NEWS
metronews.ca Thursday, May 30, 2013
BlackBerry. Smartphone pioneer’s game guru makes pitch to developers The BlackBerry might not be the first device that comes to mind when you think of mobile gaming, but the rebranded company is trying to make gaming fun on the phone that many associate with work rather than play. Anders Jeppsson, BlackBerry’s head of gaming, will deliver a keynote speech Thursday at the second edition of the Ottawa International Game Conference to pitch the operating system to developers from around the world. “Any platform that wants to be successful today, I think, needs to do gaming really, really well,” Jeppsson told Metro Wednesday. He said he will talk about what the company has been working on over the past few years and why developers should make games for BlackBerry 10, the new operating system it announced in January. The company plans to take cues from Facebook by incor-
Crowd-sourcing idea wins students a trip to China
Catch the speech
Global challenge. Three local teens head to Hong Kong to pitch InspireSource idea to potential investors
Jeppsson’s speech is scheduled for 1:30 p.m. at the Ottawa Convention Centre.
porating the social aspect of gaming into BB10 games with its popular BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) program. “With 10 billion messages being sent every day over BBM and 50 per cent of those being responded to within 20 seconds, that is a very, very appropriate vehicle for connecting you with your friends in terms of sharing what you just did in the game, or who wants to play with you, or sharing what you’ve just discovered in the app store,” said Jeppsson. He said companies like Rovio, Electronic Arts and Ottawa-based Magmic are already working on games for BB10. Joe Lofaro/Metro
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Graham Lanktree
graham.lanktree@metronews.ca
Grade 11 students Kingsong Chen, Steven Wu and Jeffrey Liang will travel to Hong Kong in late June to pitch InspireSource, their idea to bring creative students and businesses together. graham lanktree/metro
A team of three teens from Colonel By Secondary School will travel to Hong Kong to pitch their idea of “crowd-sourcing students” to investors. “The main premise is to crowd-source students to solve problems posed by businesses,” said Grade 11 student Kingsong Chen, who came up with the idea for an online site called InspireSource to bring the two sides together. “A lot of the more creative ideas are coming from youth,” he said, noting that many high school science
fairs turn out real medical innovations, and that his peers who code and do web design have skills they’re ready to develop into careers. “Hiring professionals in marketing is expensive for startups. Let’s say a business wanted a new graphic design,” he said. “They would post it on our website and we would have students from university, college and high school submit a proposal.” Chen and his two business partners, Steve Wu and Jeffrey Liang, submitted the idea to Hong Kong Polytechnic University’s Poly U innovation and entrepreneurship global student challenge earlier this year. They heard back last week that they have an all-expenses-paid trip to Hong Kong to pitch the idea June 22. “Those who are driven see it as a platform where they can display their skills to the real world,” said Wu. “It may even motivate some students.”