Imirt Board Election 2016

Voting for Imirt's new board will take place from Friday 23rd to midnight on Friday 30th September 2016. Details of how to vote will be sent to members by e-mail on Friday 23rd. To vote you must be a registered Imirt member. You can sign up for Imirt membership for only €20. If you have previously registered, your membership is valid until the end of 2017, there's no need to sign up again.

3 out of the 7 board seats are being contested in this election. These spots have been made available by board members Owen Harris, John Halloran, and Stephen Kelly. Owen and John shall both be stepping down after excellent work advising Imirt since before the Steering Committee was formed. Owen has coordinated initiatives like the ID2015 fund for GDC 2016, has run Imirt panels at multiple events, has highlighted Irish work with the press and he has been instrumental in engaging community nationally and internationally. John has organised funding from EI, managed Imirt events including the Unity event, talked with press, and handled our bank and accountancy interactions. Stephen unfortunately drew the unlucky short straw (sorry Stephen!) and he is also involved in this years nominations.

We are delighted to announce the 7 excellent candidates who have nominated to help Imirt out and we believe all are an asset to Irish games development. You can find out more information by reading their bio's below.

If you have any questions please email contact@imirt.ie and thank you for supporting Irish game developers!

The Candidates

Dan Bergin-Holly

Dan is a game producer and product manager. His work in games has varied from his own small interactive live indie projects, to working in large-scale projects for the mobile market. He as worked as a producer with Dublin games company SixMinute and as a product manager with SEGA. Dan’s background is in live events, having completing a Phd in videogames and theatre, he also founded and ran the arts festival 10 Days in Dublin from 2011 - 2014. He continued this during his time in SixMinute - taking a leading role in facilitating groups to use the office for jams and meetups, and is also a moderator in the IrishGameDev facebook group. He is currently working with GameSparks as an engagement manager, helping clients improve their titles in the market. Dan is also absolutely mad for boardgames.

What I hope to achieve

In my time with Imirt I would love help raise the group's profile with the Irish gaming community. I would hope to arrange and facilitate more visible events and meetups to create greater openness and inclusivity, while encouraging our members to interact both with each other and the board members.

I would like to grow Imirt’s presence across the whole country, exploring methods where-by the organisation can reliably have representation or contact points with devs in as much of Ireland as possible, and ensure that activity is championed accordingly.

Finally, I would like to see Imirt more aggressively and publicly petition the Irish government to improve their plans to support the games industry in Ireland.

Contact

Find me on twitter: @danyoutohell
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/danyoutohell
Or e-mail me at dan@danyoutohell.com


Jen Carey

Jen has been involved in games since starting college in '09. Fortunately she's no longer a student at this stage and has worked in a variety of companies of different scales before starting on an indie venture, Fickle Games. She currently splits her time between creating a card game, prototyping computer games and the dreaded contract work of the indie dev.

She is an active member of the community, speaking at various events and always willing and interested in encouraging new people from different backgrounds into the games scene. Jen has also organised events over the years, such as a screening of GTFO and Cardboard Ceílí, and helped with this years Inis Spraoi. She is very interested and concerned with keeping our community a welcoming and open space for work and collaborations between everyone.

Jen also hates writing in third person and finds this very strange.

What I hope to achieve

One of my main goals will be to focus on a network to help people with different skills to meet and work together. We all know that most games teams are founded by friends working on interesting projects and that can't happen if programmers/ artists/ writers/ etc don't get a chance to meet. We had a DubLudo of a similar style once and I think it can be expanded upon.

I want to encourage game makers from different backgrounds, interests and skills into the community. Make it known that you don't need a games degree to get involved.

I want to do work through Imirt on accessibility and inclusion in both our games and our games scene. Ideally I'd like to help organise workshops or talks on these topics and contact colleges about including similar content in their courses.

I think Irish games are long overdue for an international platform. As well as encouraging an Irish presence at events, I think we could benefit greatly from organising a games festival of our own to bring international interest to the country. As well as giving devs who can't afford to travel the opportunity to meet game makers from around the world

Contact

Twitter: @Jen_Carey_
Website: www.ficklegames.com
Email: jen@ficklegames.com
Slack: @jen on the IrishGameDev slack


Alan Duggan

I've been involved in the games industry since 2001 when my journey as a self employed Indie began, working on J2ME games. I formed my first proper studio, Nephin Games, in 2003, took in €2.25m in funding, grew to 19 people, and worked with the leading publishers of the time including Disney, Warner Brothers and Glu. Sadly Nephin went into receivership in 2007. I decided to try again as a founder in 2011 and formed Tribal City Interactive. We develop for Mobile, VR and PC and have a number of games live on mobile with over 50 million installs and an active ongoing community. I'm a techie at heart but spend more time in spreadsheets than code these days as Exec Producer.

What I hope to achieve

I know world-wide success is possible for an Irish games studio. This is hugely important as it is only with many commercially self-reliant companies that the industry in Ireland as a whole will be viable in the long term. That sustainability will allow us as an industry to attract investment and talent and provide employment and prospects across all disciplines and experience levels for those at home, returning home or moving here from abroad. My goal is to make that happen, not only for us as a company, but through my involvement in Imirt, for other local devs too.

Contact

Twitter - @lordugg
LinkedIn - www.linkedin.com/in/alanduggan
Email - alan@tribalcity.com
Website - www.tribalcity.com


Colin Guilfoyle

Based in Drogheda and founder of Nebula Interactive in 2014. Before founding I was in a mixture of senior IT roles and I qualified as an accountant in 2009. I delivered a TEDx talk in 2015 on Giving through Gaming and we have to date released 8 titles mostly on mobile but Project G was released on Steam this year having been greenlit earlier this year. Known for being a Lego enthusiast, home brewer and generally being a passionate entrepreneur with a few awards under our belt and national coverage for both Water Meter Dash and other projects.


What I hope to achieve

My area of expertise and interest is in the funding/ business side of the equation - I delivered a talk at Develop:Brighton this year on the topic and it’s an area that smaller developers/ studios tend to ignore/ avoid because it’s not the sexy side of the industry or they feel it’s not attainable. I feel it’s the side that we need to get better at so that we are able to build games of quality professionally and move away from hobby studios to sustainable ventures. My focus would be on improving the funding routes for developers and to grow the opportunities available both from public and private sector sources. I also have a keen interest in working with Colleges and we have worked extensively with DKIT in their various games courses to ensure that we have a stream of high quality students who have reason to stay in the country.

Contact

www.nebula.ie
colin@nebula.ie
@nebulainter / @colinbrew
https://www.facebook.com/colinguilfoyle


Stephen Kelly

Stephen is a current board member of Imirt. He has worked in the games and animation industry for over 8 years and is Co-Founder of the games and animation company, Studio POWWOW.  In his role at POWWOW he has created many award winning games and apps, the most notable being ShipAntics: The Legend of The Kiki Beast. He has also worked as an animator on numerous acclaimed TV shows for the likes of Cartoon Network, Disney and Nickelodeon.

What I hope to achieve

During my time on the board I have focused on reaching out to other groups and organisations to build awareness of Imirt and find ways we can work together. Some of these groups are as follows.

  • The Irish Film Board
  • Screen Training Ireland
  • EGDF - European Games Developer Federation
  • Animation Ireland
  • Screen Directors Guild
  • AnimAl - Animation Alliance

Building these connections has had some notable results. Just recently we have worked with Screen Training Ireland to organise a Storytelling for Games masterclass with Christian Divine. We have also had a number of very positive meetings with the Irish Film Board and EGDF, discussing potential cultural funding for games. This is work that is hard to see from the outside but it has had a big impact in building the reputation and legitimacy of Imirt and the Irish games industry.

If re-elected I would like to continue this work but with a particular focus on lobbying for cultural tax relief for games. I would also like to work to find a way to introduce a Games Prototype Fund, like the one in place in the UK and similar to the Frameworks scheme available from the Irish Film Board for the making of animated short films. 

Contact

http://www.studiopowwow.com
http://www.facebook.com/ShipAntics
http://www.shipantics.com


Olivier Masclef

I am a French videogame entrepreneur; I recently relocated to Dublin to set up Black Shamrock (PC/console, Strategy/RPG titles). I started in the games industry back in 1994 at Infogrames as producer (adventure and RPG titles), then at Appeal in Belgium as project manager on Outcast, and was CEO of Widescreen games. Widescreen worked with many publishers in Europe, the US and Japan (Namco, Bethesda, Eidos...), on both console and PC games (up to 100 people at some stage). I have also been a business development and production consultant for multiple game publishers and developers. I have been very involved in my local videogame community as founder and president of Imaginove in Rhône Alpes region, board member of SNJV and OnlyGame, and one of the board members of LyonGame that created the GameConnection events (now run by a private organization). I was also involved in education for University Lyon2.

What I hope to achieve

Why should I be a board member of Imirt when I just arrived in Ireland a few months ago? Well... you know what? Ireland is my new home, and I'd like to bring you guys the experience in the game community organizations and the international network I have developed over my career. I've been involved in the lobbying actions of SNJV towards the French government and the European Commission to get the French videogame tax credit up and running (and that was not easy). I was also one of the people at LyonGame association that pitched the idea of organizing a « game connection » event, which became one of the main business networking events in the games industry. Hey, why couldn't we do the same (and even better) here? Basically I think my experience may help to make Imirt exist on the map at a European and worldwide level. Let's be ambitious... and let's have fun to fuel this ambition and make it happen!

Contact

https://ie.linkedin.com/in/olivier-masclef-09464a2
http://www.black-shamrock.com/
http://www.imaginove.fr/
http://www.snjv.org/
http://www.game-connection.com/
http://gamagora.univ-lyon2.fr/


David Mulhall

I came to this community looking for something, I wanted to better myself, expand my horizons and meet people that interest me! It didn't take long to realise that I had found one of the richest mixes of people imaginable, this community is fun, creative, warm and welcoming. But like everything it's not perfect!

To be honest I think the Irish game dev scene is totally in its infancy and I would love to use my knowledge to help grow this fantastic community. The vast majority of my experience in the games industry is in Quality Assurance, I have been QA for a number of small titles and lead QA for Fierce fun games. I personally have a passion to encourage and educatechildren of all ages about the wonderful world of game development, it is this passion that led to my volunteering in my local CoderDojo and later the formation of a local community group call Junior Game Crafters, a group focused on helping children realise their dreams of becoming game developers.

What I hope to achieve

I believe in the old adage of "the more, the merrier". I want to try open up the community a bit more, cross pollinate if you will with other communities and groups. Have joint ventures with community centers to bring knowledge and expertise to others.

I would love to host monthly member's workshops, have members of the community share some of their skills to better everyone. In the next 2 years I would like to engage with the minister for education, in an attempt to have a solid framework put in place, country wide, to teach children basic computer science in school.