On New Year’s Eve I posted my predictions for 2008. I’m pleased to report that one of the predictions has become a reality… I predicted Seesmic would be huge and based on recent events, Seesmic is going to be massive. Considering the fact that the product is a pre-alpha release, it hasn’t done too bad - Seesmic has attracted a large user base from all over the world and uniquely involves it’s community with every major decision i.e. who they’re going to hire for a job, logo design, how to improve the service, etc.
The owner of the company is currently attending the World Economic Forum in Switzerland. Over the past few days Loic Le Meur, the owner of Seesmic has been providing live video reports via Seesmic and Twitter. He’s appearing on CNN’s live coverage of Davos throughout this week. You can watch the live reports on CNN at 10.30pm GMT.
Seesmic is about conversations, in particular online video conversations. I love the instant interaction between the attendees of Davos and those not attending the forum. Imagine being able to ask world leaders like Shimon Peres, Condoleezza Rice or even Bill Gates questions live and receive a live personal video reply within minutes. I think Seesmic can offer a whole range of people and businesses a really cool but unique way of instantly interacting with new customers, clients and friends.
If Seesmic was used within the video games community, it could, potentially revolutionize communications between community members and the communities administration. It could also provide PR representatives with a new media that could provide a number of opportunities.
I will be posting a lot more about Seesmic over the coming weeks. I have several seesmic invite codes, if you’d like to try out the service please get in touch.
Jon from CentralanUK pinged over a link to a press release, which was issued in conjunction with the TNWA Group yesterday afternoon. When I was working on World in Conflict last year, we showcased the game to CentralanUK attendees and that worked out pretty well.
I wasn’t able to post about this news until today but I did ping a tweet out about the news as soon as I heard about it. Anyhoo, here is the press release:
TNWA Acquires CentralanUK
London – 22nd January 2008 – TNWA Group, UK’s leading online tournament gaming sites, today announced the strategic acquisition of one of the UK’s most successful LAN party organisers, CentralanUK (CLUK).
Specialising in BYOC (Bring Your Own Computer/Console) events, CLUK has catered for everything from cash-prize tournaments to private functions since it began five years ago, steadily rising in popularity to become the second largest organisation of its kind in the UK.
Under the TNWA group, CLUK will now be able to offer the full offline package to its LAN event attendees, as well as providing exhibition space for its game publishing and hardware sponsors.
The next event (CentralanUK #19), starting on the 29th February will be held at Uttoxeter Racecourse, Staffordshire, and cater for over 160 people. TNWA will be putting up over £1,000 of prizes for competitors, but the event also promises to draw in a just-for-fun crowd.
“We have been interested in the CentralanUK offering for some time now,” Paul Sulyok, CEO of The TNWA Group said. “Their fantastic reputation within the community and tried and tested formula is perfectly aligned with the continually expanding end-to-end gamer proposition TNWA offers.”
Jon Winkle, Event Manager from CentralanUK, said: “Working with TNWA will increase CLUK’s offering to the community in orders of magnitude. BYOC LAN events continue to grow in popularity, especially with the inclusion of console players, and the support we’re receiving from TNWA will allow CLUK to continue to grow to meet its real potential.”
For more information about CentralanUK and its event, visit www.centralanuk.co.uk.
While I was at the cinema yesterday, I saw I am Legend. The movie was pretty good and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I am Legend was a lot better than Aliens Vs Predator: Requiem but I think its a film you have to watch at the cinema rather than at home.
I am Legend is a great movie and you should go watch it as soon as you can. Now, I’m looking forward to watching Cloverfield and Will Smith’s Hancock.
I went to watch Aliens Vs Predator – Requiem at the cinema yesterday and the movie was a lot better than I expected.
It reminded me a lot of the original Predator movie. In fact, I think the directors took the franchise back to its roots. If you’ve seen the first Aliens Vs Predator movie then you’ll recall the part when the Predator removed its mask and just looked fake.
The good thing in AvP: Requiem is that the Predator seems more realistic than the previous incarnation. It is worth watching at the cinema but will also be a good movie to watch on DVD.
While I’m on the subject of AvP: Requiem, Sierra Entertainment has already released a game with the same name on the PSP.
Macworld ‘08 is due to start in a few hours time. For some reason there seems to be a lot of anticipation and excitement with this years keynote. I’m really looking forward to the announcements.
A few days ago, Ryan posted a link to a news article on Engadget which contained a mock-up of a MacBook Touch. The picture is a fake but it would certainly be a pretty cool product if it gets announced and released.
News Article.
I’m hoping Apple announces a 3G iPhone, and a touch-screen MacBook because without doubt, I’d go out and buy those products first thing tomorrow.
Coverage:
Apple’s website - You can watch the keynote in full via Apple’s website at 5pm GMT.
Apple Insider
DailyTechTalk
Engadget
Qik
Macworld Predictions:
iPhone SDK
New model iPhone
New monitor displays
New model MacBook aka MacBook Air
I’ll be live twittering the keynote, so if you’re interested in the Macworld announcements follow me on Twitter. Twitter crashed and I wasn’t able to use it during the keynote but I’ll post up the latest Mac news once I’ve got my head around all the announcements.
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When i logged onto my MacBook this morning, I loaded up FaceBook and noticed a link that one of my FB friends had posted. The link goes to a website titled ‘Sector Seven’ which was a secretive government organisation in the Transformers movie. The password to access the flash site is: codeblack and once the pop up window loads, start clicking on the various icons and eventually you’ll see some footage from the upcoming Transformers 2 movie.
I managed to screen capture a couple of images:
It’s a Dinobot.
Grimlock, the leader of the Dinobots.
Laserbeck transforming.
One of Soundwaves pals.
I recognised both characters instantly because I grew up watching the Transformer cartoons. I’m hoping Transformers 2 will be good movie and I really do hope the game doesn’t turn out to be a pile of crap like its predecessor.
Unfortunately, it looks like Transformers 2 won’t be available to own on HD-DVD.
I posted about Warner Bros. Entertainment dropping Microsoft’s and Toshiba’s HD-DVD format in favour of Sony’s Blu-ray format but why the sudden switch?
Warner has a number of movies on Microsoft’s Xbox Live Video Marketplace service. As a matter of fact, WB has the most movies available for rental on the limited UK service. WB will release all of its movies on Blu-ray discs, instead of HD-DVD discs. I wonder, will Warner continue digital movie distribution via Xbox Live while releasing movies on Blue-ray discs?
I won an award. Thanks Gareth but WTF was you posting about awards on FaceBook at 4am in the morning?
I thought the profile was real but alas it was a hoax.
