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8 Characteristics of Motivated Kids
Gregariousness: These folks adore social interaction and love to be in a lively crowd. Gregarious folks love to be connected to others, and hate to feel cast out in any way. When they’re comfortable,...
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National Geographic Animal Jam – Open Beta!
Hey everyone! The reason I haven’t posted in forever is because I am hard at work on our newly launched project (albeit in open beta) National Geographic Animal Jam! The day is finally here to live...
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Oldy but goody links
So I was clearing out my favorites on Twitter and thought I would aggregate some of the random old articles I had saved to look at later….. way later. Why not put them here, right? Learning Big...
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My talk at Pratt
Hi All, I was asked to do a short talk at Pratt Institute, so I decided to share my slides. Basically I wanted to have a short visual aid to a myriad of mainstream, large and successful properties and...
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That’s tech learning?
Saw this and had to repost: My son is a sixth grader in a district where I don’t teach, so I always try to pry info out of him about what he is up to (no small feat, with a 12 year old boy). I’m...
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Stop it, Rihanna
Hi, My name is Joi and I’m a pop culture addict. I have been one for most of my life. In fact, I can’t remember a time when pop culture wasn’t important to me. One of the more embarrassing areas of...
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Dr Brady Barr in Animal Jam!
OMG, I am SO excited about this new addition to National Geographic Animal Jam. Dr Brady Barr from Dangerous Encounters now has a Gadget lab in Animal Jam! It’s been live for only a couple hours and...
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A million, yeah, Animal Jam passed it
So the big news is finally out! We reached 1 million players! It was last month and we are already climbing higher at a fast clip, but still something to celebrate. :) Here’s one of the news...
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Virtual Worlds Mgmt 101
Izzy Neis and I worked on a primer of kids virtual worlds that we could share with people. Kind of a what’s good about them, what difficult about them, what they are and are not. Enjoy. Virtual Worlds...
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COPPA musings
The annual FOSI conference held in DC last week really helped to articulate for me some of the current ambiguity in the COPPA legislation, specifically with it’s intention and it’s enforcement....
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Digital Kids and 2013 Predictions
I am excited to be involved in this years Digital Kids Conference as an emcee for the first day’s talks. It’s collocated with Toy Fair again in NYC, so we should have a nice crowd. Tonda, Chris and...
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Safer Internet Day!
Yeah, I know. First, Community Manager Appreciation Day (#CMAD) and now Safer Internet Day? How many trumped up days do my peers need to feel good and noticed? (The answer is infinite – we are...
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COPPA/FTC- you make it so difficult to help you out
So I have a reputation as somewhat of a COPPA compliance warrior – so much so that my co-workers have been known to groan when I mention registration or database needs. It’s an odd thing to have...
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Closing the US Gender Gap in STEM
SUPER inspired on my way to work listening to this story this morning. I was a casualty of the misogyny of university level Engineering/Computer Science – quit both degree paths after being exhausted...
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Izzy’s letter to her future Digital Native
About a decade ago, a previous CEO with tendencies toward tyranny forced me to have lunch with one of our interns. I was slammed, but she said it was a favor to her, which I was, at the time,...
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My Commitment to Kids Online Safety & Privacy
I have spent years working for various children’s brands trying to make sure that every community I oversee cultivates a culture that encourages and promotes appropriate behavior online for child...
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New AJ Parent Connection video
Here’s our newest Animal Jam Parent Connection video, detailing some of the ways my staff works to makes sure we are keeping all of our players safe, while encouraging an in-game culture of appropriate...
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Safer Internet day 2014
My dear friend and awe-inspiring colleague, Anne Collier from ConnectSafely.org, recently spearheaded the US Safer Internet Day event. Along with a fun campaign called One Good Thing, where people...
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GeekDad interview
My colleague, Bill Shribman over at WGBH, interviewed me for GeekDad.com recently. Here’s a snippet: You threw my daughter out of Animal Jam when she was making plans to meet a friend for lunch, which...
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How to do this “kids entertainment thing” right
I was on a panel at GDC this year called “Monetization of teens in a safe and legal way.” I was joking before the panel that it sounded like “How to make money off of kids.” Then I found out that it...
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