGI documentary series that recounts the most dramatic, monumental tank battles in history. The announcement was made today by Nat Abraham, Head of Distribution at Breakthrough Entertainment.

“Breakthrough has a long tradition of delivering top rated and critically acclaimed history series,” said Peter Williamson, Executive Producer. “Greatest Tank Battles blends computer generated images and documentary storytelling and will be our most exciting series yet.”

Greatest Tank Battles will launch on History Television in Canada, Discovery Communications’ Military Channel in the United States, and on Discovery Networks throughout Europe, Middle East and Africa.
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Vancouver – The first keynote of the inaugural GDC Canda event has ended, and conference attendees are now checking out the seminars on a variety of topics on three tracks – production, design and business.

Don & Victor

This morning’s keynote session featured Microsoft Game Studios’ Don Mattrick, who was interviewed by Victor Lucas. There was lively discussion about the past, present and future of the game industry, and Don shared his thoughts on directions and paths we may see traveled in the future. I will cover more of this topic when I write my event wrap-up.

There are loads of great people to meet and talk to at the conference, as well as very informative seminar sessions. There are still passes available, check out the GDC Canada website for more information.

Toronto – A world without downloading, file sharing and iPods seems inconceivable today. But this digital age was ushered in a mere 10 years ago with the creation of Napster, the music sharing software. It opened a Pandora’s box.

Today, The Globe and Mail launches The Download Decade, an in-depth editorial series examining the profound societal, economic and cultural changes resulting from these new digital technologies. The series will examine: Napster’s critical role in the resurgence of Apple; the growth of ISPs; new business models and how they are faring; the fundamental transformation of the music industry; the debate about downloading and whether ISPs should be forced to hand over information on heavy file sharers; copyright law impact; and what the future holds.
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