One of the side effects of taking a strong interest in this years Presidential election is that I've become very well acquainted with MSNBC (both on television and the interwebs) - my personal choice for political coverage. There are a number of reasons for this, two of which include Chuck Todd's awesomeness and the fact that I can't stand hearing "the best political team on television" from the CNN folks every 15 seconds. But none of those reasons, interestingly enough, had anything to do with technology.
So it has come as a somewhat unexpected surprise to find out that a network I prefer for totally unrelated reasons is also putting their hand in the same cookie jar I delve into for this blog. Metaphorically speaking. I think.
It all started a few months back when MSNBC offered up a subtle but very interesting feature to their website - the ability to easily embed their video footage in your blog. The concept, which has become commonplace thanks to services like Youtube, is not revolutionary. What makes it noteworthy is that its coming from a major news outlet, and signals what I hope to be an exciting change in the mentality of the powers that be. Obviously that is an overly altruistic mentality - news organizations, like any business, are out to make money. You don't need to be a Fortune 500 CEO to understand that this move is about building loyalty among a young (relatively speaking), digitally fluent audience who makes up a large chunk of MSNBC's demographic. But regardless of the motivation, it is a welcome addition that makes it easy to discuss important issues in whatever personal venue someone might feel comfortable. And for a little example, ZOMG DEADLIEST CATCH IS MAKING A VIDEO GAME. I'm a smidge concerned about its quality (year and a half dev time?), but you better believe I'm going to rent it =)
Now embeddable video is nice and all, but news is still news. More often than not its dry. Its bland. And even with the addition of digital media, its not like its fun... not like its a game or something. Oh fiddlesticks...
And with that beautiful use of the word fiddlesticks, dear friends, I bring you the MSNBC Arcade - and with it, an opportunity to make a game of the latest headlines. Currently, there are only two games in the arcade. Newsbreaker has been out for probably about a year, and is essentially Pong. NewsBlaster, which was recently released is just like one of those match the color, Tetris style puzzlers that I can't remember the name of. Both games are easy, casual, quick hitters that work by a very simple principle of "liberating" news headlines as you play. The headlines you earn are then stored in a little sidebar. If a headline looks interesting, just roll over it, click it, and it will pause your game and open the story in a new window. Here is a shot of Newsblaster in case words make you uncomfortable and nervous.
Hmm. Digital media. Check. Games. Check. I'm starting to get those warm and fuzzies. But in the spirit of Emeril, you best believe we still have notches to kick it up to!
So lets talk a little social networking. Because the thing about Newsblaster is that you can also play it through Facebook. And when you do, you notice some interesting things. To the picture-mobile!
We'll start with the fact that score lists are always a good thing - because don't we all want to rub our friends noses in the fact that we are better at news ... playing... than they are? But more importantly, because its in Facebook, Newsblaster knows who those friends are which makes for a more meaningful ranking. I, as you can see, am infinitely awesome ;-)
From here, you can choose to share the game with friends, or if you prefer, just let the wonders of viral social distribution do the work for you.
So do these games work? After playing for 10 minutes, could I rattle off all of todays top headlines? No, I won't say I can, but then again thats not really the point, is it? I can name three or four of todays headlines - three or four more than I could have before I started playing. And perhaps more importantly I can do it without reading through the paper or suffering through the local news broadcast. I wouldnt go so far as to say that Newsbreaker and Newsblaster were the most fun casual games I've ever played. But they were fun enough to happily spend a few minutes playing, and because of it, they were able to impart upon me a bit of news. A bit of education, if you will.
In the end, its not about Newsblaster. Its not about the embeddable video clips. Its not about other social features like "IM this Article" or "Rate this Article". The point of all of this is that MSNBC has build out a case study in speaking the language of your potential demographic. News still might not be the most exciting thing in the world and the walled gardens of information have not completely crumbled. But its nice to see that MSNBC has been willing to take a chance with less traditional ways of conveying information to people.
Education anyone? Story at 11.
So it has come as a somewhat unexpected surprise to find out that a network I prefer for totally unrelated reasons is also putting their hand in the same cookie jar I delve into for this blog. Metaphorically speaking. I think.
It all started a few months back when MSNBC offered up a subtle but very interesting feature to their website - the ability to easily embed their video footage in your blog. The concept, which has become commonplace thanks to services like Youtube, is not revolutionary. What makes it noteworthy is that its coming from a major news outlet, and signals what I hope to be an exciting change in the mentality of the powers that be. Obviously that is an overly altruistic mentality - news organizations, like any business, are out to make money. You don't need to be a Fortune 500 CEO to understand that this move is about building loyalty among a young (relatively speaking), digitally fluent audience who makes up a large chunk of MSNBC's demographic. But regardless of the motivation, it is a welcome addition that makes it easy to discuss important issues in whatever personal venue someone might feel comfortable. And for a little example, ZOMG DEADLIEST CATCH IS MAKING A VIDEO GAME. I'm a smidge concerned about its quality (year and a half dev time?), but you better believe I'm going to rent it =)
Now embeddable video is nice and all, but news is still news. More often than not its dry. Its bland. And even with the addition of digital media, its not like its fun... not like its a game or something. Oh fiddlesticks...
And with that beautiful use of the word fiddlesticks, dear friends, I bring you the MSNBC Arcade - and with it, an opportunity to make a game of the latest headlines. Currently, there are only two games in the arcade. Newsbreaker has been out for probably about a year, and is essentially Pong. NewsBlaster, which was recently released is just like one of those match the color, Tetris style puzzlers that I can't remember the name of. Both games are easy, casual, quick hitters that work by a very simple principle of "liberating" news headlines as you play. The headlines you earn are then stored in a little sidebar. If a headline looks interesting, just roll over it, click it, and it will pause your game and open the story in a new window. Here is a shot of Newsblaster in case words make you uncomfortable and nervous.
Hmm. Digital media. Check. Games. Check. I'm starting to get those warm and fuzzies. But in the spirit of Emeril, you best believe we still have notches to kick it up to!
So lets talk a little social networking. Because the thing about Newsblaster is that you can also play it through Facebook. And when you do, you notice some interesting things. To the picture-mobile!
We'll start with the fact that score lists are always a good thing - because don't we all want to rub our friends noses in the fact that we are better at news ... playing... than they are? But more importantly, because its in Facebook, Newsblaster knows who those friends are which makes for a more meaningful ranking. I, as you can see, am infinitely awesome ;-)From here, you can choose to share the game with friends, or if you prefer, just let the wonders of viral social distribution do the work for you.
So do these games work? After playing for 10 minutes, could I rattle off all of todays top headlines? No, I won't say I can, but then again thats not really the point, is it? I can name three or four of todays headlines - three or four more than I could have before I started playing. And perhaps more importantly I can do it without reading through the paper or suffering through the local news broadcast. I wouldnt go so far as to say that Newsbreaker and Newsblaster were the most fun casual games I've ever played. But they were fun enough to happily spend a few minutes playing, and because of it, they were able to impart upon me a bit of news. A bit of education, if you will.
In the end, its not about Newsblaster. Its not about the embeddable video clips. Its not about other social features like "IM this Article" or "Rate this Article". The point of all of this is that MSNBC has build out a case study in speaking the language of your potential demographic. News still might not be the most exciting thing in the world and the walled gardens of information have not completely crumbled. But its nice to see that MSNBC has been willing to take a chance with less traditional ways of conveying information to people.
Education anyone? Story at 11.
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