Desktop Tower Defense is simple little strategy game from Paul Preece that (according to Coolhunting and a little math) has now been played 15,000,001 times.
Convergence and the Ad Dollar
Stewart Yerton’s piece for the Oregonian is both well-researched and brisk. The paragraphs could send you spiraling outward (as it did me) to dreams of convergences to come. No more squeaking by on book reports based on only “the movie’s-worth” of research; The Matrix demands consumption of both the movie and the video game to get the complete story. But who’s complaining in that demographic? So blogs are the rage today. Tomorrow, reading will be so yesterday. Why read when you can get the sports drink? How about the New York Times Review of Books in your car’s heads-up display? Maybe a chapter from your car’s owner’s manual in your morning paper? Breakfast cereal with OnStar? “Mister Smith, this is Bettylou with Daimler-Chryler Marshmellow Crunch. Paramedics should be arriving shortly. Hang in there!” Sorry if I’m a little unfocused here. Sorry if this went nowhere. I was just thinking about newspapers.
Child “Ear”-ing in the Keitai Age
While some parents have a tough time navigating their cell phone for writing e-mails to their children, the children who grew up with cell phone will become parents themselves before long. Then, the cell phone will be used within families more commonly and frequently. More than anything else, cell phones might be used for parenting.
Fare and Ballast Reporting?
Edward Wasserman, of The Miami Herald, adds a chapter to the Big Blur saga. What’s news? What’s entertainment? Who’s being paid and how? I wonder increasingly: who’ll nod to the business realities driving this trend to murkiness? During Friends or TWW (apologies to the other networks, but not really) I’m no longer enticed by tales of sex and corruption (in 5-second “tween-commercial” format) to stick around for the evening news. Even the tested consumer scare… er… advocate ploy’s all but disappeared. Now it’s “Watch the news. Win cash!” And why not? I imagine WFLA’s Daytime features at least some hard news; Wasserman’s article shared screen space with no fewer than 5 banner ads. Apples and oranges? Maybe…
Hey man, was that a bring-down?
The totalitarian message is being transmitted while you’re zoned out in front of the television watching the feelies, high on soma—which is some combination of Prozac and Budweiser.
John Perry Barlow, at MotherJones.com
