A look at L.A. County's video game industry from the perspective of five leading game studios, including Electronic Arts (EA), Insomniac Games, Infinity Ward (Activision), thatgamecompany and Dreamworks. We'll also explore the nexus between the video game industry and L.A.'s indigenous motion picture industry — and how these overlapping creative industries give L.A. County a competitive advantage.

	MODERATOR, CHRIS BAKER, Senior Editor, WIRED Magazine Chris Baker writes and edits stories about video games and other geeky topics for Wired magazine. He has also written for publications like Slate, Entertainment Weekly, Spin, and Giant Robot.
	AL HASTINGS, Chief Architect, Insomniac Games Al leads research and development for internal engine and tools technology at Insomniac Games - an independent console video games developer. Together with Insomniac CEO and founder Ted Price and Al's brother, Brian Hastings, the trio created Insomniac's first game, Disruptor, in 1996. Since Insomniac's founding in 1994, the three partners have helped lead the studio to more than 32 million copies sold of their games worldwide while winning multiple honors for nurturing one of the best work environments locally, regionally, and nationally. Among other achievements, Al developed the texture and geometry scaling technology in the original Spyro the Dragon (1998), allowing for spectacular environmental long-views - an Insomniac Games signature ever since. A Princeton graduate with degrees in cognitive and computer science, Al lives in Santa Monica, Calif. with his wife and two children. He is also interested in alternative clean energy research, and is currently training to break the "old-man" world record for the 4 x 800m relay -- a "tantalizingly low" mark for those aged 35 and over. www.insomniacgames.com
	CHRIS HEWISH, Head of Global Interactive, Dreamworks Animation Chris Hewish is a 20-year veteran of the interactive and table top gaming industry. He currently serves as Head of Global Interactive for DreamWorks Animation. Prior to joining DWA Chris worked at Activision Blizzard for 13 years, during which time he held a number of positions, including Executive Producer and Lead Game Designer. Chris began his interactive career at MicroProse, where he worked as a designer and producer for 5 years. Chris’ gaming career officially began at Games Workshop in 1990. www.dreamworksanimation.com
	AMIR RAHIMI, Senior Producer, EA Casual Studios, Electronic Arts Amir Rahimi currently serves as the Senior Producer on BOOM BLOX Bash Party, the sequel to last year’s popular BOOM BLOX game for Wii. Both games have been developed in collaboration with Academy Award® winner Steven Spielberg, by the EA Casual Studios at Electronic Arts. Amir owns and drives the creative vision for BOOM BLOX Bash Party on a daily basis as he also did for BOOM BLOX. Since joining Electronic Arts in March 2003, Amir has held various roles including QA Lead and Associate Producer working on critically-acclaimed franchises such as “Command & Conquer” and “The Lord of the Rings.” Amir was also the creative visionary behind “The Lord of the Rings, The Battle for Middle-earth,” “The Rise of the Witch-king.” www.ea.com boomblox.ea.com
	KELLEE SANTIAGO, Co-Founder, President, thatgamecompany Kellee Santiago is President and Co-Founder of thatgamecompany. thatgamecompany’s goal is to make video games that communicate different emotional experiences, and expand the communicative possibilities of games. Kellee graduated from the MFA Interactive Media program at the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts where her research focused on game design, interactive narrative, and physical and gestural interfaces for digital media. While at USC she teamed up with fellow student Jenova Chen to develop the student-created game, "Cloud." The game went on to become critically acclaimed, after which the two decided to found their own studio, thatgamecompany, and landed a three game deal with Sony Computer Entertainment America, Inc. to develop downloadable games for Playstation Network. Their first two commercial releases, “flOw”, and “Flower,” went on to become award winners and two of the top downloaded games on PSN. www.thatgamecompany.com
	TO BE ANNOUNCED, Infinity Ward, Activision www.infinityward.com