Posts Tagged ‘ALS’

December 31, 2014

Top 14 of ’14: The Overall, Best of the Best for this year.

As the year comes to a close we can’t help but look back on how big 2014 was! From special icons and big events, to huge announcements, 2014 is going to be a tough act to follow. Here we have the 14 best things about 2014, ranging all things Munzee. In no particular order Team MHQ has decided on what they think made the year so special.

MHQ Gets an Office!

MHQ may have hit the ground running in 2014, but at the end of 2013 they still didn’t even have an office! So when the 3 (at the time) full time members of the team moved into their new office in McKinney, TX they knew it was a start to a big year. Having a home base (that wasn’t Rob’s living room) solidified their full time role with Munzee and paved the way for the company’s growth. Little did they know that growth would come quicker than expected…

New Hires

While the first office in McKinney was a huge step for Munzee, the 350 square foot space filled up quickly. After hiring Intern+ Matt and a month later UI Designer Peter and Master of Media Dylan, it was time to look at expansion. Even in the final months of the year our team began to grow more with development on both technical and business sides. Munzee will only grow from here- especially considering the growth of the company’s business ventures.

The Munzee Marketplace

What started as a convenience store to provide the downtown McKinney workers with an affordable snack option has grown into something much bigger than anyone at MHQ could have imagined. The Munzee Marketplace is now McKinney’s premier option for local, organic, fresh foods. The Marketplace has partnered with various local vendors and has big plans on the horizon that make Munzee proud.MarketplacEE

MHQBashEmblemMHQ Bash

All the extra space from the Marketplace was handy for MHQ’s first official event. In connection with Downtown McKinney’s Oktoberfest Celebration, MHQ Bash featured three days of activities that nearly 200 people joined us for. After seeing some of the great events our players have thrown over the year, we knew we had to go big. We learned a lot about how to plan and execute events (a learning experience to say the least) and we know next year’s Bash will be even bigger.

GemVirtEmerald128Official Virtual Garden

Speaking of learning experiences, there’s still a lot the players have to teach us. Much like MHQ Bash, players have made their own virtual gardens for a while and needless to say we have been super impressed with what our players have created. So in connection with the emerald family jewel we made our first official virtual garden outside of McKinney and our players helped us fill it in. It took a little maneuvering and some help from our players with our design, but we’re proud of the new garden and excited to release more official gardens around the world.

Rob2_128 (1)The Traveling President

President Rob Vardeman may have done a bit of Virtual Garden scouting during his world travels this year as well. CoachV started his presidency with an oath to expand the player connection and he has not wavered on that promise. For as busy as we keep Rob in the office he still made as many trips to as many events as possible this year. From Germany to California to Canada and everywhere in between, the President racked up the frequent flyer miles, sometimes squeezing trips into a 24 hour span- and enjoyed every minute of it.

Football- More Kicks- Points: 20 split cap & ownerCopa Do Munzo

It’s hard not to enjoy world travels, especially when you’re in Germany days after they won the World Cup. Rob got to experience just this during his trip to Cologne, Germany. To celebrate the world’s favorite sport, Munzee blasted the world with football special icons and held a competition where players could vote on who they thought would win in the Copa Do Munzo competition. As many guessed, Germany won the cup and Rob was on hand to reward the faithful football fans.

Special Icons

Much like the footballs that bounced across the map, this year featured a lot of special icons. From 8-bit ghostzees to non-exploding London dynamite, the unique and eclectic assortment of specials got players out at odd hours and in new places hunting for munzees. This year’s specials not only took the game to different levels, but also gave us an opportunity to do good for others as well…

Charity Fundraising

The benefit of special icons is that they are constantly interchangeable and can be used in unique ways, like helping raise money for charity in a fun way. Our players came out in full force multiple times this year to use Munzee for good. The Autism Puzzle Hearts brought in $5000 for the Doug Flutie, Jr. Foundation, The RMH Virtuals garnered $25,000 for the Ronald McDonald House of Spokane, and the ALS Ice cubes raised $54,000 for Project A.L.S.. Needless to say 2014 was a big year in many ways!

3rd Birthday Celebrations

July 2014 also marked Munzee’s official 3rd Birthday Celebration, or #FiestaThree as we called it. We kicked off the month-long celebration by introducing Ruby Munzees, held various events every third day of the month and even had Pinata special icons that players could smash open. The whole month was a huge celebration and our players even sent in special Happy Birthday pictures and videos for Munzee. Players also took advantage of Rovers in order to get the Birthday Barker badge. Speaking of Rovers…

Rovers

During one of his many trips this year, Rob and other members of Team MHQ announced the arrival of Rovers at Munzee Madness 3 in California. Rover is a supplemental piece to the game, and in fact a game within the game of Munzee. Rover is an extremely unique part of Munzee because although it is not a munzee type it encourages players to travel and expand their personal maps. Since its announcement in March, all the active Rovers in the world have traveled a whopping 61 million miles!RoverCaptured

Clan Wars

Another huge part of this year was the Munzee Clan Wars. Players battled it out month after month, fighting for that number one spot and the ever-glorious Super Chuck. This aspect of the game has shown MHQ how dedicated our players really are and the lengths they are willing to go in the name of Munzee. As we head into the new year we’re sure our players will take the battles to an even higher level and the Clan count will only grow from there!

Podcast/ Videocast

In case you couldn’t tell from our world-traveling President, Munzee is all about transparency and our player relations are extremely important to us. So what better way to interact with our players on a weekly basis than with a podcast? Our weekly update on all things Munzee has evolved a lot over the year. We’ve recently turned our podcast into an interactive videocast that players can now ask us questions each week, which has furthered the connection we get to make with our players. Be sure to join us Tuesdays at 1 pm (MHQ Time) for the live videocast where you can interact with us, ask questions and see us stumble over our words!

videocastEventzee

As big as 2014 was, 2015 is going to be even bigger. Perhaps the biggest announcement of the year was the development of our new app Eventzee! The private events-based app will not only expand the Munzee events system, but will help our business grow to new reaches and in turn grow the Munzee map as well. We’re currently beta-testing the app and fixing any final kinks, but Eventzee will be a huge part of the new year.

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Thank you to all of our players for a great 2014. We can’t wait to see what happens next!

December 29, 2014

Top 4 of ’14: Special Icons

As the year comes to a close we can’t help but look back on how big 2014 was! Over the next few days we’ll be looking back on some of our favorite moments of the year. To start things off, here are some of the icons that made this year so special. As many of you may have noticed a few of these have been re-released to the map for the rest of the year as well!

ALS Ice- Iced Over- Points: 20 split cap & owner

ALS Ice Cubes

SEPTEMBER

MHQ’s base in McKinney, Texas may usually be warm in September, but the Munzee community helped freeze us over in our fight to end ALS. This September we sold special virtual icons featuring ice cubes in connection to the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge and gave all proceeds to ALS research. The campaign was an overwhelming success and in two weeks we raised a donation of $54,000 for Project A.L.S..

Football- More Kicks- Points: 20 split cap & owner

Copa Do Munzo Footballs

JUNE

In celebration of the world’s favorite sport, Munzee blasted the world with football icons. From the first whistle in Brazil on June 12 until Germany hoisted the cup on July 13, 704 footballs bounced across the Munzee map. We also held a competition where players could vote on who they thought would win the Cup. As many guessed, Germany won the cup and in hand our players were rewarded too!

Puzzle Heart- More Love- Points: 14 split cap & owner

Autism Awareness Puzzle Hearts

APRIL

To celebrate and bring awareness to April’s Autism theme, Team Munzee deployed 680 special icons on the map. 680 represents the 1:68 ratio of children born with autism currently. The amazing efforts of our active Munzee community lead to over 8,055 hearts captured in the month of April! Player captures raised a total of $4,027.50 in donations towards the Doug Flutie, Jr. Foundation for Autism.

birthday

3rd Birthday Piñatas

JULY

As a part of our #FiestaThree 3rd birthday celebration, we released special piñata munzees around the world. What better way to celebrate Munzee’s third birthday than to hit a paper-mâché donkey until it gives you candy? We released 3,333 piñata specials and just like in real life, munzee piñatas were about getting as many different kinds of candy as quickly as possible. When you capped a piñata you randomly received one of three types of candy and a corresponding special icon. It was a hit! Get it?

What were your favorite icons of 2014? Be sure to follow along the rest of the year as we look back on more big moments from 2014!

September 15, 2014

Meet Munzee Munday: Project A.L.S.

Team Munzee is proud to announce that our players have banded together to make a splash in support of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) research. Two weeks after Team Munzee doused themselves in ice cold water and our players virtually froze the map, we’re happy to present Project A.L.S. with a donation of $54,000. For this week’s Meet Munzee Munday we wanted to put the spotlight on Project A.L.S. so our players can see what a difference their donations can make. This great organization was happy to sit down with us to talk about their story, how they’re fighting ALS and what this donation means to their cause.

Name and Title:
Project A.L.S. President Meredith Estess

Director of Research Valerie Estess.

Where are you from?
Project A.L.S. is located out of New York City, but we work with scientists all over the world.

How did Project A.L.S. start?

We were founded in 1998, as a non-profit 501(c)3, when our sister Jenifer Estess, a 35-year-old New York theater and film producer, was diagnosed with ALS. The diagnosis kind of came from nowhere, Jenifer was a committed, single, New York working woman, no one saw this coming. We were told at the time of diagnosis to “max out her credit cards and eat junk food,” Jenifer instead committed her efforts to making a difference for people with ALS—and producing treatments and a cure.

We were a family that had a lot of love and we were desperate for an answer. Each of us came from a different business perspective, Meredith worked for fashion retail merchandising and manufacturing, Valerie was in book publishing and copy writing, and Jenifer worked in theatre and was beginning to work in film. We brought a diversity of talent and skills together for Project A.L.S. and we’re an example that each individual person can make a difference.

What is ALS?
ALS is a neuro-degenerative disease very closely related to Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. With ALS a particular brain cell called the motor neuron is targeted. These motor neurons are located in the brain and throughout the spinal chord and regulate every voluntary movement within our bodies, from walking and talking to sleeping and breathing. So as these motor neurons are infected by ALS, so are our abilities to function.

What makes Project A.L.S. stand out from other organizations?
What we have found is that organizations like the Muscular Dystrophy Association and the ALS Association are primarily focused on patient services, which are absolutely crucial, but my sisters and I were thinking on different lines. We wanted to know who was doing the research and identify the most promising scientific research that will lead to the first effective treatments and a cure for ALS.

Historically, ALS research was conducted by researchers working separately on various aspects of the disease. Project A.L.S. changed that approach dramatically by requiring researchers and doctors to work together, share data openly, and meet shared research milestones. Project A.L.S. recruits the world’s best scientists and doctors to work together—rationally and aggressively—toward a better understanding of the ALS disease process and, in parallel, better therapeutic strategies.

What are some of Project A.L.S.’ achievements?
There have been so many significant breakthroughs. For example, when we first started in 1998 there was one gene identified in connection to ALS and now there are 27 genes identified in playing a role. Without genetic clues, we’re just shooting in the dark, so this is tremendous. We have also developed new technology with stem cell research. We can now take a small skin sample from anyone with ALS and turn that skin cell into a motor neuron that features the specific person’s DNA. So this gives scientists the ability to look at a patient’s individual disease, understand much more about ALS and screen drugs to help prevent further harm. It may sound like something out of Star Trek, but this discovery was a very hard-won, rational scientific progression.

Where can we see some of our donation go towards?
Your money can go to a number of projects that are ongoing. Every project needs equipment and personnel and this donation will go to the needs of our ongoing research. We’re currently supporting a drive to silence mutated ALS genes, which is being pioneered by Bob Brown at the University of Massachusetts. This would be one example of a project this donation will help fund. Some of the genes we find in ALS are known as diseases of inflammation, which are also active in cancer and diabetes. Through donations like this and by investigating the process ALS goes through we can also begin to understand other diseases as well.

Team Munzee thanks all of our players for their help in raising money for an organization we think is making a difference. We’re constantly humbled by the individuals who give so much, so we in turn use our opportunities to give back as well. Munzee is nothing without its players. On behalf of Project A.L.S. and Team Munzee we thank you from the bottom of our hearts.

 

 

 

August 28, 2014

Podcast Episode 26: Open For Business, 2 Million Deploys ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, and MHQ Bash

In this episode of the podcast, we talk the opening of the Munzee Marketplace, celebrate our 2 millionth deploy and Rob gets a bit frozen.

This week on the Munzee podcast we talk about:

  1. The Munzee Marketplace Opening and how the first week has gone.
  2. We’ve hit our 2 Millionth deploy. Congrats patnanz!
  3. The ALS Ice Munzees have frozen over Downtown McKinney!
  4. Don’t forget that the MHQ Bash is the last weekend of September.

To check past, present and future Munzee Podcasts, visit www.munzeepodcast.com.

 

 

August 26, 2014

Announcing the ALS Ice Cube Special Virtual

ALSBadge_720The Texas heat may be sweltering, but Team Munzee has caught the cold! This morning at the Munzee Marketplace Team Munzee took part in the ever growing ALS Ice Bucket Challenge and we’re happy to announce we’re taking it a step further. Based on our previous charity fundraisers (See: RMH) we know the impact that our players can make and now we want to help the ALS Association. New special virtual icons featuring ice cubes are now for sale in the Munzee store and proceeds will be donated to ALS research.

Packs of 4 ALS virtual ice cube munzees are for sale until the early September. The owner of the ice cube virtual gets 32 points when they deploy and 32 points will be split between owner and capper when it is captured. An in-game badge will also be earned for any player who captures or deploys an ALS ice virtual.  These virtual munzees are available for purchase through early September with no limit in quantity. Although we’re proud to be a part of such a big movement, be warned that this ice will melt. The ALS virtual ice will melt into your archived list at the end of September. 

ALS_icon_128pxTeam Munzee is proud of the impact our players can make and we look forward to all the good we can do.Below you can watch Team Munzee participate in the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. We challenge our players to participate in the Ice Bucket Challenge as well as the Gurus of Geocaching and fellow Downtown McKinney businesses. #StrikeOutALS

  To learn more about ALS and how you can help please visit www.alsa.org.