IMVU Launches 'Social Music Service' IMVU Music

This is exactly the kind of deals that virtual worlds need to be doing. Its a great move by the record companies, much better than them trying to do there own thing.

MVU Music offers members access to music from the major music labels EMI, Sony BMG, Warner and Universal, as well as a selection of independen music distributors such as IODA, Redeye, GetUPlayed, Tunecore, Iris, Song and artists from CDBaby. In total, IMVU Music has launched with over one million songs in its catalog.

IMVU members can also purchase DRM-free downloads of songs from the catalog, so they can listen to the songs on a wide range of devices, including iPod and MP3 players."

And they now add another revenue stream to their business model.

IMVU HERE

SPIL hits 100 million

SPIL Games has announced that it has cemented its position as the world’s second most popular casual games network, with official stats from Google Analytics showing that its monthly unique user count now reaches 100 million.

The network boasts over 50 targeted sites worldwide in a number of territories including the UK, The Netherlands, Germany, France, Russia, Turkey, North America and Brazil. Its portals are targeted towards specific segments of the casual market, and include the likes of Games.co.uk, Mygames.co.uk and Girlsgogames.co.uk."

spillgames

3 Rings launch whirled

Its flash, its accessible, its great looking and its fun.

Three rings have launched a portal that offers a host of games. The format is not dissimilar from other community game portals like Boonty & Kongregate but its well presented and has a great feel about it. I see these kinds of portals as a next generation on the addicting games type of website, it has virtual world elements and flavors of MMO's. The community aspect is also very apparent, so the social element is mixed in with the game play.

And you even get to help digitize old books when you register as they use the recapture system.

play now

Varbeck leaves EA in restructure

No surprises that EA would be restructuring especially after laying off the number of staff they did. Varbeck leaves EA as the company restructures

The Sims label to be a new Sims and Casual label.

Varbeck who also headed up the POGO.com portal is perusing opportunities outside of the publisher. Good luck Cathy.

Its a real shame as the casual industry really needs more women so lets hope she stays in Casual.

Telegraph launches casual games channel

The Daily Telegraph has launched a casual games channel. 2 years ago I predicted that large media companies and TV studios would end up offering a casual channel like SKY, FOX, virgin, NBC etc...I also think that telecoms companies and airlines will probably follow. Casual gaming channels will become a standard channel embedded in media offerings....However I think the telegraphs offering is well done.

The good thing about this site is its doing its own thing its not a copy but actually offers lovers of crosswords an online destination to play the favorites that they may find in the paper. They have added to that some good gaming community features. I imagine they will leverage their readers and it could grow from there.

Telegraph games

The gaming press are reporting this as a casual games channel and on reading the headline you sort of expect to find bejeweled or other casual favorites at the destination....but it does show you how broad the genera is....and based on how things are moving the question comes up is there such a thing as casual or core gamer....may be there are just gamers....

Games to outsell Music and Video

UK sales of video games and hardware will surpass spending on music and video for the first time, a report suggests. The BBC News has the story.

It predicts spending on games will rise by 42% to £4.64bn in 2008, with sales on music and video at £4.46bn.

Full Story here

19% of mobile consumers in U.S. now using smartphones, according to study

According to the “Mobile Market View” study released today by The Kelsey Group, 18.9% of mobile consumers in the United States are now toting smartphones, with 49.2% planning to pick one up within the next two years.