Archive for the year 2009
Happy Holi-Warming-Versary from Stage Two!
It’s been a while since we’ve moved into the new office and we definitely wanted to celebrate the holidays, so we figured that this year, we’d knock off some long-delayed things to celebrate, including having a nice office “housewarming” party and to celebrate our third-year anniversary.
To help spruce up our place, we turned to our friends at 1:AM gallery and Quinn Wharton who generously provided art and photography work that is currently hanging on our walls. And not one to leave our friends famished and parched at a party, the fine folks at Work of Art event planning & catering made some delicious hors d’oeuvres and set them up on our very own meat tree – yes, you heard that right…we had an artificial tree that was filled with meat on a stick on the tree. It was absolutely delicious!
Stage Two also made a couple of cool announcements as well, including a new “soon-to-be” website for the company and our next new product called Gunman – the first iPhone First Person Shooter using augmented reality. We encourage you to give it a shot and to let us know what you think.
We thank you for stopping by our office for our Holi-Warming-Versary party and regardless of whether you were there or not, here’s a recap of photos:
Some of the artwork provided by 1:AM Gallery
Photography art provided by Quinn Wharton
Legacy Locker’s Gregg Delman
Stage Two’s Adam Burg & Jeremy Toeman
It’s our very own meat tree!
Decorating the meat tree.
Transforming the Stage Two office.
Ron Hirson of BOKU and Sol Lipman of 12seconds.tv
David Cohn of Spot.us and Stage Two’s Jim Schaff
David Cohn, Dave Mathews, Jim Schaff & Kevin Brown checking out Gunman
Jeremy Toeman with CNET’s Rafe Needleman
And what holiday party wouldn’t be complete without some Foosball? It’s David Speiser, Gregg Delman, Andrew Kippen & Jim Schaff.
To view more photos from our holiday party, please click here.
Introducing Gunman – The First Augmented Reality First Person Shooter for iPhone
So the secret is finally out. The hours of playing Call of Duty have finally paid off. Today, Stage Two Labs is absolutely jazzed about the release of the world’s first augmented reality first person shooter for the iPhone – aptly titled “Gunman”.
We’ve been playing for hours around the office, hiding under desks and popping around corners – basically acting like kids again. Gunman combines all the fun of real-world games like paintball and lasertag, without requiring people to carry around any special equipment other than their iPhone.
The result is a laser-tag style game that takes the fast-paced multiplayer action of popular online and console titles and brings the war into the real world by allowing players to target their friends and see who *really* has the most skills. Once a target is hit, players can save or Tweet “scoped” pictures of their favorite hits to the world – making the target’s shame eternal and proving their dominance as a Gunman. In addition to the local multiplayer version, players can “go Pro” in a solo mode by collecting bounties on celebrities appearing on the Gunman “Hit List”, and even track their prey via location-based service Foursquare (Ashton Kutcher, MC Hammer, Shaq, and 50 Cent should watch their backs). Of course, this is only the beginning, Gunman will receive regular updates such as team-based tactical missions (like capture the flag mode), an arsenal of new weapons, an international leaderboard, and more.
The game uses a variety of high technology services to create a fun and engaging experience for the players. Some key components include:
- Gameplay involves “augmented reality” by adding layered services on the iPhone’s camera
- Detecting “hits” is done through a proprietary new color detection system.
- Local multiplayer gaming includes automatic peer discovery of other players.
- Sharing one’s accomplished shots incorporates the popular Twitter and Twitpic services
- Finding targets on the leaderboard is integrated with Foursquare for location lookup
Check out the Gunman website here
- Engadget says Gunman “finally makes augmented reality awesome”
Client News: Ardica Celebrates The Holidays & Announces Its Design Contest Winners
Last Saturday, Ardica Technologies had a holiday party at their headquarter offices in San Francisco. To add to the celebration, there was also an awards ceremony to honor the winners of their first-annual “Power to the People” Design Contest. This was a contest where hundreds of entries were submitted and eight finalists were chosen from among young, talented designers & technology aficionados. As part of the contest, Stage Two participated in making this a more interactive program by creating the “People’s Choice Award” and inviting the public to choose which of the eight finalists they thought were the best. The winner was also announced at the ceremony.
The winners from the “Power to the People” Design Contest were:
- First Place: Ardica Voltage Sleeping Bag
- Second Place: Coal Mining Respirator
- Third Place: Backpack for Professional Photographers
- Special Recognition Prize: Ardica-enabled Ski Patrol Vest
- “People’s Choice Award”: Coal Mining Respirator
You can read some of the coverage of Ardica and their Moshi Power Pack here:
- VentureBeat: Battery-charged clothing, anyone? Ardica could convince you it’s worth it.
- CNET: Wearable battery-pack contest unzips winners (photos)
Here are some photos from the evening:
Arriving at the Design Contest to view each finalist’s entry.
After tallying up the votes, the winner of the “People’s Choice Awards” was the Coal Mining Respirator.
Some tech influencers and bloggers that came to the event – Harry McCracken, Marie Domingo, Andru Edwards & Gina Hughes.
Ardica’s CEO Hap Klopp with GearLive’s Editor-in-Chief Andru Edwards
The First Place winners of the Ardica Design Contest – the Moshi-powered sleeping bag.
Ardica’s CEO Hap Klopp being interviewed by VentureBeat reporter Thomas Slater.
You can read the full press release of the Design Contest here. For more pictures from the evening, please click here.
Client News: Clicker on Boxee
We have some excellent news to share from two friends of Stage Two Consulting, Clicker.com and Boxee. Clicker today has launched their new Boxee app. This app, as you might expect, lets you search for and watch great Internet television content on your actual TV. Boxee is the 10 foot experience for Clicker.
The Clicker blog post has all the details. Next week, Clicker CEO and founder Jim Lanzone will be joining the Boxee guys at their Beta launch in Brooklyn, New York to get up on stage and talk about the new app. If you’re gonna be in the neighborhood, you should RSVP and check out the news (and the free food.)
Boxee and Clicker are both exciting products – both are consumer-facing, sexy, and offer compelling TV-related technology. The news pickup has been pretty good. We’ll update the coverage below as it comes in.
Redux Launches, Bringing Our Addiction to the Masses
Today is the big day. Our favorite real-time online media streaming, Twitter and Facebook feed importing, work day killing, source for addictive entertainment the web – Redux is announcing that their ground-breaking friend-sourced online media service, Redux.com, is moving out of closed private Beta, dropping the velvet rope, and opening the Redux addiction to the masses. We couldn’t be more thrilled, as the Redux team has a great service on their hands that has generated a ton of cool buzz and built an incredibly strong community. Also, we couldn’t be more terrified for the world’s economy now that Redux has been unleashed.
Head over to the Redux blog to check out this great blog post, “The Redux Manifesto”, written by Redux Founder and CEO David McInstosh: http://blog.redux.com/index.php/2009/12/01/the-redux-manifesto/
With this public launch, the entire world now has access to:
- Friend-Sourced online media fed in a real-time stream to each user only by their friends and those who share their interests – constantly fresh, completely personalized.
- Innovative Redux TV Mode that allows users to watch their personal Redux stream like a television, passively entertained by great online media fed to them by their friends
- Twitter and Facebook feed importing, bringing users’ online lives together and weeding out the boring status updates and blind links to serve up only the best online entertainment from their favorite social networks
- Highly interactive and engaging real-time, media-centered conversation unlike any other service on the web.
Check out some of the coverage from the announcement below (updated as it comes in):
Client News: Ardica Wants You To Vote For Your Favorite Design & Win!
In June, Ardica announced its global “Power To The People” contest designed to have creative designers from around the world come up with a brilliant new application using their miniaturized, portable power system called the Moshi Power Pack. From over 120 entries, the judges narrowed it down to eight finalists that will present to the judges at the Ardica offices on Saturday, December 5.
Judges from technology websites Gizmodo and Wired, IDEO, Mountain Hardwear and Stanford will examine each entry carefully and ultimately award the winners cash prizes for their innovative ideas for integrating the Moshi power pack into their design. But what exactly is a Moshi? It’s a battery pack that is both lightweight and unobtrusive and can charge most electronic devices quite frequently. The Moshi power pack can even be used as a heater so when you’re in a cold environment, it’ll keep you snug and warm.
As part of the Ardica design contest, they have also decided to award one of the eight finalists the “People’s Choice Award” whereby that winner will receive an extra cash prize of $1,000. In order to be the winner of this prize, Ardica is asking for people to cast their votes by clicking here, looking at each of the eight finalists and casting their vote. As an added incentive, three random voters will be given a Moshi power pack!
Voting goes now through noon on December 4. To cast your vote, simply click here.
Client News: VUDU brings Wikipedia into HD movie streaming
VUDU today unveils yet another great new feature to their interface, the integration of Wikipedia into VUDU. When you land on a movie page, you can view all the information Wikipedia has to offer about that film – links to actors, directors (and anything else) are all active, so you can explore to your geeky content. And film links actually can take you back into VUDU!
Their blog post says it all, so we won’t repeat it here. But this is yet another reason why their implementation of a “streaming user interface” is so darn smart. They can update VUDU with great new features like Wikipedia, Rotten Tomatoes, theatrical trailers and more, quickly and easily. It doesn’t require a user download or a firmware upgrade – it’s very much like updating a web page.
A number of outlets have covered the news. The list of coverage is below.
Client News: Pogoplug Unveils 2nd Gen Device – Pretty Darn Cool In Pink
The New Pogoplug!
At a great late night event held in their SF headquarters, Cloud Engines – creators of the ubercool award-winning Pogoplug “multimedia sharing device” unveiled the next step in their Pogoplug product evolution (see picture).
A very select group of techgeeks got a very special sneak peek and hands-on with the new Pogoplug, which boasts 4 USB ports (a big crowd pleaser), very cool new design, and a bunch of new features:
- Automatic sync with your music, movies, photos…really any folder you want
- Bulk uploading
- Improved data display for media – cover art, albums, genre, artists for music, timeline for photos
- Super easy and cool looking drag and drop slideshows
- Streaming video from my.pogoplug.com in just about any format – even stream to your iPhone
- Improved address book functions, incorporating Myspace and Facebook friends for easier sharing
- Global search across all Pogoplugs and drives – never forget which drive that file is sitting on. Just hit the search button
The Pogoplug has had an incredible year after just launching at CES in January, earning huge accolades and a very dedicated community of followers (check out www.pogoplugged.com). We’re thrilled that the second generation already seems to have captured the imaginations of many in the tech world just a few hours after its release. Check out some of the great client coverage below:
- Slashgear
- LA Times
- Engadget
- CrunchGear
- VentureBeat
- Gizmodo
- CNet
- Electronista
- MacWorld
- Ubergizmo
- PCWorld
- Cult of Mac
- OhGizmo
- GeekTonic
- Inquisitr
- Geek.com
- eHomeUpgrade
- Gadgetell
- GottaBeMobile
(more to be added as they come in)
Client News: BOKU announcing 12 major partnerships at once
BOKU has a big announcement today, which includes 12 major partnerships with some of the biggest names in free-to-play and social / casual gaming. BOKU offers a direct mobile payments system for virtual goods. Want some digital alfalfa for your virtual horses in Barn Buddy on Facebook? BOKU lets you pay for it with your mobile phone.
The new partnerships account for more than 200 million (yup, million) new customers with access to BOKU to pay by mobile for their virtual goods. BOKU is a global outfit with offices in the US, South America, the UK and Singapore. Their release went out on the wire at 9AM PST today – the full list of new partnerships are available there.
BOKU also announced the 3rd generation of their user experience today, which includes some great features to simplify and streamline customer checkout – the ability to instantly differentiate between a landline and mobile number is one example. Innovations like this make life simpler for the end consumer, and nncrease conversion for their customers, and making life better and more profitable is what being in business is all about – well done BOKU!
Several outlets picked up the news this morning, the list of publications covering the news is below. We’ll update the list as we see articles appear.
Client News: Clicker is live and ready for Prime Time
Great news for Clicker today – they’re launching out of Beta, making the service available to anyone in the world. Clicker has also increased their content index dramatically, partly through collaboration with Netflix and Amazon to index all of their video-on-demand content – this brings Clickers content index up to:
- 400,000+ episodes, from over 7,000 shows
- 30,000+ films
- 50,000+ music videos
And, they have some great new feature enhancements thanks to all the Beta feedback they received. This includes features like use of Facebook Connect (to create an account using your FB credentials) and improvement to their amazing playlist function (sort of like a DVR for Internet television to create season passes, and get alerts when new episodes are available, etc.)
We issued a press release via Business Wire this morning. A little later today, founder and CEO Jim Lanzone will be publicly unveiling the site at the NewTeeVee Live 09 event in San Francisco (in our fair city!)
A number of outlets have covered the news this morning. We will update the list of coverage below as we see it come in throughout the day.
