the world of Wazzamba

Wednesday, January 13, 2010

I joined the team working on the Wazzamba virtual world back in April 2009. And now we’ve launched in the real world.

Wazzamba is a virtual world with a twist: it includes built in games which allow you to build up a score to compete for real world travel prizes. Every week, we award 4 prizes. So far we’ve given away quality, all expenses paid trips to China, New York, Las Vegas and San Diego. Forthcoming destinations include Spain, Rome and Australia. And actually winners can select an alternative if they don’t like the headline.

The virtual world itself so far has 6 “cities”, each sub-divided into areas, for example Sunset Strip in LA (you can see me there on the left with my friend Marilyn). And we’re growing.

You can also find various adventures, or quests, set for you by NPCs (non-playing characters) usually gifted with dreadfully punning names, courtesy of my unhinged colleagues Tim & Sven.

So how do we make any money out of this ? Well the idea is you pay a subscription to take part, at “silver” or “gold” level. The higher the level, the higher the number and value of prizes you qualify for. But you can play - and win - for absolutely nothing. Zero, free, peanuts. Although we’d be terribly grateful if you didn’t.

My part in all this in theory involves building up a mobile channel, from a mobile-enabled web site up to an iPhone application. But I’ve also ended quite heavily involved in building our Facebook applications and presence, as well as a blog built on Wordpress.

It’s early days yet and Wazzamba is not fully mature. But it’s certainly worth a few minutes of your time. My avatar there is called Ostakokur and has great dress sense. Don’t forget to say “hi” if we meet!

Error handling

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

I am only too aware that there are a few glitches in this site. Little by little I’m trying to fix them, whenever I get a spare moment and have the energy. Hopefully search is now fixed. I’ve implemented a very simple search only, as I don’t really believe this site needs anything more complex. There are two separate search contexts, one for each blog. For more general search, you know where to go ...

I would be very grateful for any feedback on bugs or any other issue - my next task is to try to nail down the remaining glitches in the comment system, but that is always tricky.

And on the photography side, the gallery design is actually pretty much finished. The problem now is selecting the content!

Twitter Guilt

Friday, April 03, 2009

Every now and then I get messages telling me that somebody is following me on Twitter. Sometimes it’s obvious link bait. But not often - usually the somebody seems to be a real person, who for some totally baffling reason wants to know what’s going on over here (very little, if you believe Twitter).

I suppose I should actually write something to satisfy my (slowly) growing audience, but what exactly ? Well, at least it gives me something to blog about. Maybe if I twitter about my blog I’ll solve both problems. Then I can blog about it!

It would be nice if you could send a short message when you start following someone, to say “hi”, and say why you’re following them…

Start New Game

Friday, March 13, 2009

After over two years of intensive work on the Playyoo Flash Lite user-generated casual game platform, I’ve now reached the final score screen and run out of lives…

Playyoo carries on without me, and, I can assure you, is under constant development by the team (in the office next door). I’m sure they’ll be only too pleased to take advantage of my unsolicited advice and opinions over the coming months

My own very mixed feelings about leaving it behind have been alleviated by the challenge of taking on not one but several key roles in Imaginventure’s next big thing (still top secret), and getting a very welcome and very clear statement of confidence from The Boss.

For the first time in my working life, I’ve also been offered the opportunity of working part time for a period, which I’ve grabbed with both hands, although I’m afraid it could go much faster than I expect.

American Peyote

Monday, February 23, 2009

I discovered an interesting website today, maybe worth a visit if you’re into photography, blogging, startups, all that stuff. Not quite sure which blog to put this in, since it’s as schizo as I am! American Peyote is run by a Switzerland-based American, Mark (in Wintertur, which is about as far away as you can get from me Lugano without falling out of Switzerland). The site seems a bit slow, but it is entertaining…