Tuesday 24 April 2007

Gaming addiction CLAMPED down!

China are seeking to clamp down the fears of current gaming addictions. The Chinease government has stated that "Under-18s who play for more than three consecutive hours a day will have limits imposed on the amount of points they can score".

This means that the government has created software which has been given to online game companies in which they are forced to install this anti-addiction system.

In order to verify their age, this system is to require that all gamers register with their REAL names and credit card number.

Other attempts to try clean out online addiction is to create boot-camps. In an attempt to wean out addictions military style.

The Chinease government has also banned any cyber-cafe's from opening this year in an attempt to combat the situation.


Many people might wonder what an earth this has to do with the West!? Well, gaming companies can be persuaded to create 'tailord' games for the East and perhaps even consider creating a system for the West.

Not only that but the cost to create this system for each game will have an effect on the profits created by selling them. This will in turn bump up the prices on games even more which means we have to pay more, which means we have less money to spend on other things , which means we have even less of a social life (stereotypical me), which means we become LOSERS!

Gamers and games get flamed for the 'ills of this world'

More and more people are becoming 'hostile' towards gamers and their games. They are being blamed for the 'ills of this world' as quoted from bbc.

"There is a discrepancy between gamers and their perception in society by non-gamers."

What is happening is that people are becoming stereotypical about gamers and the industries that create such games. The average teenager is not a 16 year old spotty kid who spends his day planning to kill his teacher.

"There are more than 50 million games consumers in Europe alone, half of them are adults, and only a tiny fraction of games on the market are rated 18+"

Gamers go LIVE!

More and more gamers are striving to get online and enjoy their games alongside thousands of other players. Reasons for doing this could range from wanting more 'advanced' opponents other than the games 'AI' to things such as the social life amongst other gamers.

At this stage, Microsoft is far more advanced with their XboX live, whereas Sony are slighty behind with their recently released live system.

Although gaming industries are constantly under the risk of going broke over un-popular games which in return grants no income or very little. Companies such as EA games can always rely on the internet. Creating websites purely for gaming advertisement and teasing gamers to try a demo and buy / download the game online has a steady profit income.

Such advertisement can possibly create in-game advertising. Allowing sports companies for example to create adverts using in-game footage to create a more appealing advert. This has benefits and problems. Allowing in-game advertising means that companies such as sports orientated reach a wider audience range. Both them and the game company shall get a profit from this.
However, this also has an effect on the television box. Should in-game advertisement get popular, more and more companies shall flock and in turn demolish television advertisement. This again is another example of people becoming less involved with the television.

Gaming Industry under threat!

The gaming industry has been unable to protect themselves from upheaval.

Everybody is snatching up the 'Next-Gen' consoles, however costs to make such power machines will not be repaid untill 2008. Making these consoles is a big threat to game companies as they take on the risk of releasing these consoles under a significant amount of debt.

Computer game sales are expected to fall to a $3.7b market value. However, unlike the console market in which is expected to increase to approximately $12.2b, computer game developers have a steady income.

Gaming consoles are a big risk and the development of games is becoming increasingly expensive. The real money spinners are console games, but subject to the ups and downs of the hardware cycle as consoles launch or go out of fashion.

Sunday 15 April 2007

Net reaches out to final frontier!

Soon the US plan to put an internet router into space by 2009. This will allow voice, video and data communications for troops in remote parts of the world. Future developments could also lead to Satellite data transmissions directly from one another, rather than through ground stations.

More info for later refferal : http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6551807.stm

Teachers get Cyber-bullied! Hahaha

Teachers are frequently getting cyber-bullied by students recording fake footage of abuse on their mobiles!

A former teacher from Nothern Ireland was falsley accused of abusing one of his students, and now claims to feel "unsafe" around children.

""""It's certainly a way of neutralising a teacher who they may have a grudge against," Mr Bell said.
"I don't think many teachers actually survive suspensions. It undermines their own confidence, it undermines their careers, their standing in the schools."
Mr Bell was found guilty of a technical assault - he admitted touching the pupil under the chin when telling her to cheer up. """ - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/6540557.stm


All information is from the following website. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/6540557.stm

I accept no responsibilities in which the teachers of the Robert Smyth School may react.

Google dominates the competition!

Google currently dominates UK search engines by up to 75%. Popularity was partly kick started by its clean, uncluttered homepage which won many admirers. However, such extras like Google search bars, and Google Earth are starting to backlash. Many downloadable programs are being released with the option to install such extras, without much detail about them. People who don't generally read the pages when installing something and just continually click "Next" and relying on the computer to do everything, now find such things as Google Search bars on their internet browsers.

There has been no real study into why Google is so successful and if it is really any better than other web searchers, but, majority of people instinctively believe it is.

""With the search marketing spend in the UK netting a healthy £607m in 2006, being an also-ran in the race to beat Google can be profitable and, increasingly, rivals are realising that overtaking Google in the near future will be a mammoth task.

"It's not about overhauling Google but more about narrowing the gap. There is no point trying to be a flat-out copy. It is more a question of offering a different experience with tools that provide users with a better experience," said Mr Elliot. "" - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6546501.stm


An example of a competitor which recently ditched it's iconic butler Jeeves earlier this year, Ask, have worked hard to produce a new search engine in which gives users more control. Such as providing users with a minimized size web page before visiting the site as well as offering ways to refine search around related topics.

Methods in which Ask have been trying to get publicised is through T.V. Advertising themselves as an underground alternative.


""""" The movement to persuade users away from the dominant search engines such as Google and Yahoo may be small but it is gathering momentum from those with more solid radical credentials.
At the end of last year, Jimmy Wales, founder of the online encyclopedia Wikipedia offered an alternative "people-powered" search engine.
His plan, still in its infancy, is to Wiki-fy the process of internet search, so that human beings decide openly how to rank and organise information, not the huge private servers of Google and Yahoo.
He labelled the project "Search Wikia" and has high ambitions for it to be "the search engine that changes everything". The plan follows criticism of the secrecy surrounding the algorithms of the leading search engines. "" - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6546501.stm


All information and details have been taken from http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/6546501.stm.