Inside Social Games

Inside Social Games is a service of Inside Network, the first company dedicated to providing news and market research to the Facebook platform and social gaming ecosystem. Based in Palo Alto, California, Inside Social Games is focused on tracking the convergence of games and social platforms. Inside Social Games was started by Justin Smith in April 2008.

Research Services and Publications

We publish original research to serve developers, marketers, and analysts interested in gaining a deeper understanding of the Facebook Platform and social gaming ecosystem. Our current research includes:

• Inside Virtual Goods: The Future of Social Gaming 2010
• Inside Virtual Goods: Tracking the US Virtual Goods Market, 2009 – 2010
• The Facebook Marketing Bible: 50+ Ways to Market Your Brand, Company, Product, or Service Inside Facebook
• The Facebook Marketing Bible: Agency & Brand Edition
  
• The Facebook Global Monitor: Tracking Facebook in Global Markets
• Best & Worst Facebook Marketing 2009
  

Events and Speaking Engagements

Justin Smith is an active speaker on issues regarding Facebook, social games, virtual goods, and social marketing. He has recently spoken at the following events:

• Casual Connect Europe 2010 – Gave talk “The Future of Social Games: 2010 and Beyond” (2/11/10, Hamburg, Germany)
• Mobile Monday US – Led panel “Virtual Goods and Micropayments on Mobile and Beyond” (1/11/10, San Francisco, CA)
• MIT/Stanford Venture Lab: Virtual Goods – Gave talk on the US virtual goods market, moderated discussion (12/8/09, Santa Clara, CA)
• Virtual Goods Summit 2009 – Gave talk “Trends in the US Virtual Goods Market” (10/30/09, San Francisco, CA)
• 80/20 Conference 2009 – Led panel “Understanding and Maximizing Managed Offer Platforms” (10/27/09, San Francisco, CA)
• New York Games Conference 2009 – On panel “Viral Gaming – Innovations in Promoting and Distributing Games Online” (9/30/09, New York, NY)
• Engage Expo 2009 – On panel “Integrating Social Media Platforms Into Your Marketing Strategy” (9/24/09, San Jose, CA)
• Social Gaming Summit 2009 – Gave talk “Industry Overview and Update” (6/23/09, San Francisco, CA)
• Facebook Marketing Breakfast San Francisco - Produced entire event, led discussion “Best Practices: What’s Worked” (6/18/09, San Francisco, CA)
• Stanford University Continuing Studies – Talk on Facebook business landscape and marketing opportunities (7/15/08, Stanford, CA)
• Graphing Social Patterns East 2008 – Social Games for Social Platforms: Unleashing Viral Fun (6/11/08, Washington, DC)
• InterPlay 2008 – Social Games Everywhere: Methods for Distribution and Development (5/22/08, San Francisco, CA)
• Web 2.0 Expo San Francisco 2008 – Comparing Social Platforms (4/23/08, San Francisco, CA)
• Graphing Social Patterns West 2008 - Engineering the Viral Loop (3/4/08, San Diego, CA)
• Web Community Forum 2007 – Future of Facebook  (12/5/07, Seattle, WA)
• Stanford University CS 377W: Creating Facebook Apps - Guest speaker on Facebook Platform (11/29/07, Stanford, CA)
• SNAP Summit 2007 – Facebook development (10/26/07, San Francisco, CA)
• Graphing Social Patterns 2007 - Viral Strategy (10/7/07, San Jose, CA)
• Webster University PR Institute 2006 – Talk on social network landscape and marketing opportunities (10/20/06, St. Louis, MO)

Justin Smith

Founder, Inside Network

Justin Smith founded Inside Facebook, the first service dedicated to providing information about Facebook to businesses, marketers, and researchers, in April 2006. In 2007, he wrote the Facebook Marketing Bible, the most widely referenced book on Facebook marketing today. The Facebook Marketing Bible has been used by thousands of brands, agencies, businesses, universities, and non-profit organizations to craft their Facebook marketing strategy. In 2008, he founded Inside Social Games, the first service focused on tracking the convergence of games and social platforms.

From 2007 to 2009, Justin served as Head of Product for Watercooler, a venture-backed startup based in Mountain View, California, and one of the leading developers of applications on Facebook and other major social platforms. Under Justin’s leadership, Watercooler’s Facebook applications reached well over 30 million Facebook users, and Watercooler established itself as the leading network of sports and television entertainment applications. Justin remains an advisor to Watercooler today.

Prior to Inside Facebook, Justin was an early employee at Xfire, the largest social utility for gamers, which was sold to Viacom for $102 million in 2006. Prior to Xfire, Justin earned a degree in Computer Systems Engineering from Stanford University, where he was a Mayfield Fellow and a recipient of the Terman Award in Engineering.

Prior to Stanford, Justin co-founded the MyDesktop Network, an early internet media company, in 1996. MyDesktop was later acquired by Jupitermedia/Internet.com in 1999.

Justin grew up in South Carolina and currently lives in Palo Alto, California.

Eric Eldon

Co-Editor, Inside Facebook and Inside Social Games

Eric Eldon is the Co-Editor of Inside Facebook and Inside Social Games. Prior to Inside Network, Eric was the first employee at VentureBeat, a leading Silicon Valley technology publication, starting in 2007. There, he became an editor and the lead writer for social networking.

Prior to VentureBeat, Eric co-founded WriteWith, a writing software startup. Eric graduated from Stanford University with a degree in International Relations in 2005, where he reported and edited news for The Stanford Daily, and ran its business for a year.

Chris Mack, Lead Reviewer

Lead game reviewer Christopher Mack has been writing since late 2008.

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Disclosures

Justin Smith is an advisor to Watercooler, but the views on this blog are his own.

Thanks

Thanks to Javier Reyes at Sociable.es for the Facebook Connect WordPress plugin that our implementation is based on.