Modern life is complicated enough without the need to constantly track the movement and location of the little ones or loved ones you are responsible for in order to keep them safe from the desires of societies predators.  Now gentlemen we have the Keruve GPS Watch that looks and operates like a normal watch, but contains a GPS tracker bracelet that can be worn in the water and only detached using a highly specialized tool.

The Keruve GPS can also use cell tower triangulation (commonly referred to as A-GPS) to determine the wearers location when your loved is inside a building, something regular GPS can’t do.  The watch is matched with a handheld device that registers the wearers’ location on a handy map, has an alarm that warns you when power is getting low and even allows the tracker to set boundary conditions, which when broken, sends a warning signal to the tracker to announce the watch and wearer are beyond the boundary perimeter.  The Keruve GPS bracelet GPS receiver uses GSM1800 and GSM900 networks to broadcast its location to its tracking unit, so it will be hard for your target to escape your gaze.

Price $1300

Blurred Edge Magazine recently talked to representatives from three of the current crop of Christian interactive video entertainment developers; Mr. Peter Churness, CEO of Rebel Planet Creations, creator’s of The Axys Adventures: Truth Seeker (the winner of last years Christian game of the year award); Mr Brandon Lewis, CEO and founder of 3^rd Day Studios (Captain Saint); and Mr Scott Wong, CEO of Brethren Entertainment.  About their companies, games, the future of today’s interactive entertainment industry and the role Christian developers are hoping to play in the coming drama.

• 1. Good morning sir. Could you give our readers a brief description of you’re company’s highlights and disappointments for the year 2007?
• 2. Christian games are continuing to reach an ever increasing audience, what message is your company trying to send to the video gamer with the choices you have made while developing your video games?

Well it really depends on the type of game and the context.  But in a nutshell, as we design games, we often surround the content around a certain principle or issue that we think is important.  For example, in our children’s games we know the most common issues with young children are lying, sharing and obedience issues.  So we created a game that focused on teaching those lessons while at the same time having a fun context to teach it.

For games with an older audience we are looser with our design and consider the game as a medium for artistic expression.  Being Christian guides and shapes how we interact in the real world and those same sensibilities are likely to exist in our virtual worlds as well.  CS Lewis appeared to craft his stories and creative energies in this fashion and we have that philosophy as well.  In fact Lewis is quoted as saying when asked the question of whether the Chronicles of Narnia were intentional allegory:  “If Aslan represented the immaterial Deity in the same way in which Giant Despair [a character in The Pilgrim's Progress] represents despair, he would be an allegorical figure.  In reality however he is an invention giving an imaginary answer to the question, What might Christ become like, if there really were a world like Narnia and he chose to be incarnate and die and rise again in that world as he actually has done in ours? This is not allegory at all” (Martindale & Root 1990: ISBN 0-8423-5115-9), I think by having this philosophy in how we create games will provide the basis for making great games, which happen to have Christian themes.  Undoubtedly by doing this, we will provoke healthy discussion and dialog and that we think can be a good thing if our games are an example of how things are done well.  We’re of course not there yet, but definitely this is our ultimate goal.

• 3. Christian games have evolved since the first Christian genre games first hit the market, what is your opinion of the direction taken by Christian game developers? Are there any games marketed as Christian interactive video entertainment that you don’t think are particularly Christian from your point of view?

Well of course many of the games have progressed mainly due to market and technology forces more than anything else.  Better engines, better tools, lower financial thresholds to getting tools and easier access to the market has helped, however, most companies including us, lack the huge marketing budgets required to get people to hear about the games and also get them distributed widely.  It costs a lot of money to undertake a “brick and mortar” retail distribution effort, so the natural tendency will be for Faith based games to be distributed more digitally.  We are in fact doing that now and will have a portal up soon.  Many other content holders are attempting to do this as well.  It’s definitely the direction things are heading, especially because retailers are pushing more console content because they make more per sale.  Shelf space for PC games is dwindling, so the most attractive alternative is digital.  It’ll be interesting to see how all of that unfolds however, it also takes capital and savvy to distribute on the internet.  We do hope that our efforts will become popular however because it funds us better and we then build capital to improve and make better and better games.  Who knows, someday we may even have enough to make a console game.  But that’s a ways off.

That said, I think in order to be successful, the games themselves have to improve too and simply be better designed within the given budgets of each team.   In order for the space to become really successful there needs to be the breakout game that sells a ton of units, that’s basically what, attracts retailers.  I don’t think it really matters to them that it’s Christian or not, they just want to clear shelf space and developers need to make money.  It’s just simple economics.  Since the competition is fierce, it’s very difficult to know what will sell and what won’t.   So I think a studio has to realize that it not only has to know how to create good games, they may have to create a bunch of them so one can hit it big. 

We think this is the natural direction.  Although we play many of these games, the most popular game in the studio isn’t Halo, nor is it Ratchet and Clank, nor is it even Gears (or God of) War… it’s actually  Geometry Wars.  The graphics are amazingly basic and the game is so beautifully balanced, it’s ridiculous.  One of our younger programmers describes it as, “Sooooo good, its epic.”  Economically any developer in the Christian space could have made a game that cool, and if they attached simple Christian hooks to it, it could be minimally defined as a Christian game.  Now I’m not telling people to go out and copy a game like that, be original.  But I’m saying that there’s value in being creative and one doesn’t necessarily have to raise a small fortune to create an amazing game.

 As far as Christian games out there considered not “Christian enough”, I just think that games companies like ours need to simply refine our skills such that when other Christians who might even care to buy our games won’t be embarrassed by it.  To them, having to play a less-cool game that has good content may be far worse than playing a cool game with horrible content.  Peer pressure is a big influence and I think it’s up to Christian developers to figure out how to make these games more relevant and cool, while at the same time providing a strong Christian worldview.

• 4. Tell our readers about your current games and what they can expect when they play them or try the demo?

Sure, people can go to our website at www.brethren-et.com.  We created a children’s game called the Light Rangers and we have a much older game called Victory at Hebron based on the Redemption Card series from Cactus Game Design.  We’re currently working on a whole slough of smaller games while we are raising funds for bigger games.  We’re hosting a lot of casual games from other companies to provide “long tail” content.  These are basically secular games, but we screen them to ensure that they’re at the very least family safe; you’ll find old favourites like Diner Dash, Virtual Villagers and Sudoku.  We get commissions for these and all of the proceeds from the sales of these will go toward the creation of more Christian content.   This might be a stretch, but if anyone wants to help us out and are buying these games anyway, by all means buy them off of our site.  We’d really appreciate it.  Or they can simply buy our products on our web store.  That would be great too.

• 5. When I first started playing video games as a youngster, I remember video games use to be more of a challenge then the graphics and audio dominated games of today. The interactive video entertainment of today immerses the human senses in a separate universe from the thinking mind, is more in tune with creating a sensual world for the gamer to escape into, rather then challenge the human mind. Creating separate realities in which gamers can do anything they wish, with no regard for possible consequences of such actions outside the video screen. They are then forced to function in a society where sex and violence are influences requiring maturity to understand and comprehend in proper context. Do you think this puts the young, easily-influenced, mind in a conflicted position as concerns their conduct and possible rewards of such actions, considering the rewards and punishments involved in the video games they play? In video games you are often rewarded for things that in normal society would get you killed or incarcerated for life.

Sure, I think what you’re saying has some truth to it.  I think that developers try to prevent younger kids from playing those types of games, but in truth they’re all playing.  Violent and sexual content exposure is pervasive in our society; you’ll even see aspects of it in things generally considered safe like Disney channel.   And, I think it is definitely true that some videogames can contribute to these problems.  For some it may create numbness to situations that normally require action to prevent; like, beating someone to death with a bat or running over someone with a car.  I think in the past people would be horrified by the news that someone was beaten to death with a bat or run over with a car.  Now, it’s not surprising to hear on the Tonight Show, Jay Leno making a joke about it or kids hearing it laughing about it.   There’s nothing much to do about stopping the production of games like these because they have a constitutional right to make them, parents have a right not to buy them and the government has the power to enact laws to prevent exploitation, however we feel that to help with some of this is to create alternative content to compete for their time and attention.  Of course this won’t be sufficient to remedy these issues, but possibly it could help. 

• 6. Tell our readers a little about yourself and your company for those who are interested?

Well there’s not a whole lot to say.  We’re a bunch of guys who were not trained in the games field who woke up one day thinking, “I think we’ll start a faith based game company”.  That was nearly 10 years ago, and we’ve kind of navigated the waters a bit and found out that making games for a living is hard work.  Initially we thought we’d only make Faith Based games, but now we found we need to find a happy medium between billable work and making Faith Based games, which is ok with us.  Over the years, we’ve learned a lot about the industry, made a lot of amazing friends in the industry and hope that as we gradually introduce more products into the market, one of them will take off and we will have enough funding to do the games we really want to make.  But for now, we’re just a small company in the Pacific Northwest just trying to keep up with the middle sized development houses around here.

• 7. What are your long term plans for your company and the direction and games you would like to product?

Our plans for our company are to become one of the premiere Faith Based entertainment companies in the country.  Our products will include Manga, Anime movies and games.  Our ultimate goal someday is to create a console game, but they are tremendously expensive, so a more realistic one is to make a great PC RPG game.   But for the time being, we’re also happy with making high level family friendly content and do art work for hire projects to pay the bills until we make enough to create the games we want.  Unless they are really high quality, we’ll keep working until we make enough to create them.  We have a title in development that we hope lots of people will enjoy, but we’re going to keep in mum until for sure we have enough funds and manpower to do it right.  

• 8. How does a Christian game developer draw the line between preaching to the gamer and trying to provide them with alternates to violence and sex?

Well we can’t speak for the other developers out there, but our philosophy is that the preaching should be done by the pastors.  What we try to is provide a context where people can either be challenged about how they think about the world around them and ask themselves how well God fits into it or not.  This isn’t a blatant thing, but more of a by product of playing the game.  Its human nature to be curious and if we pose a context where something is wrong in the virtual world, the natural inclination is to fix it.  How does it get fixed?  What is the philosophy behind fixing it?  We will provide one way to do it, but it’s up to the player to agree or disagree with how we decided the end of the puzzle or task is determined.  Then a player can leave and agree or disagree with that approach.  They can say “this is stupid” or “this is dumb” and some may even articulate very well why they disagree with it.  That is fine, we’re providing a source of discussion and that’s basically what we’re hoping to do.   Conversely the content could really resonate with the player at a deep level.  For example in one of our upcoming games, we have a character which is an anti-hero.  There is much entertainment out there that says you have to be the best to succeed, and if you fall short, your chances of being a “winner” in life is severely diminished.  If you throw the winning touchdown, you’ll get the girl.  If you have a 47″ vertical leap and can slam dunk the ball, you’ll be an All Star and your life will be awesome.  If you’re amazingly handsome, athletic and smart, you’ll have the American dream.  But, these depictions are often far from reality.   Many youth don’t fit that mould and because they feel societal pressures have some performance expectation, they get discouraged. But I think it’s nice to demonstrate creatively that is an alternative.  And happiness can be attained without these things.  The Christian message has many examples of these alternatives and for some, including us, is indeed a source of our happiness, especially when times are tough.  Saying that there’s still hope in the world and hope to people when it seems to be going all downhill, I think is encouraging to people.  So I don’t consider this preaching, but I do think that it is an important aspect of Christian game design that may be an important differentiator when compared to a secular game.

Do you think there is and can be a contextual component to violence in Christian genre interactive entertainment?

Sure.  There’s never a place for Gratuitous violence, however conflict can contain violent acts or violent events.  Without conflict, there is no drama.  And I think great lessons can be taught through drama and many of them had an epic battle between good and evil, for example, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, and even the highly controversial, Passion of the Christ, used violence as a backdrop to contrast the difference between good and evil, and it’s an effective tool.  It provokes a response from people.  When used gratuitously, it has a numbing effect and I think that anything in excess has its problems.  But a skilful use of that tool in story telling and game design can be very effective.  Violence in games has been highly politicized and I think that each case needs to be assessed in context whether it’s bad or not.  In Christian games, there is a context where I think its ok, but the manner and method to how it’s used needs to be finely tuned such that the overall message does not highlight the violence.  If it highlights the good, it’s done its job. 

• 9. For inspiring Christian or any game developers out there could you describe your journey to where you are today? What advice would you have for inspiring game developers as a whole?

I think I’d say to all developers, work hard.  Know your craft and be amazingly good at what you do.  Listen to advice people give you, even critics that are fair and balanced.  Ignore critics who just want to pull you down, to make themselves feel better, or because have a bone to pick.  Make great games, play lots of them and take notes, study control, study technology, study motion, study immersion, understand the economics of development.  Read books, watch movies, but just don’t be a consumer, ask lots of questions, be curious.  If you end up making an amazing game, be smart and make sure you set up your business structure properly.  Seek legal advice early.  Most of all …. Be careful of NET royalty publisher deals.  Lastly, in the beginning, no one will know you, so when negotiating royalties, remember in the beginning a little bit of something is better than 100% of nothing.  Be prolific!

Additionally, to the young budding Christian game developers:  Remember that with any art form including game development that is an extension of ones own personal spiritual engagement with God so make sure that you’re making Christian games for all the right reasons.  God’s imprint is in everything you do.  So be a good representative in what you say and do, yes that means in your games too.  Be authentic in your business practice and in your games and you’ll do ok.  Lastly, don’t get too tied up with religious legalism.  Be smart and know the issues, but don’t force yourself into making a bad game either by ignoring core doctrine or adhering to it to such an extent that the game you end up with is really weird.  Weirdness can be a good marketing tool however, but at the end of the day you’ll have to be a good sport if you end up as well known for your weirdness, like a William Hung, a Tay Zonday or a Dennis “Danger” Madalone. 

• 10. The blurred edge between Christian interactive entertainment and mainstream developers appears to be coming clearer in recent times. Some Christian game developers have stepped over the blurred edge and are bravely attempting to bring Christian interactive entertainment into the mainstream. Do you think the blurred edge will continue to merge into one, or will the blurred edge between the two groups become even more blurred in the years to come in the industry?

Well as things are going, I have a feeling that this market will segment.  One segment will become a niche area to keep people who want to keep games as innocent and clean as possible, which I think there will be a need for; whereas, the other segment will stretch the definition of what will be considered Christian.  I think that’s already happening with Christian music with groups like U2, Switch foot and P.O.D, even singers like Amy Grant, Stacy Orrico and others have crossed over and done well.  In Movies, long ago movies like the Ten Commandments with Charlton Heston, Brother Sun, Sister Moon by Zefirelli and King of Kings were huge studio pictures, and then there was a quiet period until Passion of the Christ, followed by Chronicles of Narnia came out.  Pop culture Christian media outlets began talking more about Tolkien’s faith and tie-ins to Lord of the Rings, as well as the spiritual references in both the superman comics and Superman Returns, seemed to galvanize the Faith-based movie making community.  I think from this, there will be higher quality Christian movies coming out.  In like manner, I think Christian gaming has this potential, but it will take some time.  It takes time for the public to wrap its brains around the idea that Christian games can be more like Lord of the Rings, albeit done properly.  Granted there will always be people who will think Christianity in state of the art videogames makes as much sense as chocolate syrup on a pork chop, but I think over time as games get better; the blurred edge between the secular and Christian games may one day merge.

• 11. Your company has been over in Japan recently can you give our readers an update on your company’s current activities in the Japanese interactive entertainment market?

Basically, we have relationships with many of the artists in Japan who worked on the Digimon anime series and some of the 3d artists who worked on final fantasy XIII.  There are friends of mine in the movie industry that knew people from USC in Japan and I connected with them and the rest is history.  Currently, we’re producing and anime series created in Japan based on our Light Rangers video series.  It’ll cater to the Pokémon and Jetix, from toontown, Disney age group.  We’re nearly finished with principle artwork and later this fall we’ll have some preview clips of the animation up on our website for those who are interested. 

• 12. MMO’s appear to be the direction millions of gamers and some of the current developers are headed in, does your Christian developing company plan on any future Christian MMO’s for gamers to check out in the future?

Yes, there are plans for a Christian MMO by a few companies, however they are quite expensive, and hard to monetize and upkeep if you don’t have the right team and staff.  I’m not at liberty to say much more than this as far as our plans at this time on MMO development, but we are working closely with Microforte and Bigworld Technologies on a possible project.  The CEO, John DeMargheriti, is on my advisory board.  John’s company creates MMO middleware for large MMOs such as the for the upcoming Stargate Worlds, based on the popular Stargate SG1 TV show, and Tian Xia II, one of the largest MMOs in china.  Another partner of mine is working on MMO development in India.  As things solidify, we’ll update all our fans on our website as to whether our plans will work out in this space and what we’re going to work on if they do.  But for now it’s a little too premature.

• 13. When you were going up Scott did you have any idea what you would be doing for a living presently or did you have other directions in mind and kind of accidentally fell into video game development?

Well I definitely wanted to go into game development which was a dreadful thought to my parents when I was growing up.  I went to a game development camp for apple computer in the 80s run by Ken and Roberta Williams.  Richard Garriott was our counsellor and he taught the game programming class.  He just finished Ultima I in Applesoft basic and he was working on Ultima II, which I believe was published by Sierra On-line before he founded Origin Systems.    After that I was hooked and played all types of games, my favourite games were the Nintendo Mario games and pretty much any Japanese RPG game, like Final Fantasy, ChronoTrigger, Secret of Mana and Dragon Warrior.  This is what motivated me to want to work on RPG games and prompted my desire to work with the Japanese anime, manga and games community.  Many are beginning to see we’re building a lot of our properties around that.

• 14. Many game developers are creating episodic game content with some of their games today, does your company have any plans to develop any episodic games with content added as time passes. Considering the book format of the bible, do you think that Christian game development could head in this direction in the future? What I’m saying is that considering the way the bible was constructed episodic game structure maybe a way to go for future Christian developers? The format of the bible may lend itself to episodic content is what I’m asking?

Well episodic content is definitely a direction many of the bigger development houses are going because the development times and budgets are much better, and companies like Valve who can digitally distribute certainly can benefit form that model.  I think though that the release velocity needs to be faster for that model to work well.  Casual games have even shorter development cycles and much smaller budgets, yet have the same MSRP.  So, I’m not sure how long the bigger companies will be able to sustain marquee episodic game development, but for now it’s working.  As for doing it for the bible, I’m not really sure.  I think someone may be able to do it, but the bible isn’t exactly a blueprint for making a video game, and the game that would come out will have the views and perspectives of the development team, which will surely be different than many other people’s interpretation.  The format of the bible too, I don’t think necessarily lends itself well to that model either because the content is very eclectic in content, theme and intent.  I think some of the stories of the bible may lend itself to that model better.

• 15. What is your opinion of the current ESBR set up and the way they currently rate the interactive video entertainment available on the market today?

Well, I think it has its flaws, but unfortunately it’s the main thing out there that the retailers recognize as risk mitigating.  I think the dove foundation and other groups have tried to establish their own rating system for the Christian market, but it’s not widely known or used, except for in Christian retail.  I was surprised that they raised their rates for evaluation.  I think someday I have to figure out what they spend all their money on.

• 16. Looking down the road for your company and its goals, what is next for your company that we don’t know about yet?

Well just keep improving our techniques and skills, and keep producing great inspirational content.  Aside from that, we have a lot of things in the hopper and just stay tuned on our website to what’s new later on down the road.

  We would like to thank Mr Scott Wong for talking with us today and allowing us to reach into his life and the current activities of Brethren Entertainment within today’s interactive video game industry.

GestureTek is the pioneer, patent-holder and world leader in gesture-recognition technology and computer vision control for information, presentation and entertainment systems.  Their revolutionary video gesture control software allows users to control interactive content, access information, manipulate special effects or immerse themselves in a 3D virtual universe, all with simple hand and body movements.

  Their gesture-recognition technology is utilized by Fortune 500 firms, such as CNN, NASA, BMW, Ford, Oracle, Intel, IBM, Federal Express, Autodesk, and Panasonic, to name a few.  Their list of patent and software licensees includes Microsoft, Sony, Hasbro, and NTT DoCoMo.

  I had a chance to talk with Vincent John Vincent, President, co-founder and recognized gesture-technology guru recently about GestureTek, the work environment the company provides for the employees they hire and their plans for the future.

  “The world of gesture-recognition has taken off in the last few years Mr. Vincent, what are your firm’s plans for future hiring pushes at GestureTek?”

  “In the past 5 years, GestureTek’s employee growth has averaged approximately 30% per year.  Although we have no plans in 2008 for a major enterprise-wide hiring push, we are currently in need of software programmers, computer vision programmers, a product manager, sales and business development account reps for our interactive display business, as well as technicians for our interactive display business who would be responsible for setting up client installations and making them operational.”

  “What technologies that your company currently uses appeals to customers and developers in your industry?”

  ”Our gesture-recognition technologies appeal to application developers, original equipment manufacturers and game developers in many industries. This includes museums, science centres, location-based entertainment facilities, amusement parks, retail stores, nightclubs, restaurants, hotels, trade show exhibitors, event planners, real estate presentation centres and showrooms, architects and designers, Fortune 500 corporations who have boardrooms, showrooms and presentation centres, healthcare organizations, television networks, original equipment manufacturers who make camera enabled hardware (such as mobile devices, pc’s, set-top boxes, and consoles), application developers, game developers, audio visual integrators, advertisers and marketers, and digital signage solution providers.

  “What advice would you give to a prospective employee who wanted to obtain employment with GestureTek?”

  “Be patient.  Be persistent. Let us know how and why you will be able to help take GestureTek to the next level to which it is heading.”

  “What does a typical day for an employee look like at GestureTek?”

  “This really depends on the nature of the job.  Let’s assume we’re talking about an operational employee involved in executing on client projects. A typical day would involve liaising with vendors to source or purchase services or components, scheduling various activities associated with the installation, liaising with clients on project-related issues, liaising with internal sales-representatives on project-related issues, liaising with development staff to resolve technical issues associated with client installations, shipping components to installation sites, documenting data and updating project plans. Whatever position you may occupy within the company there is plenty of opportunity to be creative and to help the company evolve the ideas and products for which it has become so famous.”

   “Give our readers a rough outline of the background of your current employees.”

  “Many are used to working for smaller companies.  Many have technical, application development or operational experience. Many have a production or manufacturing background.  Most are college or university educated.  Of those with university education, many have degrees in computer science or computer engineering.”

  “What do you like best about working at GestureTek?”

   “It’s great because no day is ever the same.  The fast-paced, competitive nature of the business can provide a real adrenalin rush because everyone is constantly shifting into high-gear to win a job or execute on a job.  As is typical in an entrepreneurial company, everyone has too much to do, too little time and too few resources.  It’s always a challenge to execute client jobs with 100% accuracy at lightening speed.”

  “Describe the office environment around GestureTek.”

  “It’s a fairly casual environment.  People work hard (sometimes too hard) but they also have fun.  As is common in an entrepreneurial company, everyone is so busy doing their own jobs that they don’t always have the opportunity to gain an in-depth understanding of the broader business strategy.  GestureTek is currently looking for ways to expand and enhance internal communications within the company, and to make the company an even more fun place to work.”

  “What qualities does GestureTek look for most in prospective employees?”

  “What GestureTek looks for in an employee depends on the position.  Certainly specialized expertise in application development, vision programming, etc. is critical for certain technical positions.  In general, GestureTek needs what every other entrepreneurial company needs – positive employees who are self-starters, who demonstrate a can-do attitude, who are willing to roll up their sleeves and work hard, who are flexible enough to pitch in and do things that might not necessarily be in their job description, and who are nimble enough to switch gears when the needs of the business change. “

  “How many of your employees have been with GestureTek for over ten years?  How many were hired in the last year?”

  “Ten years ago, we were a small start-up with very minimal employees.  As a result, only a small number of our employees, with the exception of GestureTek’s two co-founders, have been with the company for more than 10 years.  Last year, from January 07 until the present, about 12 employees were hired.”

  “If an employee makes a mistake that costs the company money and negatively effects its image, what, if any, disciplinary action does the firm take?”

  “Mistakes are normal and human.  If this happened, the employee’s manager would notify the employee of the error, discuss how the error could have been avoided, and agree on future strategies for minimizing the likelihood of the error happening again.  Serious errors are less likely to occur in environments where operational processes and financial guidelines are clearly documented.  It’s incumbent upon senior management to share guidelines and procedures with employees so that they understand what is expected of them.  In an ideal environment, employees are praised and rewarded for conducting due diligence and for taking an active role in identifying and preventing mistakes that could cost the company money and negatively affect its image.”

  “How would you describe the culture at GestureTek?”

  “Our culture is an interesting blend of traditional and new age management thinking.  As is common in many entrepreneurial companies, the co-founders feel an incredible sense of ownership and accountability to the company, so they enjoy being involved in many aspects of the day to day business.  As the company has grown and the skills and capabilities of the GestureTek management team has increased, we have naturally experienced a few ‘growing pains’, since the role of the owners has changed to focus more on building the roadmap for future growth and success of the business.  Similarly, as is natural in an entrepreneurial business, employees are encouraged to show initiative and take responsibility for their actions, yet at the same time, they are encouraged to keep the co-founders in the loop. A great deal of knowledge and experience lies with the co-founders of the company which, if tapped, can help avoid mishaps.”

  “How much authority and responsibility is given to employees?”

  “Employee ownership and accountability is encouraged and authority and responsibility is readily given to employees who prove they can handle it.  It’s important to note, though, that the nature of our business in developing custom gesture-control applications requires thorough attention to detail, rigorous adherence to project specifications and constant communication and collaboration between team members to ensure the smooth execution of a project.  This business may not always be conducive to the ‘maverick’ approach to doing business.  It’s not good business practice to ‘reinvent the wheel’ every time, or to try new and unproven processes or procedures in order to complete a project.”

  On behalf of everyone at trenchmice.com, I would like to thank Mr. Vincent for talking with us today about GestureTek and answering our questions. 

Calgary, Alberta – Rumours that Richard Anderson, the troubled and under fire CEO of troubled First Calgary Petroleum Ltd, the Calgary based developer of Algerian natural gas reserves, is headed down the road became true today as the company announced that Mr. Anderson had decided to resign amid the current controversy surrounding his decisions and corporate choices in the last year.

This happened after rumours that dissident major shareholder Waterford Finance and Investment Ltd carried the board’s decision to restructure the company’s current board and shake up its complacent managers.  Apparently the two sides came to an agreement during the proxy battle that will see the company made up of a board of directors nominated directly from Waterford but will still be headed by current chairman Garfield Emerson, while the new CEO will be Shane O’Leary, who is a former executive for EnCana and BP. 

We were able to contact company officials, who wished to stay unnamed, for comment on the current situation at Calgary Petroleum Ltd.  Stating that the new board still needs to be voted on and this will occur at First Calgary’s annual corporate meeting this Friday, but the company would release a press statement at this time.

In conclusion, customer, investor and employee confidence in a company can be a finicky thing; boards need to stay aware of their customers, investors and employees ideas about the company and people who run the company.

Restructuring a company requires input from all who are effected by such decisions and this seems to be what is missing in this situation, input from the employees who will be doing the work that produces the product the company sells.

 Then you need to learn to read their minds and online surveys maybe the roadmap you should use.

  Like all things in life the internet and way we do business on the World Wide Web is constantly in motion, ever changing in response to the needs and desires of the customers each website is attempting to drive to their site.  Everywhere people are workings at a feverish pitch to try to understand how to drive traffic to their sites, yet most have no clue as to what’s really important: What your visitor really wants to see in order to make a buying decision.

  Many entrepreneurs fail to realize that they may have an incredible product and even lots of traffic, but if you cannot read the mind of your customer you will not sell a single thing on-line.

  Have you ever thought of polling your visitors about what they want to see or buy?  A good way to learn how to get your customers to buy is to conduct a survey of what they want to see and buy.  To find out how the market wants you to deliver the goods. 

  Online surveys provide a fast, efficient, and flexible method to learn more about your customers and prospects.  The speed of response and the flexibility of online surveys can quickly provide an online business with essential information.  You can literally do a test run today, then launch a product or service the next day, and be able to promote it while hitting the hottest buttons your prospect has been urgently looking for.

  Why should you survey your customers? 

• 1. To find out why your visitor came to your site, and what information they want. You only have three seconds to relate to their needs with a captivating headline or display. Do this right and your customers will read every word of your sales copy.
• 2. To find out how to improve existing products or services, give your customers what they have been desperately seeking – and not finding – anywhere else.
• 3. Find out which products or information your customers would like to see you sell in the future. This will increase your back end product sales.
• 4. Find out how to improve your customer service. This will cut down on customer complaints and enable you to better resolve problems.
• 5. Find out how to improve your sales letters or ads. This will increase your sales, as well as your traffic and numbers of e-zine subscribers.
• 6. Find out what kind of articles or interviews your market wants to see in your free e-zine. This will raise your e-zine readership.
• 7. Find out what your competitors products or services are lacking. Give your market exactly what it has been looking vainly for.
• 8. Find out what kind of non-related products or services your customers would buy. This will help increase the lifetime value of your customer.
• 9. Find what percentage of customers would buy at different price points. This will help you see what price will make you the most money. Sometimes selling something at a higher price to fewer people will earn you more then selling more for less.
• 10. Find out where your potential customers are hanging out. This will inform you where to market and promote your products.

  You need to find out as much as you can about your customers, so if you have a list of e-mail addresses of your customer or prospects and a list of e-zine subscribers you need to get their permission to send them an e-mail survey to help serve them better by conducting market research.  Sometimes people don’t want to take the time to fill out a survey.  To encourage them, offer a freebie if they fill it out, like  free e-books, free advertising, free reports, free internet services, or a free e-zine.  Hold a free online contest or sweepstakes and ask visitors to fill out a survey before they enter.

  You can learn a lot of valuable information from an online survey about your business and its customers.  Create a pop-up ad that offers something free or at a discount if visitors take a survey.  Maybe your customers buy your main product just to get the free gifts.  Or, your visitors may think it’s too hard to navigate through your website.  Or, you may find out that most of your customers make over $100,000 a year.  By acquiring this type of important information, you can improve your website, products/services, advertising, and marketing.

  Many people are getting results extremely fast by directing traffic directly to a short sales page.  Here a compelling headline outlines all the benefits of a product currently in development, with promises to give the product for free when it is completed.  After they’ve completed the survey, redirect visitors to an affiliate page that offers them what they originally wanted.  This can earn you money and help you learn valuable information about your market, well before you develop a product.

  If you don’t yet have an e-mail list or a budget to buy traffic from search engines, you could post your survey on appropriate newsgroups, forums and discussion boards.  You could also upload survey software to your website, or use a free survey service on the Internet.  Check out these free survey sites: http://www.coolsurveys.com and http://www.surveymonkey.com.

Mississauga, Ontario – Rumours that Toronto-based Vasogen Incorporated’s new Celacade treatment for heart failure, also referred to as Acclaim II, is a failed drug and that clinical trials for their new product has reached the failure stage, apparently its new Celacade system has suffered a striking reversal of study requirements that are required by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, has apparently started the rumour mill spinning at breakneck speed today about the possible closure of the firm and the total loss of 125 high paid employees of the troubled firm.

This comes directly after the company announced it was cutting 85 percent of its current workforce and seeking alternatives to save cash because of the recent announcement of the failure of their Celacade System, but that about 15 employees would remain after the restructuring move.

We were able to contact representatives of Vasogen, who wished to stay unnamed, for comment about the current situation.  Vasogen officials stated that the company needs to restructure to find about 3 million for planned restructuring in the second half of the year, thus the cost cutting actions to allow them to achieve their goals to allow the company to stay afloat.  They stated that they would be discontinuing operational and financial support for European commercialization and exploring alternates for their cash strapped European marketing partner, Grupo Ferrer.

In conclusion, bringing a new drug onto the marketplace is a time consuming and expensive adventure for most pharmaceutical companies, the hoops they need to jump through, the years of trials, often mean in the end the product never makes it to market.  If Vasogen’s new Celacade System works and can provide sufferers of ailments with treatments that will help alleviate the symptoms and effects of their afflictions, then eventually it will get approved, but time will tell.  

Chennai, India – India’s automotive workers are about to get additional employment options.  Today, automotive components manufacturer Emcon Technologies India, announced plans to build a plant in Singur, West Bengal, to manufacture exhaust systems for Nano, the low cost car from Tata Motors, in partnership with Anand Automotive Systems of India.

Turning the rumour mill as rumours that the growing firm as plans to put even more workers to work, by opening additional plants at Pune and other sites which weren’t named.

The plant at Singur is in the planning stages Emcon officials said when contacted for comment, they did confirm rumours of the Pune facility, but would not give specifics about any other planned plants in the works in India’s growing automotive sector.

In conclusion, all the big and small manufacturers of parts for the automotive industry and the car makers themselves are surely making plans to unveil new, Earth-friendly, car models by 2010, Mother
Earth would be proud, if it wasn’t for the previous 2000 years of human progress.