Office-Politics Press

Office-Politics Exposed at ECTS in London

London, England — Nerdheaven Ltd. previews Office-Politics, a "gameshow contest" and marketing product designed for converging media, at the ECTS, Europe’s premier interactive entertainment expo. Nerdheaven is exhibiting under the Telefilm Canada umbrella on September 2nd-4th. At full commercial launch, Office-Politics will be playable on wireless, voice web, web and digital TV. Office-Politics is sponsored by Apple Computer and Motorola, Inc.

"Telefilm is opening doors for Office-Politics, the game everyone plays. As Canadian content developers we are very fortunate to have Telefilm whose raison d’etre is to encourage the development of original Canadian content for international distribution. The ECTS event is an ideal opportunity to talk Office-Politics face-to-face with heavy-hitters in the European telecommunications and games industries." Franke James, MFA, Creator, Nerdheaven Ltd.

The inside dirt on Office-Politics
From the player’s perspective Office-Politics is wicked fun. The players engage in intense social interaction, compete for prizes, and laugh (or squirm) at the twisted social commentary. From a marketer’s perspective the game is a sophisticated vehicle which delivers demographic information, psychographic profiles and advertising impressions. It helps advertisers build stronger relationships with their customers.

The game is a self-organizing system designed to promote player-to-player communication and produce measurable marketing results. Each player’s mission is to unseat the current CEO. Vices and virtues are the currency of the game. Players are counselled to "Kiss-ass, backstab, hire and fire your way to the top." Bill James, Game Architect said, "Office-Politics will appeal to everyone who wants a psychological, strategic and social online experience. It’s not thumb-candy for hard-core gamers, it’s brain-candy for everyone." The target audience is 18-35, male/female, P2P, casual gamers. Office-Politics is designed to take advantage of the exponential growth in peer-to-peer communications.

Who really pays for Office-Politics?
Office-Politics’ primary customers are content distributors and telecommunications providers. For the content distributors Office-Politics provides an integrated entertainment and marketing property which offers interactive mass-market reach, data collection and community building. For the telcos, the game delivers highly relevant and compelling content needed to generate incremental air time, reduce customer churn and differentiate their brand. Secondary customers include the advertisers and agencies who will purchase consumer data and profile information.

The brains behind Office-Politics
Bill James, Game Architect, Co-founder, Nerdheaven Ltd.
Franke James, Creator, Co-founder, Nerdheaven Ltd.
Office-Politics is the satirical brainchild of artists Bill James and Franke James, whose hybrid talents of art, technology and marketing have attracted such notable clients as Sony Music, Roots Canada, Umbra and iVillage. The James have been at the forefront of creating entertaining content for advertising clients since 1995. They launched Roots Canada on the web in February 1996 with an interactive story project and contest entitled "Around the Campfire". In 1997 they pioneered a pseudo-psychological advergame called "The Room", for Umbra (a global houseware manufacturer). It went on to attract millions of visitors, garner international awards and achieve "hot site" status with USA Today, AOL, and Yahoo. Other examples of their work include the "Looking Glass" self-analysis beauty game (1999), the animated and twisted comedy "Control Alt Delete" (2000), and the MyObsessions.com "Love Quiz" (2001).

About Nerdheaven Ltd.
Nerdheaven Ltd. is a privately held company based in Toronto, Canada. The company is developing original games which integrate multi-player communication, entertainment, advertising, and market research capability across converging media including the web, wireless, voice, and television networks. The first entertainment property to be developed by Nerdheaven is Office-Politics — "the game everyone plays".

Telefilm at ECTS
Francois Macerola, Chairman of the Board of Telefilm Canada stated: "Canadians in new media entertainment continue to demonstrate the expertise and forward thinking that gives them a competitive edge at the ECTS." Telefilm Canada, a cultural investor in cinema, television and multimedia Telefilm Canada is a federal cultural agency dedicated primarily to the development and promotion of the Canadian film, television and new media industry. The Corporation acts as one of the government’s principal instruments for providing strategic leverage to the Canadian private sector.

Booth Location at ECTS
Nerdheaven will be presenting the Office-Politics demo at ECTS in the Telefilm Canada booth, #1652, September 2-4, 2001. Office-Politics official sponsors at the ECTS show are Apple Computer, Motorola, Inc. and Telefilm Canada.

Nerdheaven Development Partners:
Nuance Communications, www.nuance.com
Pirate Radio, www.pirate.ca
Starnix Inc., www.starnix.com

For more information contact:
Nerdheaven Ltd
Tel: 416-256-9166
www.nerdheaven.com