XplanaZine

Here’s our take on news that matters for Monday, March 20. Today’s theme is Magic Monday , and here are a some links to headlines about technology that is changing the way we live and learn.

• Gaming — It’s not just the big games that bring in the cash. Last year, 5 million to 6 million American mobile-phone subscribers downloaded at least one game a month. Also, if you want to take a look at the subtle blurring between real life and fantasy in the video game market, check out Wired magazines report on
  href=”http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.03/lafuga.html”>’La Fuga’ (The Escape). “You overcome physical and mental challenges to escape a prison. Not just any live-action role playing game, this one is run in a $20 million facility in Madrid. A networked PDA and RFID tag keep you in touch while you play. The company is now building a 30,000-square-foot game center at 49th and Broadway in New York City.”

• Blogging, Podcasting, and Vodcasting — As a sign that blogging and podcasting are all about content, Podtech has raised $5.5 million to create the “NPR of podcasting”.
  Podtech’s Furrier is just a person who started doing regular podcasts. Now, “We’re a media company dedicated to podcasting,” he says. “We’re not trying to build a network, or aggregate. We’re just trying to create content.”
• Handhelds – In a European contest, music groups are vying for mobile success. Fifteen aspiring bands are bidding to have a song released on a national mobile phone network in the US before they even have a record deal. They have been selected from a total of 4,033 entrants in a contest being held by US mobile operator Verizon Wireless and online community service MySpace.com. Goodbye American Idol and hello MySpace.And now, mobile users can access a special version of Mobile Wikipedia. thanks to New Zealand-based company Instinct. And, in news for the rest of us, NBC has announce that it will air Web-only episodes of The Office this summer in an effort to gain a wider support base for the show. Even better, they will air some new episodes on the Web that have not been seen on traditional TV.
• Social Networks – So, social networks are all about making friends and being nice, right? Wrong! Check out Nemester, a social networking site that
  that connects paranoids, egotists, villains, and monomaniacs through networks of competing agendas and incompatible ideologies for bitter conflicts, mutual loathing, or to find their one, true nemesis. Also, Yahoo continues to ads more personalization to its portal. Now the Web giant is allowing users to add local news. Finally, check out Kathy Sierra’s take on Web 2.0. “More and more, the Web 2.0 and Blog world feels like a highly-scaleable, web-enabled way to peek into more medicine cabinets. And it’s even sucking the slightly elicit fun out of that now that we’re all encouraged to Share. Where’s the mystery? Where’s the excitement that comes from not knowing everything? Is the (metaphorical) allure of the strip-tease gone forever?”
• Technology Talks — IBM’s Magic Book voice recorder is more than just another pretty recorder. It records and offers a variety of searching options including time range, keywords or even a
  person’s voice. All of this is done thanks to advanced voice-recognition
  technology. And, e-book readers are back in vogue. And, first, we had Sony’s new device and now we have news of iRex’s new iLiad reader. This e-ink device has lots of memory and also boasts over a week of three-hour-a-day reading sessions are possible
  between charges. The company promises to expand upon the PDF, XHTML, TXT, and MP3
  formats that will supported at launch. Finally, if you haven’t been keeping up with SXSW action, read Jackson West’s full summary.