Startups of London's "Silicon Roundabout"

The Observer's Jemima Kiss does a roundup of exciting new startups in London's satirically named "Silicon Roundabout," including my wife's new project, a game-based 3D printed dolls company called MakieWorld. My own pride aside, Kiss makes interesting points about the UK government's goal of cultivating a tech boom in the area while courting staid tech giants instead of spunky startups.

Alice Taylor was trawling the aisles of a toy fair in London's Olympia last year when the seed for Makieworld was sown. "I was struck by the total lack of innovation and creativity," she says. So she began devising an "entertainment playspace for young people" that will invite users to download and print 3D dolls and accessories. Taylor wants to build on the success of digital favourites Stardoll, Moshi Monsters and Habbo, which all offer safe fantasy characters and environments for children to explore online.
Taylor has the perfect background to lead a business reinventing dolls for the digital age. After four years at software company Stor, she joined the BBC as a producer in 2002, and five years later became commissioner for education at Channel 4. Mother of a three-year-old girl, she is well versed in the tyranny of pink girls' toys, and adamant that Makieworld will be equally for boys. "Action figures," she says, "are just dolls with more jointing."
Taylor is a loss to Channel 4, where her imaginative digital commissions helped to reinvent the station's educational offering. She admits that she won't miss the pressures of the job: "Being a commissioner meant having to say no 15 times before breakfast."

The tech startup stars

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

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Crystaltips

>sveyk it doesn’t make you chuckle? It’s pasted up in the windows of shonky old “El Paso” restaurant atm. Joy!

>silvermoon tell me about it…

>James: HAH! Thanks :)

>jaytkay tisk, *assumptions*! If you watch kids with dolls/figures, they’re rarely sedentary…
SilverMoon

Being a mother means having to say no 15 times before breakfast too! And lunch, and dinner. And bedtime. More like 30 times before bedtime.
Anonymous

So wait … Alice Taylor is your wife?? I never knew …

I met her in Edinburgh a few years back and pitched to her at Channel 4 some time after – lovely lady.

Small world.
W. James Au

That’s such a rocking photo of Alice! It could be the cover pic for a new edition of FTW.
jaytkay

an “entertainment playspace for young people” that will invite users to download and print 3D dolls and accessories. Taylor wants to build on the success of digital favourites Stardoll, Moshi Monsters and Habbo, which all offer safe fantasy characters and environments for children to explore online.

Another sedate spectator activity for kids. Might as well plant them in front of the TV.
ilja

abruptly
Svejk

Oh Lor’ Speaking as someone who works in IT at “Silicon Roundabout”, I actually feel the sick in my mouth when the term is used.

Sad sad sad labelling and utterly meaningless, the distributed nature of developing via the cloud means hot new things are happenening everywhere.

Which is less of a snappy title.

I loves old media scrambling to describe the new always reminds me of Decca telling the Beatles that guitars are on the way out.