One Of The Best Years Of My Life - 2013 Recap

Hey guys, Jordan here. Hope you are all doing well. I'm so sorry for not updating the blog as often as I would like to. You may or may not know that since My Little World came out, I've been focusing a lot more on my new startup TeachWare, but that doesn't mean I'm not working on Casey Games anymore, and like last year, on December 30th I will be announcing my plans for the new year. Also last year I did a "Year In Review" post and this is exactly what I'm going to do now. I never expected this year to be as amazing as it turned out to be, this is one of, if not the best years of my life.

Last Year I did bullet points, But this year I'm going to arrange everything in monthly order. Let's get started

January

The year started with a bang. In early January we launched our first game of the new year, Food World. It turned out to be a great success. We took a hiatus on the project however due to our designer, Aidan and his import GCSE exams. With all that's going on at the moment, I can't really try and fit this project into my current active ones, but this is one of the games I wish to try and resume in the new year.

I also got the amazing opportunity to speak at the BETT conference in the EXCEL in London. t was amazing!  This is the first of many trips to London in the year, and I really really really love the city. It's definitely the top place I'd like to live and set up my business in.

February

February was a great month too. I started trying out a radio station entitled "Casey Games FM" but that didn't go too far. I also announced the development of our main game of the year, My Little World.

I got the awesome opportunity to attend the "Casual Connect" Conference in Hamburg for 3 days. It was a really really really benefiting conference, as I got to meet some awesome people from the gaming industry.

March

March, like all the other months was great too.

I got the opportunity to speak at the Games Ireland Gathering in the Aviva Stadium and I got to show My Little World for the first time.

But, March was a very busy month as I put all my focus on My Little World and I made a lot of progress on it.

I also tried another media project, this time being a gaming network, "CGN" but that, like the radio station didn't go too far.

April

April, April, April... one of the BUSIEST and BEST months of the year by far.

On the first of April, I ran a King Of The Web campaign. I finished in an incredible 15th place!

I won the "Best Innovation" award at the Student Enterprise.

I had the amazing opportunity to go to Amsterdam where I spoke at both The Festival of Games and The TNW Conference, both of which were AWESOME!

And the big thing was appearing on Junior Dragons Den on RTÉ. The experience was absolutely amazing! I got a €2000 bursary to work on my company from Peter Casey. It was all amazing! It was amazing exposure for my company, at one point I was the most trending topic on the internet in Ireland:

I gained 300 Twitter followers in 30 minutes and also got a lot of amazing opportunities out of it, but we will get on those later.

May

May was an awesome awesome month! One of the best of the year. Not a lot of things going on at the start of the month, as I was studying for exams, but for the end of it: I got the opportunity to go to Silicon Valley! The tech capital! I got the opportunity speak at the TiEcon event in Silicon Valley, I got the opportunity to visit the HQ of one of my favourite companies: Adobe and I got to meet some amazing, AMAZING people. It was also the first time I've been to the US, It's THE country I've always wanted to visit, so it was amazing on that part too.

June

June was a somewhat quieter month. I did get the opportunity to go to London for the Apps For Good Awards but most of the month I was enjoying my holidays going out to play football with my friends and then working on the game.

July

July on the other hand, was the complete opposite. Busiest month for me. It started off when I was asked by the European Commission to speak at The Digital Agenda Assembly. Now, this event, this was awesome! It took place in Dublin Castle, and the conference was just so so great! I got to opportunity to speak on the same panel as the COO of Rovio (Creator of Angry Birds), I got to meet some amazing people, such as Neelie Kroes (VP of the Commission) and Lord David Puttnam (Oscar winning film producer and Ireland's Digital Champion) Also, thanks to being at the DAA I met a person who asked me to speak at an event in London organized by the Guardian. Also, while there I got the opportunity to visit "Moshi HQ" or Mind Candy's HQ (Creators of Moshi Monsters) and also got to meet Michael Acton Smith or "Mr Moshi" , the founder of the company. For me, this was a massive honor, as when I started getting into technology and computers Moshi Monsters was one of the main games I played, as well as Club Penguin. So, to get the opportunity to meet the creator of one of my favorite games was a dream come true! 

And, one of the highlights of my year was when I was invited by The Irish International Business Network to speak in New York City.. at the Apple Store in SOHO! I saw this as a perfect opportunity to launch My Little World there, and so I did. 

New York is to me, one of the best cities in the world. I loved it so much! At first, we didn't think we were going to make it, as our flight was cancelled, but thankfully, thanks to some amazing people, we did get there in the end. It was just amazing! To get the chance to speak in the Apple Store and to launch an application is just unbelievable and I am so grateful to the IIBN for giving me this chance.

August

August was the month I really started to focus on TeachWare, my latest startup. I'd been working behind the scenes on it for a bit, but it became my main focus in August. I launched the testing versions for the teachers. I also got to speak at the European Pirate Summit in Cologne, Germany again. A unique startup event, this was the second time I had the honoring of attending.. It was great.

September

September came around fast, and I was right back in school.. Yay! 

Another highlight did however take place in September when I spoke at the Campus Party in London.. It was techie heaven! I got to see amazing talks, play the Xbox One early and play people in FIFA, :). Great, GREAT event.

October

October was another busy month for me. At the end of it, the Web Summit event took place in the RDS in Dublin. To coincide with the event, I saw the opportunity to launch TeachWare to the public there. I heard it would be a perfect place to launch a project, and it was indeed. I got a lot of exposure for the product, met a lot of contacts and I also got to speak there.

November

November was here, ALREADY! This year had flown, it had really flown. After launching TeachWare, I decided to take it easy for this month, I celebrated my 14th birthday and I also spoke at the WebCongress event in Miami, Florida, which was another amazing opportunity for which I am very grateful for. Other than that, quiet month.

And so, with that we end another roller coaster of a year... a very fast one as this year absolutely flew... But time flies when you're having fun.

2013 I can honestly say was one of the best years of my entire life, but I wouldn't be where I am today without some help, particularly from my family & friends. I am also extremely grateful to everybody who has helped me and my business this year, whether it be inviting me to a conference, giving me some exposure for a product or giving me some amazing advice, I thank you and am extremely grateful.

And with that, we end another great year. Thank You So Much Everybody and Merry Christmas to all of you! 

-Jordan :)