I am excited to announce today that I have officially joined the social gaming team at Playdom. This company has an unbelievably bright future and I make this move with deep conviction and enthusiasm.

The last few months have been filled with an unusual amount of opportunities resulting from the launch of Storybook Anytime’s social game Reef Life. Since very early in the projects life I have been both humbled and inspired by the support of my friends and colleagues. It is that inspiration and support that has ultimately led to this opportunity — for that I am eternally grateful.

Playdom boasts the #1 game on MySpace—Mobsters—and three of the top four applications. Fueled by explosive growth on Facebook and an expanding pipeline of new games and features, Playdom may be the fastest growing social gaming company on the planet! It is an honor to be part of Playdom and exciting to know that I will be helping to move social gaming forward on a much larger scale than ever before.

The Launch.

On September 8, 2009, Storybook Anytime, officially announced the beta release of “Reef Life“. A family friendly social game on the Facebook platform. This marks the long anticipated follow up to the “original” Facebook aquarium game, Sam’s Fish Bowl. Over six months of around the clock work by the Storybook Anytime team has produced an immersive underwater world that has combined elements of virtual world exploration and social gaming to truly raise the bar for social games today.

What is really special is the uniqueness of the game. Coming from the origins of Sam’s Fish Bowl, we could have easily taken the approach of creating a game of “fish management” in an aquarium like setting. Sam’s Fish Bowl was very much a simplified version of that concept. We wanted to create an original, immersive and deep game that allow users to invest their personalities into game play in a very real way. In “Reef Life” you and your friends are the fish.

The Story.

You were once a small fish living the good life inside a fish bowl. While on a Caribbean cruise with your human family, your bowl accidentally fell overboard. As you drifted through the vast depths of the ocean, you came to rest on a large coral reef. You soon discover that this reef is actually an amazing underwater world filled with all kinds of interesting characters and unique marine life. You are immediately taken under the fin by “Reef Whale”, Ronald Trout. Mr. Trout is going to teach you how to start living the “Reef Life” and in the process, how to become a whale yourself.

Life on the reef is a fragile balancing act, but there is plenty of opportunity for you and your friends. You can find starfish and recycle bottles to earn coins- the main currency of the reef. If you are really entrepreneurial, you can rent neighborhoods with businesses to give yourself even more earning potential.

The Results… So Far.

As a social game, “Reef Life” is not meant to have a traditional beginning, middle or end. It is in a constant state of improvement and development. Major feature builds are being launched weekly and will likely slow to bi-weekly after the first of the year. It is expected to remain in beta until at least that time as only a fraction of the game play and features have been revealed. Already, the game is experiencing stellar viral growth and receiving a few positive kudos from industry insiders in early reviews. It is a project that myself and the entire Storybook Anytime team could not be more excited about. We look forward to growing the game for the users.

Find out more about “Reef Life” at http://www.becomeawhale.com.

The AIR Marketplace and AIR product team have been a fantastic champion of Storybook Anytime. I’d also like to take this opportunity to thank them for their continued support.

You can view the full presentation here at the Adobe Air blog. Thanks Adobe. You guys rock!

In some cases companies such as Coca-Cola or Ford Motor Company already have a brand that makes choosing and owning a domain name a no-brainier. For most of us however, this process is difficult given that our company name was created well before we thought about competing in the online world.

I have found that there are two pervasive naming strategies that companies can successfully employee to maximize their online brand:

1. Create a completely new online persona

A company will often use this strategy to sell products and services online without regard to their current brick and morter brand. This works extremely well for companies that are well established in their respective local markets and are new to the Internet. If you are creating an entirely new online identity then creating a good company name is crucial.

Michael McDerment of FreshBooks.com offers some insight into the process of discovering and creating a good company name in his recent article “How to Name Your Company“. In it he details the five critical steps necessary to generate a good company name. During this process it should be a key litmus test to check for the “.com” availability. Without it, there may be no reason to use the name. Although there are many top-level domain options available today (.us, .info, .biz, etc.) there is still a base line association with “.com” for anything web related.

2. Create a unique online identity that accentuates or complements your existing brand

This is sometimes the most difficult strategy to implement. It is generally chosen because the existing brand name is not always available as a domain name. This strategy requires a business to create a truly original domain name that complements its existing brand. As mentioned in the previous strategy, “How to Name Your Company” will offer some insight to the process.

In the case of Friedman’s Shoes, an Atlanta shoe retailer since 1929, all it took was a little creative brainstorming. All though the company name was available, the domain name was difficult for people to spell and worse, placed two letter S’s back-to-back (friedmansshoes.com). This was not acceptable. We decided to create a unique identity crafted around their product line and largefeet.com was born. It was not only a simple and easy name to remember but a brilliant stroke of marketing- both online and off line.

What successful online naming strategies have you seen?

Strategically, creating a business around this model is the equivalent of agreeing to be a dog chasing it’s tale. A company that operates under this model must always be re-inventing itself. It must be the perfect blend of sales, creative and execution. If any of these three pillars fall short it will impact the future of the business. Revenue is dependent upon closing the next deal. Resource management becomes tricky. You are only as good as your last project. Reputation is everything and one false slip at scale could destroy everything.

At an operational level it requires that a business be diligent about the number of hours and resources it dedicates to any single project. It must be accountable down to the minute and thus, keep the client accountable as well. Many times this is in stark contrast to the typical agency mantra of “keep the client happy“— after all, the agency of record is the holy grail. The drive to keep the client happy, execute the big idea and actually generate revenue is great in philosophy but extremely difficult in practice.

So it makes no difference if your business is interactive, social, digital, new media or even traditional advertising. The “Agency Path to Enlightenment” may provide insight into one possible path to agency success. Is it sustainable?

[Portal Game Website: http://www.whatistheorangebox.com/portal.html]

The XBOX 360 gaming experience is quite simply the best. Over the course of a year, as a side benefit to my [former] job at Millions of Us, I have had the opportunity to view many game titles on both the XBOX 360 and PS3 platforms. I also had the unfortunate pleasure of writing code for the Playstation 3 console itself. I can honestly say that the user experience and graphics are simply better on the Microsoft platform.

That said, I am (and have been for the last 7 months) the proud owner of an XBOX 360. When I have extra time there is nothing I like better than a little console gaming. The Live experience from XBOX is also second to none. You can generally find me playing RockBand 2, Guitar Hero World Tour or Call of Duty. I am also a big fan of the Tom Clancy Rainbow Six series. My Gamer Tag is BigMikeJ Cali - let’s play!

Sam’s Fish Bowl allows you to become the caregiver of a super-unique fish. Your fish is alive and well and lives everyday on Facebook. He will require special care and feeding from both you and your friends, and will certainly become a beloved member of the family.

Each time you feed your fish you will earn Super Feeder Points. These points can be shared with your child’s Super Reader Points within Sam’s Interactive Reader. You’ll love this casual game and it also helps spread the word about Storybook Anytime through everyone’s social network on Facebook.

The application is available to download for free and comes with a free story to get you started. Its easy to use interface allows your children to instantly access their own library of stories while simultaneously allowing you to shop for more stories in our online bookstore. The online store has originally written and illustrated stories available for purchase with brand new stories, activities and age appropriate entertainment always in production.

There are also brand new Storybook Anytime Gift Cards available that make a fantastic present for the upcoming holiday season.