2013 has been an exciting year for us at SonyRumors. After laying low for the first half of 2012, we began to get our compass bearing right again and worked tirelessly to make sure that the year to come would be our best one yet. Part of that is building an extensive outreach so that you can enjoy our content at your discretion and on a service that you consume. Thanks to those efforts, besides our site, you can find us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Google+, YouTube, Flickr, and Raptr to name a few (so if you’re on one of those services and are not following us, make sure you do and stop by to say hi!).

With the platform in place, our team efforts turned towards revamping our website from the ground up. Not a single line of code was left unturned as we built this new and much more robust web experience. Part of our design philosophy was keeping mobile in mind, be it for an iPhone, iPad, Xperia Z, or PlayStation Vita. Unlike before, where we had a ‘mobile’ version and the full version, our new theme transforms itself natively to fit any web browser, no matter the OS that powers it or the screen resolution that it’s viewed with. This also makes sure that our content is unified and that you simply don’t lose out on important information, based on your device.

Of course, the above statements are meaningless without great content. Many of us visit websites with less technical oomph because they have great content. To tackle this, over the last month, I’ve had the great pleasure of bringing Sarah Ingram and Joel Dale on board who’ve brought us some of recent and much talked about editorials and movie reviews. Now, I have the great pleasure of introducing you to our latest team member, Mana Drake.

You might know Mana from her fun Twitch game streams or her fantastic art skills. If you don’t, I promise that you’ll be seeing a lot more of her as she will be our new Community Manager. With this position, you expect a lot more Mana on our Facebook and Twitter feed in addition to other exciting initiatives that we’ve yet to announce. But enough of me telling you about Mana. After the jump, you can learn more about Mana in her own words.

Hey, Hi, Hello! I am so pleased to meet all of you and REALLY excited that you are getting to read this.

My name is Amanda, but everyone calls me Mana, and I am your new Community Manager! I know you are just itching to learn more about me so here we go! I have been playing video games for as long as I can remember, first game being PaperBoy on the Atari 2600, and I was hooked. I’ve been a huge Sony fan (my desktop is a Sony VAIO, so are both laptops I’ve owned, and even my cameras are Sony products) since the first PlayStation was released. I have been part of the online gaming community since I graduated high school in 2004 and I have had the pleasure of seeing it grow into what it is today. The video game culture and community actually helped me realize what I am truly passionate about and that is getting to interact with people, which is why I am working on finishing up my degree in Public Relations and Marketing (graduating in summer 2014!!).

My humble beginnings into this community include; competing and coaching in Halo 2 at MLG events for two years, blogging for GamePro & IDG Entertainment at GameGirl.com, running my own geek related site TheStartScreen.com, interning with Ubisofts all female marketing team, and now I am a streamer on TwitchTV where I play a variety of video games for your entertainment. Despite all of that most people know me because of my hair (it is a pretty outrageous purple…and yes I was born this way ;] ) and my job as a freelance illustrator and graphic designer. I am extremely excited *queue high-pitched squeals* to be able to bring you lots of fun content from here on out and to help this little family of ours grow. Keep an eye out for awesome stream events and other shenanigans we will be planning for you in the near future.

<3 Mana

I can’t wait for all of you to interact more with her and be sure to follow her on Twitter (@ManaDrake) and subscribe to her YouTube and Twitch channels. If this seems like the kind of team that you’d like to be a part of, be sure to check out our careers page! Be sure to put our comments section to good use, be it to simply say hi or if you have a question for her.