IGDA: Speaking Out For Games. It’s a little ranty, but sketches out a case for games as a gateway for subjects that have lost appeal in recent years.
“If you really want to make games, you need to do well in math, science and English.”

Gamasutra just posted a feature I wrote for them: Uncanny AI: Artificial Intelligence In The Uncanny Valley
There are lots of things across all media that can already fool us. The crucial question, though, is how well do they do it? Distance and brevity obscure all manner of flaws, but at some point in a [...]

Microsoft’s entertainment and devices division – the same department responsible for Xbox 360 – has unveiled a new
“Entertainment and devices has a long history of bringing innovative product experiences to market – such as Xbox, IPTV and Zune. Today, E&D’s vision is anchored in delivering end-to-end hardware, software and services across different pillars of Connected [...]

From Water Cooler Games:
Today, I’m excited to announce that Persuasive Games has a new publishing relationship with The New York Times, in which they will be publishing newsgames we create on their op-ed page, as editorial content, not just as games. This is unprecedented, and at the risk of tooting my own horn, I think [...]

Via gamesindustry.biz
“The UK Government needs to do something more useful than just criticising violent content in videogames,” Doak told GamesIndustry.biz during an interview about Haze, Free Radical’s upcoming next-gen shooter.
“Here’s an industry that 20 years ago we led the world in – through bedroom rock-and-roll development on the early home computers – and now there’s [...]

This just in from Monumental Games:
Football Superstars
A sports MMO based on 3 to 11 a side matches, offering everything from a kickabout to leagues. Genius; the market for this could be gigantic, and I can’t believe anyone ever thought Blizzard had the MMO market sewn up.

Charles Cecil speaks about videogame price points and diverse markets on gamesindustry.biz today:
Gears of Wars was clearly a blockbuster, people are happy to pay GBP 40 for that and feel it’s good value. But then we have all these smaller games like Katamari Damacy that get very well reviewed and perceived very fondly by people [...]

Valve’s digital distribution service Steam has now reached more than 13 million subscribers.
I do wonder: How many of those accounts are regular users?

EA have bought a 15% stake in major Chinese videogame publisher The9. Says Joystiq:
The US-based publishing powerhouse will have 15% of the The9’s common stock, which amounts to US $167 million. The two companies also announced a licensing agreement that makes The9 the sole publisher of FIFA Online in mainland China.
EA had previously half-denied reports [...]

There’s certainly a lot going on with brands in Second Life at the moment. This recent post from the Business and Games blog includes a link to this PDF chart of traffic stats for many brands in the world.