Resume

Dr Paris Buttfield-Addison

Building products at the intersection of technology, creativity, and human experience.

paris@paris.id.au hey.paris LinkedIn Hobart, Tasmania
01

Experience

2023 — Now

Head of Product, Research & Analytics

Yarn Spinner Pty. Ltd.

Leading product, research, and analytics for Yarn Spinner—the narrative game tool powering DREDGE, Venba, A Short Hike, Night in the Woods, and thousands more. Spearheaded spinoff as new company in 2023. Top 10 Yarn Spinner games on Steam have sold over 6M units.

2020 — Now

Head of Product and Creative

Secret Lab Pty. Ltd.

Co-founder leading product at the intersection of game design and UX. Notable projects include the BAFTA/IGF-winning Night in the Woods, ABC Play School games, Qantas Joey Playbox, and The Museum Game for the National Museum of Australia.

2025 — Now

Space News Presenter

ABC Radio

Monthly space news segment on ABC Radio Hobart and Northern Tasmania.

2011 — 2023

Technical Author

O'Reilly Media

Co-author of ~30 technical books covering Swift, iOS, game design, ML, AI, and astrophysics. Translated into multiple languages. Delivered worldwide conference talks and workshops.

2007 — 2013

Product Manager

Meebo → Google

Built mobile apps debuted on-stage at Apple's iPhone OS 3.0 event. Served ~70M users. Acquired by Google 2012.

2008 — Now

Sessional Academic

University of Tasmania

Teaching HCI, Mobile Development, AI, Computer Graphics, and introductory programming.

02

Projects

Yarn Spinner

Open-source narrative tools powering hundreds of millions of players worldwide.

Yarn Spinner Pty. Ltd. Secret Lab

Secret Lab

Award-winning game studio. BAFTA/IGF-winning Night in the Woods.

Secret Lab Pty. Ltd.

/dev/world

Australia's longest-running Apple developer conference. Since 2008.

AUC
03

Community

2021 — Now

President

Tasmanian Game Makers Inc.

Leading Tasmania's game development community. Founding board member 2019.

2023 — Now

Chair

West Coast Space Centre

Co-founded this not-for-profit for STEM education.

2014 — Now

Secretary

Australasian Apple University Consortium

Executive Council member. Oversee /dev/world conference.

2022 — Now

Program Manager

Tasmanian Game Development Incubator

Helping Tasmanians start and grow games projects.

04

Education

PhD, Computer Science

University of Tasmania

HCI, Information Management. 2009–2012.

Bachelor of Laws (LLB)

University of New England

In progress.

BComp (Hons), First Class

University of Tasmania

Thesis: "See Through Paper: Exploring PIM with RFID"

BA/BComp

University of Tasmania

Medieval History & Computer Science

05

Skills

Product Management Product Strategy UX Research Human-Computer Interaction Game Design Technical Writing Swift Unity C# iOS Development Machine Learning Science Communication
06

Books

Unity Development CookbookUnity Development Cookbook, 2nd Ed.
Chinese Practical Simulations for MLPractical Simulations for Machine Learning
Chinese Head First SwiftHead First Swift
Unity Game Development CookbookUnity Game Development Cookbook
Chinese Practical AI with SwiftPractical Artificial Intelligence with Swift
Chinese iOS Swift Game Dev CookbookiOS Swift Game Development Cookbook, 3rd Ed.
Chinese Learning SwiftLearning Swift, 3rd Ed.
Japanese Polish Chinese Mobile Game Dev with UnityMobile Game Development with Unity
Learning SwiftLearning Swift, 2nd Ed. The Kerbal Player's GuideThe Kerbal Player's Guide
Chinese Learning SwiftLearning Swift, 1st Ed.
What's New in Swift 3What's New in Swift 3 Swift Dev for Apple WatchSwift Development for the Apple Watch
Chinese iOS Swift Game Dev CookbookiOS Swift Game Development Cookbook, 2nd Ed.
Swift Development with CocoaSwift Development with Cocoa iOS Game Development CookbookiOS Game Development Cookbook Learning Cocoa with Objective-CLearning Cocoa with Objective-C, 4th Ed.
Portuguese Chinese Learning Cocoa with Objective-CLearning Cocoa with Objective-C, 3rd Ed.
Unity Mobile Game Dev For DummiesUnity Mobile Game Development For Dummies iPhone & iPad Game Dev For DummiesiPhone & iPad Game Development For Dummies