“I mean I know itís a photo sharing site, but what makes it so damn interesting? Then, last night, I finally figured it out: flickr is a MMORPG.”

“On Tuesday, November 5, 1996, a standard 15 by 15 crossword puzzle constructed by Jeremiah Farrell appeared in The New York Times that the editor, Will Shortz, said was the most amazing puzzle he’d ever seen.” (Thanks Waxy.org!)

“One of the writers at Game Girl Advance is reading Understanding Comics, and wonders if it would be possible to create a game that explains gaming in the same way that Scott McCloud created a comic that explains comics.”

“Just click on the arrow and it will take you to a page that explains the links, the lists show what I feel to be milestone games.† These are games that either offered something completely new to a genre and enabled it to grow in a new direction or were just so good that they upped the profile of that genre.† So if you are new to gaming or an old hand this should offer enlightenment or tears of nostalgia. It’s amazing to see such change in an entertainment medium in such a short space of time, just looking at the pictures above amazes me how far we have come in such a little space of time.†I wonder if in 15 years we will be talking about the gap between Quake 2 and id’s latest total immersion game.”

“…at MIT circa 1961 there’s a group of hard core computer nerds calling themselves the tech model railroad club: wayne witanen and j. martin graetz, along with 25 year-old steve russell, they develop the idea to pit two spaceships with limited fuel supplies against each other in a missle duel. the program becomes ’spacewar !,’ the world’s first fully interactive videogame, with russell as main programmer (1962)…”

A Conversation with Will Wright by Celia Pearce: “Well, actually, the way to put it is that I’m trying to build the maximum possibility space in your head, not on the computer. (Laughter.) Okay. Because the possibility space on the computer is just a huge pile of numbers, but as far as you’re concerned that pile of numbers is the same as another pile of numbers…”

“In 1949, a young engineer named Ralph Baer was given an assignment to build a television set. He wasn’t supposed to build just any television set, but one that would be the absolute best of all televisions. This was not a problem for Baer, but he wanted to go beyond his original assignment and incorporate some kind of game into the set. He didn’t know exactly what kind of game he had in mind, but it didn’t really matter because his managers nixed the idea. It would take another 18 years for his idea to become a reality, and by that time there would be other people to share in the glory…”

“Museums, for their part, see video games as a medium that encourages visitors to interact with art at a fundamental level. ‘Museums are followers,’ said Mr. Manetas, the New York artist, in an e-mail message. ‘Digital is fashionable, and they also hope to attract sponsors and public.’ But he added: ‘They are also like mothers who want to play Doom with their son, hoping to communicate with him. They just ruin the game.’”

“This is a forum to discuss the user experience of interactive entertainment. Interactive entertainment is becoming an increasingly important feature of the wired and wireless world. Entertaining content offers the kind of engagement and stickiness that creates devoted and frequent users. This group is interested in how end users can be involved in the design and evaluation of interactive entertainment such as games, gambling, interactive advertising, and electronic toys. It is a ‘platform independent’ forum, discussing user experiences across (and between) Web, mobile, interactive TV, and dedicated appliances.”

“I’d Rather Play Computer Games Than Do Real Work! (Wouldn’t You?): Given the choice of playing a computer game or doing some more serious computer application, I’d generally choose to play a game. And I know I’m not alone in this choice. What is there about games that makes them so appealing? Playing is generally more appealing than working, certainly. But is there more? As part of the research association with Rensselaer’s distance-education program in Human-Computer Interaction, I’ve started to explore computer-games interfaces — their appeal, usability, and supportiveness — to try to understand how we can make human-computer interaction, in general, more effective.”

“What good is storytelling in an action game? Steven Johnson looks for answers in the new game Oni… ‘One of the best fundamental principles that anybody ever expressed to me about game design is that games should teach you how to play them,’ says Hardy LeBel, designer of the newly released Oni, from Bungie Studios. An action title deeply influenced by Japanese animé films like Akira or Ghost in the Shell, Oni follows the story of a young cybernaut named Konoko and her battle against an industrial espionage outfit called, predictably enough, The Syndicate.”

David Strom’s Web Informant: “My friend Marc Prensky has written a wonderful and thought- provoking book entitled, Digital Game-Based Learning. Here is a short compilation of excerpts and ideas from the book that should stimulate your own thinking about how we learn and how corporations can become more effective at training their employees.”

“A huge collection of documents on interactivity, design, and storytelling. There are nearly 3 megabytes of material here, almost all of it text.”

“AIGA Journal of Design for the Network Economy is a twice-yearly print and web publication dedicated to exploring the content and consequences of experience design, a new discipline that has emerged from the needs and forms of communication in the network economy.”

The Game”After all I’ve learned from my computer, the latest lesson was still a shock: I’m a miserable failure. At least at running a start-up tech company. Thanks to the French PC game ‘Start-Up 2000,’ a business-management program produced by the Paris-based ht