Has it really been nearly seven years since Flickr was acquired by Yahoo!? At the time, it was one of the largest acquisitions of a Canadian online company, thrusting the spotlight on its co-founders Stewart Butterfield and Caterina Fake
Butterfield, who stayed with Flickr until 2009, has been working on a number of projects, as well as speaking about design and technology. He also co-founded Tiny Speck, a startup that is “building something enormous…that will blow your minds”. Tiny Speck’s first product, a multi-player online game called Glitch, launched last month. (see the video below.)
“”We wanted to make something very specific that hadn’t been made before,” Butterfield told the Guardian after Glitch made its debut. “Because it’s played in the browser, people superficially think of social games and expect a particular dynamic both in terms of how it makes money, and the experience of playing it. But people are playing live and synchronously with each other, and the monetization mechanics aren’t based around speeding up the gameplay in exchange for real-world currency.”
Given Butterfield’s involvement with Flickr, which was based in Vancouver, and how games are becoming increasingly more popular online, having Butterfield as mesh Vancouver’s keynote speaker seemed like a natural choice.
We’ll be interested in getting his view on online games, design, social media and how the world of online photography has changed over the past few years given the rise of new players such as Instagram.
Here’s where you can see the schedule and speakers for mesh Vancouver. Early-bird tickets for the one-day event are $239 until Nov. 4.
