Businessweek: As video and PC gaming’s popularity skyrocketed in the past few years, our favorite TV shows (“The Simpsons”), movies (“Catwoman”) and comic books (“Batman”) were turned into games. Now, we are on the brink of a new era, it seems: Games publisher Atari just released a game based on a book THAT HASN’T EVEN HIT THE BOOKSTORES YET. That’s […]

GlobeGazette.com: Transported half a world away via a digital connection, best friends Emily Coovert and Simone Boissonneault drift into their own head-bobbing universe of sound as they watch a Japanese stadium show, a furious mix of hard guitar licks, operatic Queen-like vocals, the occasional classical flourish and bouncy beats. It is one of, give or take, 500 J-rock — or […]

PSFK: Skateboarding was just a fad back in the early 80’s but 25 years on and it is a multi-million dollar industry that continues to grow. A recent website to promote the book ‘Built to Grind’ captures the world of these early skaters to present day through amazing photgraphy and an accompanying audio by skate veteran Steve Alba. The book’s […]

The New York Times: The first advertisement appeared in USA Today a week ago, right on schedule. People from around the world had stayed up all night waiting for it, talking in chat rooms and online forums. It had to be a clue, they thought. Everything before it had been a clue. “LOST. The Cube,” read the ad, posted at […]

Wired News: NEW YORK — Picture an Elmo or Winnie the Pooh plush doll that knows a child’s name and favorite food, and tells stories and sings songs incorporating such personal details. Or a new version of Furby that recognizes voices and reacts with emotions from surprise to dismay, and responds to specific words a child says. These electronic toys, […]

We Make Money Not Art: Backseat Playground , developed by John Paul Bichard, Liselott Brunnberg and Oskar Juhlin at the Interactive Institute in Stockholm, is a mobile gaming research project that will enable kids to play with the world outside their window from the back seat of a car. This augmented reality game uses a digital compass and a GPS-receiver […]

The New York Times: Electronic Arts, hoping to shore up its eroding dominance in the sports video game market, said yesterday that it had signed a 15-year deal giving it the exclusive right to use the ESPN brand in games. Under the agreement, Electronic Arts, the largest independent video game publisher, will pay $750 million to $850 million for the […]

USA Today: TVs are hotter than they’ve been in decades. Screens are getting bigger and brighter as they undergo their first major technological overhaul since the birth of color television in 1953. The highest-tech sets are so thin, they can be hung on the wall like a painting — and are vibrant enough to resemble one, too. Although early models […]