Jon Radoff (born September 17, 1972) is an American

entrepreneur Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value. With this definition, entrepreneurship is viewed as change, generally entailing risk beyond what is normally encountered in starting a business, which may include other values t ...

author An author is the writer of a book, article, play, mostly written work. A broader definition of the word "author" states: "''An author is "the person who originated or gave existence to anything" and whose authorship determines responsibility f ...

and

game designer Game design is the art of applying design and aesthetics to create a game for entertainment or for educational, exercise, or experimental purposes. Increasingly, elements and principles of game design are also applied to other interactions, in ...

. His work has focused on

online communities An online community, also called an internet community or web community, is a community whose members interact with each other primarily via the Internet. Members of the community usually share common interests. For many, online communities may fe ...

, Internet media and

computer games A personal computer game, also known as a PC game or computer game, is a type of video game played on a personal computer (PC) rather than a video game console or arcade machine. Its defining characteristics include: more diverse and user-d ...

. He is CEO and co-founder of

Beamable Beamable Inc. is a technology company based in Boston, Massachusetts. They currently provide implemention services of Games as a Service features within the Unity game engine. Before filing for bankruptcy in 2020, the company worked within ga ...

, a Live Game services platform that enables the creation of online games based on Unity. Radoff began his career when he dropped out of college to found NovaLink, an early internet service provider.Online Company SparkForge Formed, Coins 'MSOGs'
''GamaSutra'', September 22, 2006 In 1991, while at NovaLink, he created '' Legends of Future Past'', one of the first commercial

MMORPG A massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) is a video game that combines aspects of a role-playing video game and a massively multiplayer online game. As in role-playing games (RPGs), the player assumes the role of a character (of ...

s. In 1997, he founded Eprise Corporation, a creator of Web

content management software Content management (CM) is a set of processes and technologies that supports the collection, managing, and publishing of information in any form or medium. When stored and accessed via computers, this information may be more specifically referr ...

. Eprise went public on the

NASDAQ The Nasdaq Stock Market () (National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations Stock Market) is an American stock exchange based in New York City. It is the most active stock trading venue in the US by volume, and ranked second ...

stock market in 2000 and was acquired by Divine Inc. in 2001. On September 21, 2006, Radoff founded GamerDNA, a

social media Social media are interactive media technologies that facilitate the creation and sharing of information, ideas, interests, and other forms of expression through virtual communities and networks. While challenges to the definition of ''social me ...

company that developed social gaming communities and a videogame advertising network. GamerDNA is now part of

Live Gamer Live may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Films * ''Live!'' (2007 film), 2007 American film * ''Live'' (2014 film), a 2014 Japanese film *'' ''Live'' (Apocalyptica DVD) Music *Live (band), American alternative rock band * List of albums ...

. In March 2010, Radoff started a new social game company called Disruptor Beam that built games for Facebook. In February 2013, the company released

Game of Thrones Ascent ''Game of Thrones Ascent'' was a 2013 strategy game developed and published by Disruptor Beam for iOS, Facebook, Kongregate, and Android. The game is an adaptation of the series of fantasy novels '' A Song of Ice and Fire'' by George R. R. Martin ...

. The company ultimately sold its games to other publishers, underwent a reorganization, and relaunched as Beamable.

Writing

Radoff wrote ''Game On: Energize your Business with Social Games,'' which was published by Wiley in 2011. The book discusses social games, which Radoff views as a 5,000-year-old phenomena, and how games can be applied to businesses to make them more engaging and profitable. Radoff is generally critical of the gamification trend, and explains to businesses that they must incorporate story and immersion into their businesses if they really want to take advantage of the unique engagement offered by games.

Early career

Radoff lived in Northborough,

Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett language, Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut assachusett writing systems, məhswatʃəwiːsət'' English: , ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is the most populous U.S. state, state in the New England ...

and was a 1991 graduate of

Algonquin Regional High School Algonquin Regional High School is a public high school located in Northborough, Massachusetts, United States. The school serves the students of the Northborough-Southborough Regional School District (NSRSD) comprising both Northborough and neigh ...

. During his high school years, he develope
Space Empire Elite
a

bulletin board system A bulletin board system (BBS), also called computer bulletin board service (CBBS), is a computer server running software that allows users to connect to the system using a terminal program. Once logged in, the user can perform functions such ...

strategy game for Atari ST BBS systems. Much of the money Radoff earned from Space Empire Elite and his other Atari ST game, Final Frontier, later became seed capital which he used to start the company NovaLink. Later authors who maintained or contributed to SEE include Jurgen van den Handel, Steven P. Reed, Carlis Darby, David Pence, Doc Wynne, David Jones, and Dick Pederson. Also while in high school, Radoff purchased the rights to port the Atari ST BBS software StarLink, which supported FidoNet, to the

Amiga Amiga is a family of personal computers introduced by Commodore International, Commodore in 1985. The original model is one of a number of mid-1980s computers with 16- or 32-bit processors, 256 KB or more of RAM, mouse-based GUIs, and sign ...

; Radoff named the ported software Paragon BBS. After a brief time studying at

Worcester Polytechnic Institute '' , mottoeng = "Theory and Practice" , established = , former_name = Worcester County Free Institute of Industrial Science (1865-1886) , type = Private research university , endow ...

, Radoff dropped out to form his first company.

Games

The games developed, co-developed and/or directed by Jon Radoff:

References

External links

Jon Radoff's blogInterview
with

Gamasutra ''Game Developer'', known as ''Gamasutra'' until 2021, is a website founded in 1997 that focuses on aspects of video game development. It is owned and operated by Informa and acts as the online sister publication to the print magazine '' Gam ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Radoff, Jon 1972 births Living people American entertainment industry businesspeople American video game designers