Microsoft XNA (no, that's not an acronym, it's a load of crap) is the toolset which Microsoft is pushing for development of Windows and Xbox 360 games, providing game developers with a common standard to allow them to not have to worry about the "nuts and bolts boilerplate coding."

As well as giving this platform to developers, Microsoft has recently flung open the doors to homebrew developers on the PC and - critically - the Xbox 360. This will allow the bedroom coder crowd to develop on XNA.

But will they? I don't think so. The mod community which has been around since the days of Quake, and which exploded after the release of Half-Life in 1998, is much better at taking a complex developed game (we'll call it a platform) and reshaping it, rather than designing something from the ground up.

Generally speaking the amateur game developers who have designed their products from the ground up have suffered greatly in terms of what they finally manage to produce. Having to worry about everything from the game engine up costs mainstream developers a lot of time and money, and for amateur developers it can be a prolonged nightmare.

This is even so for mainstream developers - most developers simply buy a third party engine to run their games, essentially making them more professional mod squads. The Doom and Unreal engines are the current big wigs, and before that you couldn't fire up a World War II shooter that wasn't made in the Quake III engine.

Microsoft is throwing open its platform to allow for development, but in reality I think that it will be developers who will be messing around with XNA, not modders. Mod squads are at their most successful taking a game like Half-Life 2 and twisting it around to their ends.

The word "convergence" has become a bit of a dirty one in the tech world, thanks to rather crap attempts to take every device known to man and stuff it into a handheld device that doesn't have very much battery life. In the New Media world however, the word might find new and productive meaning.

MySpace and Snocap (alright, so not Napster, it's just made by a bunch of the same guys) are jumping into bed together to provide music ("and maybe more..." Ohh God, that sounds like a midnight sex chat ad on the telly) to the fawning young masses.

The idea is that "if we want to crack the youngsters, we have to do it on their ground and on their terms", meaning that youngens will be far more likely to buy your stuff if it's sold to them on MySpace or Bebo than traditional outlets.

This entry should really be titled "I feel like I'm getting old", but I'm not self centred enough to take up a whole headline to tell you that. The guts of a paragraph will do. The reason? Because I'm so disconnected from this Bebo generation, and for the first time I feel like an old man in the technology world. Kids (I mean about 12 and up) are using sites like MySpace and Bebo to the extent that, like mobile phones, everyone has a profile and is to be found on one of these two social networking sites.

They're using them as cheap text messaging services and putting videos and pictures up on the web thanks to the simple interfaces offered by sites like YouTube. There's a whole debate about how dangerous this may be to said youngens, but that's another days discussion. For now, let's just accept that it's happening.

So I feel old because I'm watching as 12, 14, 16 year olds who would have derided anyone openly capable of switching on a computer, let alone being able to touch type, just a few short years ago; now just about as tech savvy as anyone really needs to be to get by in the modern day and age, if not more so besides. It has kinda crept up on me - we in the tech sector have been observing it from a distance, but it's different to sit down next to a 14 year old hammering away with a Bebo page and six MSN windows onscreen.

Back to New Media Convergence, if you please. Now that everyone in the hard- to-reach young demography is on social networking sites, New Media Convergence can happen. We already see it with, for example, Bebo integrating YouTube to such a simple extent that it's a matter of pushing a few buttons to get a stock video on your page; and just a few more after that to get your own cam/phone/whoknowswhatelse vids online.

Google paid top brass to get to be the search engine for MySpace a short while ago. And now we're entering into direct sales - forget about just being able to advertise to the demographic, how about being able to directly sell to them like even iTunes can't?

The new big growth sector is New Media Convergence, and so long as the social networking sites hold their water as mobile phones have done we'll be seeing them becoming a more day-to-day thing. Mix up mobile phones, social networking sites, search engines, stores, even municipal WiFi and you can see the shape of teenage lives forming around the internet, whether we like it or not.

Congratulations are in order, we've made technology so mainstream that ditsy blonde teenagers are using it in their fumbling attempts to have sex with one another.

A Sudanese man has been forced to marry a goat he was found having sex with. Actually, this could be a rather short post as I'm kind of stuck for words at this point. Apparently, the goats owner found the man, "Mr Tombe", on top of the goat. The owner startled Romeo in the act and he "fell off".

Romeo was then taken to a council of elders and forced to pay a dowry of around $50 and take the goat as his wife.

Sorry, I just read that and simply had to share it with the world. I hope you weren't drinking hot tea or coffee when you came across this. My nose still burns... And I swear, a more thought provoking and high-brow post is coming in a minute.

The award winning documentary "9/11" by French filmmakers Gedeon and Jules Naudet and retired New York firefighter James Hanlon, all of whom were with a New York fire crew on September 11^th 2001 (and one of the cameramen actually in Tower 1 when Tower 2 collapsed), has been prevented from airing on a number of CBS affiliates due to swearing in the film.

This perhaps marks a rather low watershed - the film was due to be aired at 8pm across the country, but after a campaign from Christian family pressure group the American Family Association it was decided by many affiliates not to show the film. I might take issue with this, if you please.

Airing profanity for profanities sake before the 10pm watershed in the US is not acceptable. In the case of this documentary however, I daresay it is warranted, even if kids are watching - indeed, I daresay that children too young to now remember September 11^th 2001 are the best audience for this film. The swearing in it is not gratuitous. It is human nature, and the swearing is "mostly by fire fighters" - That is, the chaps who ran into the burning buildings whilst everyone else was running out.

To censor or simply not air this documentary in a popular time slot because the men on the ground didn't have the good taste to say things like "Ohh my word, we appear to have been accosted by some rogue trouble makers" instead of "Holy fucking bananas some bastard just flew another goddamn plane into the goddamn tower" is stupid Political Correctness nonsense. Even moreso perhaps coming from an organisation like the AFA, whose other issues of the day include telling us how Ford's 11.6% drop in sales probably has something to do with homosexuals.

I think that we can make exceptions to strict watershed rules in the case of documentaries. Indeed, in the UK you will sometimes news items and documentaries with profane language shown in the middle of the day. Why? Because these things need to be seen. "9/11" is not a film about swearing fire fighters. It's a film about a day that needs to be remembered. Concentrate on the latter, not the former.

Hundreds of comments later, Joystiq decided to wipe the egg of its face and
terminate Summa's employment as one its most prolific bloggers. Joystiq editor
Christopher Grant quickly wrote a thoughtful href="http://www.joystiq.com/2006/09/08/an-apology-and-a-note-on-
hype/">apology to readers, which essentially put the blame on Joystiq for
succumbing to the rules of Internet hype instead of real news.

Grant states: "The worst part is, we understand that it was our hard-earned
credibility that contributed to this excitement cocktail. There are gaming
websites that trade in hype, and we've always prided ourselves on avoiding it.
If we tell you that something is "major" and "worth waiting for," naturally you
would expect it to be."

Well, it didn't take long for Summa to land somewhere else -- a new gaming blog
called Destructoid -- and fire back at
Joystiq. In a post on Destructoid, Summa declared that he was
"very happy to be free from Joystiq's shackles" and that "Joystiq takes
themselves WAY too seriously." Summa doesn't apologize and instead paints
himself at Joystiq's scapegoat. Here's more from Summa's post:

"I in no way meant to hype anything. There was no ulterior motive to bring
increased traffic. The entire affair was blown way out of proportion. Joystiq
fired me because of fan reaction and their fear of losing whatever credibility
they think they have. Also, we were both headed in different directions. They
wanted content that was long, boring, and obscure. I want to write about fun
stuff like rumors, culture, and everything that is humorous out there."

And rumors it will be, apparently. One of Summa's recent posts on Destructoid is
a self-described rumor about Wii online beta testing, which Summa got off a
forum from a guy who he writes is "just talking out of his ass." Ironically,
Summa started off the post with "I don't normally like to take rumors from
message boards, but considering how plausible it sounds, what the hell." (the
post also featured the above image of "Rumor Has It...", and I can't tell if
that was meant as a disclaimer to readers or a tounge-in-cheek gag)

I think I have an idea of what's going on here. Clearly, Summa wasn't adhering
to the same journalistic standards as his employer. Joystiq is trying to ensure
quality the same way a newspaper or magazine would, whereas Summa feels the site
is just shoot-from-the-hip blogging where the rules of journalism don't apply.
Summa isn't a reporter -- he's a blogger. But even a blogger, who's delivering
information to the masses, has a duty to be truthful and accurate. So is Joystiq
to blame for hiring someone they knew was a blogger but who they wanted to act
like a journalist? Are they to blame for allowing Summa to hype a press release
as a "scoop" and then firing him when readers reacted badly to the news? Or is
the unapologetic Summa to blame for callously discarding his responsibility to
readers and laughing off Joystiq's credibility? Should Summa be blamed for
acting unprofessionally, even if he's not a "professional"?

Maybe it's all of the above. I'll need a few more days to think about this
one.

Well, there's just one problem, apparently. JP's Domain alleges that in fact a
significant number of front page stories are submitted and Dugg by the same,
small group of prolific Digg members. The blogger even identifies severa Digg
members that are apparently flooding the site with content. But is this true
manipulation? Are these Digg members simply casual acquaitances and avid Digg
fans or are they agents of an insidious plot to turn Digg into their own
exlcusive club? I'm not sure, but JP's Domain believes the issue loophole needs
to be close. The blogger writes:

"What it comes down to is there very literally is a group that controls Digg. If
you are within this group and you submit a story, you are more or less
guaranteed 10-15 (or more) automatic diggs from this group. What happens to the
people who don't have such a luxury and only get the default single vote like
everyone else? This only encourages a cycle where those who are getting votes
will continue to get more and more, as they feed each off each other and pat
each other on the back."

JP's Domain blames Digg's "Friends" feature, which allows Digg members to link
up with other Digg readers. This of course creates a system where a limited
group of people can get together on the site and combine their efforts to exert
greater control on the Digg electoral process.

In essence, they're a lobby group or a PAC (political action committee).

Interestingly enough, JP's Domain submitted the post to Digg, and it quickly
became a popular entry with 865 diggs at last count (including my own digg).
JP's Domain also posted a follow-up blog entry found href="http://jesusphreak.infogami.com/blog/what_happened_to_digg">here.

As a result of the posts, Digg co-founder Kevin Rose href="http://diggtheblog.blogspot.com/2006/09/digg-friends.html">pledged to
reform the site with a key algorithim update that is designed to select a more
diverse range of Digg submissions.

But one member of the Digg "in-crowd" was none too please with JP's Domain and
Rose's promises to reform the system, according to my old CMP pals at href="http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=192600648"
>InformationWeek. According to the article, Digg member " href="http://www.digg.com/users/p9s50W5k4GUD2c6">p9s50W5k4GUD2c6 ," who had
sumbitted the most stories of any Digg user, denied that he or she was rigging
the voting process and decided to leave Digg altogether.

"As a direct result of your blog this evening, I will no longer no supporting
(sic) Digg going forward. I bequeath my measly number one position to whoever
wants to reign," p9 was quoted in the InformationWeek article. "Now YOU can
spend all the time, all the effort and get stabbed in the back by fellow Diggers
-- aptly named -- and then tossed to the side by a Digg team that values toilet
paper with more worth than the core users that feed this site it's content every
day."

I swear, Web geeks are SO sensitive.

Now if you'll excuse, I'm going to get on Digg and check to see if any of the
"in-crowd" ever dugg any of my TwitchGuru stories.

For months now geeks have been closely following the v(ideo)log of a YouTube'r named "LonelyGirl15", a teenage girl named Bree who had strictly religious parents (yadda yadda) and was interested in "geek stuff", for wont of a better phrase.

Well, it turns out that the LonelyGirl saga was a fake, and that it was created by some enterprising film makers using nothing more than their intelligence, acting ability and a web cam. They led many scores of obsessed geeks on for four months, until finally a massive web witch hunt tracked down the producers and unveiled the mask of LonelyGirl.

Many geeks are decrying this great "scam" against them. I don't see why everyone has to get so touchy - well, I do actually. On the internet we all seem to be trying to form meaningful connections with others, even if it's just a passive thing where you watch that other persons vlog on YouTube, or comment in their blog, become one of their friends on MySpace or get chatting on MSN. LonelyGirl was one such passive relationship, where geeks listened to her woes and associated with her interests, probably amazed that a good looking girl could also be classed as a geek.

So some people feel personally betrayed that this was all a show. Well, tough luck I say. If you come onto the internet looking for meaningful lifelong relationships then you're entering into dangerous waters; even more so if the "relationship" you have is with a person looking into a webcam to record a vlog entry. Go out and meet some real people, for crying out loud. Internet relationships can work, but you have to have that distance between yourself and the chat box representing the person on the other side, or else you are quite likely as not to get burned.

I see the LonelyGirl show instead as a brilliant example of what can be done by film makers in the age of New Media Convergence; a scriptwriter and an actor, maybe even with a prop or two, can run an entire show - be it a fictional one like LonelyGirl purporting as real life, or a current affairs show, or whatever else you want - off of a site like YouTube, other blogs will talk about it and link to it, then big publications will weigh in. Even the "hunt" for who the real LonelyGirl was is a bit of fun - a distraction, something to do in your spare time, as most of this stuff is.

There's a lot of crap on the internet, but increasingly too there's a lot of quality stuff out there, the entry bar to creating of which has come down very low in recent months, and I don't see the LonelyGirl incident as a personal betrayal - it's a successful experiment.

It was one of those seminal events to which you can pinpoint exactly where you were when you heard the news. I recall waking up early on Sunday morning, switching on the TV and flicking through the breakfast programs. They all seemed to be talking about someone in particular, but I couldn't figure it out at first, between the sleepiness and all the mentions of "She was..."

Then, I think it was on ITV, they said it. "If you're just joining us, we have some terribly sad news. Diana, Princess of Wales, has died in a car crash in Paris." Talk about a ton of bricks falling on your head.

The week that followed was quite an interesting one. Whether you believe the outpouring of national grief that followed the death of Diana was sincere or not, it sure was a spectacle. It had everything: A fairytale that had gone wrong, ending in tragedy, flowers building up outside of palaces and then - to cap it all off - what appeared to be an icy Queen sitting on her Scottish estate refusing to say or do a thing about the whole affair.

The Queen is a film about this week in history, exploring the British Monarchy in one of its darkest moments since the abdication of King Edward VIII to marry the American divorcee Wallis Simpson. It explores Her Majesties mindset, her duties and the role of government - the very earliest days of Tony Blair's, for that matter - in one of the worlds older and more formal institutions.

I have to say that, for me, The Queen has marked the ending of the summer blockbuster season (of which there were few this year) into the Autumn season of thought provoking, interesting pictures. The only thing this film asks of you is that you know something about the death of Diana - not a whole lot more than just about everyone in the western world who lived through those events would happen to know.

The film is not biased - not Royalist, not Republican in its outlook. You bring to the table your own views on the monarchy, and if they happen to change during the portrayal then so be it. The only facet of society to which the film is really cynical is the British press - portraying Diana as a manipulative bimbo one day, hounding her to her death in that Paris underpass and then putting her up on a pedestal after her death.

Bottom line: Go see The Queen. It's out in Britain, and will be out in the US of A at the end of September. It's funny, it's thought provoking and you leave the picture house with something for your mind to chew over.

Last month, I wrote a column about PlayStation 3's troubles and examine the
next-generation consoles in regards to the media hype and news cycle. Here's a
quick excerpt:

"After getting beaten up for a few years during the GameCube era and accused of
being obsolete, Nintendo is now emerging as the media darling with Wii. Part of
this is due to how Wii has separated itself from Xbox 360 and PS3 with an
innovative approach and lower price tag. But don't underestimate people's
"Nintendo nostalgia," which I think is leading to many folks to view Nintendo as
the loveable underdog instead of an out-of-touch has-been. In addition,
Microsoft has taken its lumps in years past, but releasing Xbox 360 on time and
ahead of its rivals proved the company has staying power in the video game
market and it has earned Microsoft at least some measure of respect from the
gamer community.

"But again, it's a news cycle. So-called purists are falling in love with
Nintendo's commitment to fun gameplay over realistic graphics, but what will
happen in a year or two? Will people begin to complain that Wii's processing
power pales in comparison to PS3? What will happen if style="FONT-WEIGHT: normal; PADDING-BOTTOM: 1px; COLOR: #ff6600; BORDER-BOTTOM:
#ff6600 0.07em solid; BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent; TEXT-DECORATION: underline"
href="http://www.twitchguru.com/2006/08/07/mmr/page2.html#" target="_blank"
itxtdid="2188621">Blu-ray turns out to be the dominant DVD standard and
provides a huge incentive to purchase a PS3? It's important to keep these things
in mind."

Well, I should have written "But what will happen in a month or two?" in the
above paragraph because it seems like Nintendo's hype has reached the breaking
point. I've read a lot of stuff about Wii in the wake of Nintendo's big event in
New York last week, and it appears there may be a little bit of a backlash
against Nintendo after its summer of media love. Nintendo announced the console
will launch on Nov. 19 in the U.S. and be sold in the for $250.

While $250 was the expected price point by most folks, industry rumors this
summer suggested the cost would be as low as $199. While I personally didn't put
much stock in this rumor (hey, $150 less than the next system was good enough
for me), some gamers did. Check out some of the forum feedback for disappointed
gamer who were hoping for a cheaper console. Now other gamers are saying Red
Steel and the new Zelda title don't look all that good, that too many of the
games don't support four players, and that the Broadway processor from IBM will
be too weak to support the system. My, how quickly things can change.

As for me, I'm still pumped about Wii. Nintendo got their hooks into me a long
time ago, and I've never been able to get them out. Like a lot of people, I
suffer from Nintendo nostalgia so I'm more excited about Wii than the other two.
But enough about me. Here are a few good bits from the Web regarding Wii.

Check out a report from TG Daily's Mark Raby href="http://www.tgdaily.com/2006/09/14/analysis_nintendo_wii/"> here. Mark
examines what gamers will really be getting for the low price point of $250 and
wonders whether the money saved on the system and games will make up for the
vastly lower processing power and inferior graphics of Wii compared to PS3 and
Xbox 360.

Kotaku has a number of funny,
insightful posts about the recent Wii news. Check them out. The headlines alone
are priceless.

Joystiq weighs in on Wii's multiplayer shortcomings, href="http://www.joystiq.com/2006/09/15/wii-not-even-remotely-region-
free/">false region-free claims, and other href="http://www.joystiq.com/2006/09/14/critiquing-nintendos-wii-launch-
details/">Wii launch details. There's also a good href="http://www.joystiq.com/2006/09/14/wii-then-and-now/">"then and now"
post from Ludwig.

Ex-Joystiqer Robert Summa, now at Destructoid, muses about the href="http://www.destructoid.com/a-wiis-day-is-done-looking-back-at-the-nyc-
nintendo-event">NYC event and takes a critical look at Wii.

Khaaaaaaan!!!! KHAAAAAAAAN!!!!!

Whatever. Maybe this will lead to an outcry from jilted North American and
European gamers (who will pay a higher price for in U.S. dollars for the console
than Americans -- more than $800 for the premium 60 GB version!). But I'm not
holding my breath. Why? Because I think that Sony's move was prompted by
Nintendo's less costly Wii, which has absolutely owned the next-generation
console buzz since E3. Microsoft hasn't particularly excelled at winning over
the Japanese crowd in the past, so it's easy to see why Sony may be more
concerned with the hometown favorite and lovable underdog Nintendo.

I'm not the only one who suspects that Sony has a little case of Wii-envy. Check
out the latest href="http://www.tgdaily.com/2006/09/22/sony_price_cut_nintendo_wii/">report
from Wolfgang at TG Daily.

Is Sony running out of material? It certainly seems like it. A keen observer at the blog Gaming Edge picked up on a striking similarity at the recent Tokyo Game Show. Ken Kutaragi, president and CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment and the father of the PlayStation, delivered a highly anticipated keynote address at TGS. While most of the buzz was about Kutarag announcing an unexpected price cut in Japan for the 20GB version of the new PlayStation 3, Gaming Edge's Rod Oracheski had a bit of deja vu and discovered that some of Kutaragi's speech was recycled -- word for word, apparently -- from a speech he gave in 2000 prior to the PlayStation 2 launch. Here are some excerpts of the speech:

"We need an open system. Like an internet. People can have a first hand experience: the network world of the game has to be open to everyone."
"Sony has Sony's agenda. But (I) want a very open platform, equal for every person."
"For instance: for movies. You looked at the [..] you can jack in and watch the new world. We are very lucky to live in this era. We try to open the door for the future."
"You can communicate to a new cybercity. This will be the ideal home server. Did you see the movie 'The Matrix'? Same interface. Same concept. Starting from next year, you can jack into 'The Matrix'!"

First off, let me just say that Oracheski has got one hell of a memory. You have to have a sharp eye (or ear) and a whole lotta video game industry knowledge to make that connection. Kudos to Gaming Edge!

Second, "The Matrix" was, like, 10 years ago.

Third, if this doesn't indicate that Sony is coasting on the remarkable success of PS2, then nothing will.

Yes, there is a href="http://www.twitchguru.com/2006/07/10/mmr/page4.html">Madden curse; I
wrote about it a couple months back. Electronic Arts' Madden NFL series is one
of the most popular video game franchises of all time, but for whatever reason,
the NFL players that make the cover of the game always seem to fall on hard
times immediately after receiving the dubious honor. I'm not sure why this is; I
don't really believe in superstition or the supernatural. But these seemingly
unrelated series freak occurances, poor plays, and serious and even career-
threatening injuries always seem to strike the Madden NFL cover boys, who tend
to have their worst seasons of their careers after being put on the cover of the
game.

For all those people out there that bet big on Seahawks and had Seattle
returning to the Super Bowl this year, well, don't say I didn't warn you.

For further reading, check out:
Tom's
Hardware Guide is 10 Years Old Today
and
Tom's Hardware Guide -- the book

Children of Men is the second great film that I've seen in as many weeks, the first having been The Queen, which has been released in the UK & Ireland before the US of A (it's usually the other way around.) The film basically concerns itself with a slightly futuristic (but still highly recognisable) Britain (and world, in general) in which women can no longer have babies. Let's not concern ourselves with the premise (whether you believe it or not, or are inclined to quake with fear or scoff it off doesn't matter). The meat of the film is more than satisfactory.

At its most basic level, this is a thriller. Pregnant girl is found, must be taken to the coast to be picked up by great scientists, all sorts of fascist government types and crazy, uncivilized rabble in the way. Kind of like Half-Life 2, actually. Well, anyway. On a deeper level, this is a social commentary. It may be set in the future, but still within many of our lifetimes (2027) and concerns itself with how humanity would react to a slow-burning but inevitable end of humanity, which in this case is preceded by the end of civilization as we know it.

It's chilling stuff, and perfectly plausible - as my cinema going colleague (slash drinking buddy slash cell mate, etc) put it to me, the film looks at what has happened in human history before now when we are confronted with great troubles, and uses the good old mantra that history is usually prone to repeating itself. In Children of Men we get a good mix of history - think post World War One, leading into World War Two, the End of Empire, War on Terrorism and good old fashioned xenophobia (a timeless concept, really.)

Of course as a straight up-and-up thriller, this movie will have you on the edge of your seat from start right until the credits roll. Then, when you've left the cinema (or, as you sit there in silence), it will provide you with much to think about.

Cynics might say that Michael Caine is in the movie as a headliner, and he probably is, but never the less he gives a memorable performance which provides some light relief in the midst's of the depression; as well as acting as yet further social commentator, with a rather amusing take on marijuana legalisation.

Poor American's won't be able to see this one in the picture houses until Christmas. Wah wah wah. Consider it revenge for ruining who shot Mr Burns all those years ago. Bastards. In the meantime, anyone more local should go and see this movie. It's another one of what is turning out to be a fine Autumn/Winter crop in 2006.

Here's what the head honchos at MTV had to say:
"The acquisition of Harmonix will deepen MTV's connection to its audience via
on-line, mobile and console music gaming, and expand the relationship with both
labels and artists through the creation of games based on classic songs as well
as future album releases," said MTV president Christina Norman in a press
statement. "Harmonix's technology allows everyone to pursue their rock and roll
fantasies, even people like me, with more musical ambition than actual talent."

"The acquisition of Harmonix advances MTV Networks' strategy of connecting with
target audiences by creating immersive, multi-platform environments that extend
to every device they use," said Judy McGrath, chairman and CEO of MTV Networks,
in a press statement.

Is MTV ready to be a big time game company? Well, it certainly needs a new
avenue because the network doesn't show videos anymore (as I pointed out in the
above column) and its reality TV programming is - how do I put this gently? -
complete and utter dog poo. In the column last month I wondered if a company
like MTV, which was producing crap content in one medium (TV) could branch out
and produce excellent content in another medium (gaming). I'm not sure if we'll
have the answer to this one for a while, but it will be interesting to watch
considering that MTV Networks is going with a convergence strategy.

MTV now has Atom (which boasts AddictingGames.com and Shockwave.com gaming
sites) as well as Xfire, the popular online gaming communication application,
which has more than 5 million registered users. With the addition of Harmonix,
which has Guitar Hero 2 coming out this November, MTV will have a formidable
gaming presence on which to build. But how in the world can MTV match up its
gaming strategy with its TV shows like "My Super Sweet 16" and "Pimp My Ride"?

For more on Guitar Hero, check out David Konow's story on href="http://www.twitchguru.com/2006/03/01/guitar_hero/">TwitchGuru.

I remember a time when Sony was king of quite a few hills, and king of no bigger a hill than the video game console market. The word PlayStation is synonymous with a gaming box attached to the TV. Sony is master of this market no more, however, and the worry now is that they may crash out of it altogether.

To put it bluntly, I'm not sure if Sony could successfully organise a piss up in a brewery these days, where the gaming market is concerned. The first signs of worry came in 2005 with the PlayStation Portable. The handheld console is a nice piece of kit, but it's over expensive, dogged by piracy and poor format support in the form of UMD movies and games.

From a business point of view, Sony couldn't even roll it out to the world without a bit of a fiasco - anyone in Europe may recall that the entire European allotment of the PSP was shipped to North America, where expected frenzied buying never emerged, leaving Europeans to wait a half a year for the handheld and American warehouses full of them.

It's the PlayStation 3 which is the biggest concern for the company, however. I dunno about you, but when a company stands up and says "Expect it to be expensive, ohh and we're delaying it again... and hiking the price again... and not including some of its best features as standard, like HDMI cables... ohh, now we are, but we have to raise the price again because of it..." Well, I'm not particularly confident in that company. I'm even less impressed when they stand out on stage and arrogantly proclaim to the world at large that "The next-gen doesn't begin until we say it does" when, to be frank, if we left it up to them mankind would probably never get out of bed in the morning.

The PlayStation 3 is setting itself up to be a massive failure, at the very least a large loss-leader for Sony. This lot think that it might bankrupt the company entirely. I doubt that a little, but the numbers are interesting to look at; certainly the "next-gen" isn't going to make Sony a particularly rich company in the short to medium run.

When Microsoft came to market with the Xbox we all laughed at the massive losses the company was incurring - and still is incurring with the 360 - to grow itself a market position. Now Sony too is going to make a massive loss on their console... funny how the "norm" can switch so quickly to such a polar opposite position. It would seem that the boys at Microsoft have a lot more long-term brains than anyone has given them credit for with their games business.

Rahul Sood announced the acquisition on his href="http://voodoopc.blogspot.com/2006/09/project-vampire-is-about-to-
fly_28.html">blog. Sood had made news back in March when he suggested in his
blog that Dell would buy Alienware - before the Alienware
acquisition was announced - and then followed up by disclosing in his blog last
month that he and Michael Dell had discussions in 2005 about the possibility
earlier of Dell buying VoodooPC. According to Sood's href="http://voodoopc.blogspot.com/2006/08/where-theres-smoke-theres-
fire.html">blog entry on those discussions, he felt direct computer maker
wasn't a good fit for VoodooPC because Dell lacked innovation and it "lost its
way a long time ago."
Instead, VoodooPC will become part of HP. Sood wrote in his blog that he feels
HP, with its history of innovation and current management leadership, is a
better fit for his company. Sood continues:
"HP is hungry for new innovations, and if you can imagine what plugging our
corporate DNA into their labs would do - well, you get the picture. We are now
in the position to create absolutely fantastic products in all categories.
Voodoo and HP are complimentary opposites. This deadly combination of Voodoo's
gaming/luxury PC expertise and our brand DNA and influence, with HP's
innovations, scale, and leverage is going to lead to some of the most compelling
machines money can buy."

This is an interesting development for several reasons. First and foremost, I'm
surprised but glad that both Dell and HP, the top two PC makers in the world,
are taking gaming seriously. Second, I have to wonder if this will begin a trend
that will lead to fewer and fewer independent boutique computer makers that
create truly awesome gaming machines. Third, it will be interesting to see how
being part of huge multibillion dollar technology corporations will change
VoodooPC and Alienware. Will innovation be stifled or will having access to
great technical minds and lots of R&D (well, at least in HP's case) propel
the computer makers to new heights?
Whatever the case, I suppose the bottom line may be that the death of the PC was
greatly exaggerated. At my previous gig covering business IT, all we heard about
after 2001 was that PCs were a dead end business, especially after IBM sold its
PC business to Lenovo. But it's shaping up to be a fascinating time for PCs once
again and we may indeed start to see some true innovation real soon.

"It is true. Robert Downey Jr. is Tony Stark. I am about as excited as I can be.
I saw what he can do and he is extremely enthusiastic about playing Stark. I can
say with absolute certainty that there is no better choice. The humor and
emotional dimension he brings truly raises the bar on this project. Get ready."

Yeah! Right on, Favs!!!

Personally, I love Downey. Troubled as he may be, he's fantastic actor, maybe
even a brilliant one. "Natural Born Killers"? Brilliant. "Chaplin"? Outstanding.
"Kiss Kiss Bang Bang"? Superb. And he was great on "Ally McBeal," too.

Oh God, did I just write that?

Sure did. Moving on. I'm intrigued to see what Downey can do as a superhero in a
comic book movie. It's about time he gets a leading role in a movie that can be
a bog hit and showcase his talent. Maybe this will be Downey's "Pirates
of the Caribbean," I don't know (personally, I always Downey was better than
Johnny Depp, but anyway). Not to make light of Downey's past struggles with
substance abuse, but I can't think of a better actor to play Stark, the
alcoholic billionaire and industrial genius who becomes Iron Man (if you recall,
the longstanding rumor was that Tom Cruise would play Stark). Plus, I think that
Favreau is the kind of director that can make it all work -- the acting, the
action, the humor, the CGI and the character drama. "Made" is one of my favorite
films, and "Elf" was susprisingly funny.

Of course, I'm a little worried that we won't see enough of Downey because he
may be hidden behind CGI armor for a lot of the film. And I don't like the fact
that Favreau has said the current "Iron Man" script won't really deal with
Stark's personal demons, which is part of what makes Iron Man such a compelling
superhero (an orphaned boy genius with a damaged heart who become a an alcoholic
billionaire weapons developer for the U.S. government). In any event, kudos to
Paramount, Favreau and Downey for pulling this one together. It could be the
best casting decision of the year.