E3, E3, E3, oh and E3. Let's get to the Geek News that's E3 . .. and beyond.
Career:
Small improvements add up in your career. Some good advice for those of you feeling your life is improving too slowly.
Thinking you can't change careers? A look at some myths holding you back.
Be cool and catch up on Goldman Sachs Facts with this infographic and data dump. Mmmmm, fast knowledge delivered pretty!
Social Media:
AOL sells Bebo. Unhappy the news is leaked. So I guess we're making them more unhappy reposting this. The sale isn't closed, and speculation it's part of an overal plan of AOL to sell itself. Of course AOL is also heading for a content service, so I'm wondering just what their plan is – if there's just one.
Interesting. Socialtext wants to help integrate social features into existing enterprise applications. This sounds pretty neat, as it'd leverage people's knowledge of those applications and social media.
Ning partners with CafePress, Heyzap to offer shops and games in their social networks. Still not quite sure Ning is going to pull this off after their big move-to-pay, but it's at least an attempt – I just don't feel they can survive after annoying so many users.
Technology:
Stealth Startup Affirmed Network raises nearly eleven million dollars in investments. Not much data on them, but they're in the Boston area, which is rather geektastic, so hey, get a resume ready . . .
Thoughts from the creator of Google news (and the writer) on how journalism will change in the next five years. It's a lite article, but has some things to think about.
Also Microsoft Office 2010 is out and . . . almost no one seems to care. Honestly, there's surprisingly few articles on it, I couldn't even find one that seemed worth reading.
Television:
Test CGI for a Blue Beetle TV series. Has a Sentai/Rider feel to it, might work out – certainly looks good just in tests, and the character has new appreciation thanks to Batman: Brave and the Bold.
Video:
Wow. Youtube adds in-browser video editing tools. Simple, yes, but I've seen people do amazing stuff with simple. Beyond the technical achievements, note that this further empowers users – which in turn builds brand loyalty. Wonder if they'll let you re-download the clip in a preferred format afterwards . . .
Video Games:
Kotaku does a roundup of E3 Day One so you can catch up on everything. Penny Arcade has a more humorous, NSFW summation here. With so much news, we'll be covering the geek-career highlights here.
Best Buy at Gamestop let you pre-order Playstation Move. That was fast. Of course they figure it's a good thing and they want in on it – and want to ride the E3 wave. Now about that PS3 surround sound . . .
Microsoft Disses 3D gaming, notes its more for the future. I have to agree, especially when you see the price tag to play PS3 3D – ouch. Then again that's Sony and it's throw-it-at-the-wall strategy. Gives us an idea of where Microsoft is NOT going (and if you're interested in 3D games, who you may be making them for).
SquareEnix ups their interest in western RPGs: they own the Dungeon Siege franchise outright now. It seems to me SquareEnix's interests obviously lie in the West as much as possible, and they're working to get the properties they need.
QUESTION OF THE DAY: AOL will inevitably be bought. Who do you think is the best candidate?
– Steven Savage