Gather ’round, children, and let me tell you a story about the old bugaboo we used to call DRM. Digital Rights Management was the beast under every gamer’s bed in the mid-2000s, an invisible bit of software baked into game discs that dictated and tracked player behavior under the guise of preventing piracy. DRM software, like SecuROM, limited the times a game could be downloaded and forced players to regularly connect to the internet for authentication checks, at a time when less than half of American adults had reliable broadband connections. DRM features soured the releases of BioShock, Mass Effect and Spore, and by 2010, anti-piracy software had rendered Assassin’s Creed 2 and Splinter-Cell: Conviction unplayable. When Microsoft attempted to release the Xbox One with always-on DRM features in 2013, intense vitriol from fans forced the company to reverse its plans at the 11th hour. There were lawsuits. DRM was a curse word. Meanwhile, Valve was building out Steam. When it landed in 2003, the digital PC storefront was designed to streamline the patch process for games like Counter-Strike and make it easier for Valve to implement anti-piracy and anti-cheat measures. Steam was made to be a DRM machine. In 2004, with the release of Half-Life 2, Valve made Steam a requirement for every player, and even those who’d purchased new, physical copies of the game had to boot up the launcher first. There was some low-level grumbling, but PC players were used to being lab rats, and... Continue reading at 'Engadget'
[ Engadget | 2024-03-04 16:30:21 UTC ]
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Shachar Orren, co-founder and Chief Marketing Officer, EX.CO In recent years, Meta, TikTok, Twitch and even Pinterest have encouraged digital publishers to create vertical content to adhere to their platforms’ standards for engagement driven by our vertical mobile device screens. In response,... Continue reading at Digiday
[ Digiday | 2023-10-24 13:02:04 UTC ]
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In the lead-up to this year's Esports Business and Gaming Summit, the event's organizers polled 112 North American gaming and esports executives about their thoughts on the industry’s current trajectory, representing a cross-section of executives in sectors including broadcasting and media,... Continue reading at Digiday
[ Digiday | 2023-10-24 04:01:00 UTC ]
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Guest of Honor Slovenia kicks off its professional program at the Frankfurt Book Fair with a presentation of Ljubjana Reading Manifesto. The post Frankfurt: Ljubljana Reading Manifesto Rallies Book Industry appeared first on Publishing Perspectives. Continue reading at Publishing Perspectives
[ Publishing Perspectives | 2023-10-18 15:10:08 UTC ]
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Following a July slump, book sales were up 8.5% in August at the 1,233 publishers that supply data to AAP’s StatShot program. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2023-10-17 04:00:00 UTC ]
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New York Comic Con held an exhausting yet exhilarating annual celebration of comics and pop culture October 12–15, where new imprints, partnerships, and plenty of dealmaking took place alongside cosplay, massive manga character balloons, and immersive activations. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2023-10-17 04:00:00 UTC ]
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The world of ants is a mysterious one, as we’re still learning new stuff about the most populous insect on Earth. Soon we’ll be able to get a more hands-on approach with everyone’s favorite picnic-ruiners, thanks to the forthcoming insect sim Empire of the Ants. The... Continue reading at Engadget
[ Engadget | 2023-10-13 19:10:34 UTC ]
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Cable used to be the only game in town for wide entertainment. Sure, if you wanted to subscribe to a game like EverQuest or World of Warcraft, you could (and well, guess the rest of us were never seeing you again). But for variety, cable is what you had—and it wasn’t cheap. So when... Continue reading at PC World
[ PC World | 2023-10-04 14:10:27 UTC ]
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Author Walter Isaacson joined the L.A. Times Book Club to discuss the stories and controversy behind his bestselling "Elon Musk" biography. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2023-10-02 18:53:46 UTC ]
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The company is also selling and spinning off some of its divisions as the video game industry faces cutbacks. Epic Games, maker of the smash hit Fortnite, isn’t immune to the troubles of the video game industry. The publisher announced Thursday it was laying off 16% of its staff, which works... Continue reading at Fast Company
[ Fast Company | 2023-09-28 14:15:00 UTC ]
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Writing literary fiction is a freeing thing—there are no rules, there is just a story waiting to be told. When I started writing my first novel, The Theory of Flight, I knew that I wanted it be a character-driven story that explored difficult social and political terrain in order to reveal... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2023-09-27 08:45:38 UTC ]
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During the Digiday Publishing Summit, execs from companies including Condé Nast, Dotdash Meredith and Thomson Reuters assessed the industry's readiness. Continue reading at Digiday
[ Digiday | 2023-09-25 04:01:00 UTC ]
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Authors have entered a war over words with OpenAI for using their books as ‘training’ feedstockBattles between human and artificial intelligence are no longer science fiction. The strikes in Hollywood led by the united guilds of actors and screenwriters have a common, intangible enemy: the... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2023-09-23 15:03:31 UTC ]
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Book manufacturers gathered recently in New York to take stock of the sector in the wake of the pandemic, and to look to the future. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2023-09-22 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Book sales fell 10.9% in July at the 1,233 publishers that supply data to AAP’s StatShot program. Sales of adult books dropped 4.6%, and children's/young adult book sales declined 10.7%. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2023-09-19 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Publishers of interactive formats extend key franchises with exciting new titles and products. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2023-09-01 04:00:00 UTC ]
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If one thing kept me coming back (and back) to Homeworld, it was skirmish mode. Setting up a quick (“quick”) battle against the CPU would often rob me of a whole weekend while at college. Homeworld 3 sees a new mode arrive on the second sequel, a roguelike-inspired multiplayer co-op called War... Continue reading at Engadget
[ Engadget | 2023-08-25 15:30:05 UTC ]
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Joan Meyer, who died a day after raid, shouted at six officers who searched her home in incident that has drawn national scrutinyNewly released video shows the 98-year-old mother of a Kansas newspaper publisher confronting police officers as they searched her home in a raid that has drawn... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2023-08-22 23:04:32 UTC ]
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Consolidation was supposed to be books’ biggest threat. Is private equity worse? Continue reading at Slate
[ Slate | 2023-08-11 14:00:00 UTC ]
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Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow overtook titles by David Walliams and Colleen Hoover to become the UK’s number one bestseller. The author, booksellers and fans reflect on how it became a literary phenomenonTomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow’s distinctive cover, with its image of Hokusai’s... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2023-08-11 10:00:35 UTC ]
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Book publisher Simon & Schuster's sale to investment firm KKR is novel in many ways, but also part of a long-term trend. History tells us to expect the unexpected. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2023-08-08 17:35:35 UTC ]
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