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NEW YORK, Dec 19, `07 /PRNewswire/ — MTV Games, a division of Viacom’s MTV Networks, today announced an exclusive deal with internationally renowned motion picture and television producer Jerry Bruckheimer to develop and create new and original video games, marking his first official foray into the gaming world.

As part of this landmark agreement, Bruckheimer will build a game incubation studio with MTV Games, where a team of experienced video game experts, artists and storytellers will seek out and deliver new game concepts and intellectual property.

By joining MTV Games with Bruckheimer’s blockbuster track record for creating successful entertainment properties in film and television, both new and experienced gamers can expect what promises to be some of the most entertaining, challenging, and unique games.

MTV Networks will support this venture across all its broadcast and digital platforms including CMT, MTV, Spike and VH1. Gaming is a focal point of MTV Networks’ overall vertical entertainment strategy of super-serving its core audiences with engaging experiences across multiple platforms.

In August of 2007, the company announced that it will invest more than $500 million over the next two years in the development and distribution of its Interactive Entertainment and Video Game business. MTV Games’ recently released Rock Band from developers, Harmonix, which MTV Networks acquired in 2006. More at Viacom.

Dec 07, ‘07 — UNICEF, One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) and Google today announced the launch of ” Our Stories “, a joint initiative to preserve and share the histories and identities of cultures around the world by making personal stories available online in many languages.

Using laptops, mobile phones and other recording devices, children will record, in their native languages, the stories of elders, family members and friends. These stories will be shared globally through the Our Stories website, where they can be found on a Google Map.

By making these stories accessible around the world, the Our Stories project hopes to contribute to a better understanding of our shared humanity across countries and cultures, across religious traditions, across languages, and across generations.

Low-cost XO laptops by One Laptop per Child will serve as a foundation to help build this digital archive of personal stories by providing children in developing countries with easy-to-use technology to record their stories and interviews.

The Our Stories website will initially include stories collected by Brazil’s Museum of the Person and stories recorded for UNICEF by young people in Ghana, Pakistan, Tanzania and Uganda.

Our Stories has taken inspiration from the StoryCorps project in the United States founded by MacArthur Fellow Dave Isay. “StoryCorps is proud to lend its experience in recording the conversations of nearly 30,000 Americans to this global undertaking,” said Isay. “These efforts teach us that the lives of everyone – whether they are in New York or Nairobi – matter, and that they will not be forgotten.”

More stories from more countries will be added to the site every month in an effort to preserve an oral history of humanity in the 21st Century.

Leading figures have already lent their voices to the project: Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General of the United Nations, Her Majesty Queen Rania Al Abdullah, Queen of Jordan and UNICEF Eminent Advocate for Children, and Ishmael Beah, UNICEF Advocate for Children Affected by War and best-selling author of A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier, have all recorded messages welcoming users to the site and encouraging them to share their stories.

Listen to a story today at OurStories.org.

WASHINGTON — Dec 03, ‘07 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — As the agency commemorates its 50th anniversary, NASA has launched “NASA.gov 5.0,” the first major redesign of its primary Web site in more than four years.

The new design goes beyond a cosmetic facelift. It features a new level of interactivity and customization, and provides the opportunity to comment on selected NASA stories, create personal playlists of favorite NASA videosand share agency content with social bookmarking sites on the Internet.

While adding new features, the site’s overall focus remains on providing the latest news, which is prominently displayed at the top of the page. Also, NASA imagery and videos have been given more prominence.

Visitors will notice a new navigation interface, with 10 topic areas covering the depth and breadth of NASA programs replacing three outdated
and overly broad categories. Web editors from around the agency will be able to contribute content.

Web managers have improved the new site’s search capability using Google’s Customer Search Engine to provide visitors with the same search
results they would get from Google’s public site. NASA has tools to apply “crowd wisdom” to search results by weighting findings according to how many previous searchers clicked on a particular link.

NASA revamped the customized “myNASA” feature to allow users to collect their favorite NASA Web content, including videos and news feeds, all in one location. NASA.

Nov 27, ‘07 — Naomi Kim of Reuters bring us the Brookstone story, which adds 3rd dimension to the online shopping.

“Consumers looking to avoid crowded malls and the tedium of online shopping can now shop in a virtual 3-dimensional store.

Specialty retailer Brookstone Inc. opened the virtual doors to its 3-dimensional store, which combines a Second Life-like visual experience with real merchandise customers can buy.

The virtual store replicates the look and layout of a real store. Customers can move through the aisles and browse and zoom on products using a mouse and keyboard. Detailed information is available by stopping in front of an item.

“We think it really appeals to a younger audience for us, a demographic probably 25 to 40… because of the almost gaming nature of it,” said Sweeney. Brookstone.com will still offer its wares in the conventional way, but offers the 3-D store as an alternative”. More at Reuters.

Brookstone 3D Online Store (Warning: On the next screen, you have to install -never heard before- Kinset shopping browser in order to browse the 3D store).

Related Story: EveryScape Will Show You the Real World, Online!

Nov 27, ‘07 — Reuters is reporting on General Electric’s NBC Universal agreeing to start offering interactive advertising services and subscribe to a ratings service from TiVo, citing the companies.

“The agreement covers GE’s 14 networks — including NBC, Telemundo and Bravo — as well as its 10 NBC-owned TV stations. Advertisers who buy television commercials on those networks and television stations will have the option of adding an interactive component to those spots.

They can insert TiVo “tags” into television commercials that let viewers click on an icon when watching an ad to obtain more information about a product, the companies said. NBC Universal also purchased a ratings service from TiVo that provides second-by-second viewership ratings on television commercials”. Reuters.

Worlds are not born, they are created. This is just the beginning of ours. And yours. Welcome to EveryScape beta — where together the real world is being created, online. Says EveryScape.com

Nov 26, ‘07 — Anne Eisenberg of International Herald Tribune writes an in-depth article on EveryScape,  a website that provides 3-D-like tours.

Three-dimensional mapping programs like Google Earth let people fly over the rooftops of virtual cities, and other online services lead them down individual streets.

She further writes, “Now, one company is planning 3-D-like tours of Cambridge, Massachusetts, and other cities that not only venture down streets, but also inside some businesses. Tourists to this virtual Cambridge will be able to click their way along a Brattle Street rendered in realistic detail and move through the computer-generated interiors of dozens of nearby shops and institutions.

EveryScape in Waltham, Massachusetts, will start virtual tours of streets and businesses in Cambridge and Lexington, Massachusetts, in December, said Mok Oh, founder and chief technology officer of EveryScape.

So far, a limited number of street tours in Boston, New York, Miami Beach and Aspen, Colorado, can be seen on a beta version of EveryScape’s Web site.

EveryScape’s service may be attractive to companies that want to expand their online presence beyond a standard Web listing, said Denise Jillson, executive director of the Harvard Square Business Association.

Online visitors will be able to take the tour when they go to the Harvard Square Business Association site, www.harvardsquare.com. A preliminary version of the tour, already posted, lets visitors navigate local streets, but not the interiors of businesses.

The Harvard Square site is popular, Jillson said. It gets about 2 million hits a month, about 37,000 of them first-time visitors, up from about 1.3 million and 30,000 new visitors a year ago.” More at IHT.

AMSTERDAM, The Netherlands — Nov 26, ‘07 — Cisco announced today that Amsterdam ArenA, a premier multipurpose sporting and entertainment venue and home to AFC Ajax football club, has turned to Cisco to help make the famous stadium smarter.

With the deployment of Cisco Internet Protocol (IP) technology, the stadium is introducing several innovative services for the 2 million visitors it attracts each year. Visitors will be able to reserve seats from home, get access to real-time travel and parking information, and pay for tickets using their mobile phones. Spectators and sports fans can more easily access all stadium-related services and the organisation can deliver improved visitor service at every event.

Henk Markerink, director of the Amsterdam ArenA said: “The most important goal of the Amsterdam ArenA is to further improve the customer experience, which includes focusing even more closely on the entire service provision chain, from the moment the customer buys tickets, as they travel to the ArenA, the visit itself, to the time he or she is back at home and wants to book tickets again.

We aim to introduce the first services in the middle of next year.”

Integration with radio frequency identification (RFID) technology will make it possible to offer location-specific information to visitors as well.

Markerink added: “The Amsterdam ArenA depends strongly on its transport links. The public transport connections are perfect and the accessibility for motorists is fine, with four motorways nearby and parking for more than 11,000 vehicles. But if the area around the ArenA wants to grow further, then we need to improve mobility.

We also plan to send information to car navigation systems and mobile phones about the best route to take and where to park.”

Cisco has equipped a number of sporting arenas with similar intelligent networks, including the world-famous Bernabéu stadium in Madrid, the Allianz Arena in Munich, Ascot racecourse in the UK and the Misano racetrack in Italy. Thanks to a comparable ‘connected stadium’ infrastructure, the Amsterdam ArenA will be able to extend its reputation as a world-class multipurpose venue and business centre.”

Cisco technology to be deployed at Amsterdam ArenA includes Cisco Catalyst 3750 Series Switches, Catalyst 6500 Series Switches, Aironet wireless access points and CiscoWorks LAN Management Solution. More at Cisco.

 ATLANTA–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Oct 31, ‘07–Porsche today announced it has launched a new “Web Cinema” on its Web site that offers Porsche sports-car fans and admirers the ability to view extraordinary Porsche films. This new Web technology gives browsers a “virtual” front-row seat to experience much of what embodies Porsche’s legendary sports car driving. The site features rare product development documentaries, inside-the-factory research and even brings the auditory passion of Porsche to life with sounds of the famous engines from the German car maker.

All of this is now live on the Company’s Web site, Porsche Web Cinema.

“We are constantly seeking ways to connect consumers to our exciting world of races, rallies and sports car driving,” said David Pryor, vice president of marketing for Porsche Cars North America. “With the new web-cinema in place, viewers can feel a part of the action anytime; and the engine sounds truly are music to the ears of a true Porsche lover.”

October 31, ‘07 — A Web start-up, TokBox, wants to do for live video chats what YouTube did for video watching.  

Tokbox is a free service that lets you talk with your friends over live video. Here’s how it works: you sign up and we give you a link. When you want to talk with anyone, just give them the link - they click and you chat. Free video calling from any website. 

The company makes it easier for you to put your TokBox on your social network profile, blog, or personal webpage. Anyone can come to your page and see a “Push to Talk” button. They click it and connect to you in real time using live video and audio. 

TokBox features 

• Free video chat: No cost. No prepaid minutes. Really free
• No downloads: Talk through your browser. No chat client needed
• Any website: Embeddable on all websites and social networks
• Privacy control : You control who can see you and who can’t 

Several other services, including AOL’s AIM, Yahoo Messenger and Skype, allow live video chats but require that each party download the software and be online at the same time. On TokBox, if one party is not present, users can send a video mail message of up to five minutes in length that the other party can later retrieve at the site. TokBox

SAN FRANCISCO, Oct. 19, 2007 — Hundreds of industrial designers attending the Connecting’07 conference in San Francisco this week are experiencing the HP mscape software platform as they roam through the city’s neighborhoods playing Defenders of Design, a customized and highly interactive location-based mobile game created especially for the conference.mscape is a software suite that enables people to design, play and share “mediascapes” – location-based experiences, games and tours. Developed by HP Labs, the company’s central research facility, the technology has been used to recreate historical moments, bring a community’s stories to life and develop new ways of socializing, entertaining and learning.

Earlier this year, HP made the mscape authoring toolkit and mobile player software available via download from the community website, mscape, at no cost for non-commercial use on specific iPAQ models and other compatible handheld devices. The toolkit allows people to associate physical locations with digital media, such as video, music, images and text.

Defenders of Design was created by The GoGame, which produces and stages interactive participative team-building games for corporations and other groups. The group incorporated mscape’s location capabilities into the game, which supplies clues and other information that guide Connecting’07 participants to some of San Francisco’s premier design studios and through special missions that challenge their creativity.

“mscape is a great tool that opens new possibilities for the designers of our high-tech urban adventure,” said Finnegan Kelly, co-founder, The GoGame. “The mscape platform gives us the ability to integrate customized digital media that we can link to a specific location in our futuristic storyline. We can send fun facts about a design company just as players walk in the door of a studio, or a video containing an important clue before participants approach an undercover actor with a secret password.”

HP Labs offered the mscape platform to the public so consumers, gamers and designers could experience its capabilities and explore new uses for location-sensitive technologies. The mscape site hosts numerous ready-made mediascapes, which can be downloaded by anyone to use with a GPS-enabled HP iPAQ or other compatible handheld device running the Windows® Mobile operating system. The website provides everything people need to develop their own mediascapes, including training and tips to get started, and it encourages people to upload their mediascapes so others can enjoy them.

“mscape matches digital media with the physical world, providing an immersive and location-aware experience,” said Phil McKinney, vice president and chief technology officer, Personal Systems Group, HP. “Mobile devices will increasingly incorporate context and location awareness in the coming years, and mscape helps us better understand how associating digital media with physical locations can not only be fun and informative, but also useful in our personal and professional lives.”

More at HP, mscape

IRVINE, Calif., Oct. 17 /PRNewswire/ — Entrepreneurs with a multitude of questions on how to grow their companies can now ask the experts
directly on “Ask Entrepreneur,” a new online forum connecting business owners with a panel of Entrepreneur.com’s top business advisors. Right now, over 25 expert advisors on Ask Entrepreneur are responding to business owners’ burning questions on just about everything there is to know in the world of business. Advisors on the panel include experts on topics covering every aspect of business ownership and management, including Internet/e-commerce, sales and marketing, money and finance, employee management, advertising, technology, legal topics and business plans.

“Entrepreneur.com has always been the place to go for answers to virtually any question on how to start, grow or branch out with a
business,” says Dave Pomije, VP of site development at Entrepreneur. “With Ask Entrepreneur, we take this to the next level by bringing together a panel of top names to provide answers directly to the entrepreneurial community. This is a new and innovative way for us to continue meeting business owners’ changing needs.”

Entrepreneurs can post questions and get answers from any of the business advisors on Ask Entrepreneur by visiting http://www.askentrepreneur.com. Business owners can also search through hundreds of existing answers by browsing questions by topic, business advisor or most recent postings.

About Entrepreneur Media Inc.: Entrepreneur Media Inc. is the premier content provider for and about entrepreneurs. Our products engage and inspire every day with the advice, solutions and resources that fuel the bold and independent way entrepreneurs think.

More at PRNewsWire

AppleInsider is reporting on second Apple Force-Sensitive Display Patent. “If a recent series of patent filings with the United States Patent and Trademark Office is of any indication, Apple Inc. as early as next year could add force-sensitive detection to the repertoire of its fledgling multi-touch platform, AppleInsider believes.

On the heels of last week’s discovery of a patent titled “Force Imaging Input Device and System”, documents published for the first time on Thursday reveal a successive and similarly focused filing titled “Force and Location Sensitive Display.”

Originally submitted to the USPTO on May 9th of last year — about five weeks after the first — the patent request again describes today’s touchscreens and touchpads as limited by their relatively simple input, which track only the location of the finger or stylus on the surface.

A method of detecting the strength of the user’s input would add a new element of control, Apple again suggests. Such a device capable of providing both force and location detection would include “a first transparent substrate (having first and second sets of conductive traces oriented in a first direction), a second transparent substrate (having a third set of conductive traces oriented in a second direction) and a plurality of deformable members (e.g., rubber beads) arranged between the first and second transparent substrates.”

More at AppleInsider

According to Live-PR and Businesswire, ” has announced its dynamic new StarBoard FX Duo interactive whiteboard series that revolutionizes the education industry with new multi-touch interaction capabilities only possible with the unique combination of Hitachi Software’s durable whiteboard design and cutting-edge software technology.

Taking interaction to a whole new level for educators and corporate presenters alike, the StarBoard FX Duo allows control using multi-touch hand gestures, as well as use of the presenter’s finger, an electronic pen or any other object. “The ability to use two hands naturally creates a whole new interface for whiteboards and computers in the classroom,” explained Akira Nagamori, director of business development, Hitachi Software. “A teacher can bring a static diagram of a plant cell to life by zooming into detailed areas — just by spreading his or her two fingers apart, marking it up with vibrant inks, and then linking it to a free flash simulation on the internet.”

More at Live-PR and BusinessWire…