Our Team

Storium is being developed by Protagonist Labs, a startup based in the San Francisco Bay area with staff located across the US. We believe that technology can help unlock human creativity, and Storium is our effort to do just that. Between us, we have many years of experience spanning startups, engineering, product design, game design, writing, editing, art direction, and more.

Stephen Hood Co-Founder & CEO @stlhood on Twitter

Stephen has spent his entire career creating technology, including stints at Yahoo and social bookmarking pioneer Delicious, where he first worked with Josh. Stephen is an avid reader and a life-long lover of games. Storium originally began as a prototype Stephen built so he could play with old friends across the country.
Josh Whiting Co-Founder & Lead Engineer @yetanotherjosh on Twitter

Josh has also spent his entire career working on technology, specifically as an engineer and architect. He was a senior engineer at Craigslist, and was engineering manager at Delicious. In his spare time he is a composer of electronic music. Josh and Stephen have worked together for years, across four different startups.

Advisory board

Veronica Belmont Advisor @cwodtke on Twitter

Veronica has been an advisor for tech startups like Goodreads and about.me (where she now sits on the Board of Directors). She co-hosts Sword and Laser, the hugely popular genre literature podcast, video show, book club, and publishing imprint. She’s been a high-profile TV and online video host and producer for years, with credits including Gizmodo, Engadget, CNET, and Discovery Digital.
Christina Wodtke Advisor @cwodtke on Twitter

Christina is an experienced technology executive, designer, and entrepreneur. She led the creation of Zynga’s social network/gaming platform and has been a general manager at Myspace, a product manager at Linkedin, and a design director at Yahoo. She co-founded the design journal Boxes and Arrows, and currently teaches game design and entrepreneurship at Stanford University.
Erin Hoffman-John Advisor @gryphoness on Twitter

Erin is a respected game designer, entrepreneur, and novelist. Currently employed by Google, she previously led game design at GlassLab, a Bill and Melinda Gates- and Macarthur Foundation-supported initiative to foster next-generation educational games. Erin has been designing games for the past seventeen years with studios and clients including Dreamworks Animation, Konami, and Zynga.
Chuck Wendig Advisor @chuckwendig on Twitter

Chuck is a New York Times bestselling novelist, comic writer, Emmy-nominated screenwriter, and widely-followed blogger (at terribleminds.com). Chuck is known for his popular novels, including the Star Wars: Aftermath series, the acclaimed Miriam Black books and the Heartland young adult series, among many other works.
Mur Lafferty Advisor @mightymur on Twitter

Winner of the 2013 Campbell Award for best new novelist, Mur is an acclaimed author who has won rave reviews for her novel The Shambling Guide to New York City. She has recorded over 300 episodes of her Parsec Award-winning podcast series, I Should Be Writing. Her newest novel, Six Wakes, debuted in January of 2017.
J.C. Hutchins Advisor @jchutchins on Twitter

J.C. is well-known for his acclaimed 7th Son series of thriller novels. He also co-wrote Personal Effects: Dark Art with Jordan Weisman (of Shadowrun fame). He has worked on major transmedia projects for Cinemax, A&E, Discovery, and many others.

Alumni

Will Hindmarch Advisor & Designer @wordwill on Twitter

Will’s extensive résumé spans tabletop gaming, video games, fiction and beyond. He’s worked on a number of influential games and projects including Vampire: The Requiem, the Dragon Age RPG, Lord of the Rings Online, Always/Never/Now, and Project: Dark. Will’s expertise and instincts have deeply influenced nearly every aspect of Storium’s design.
Leonard Balsera
@baneofcows on Twitter
Project Manager for Education

Lenny is an award-winning game designer. He was lead developer for the ENnie- and Origin-winning Fate Core role-playing system from Evil Hat Productions. Lenny brought to Storium a fervent belief in the power of games to engage and teach students of any age.
Erin Hardee Community Manager @erindubitably on Twitter

Erin is a storytelling enthusiast, educator and outreach organizer whose collaborative writing career has thus far yielded a wife, two book deals, and a host of awesome friends across the globe. As community manager she played a key role in helping Storium to be a vibrant and welcoming online community.
Elsa S. Henry Community Manager @snarkbat on Twitter

Elsa is a game designer, editor, and writer. As community manager, she worked to ensure that Storium’s community is a healthy and welcoming one. As a disabled gamer, she helped us make sure that Storium is accessible and fun for everyone.
Jessica Banks Art Director @profbanks on Twitter

Jess is an editor, art director, educator, and activist, with an extensive education in medieval history, languages, and literature. By day, she manages customer and retail support for Atlas Games; by night, she does freelance art direction, translation, and editing, along with grassroots organizing for a number of causes. She also loves groundhogs.
Amanda Valentine Managing Editor @ayvalentine on Twitter

Amanda is a freelance editor and developer who works in both gaming and fiction. Her award-winning work includes The Dresden Files RPG, Fate Accelerated Edition, Little Wizards, and many others. She blogs sporadically at ayvalentine.com about editing, parenting, and gaming.
Marissa Kelly Art Director @mariscka on Twitter

Marissa (MK) is the co-founder of Magpie Games and the author of Epyllion, a dragon epic RPG. In addition to her design work, Marissa has also provided art direction for Magpie Games, Evil Hat Productions (Fate Worlds), and John Wick Presents’ (7th Sea). She also works as a paleontology intern throughout the year, spending summers in Montana and Wyoming doing field work.