As per  Eliot Mizrachi of MarketWire, “Since their inception in 1994, the ESRB ratings have become a trusted resource for parents when choosing computer and video games. In April 2007, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) released a report(1) which found that nine in ten parents are aware of the ESRB ratings, 87% expressed satisfaction, and nearly three quarters use them regularly when choosing games for their children.”

I am very pleased that ESRB has released this application for the iPhone. I actually find myself, more and more, going to the ESRB site or using the ESRB widget to look up game ratings. The app offers instant access to ESRB’s Ratings Guide and access to the over 18, 000 reviewed game titles. Which means, if you want to make certain that a game is age appropriate – you can quickly search for the game and get back ESRB ratings results. This is also helpful when you are not certain what the game Content Descriptors mean – for example “Comic Mischief” or “Lyrics.”

ESRB is not forgetting about those dads/parents who do not have iPhone’s. If you happen to fall into that category then you can access ESRB mobile from your web enabled phone - m.esrb.org.

The interface is what you would expect from ESRB – clean and simple. You have three options:

1. Search
2. Home
3. Ratings Guide

Moving between screens is a bit slow but let’s just blame the appalling AT&T network, for that one. I have a couple of concerns with the user interface (UI) – text is small and some of the buttons are small and too close to each other. There appears to be enough real estate so the text and buttons could be larger. This would make the UI more user-friendly. Honestly, these concerns are superficial and I have been recommending, to all my iPhone carrying dads, that they need to get this (free) app, sooner than later.

Photo credit: New York Times

WordCampNYC was last weekend. It was held at Baruch College – William and Anita Newman Vertical Campus. I had no expectations since it was my first WordCamp. I have to say that I was very pleased. The Conference was broken up into eight tracks (or sessions). I attended the Blogger Track. There were a great many topics covered from the very first session on Lifestreaming – presented by Erin Blaskie to Media Attention – presented by Michelle Leder. Two of my favorite presenters were Adria Richards and Corey Eulas.

Adria was my 1000th Twitter follower which was rather cool. We had a few laughs about it. In any event, Adria had two sessions 1. Borrow, Buy or Build and 2. Blueprint for Small Business. I enjoyed both sessions but Borrow, Buy or Build was my favorite – it covered WordPress Themes and whether you should use:

1. Free Themes
2. Commercial Themes
3. Custom Themes

Adria made the distinction that Free Themes are great because they are free but that support was poor at best; limited to Forum support in most cases. She continued to explain that Commercial Themes are those themes that you purchase – these have a structured support model but you should always ask for references. Lastly, Adria stated that Custom Themes are themes that require a developer/designer – always ask for references and customizations normally run from $200 to $6, 000. One of the most important pieces of advice she imparted was – always have a contract for Commercial and Custom Themes. This will set expectations and protect Intellectual Property (IP).

Corey Eulas covered SEO in his session. The session was 45 minutes long and as you may have already surmised, that is not nearly long enough to cover any SEO topic in great detail. With that said Corey did a wonderful job in covering the main topics and giving a broad overview of the SEO basics. He touched on topics like the importance of having a H1 and H2 Tag, that the  ”Google SEO 101 Guide” is a must read and that most readers don’t read below the fold.

Sunday wrapped up the WordCamp 2009 Conference. The majority of the conference were presentation lighting rounds. There were dozens of presentations but in my opinion these four were the best:

1. BuddyPress
2. WordPress MU
3. Elastic Theme
4. Press This

Well that is it folks. As I mentioned in the title – this was my first WordCamp and I really enjoyed myself. I learned more than I ever thought I would learn, the speakers where great, the location was good and the WordPress NYC folks did a very nice job in keeping these two days feature rich and smooth running. I can’t wait for next years WordCampNYC.

In the meantime, if you are interested in WordPress you don’t have to wait until next year. The WordPressNYC group meets monthly. They will be taking the month of December off. When they return in January, WordPressNYC will have a new home at Sun headquarters in NY.

Last note WordPress 2.9 should be out  sometime December.

“All consumers should know that piracy is illegal and that modifying their Xbox 360 console violates the Xbox Live terms of use, will void their warranty and result in a ban from Xbox Live,” Microsoft said in a statement on Wednesday.

The timing of this announcement corresponds with the release of “Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.” This is one of the most anticipated Xbox games of the year. COD is a very profitable franchise for Microsoft and means big sales during the holidays; as such Microsoft is coming down hard on pirated copies. This is self evident by the actions Microsoft took this week. They explained that anywhere between 600,000 and 1 million players who use Microsoft’s Xbox Live gaming service will be cut off from the service. Why? Because gamers have modified their 360 or played games that were illegally downloaded from file-sharing sites, according to Microsoft.

In its Xbox Live “Terms of Use” Microsoft says that players are to use “only authorized software and hardware to access the Service,” and that they agree that their software and hardware “have not been modified in any unauthorized way.” Microsoft takes piracy and hardware modifications very seriously. I understand the consumer argument “but it’s my 360.” In Microsoft’s defense – we are using their services so we have to play by their rules.

Photo credit: Dimitris Kritsotakis

I  have lived in NYC all of my 38 years. I love this city. I love the summer most. This is when NYC comes to life. Between the block parties, festivals, summer concerts, restaurants and site seeing – it’s very difficult in deciding where to spend your time. Even for a seasoned New Yorker – let alone a visitor. This is the primary reason that I have become such a fan of Yelp and HopStop. These are two invaluable services that anyone in NYC is hard pressed to live without.

Yelp is a service that not only allows you to post reviews on restaurants, parks and other attractions but you can ask where to get the best Mojito and someone will respond. Just the other day, I was looking for a near by park to hangout with the family. I pulled up Yelp on my iPhone. I found that we were close Washington Square Park so we headed over and enjoyed the beautiful day.

HopStop is truly a gem of a service. If you have spent any time in NYC you will quickly notice that driving is not a good idea. NYC is best traveled by mass transit but with so many trains and stops, how do you figure it all out? Even if you were born and raised here – it does not mean that you are an expert. HopStop solves that problem – just enter your current location and destination and HopStop does the rest. Just the other day I was heading to physical therapy for the first time. I had no clue where this place was. I pulled up HopStop and I got there in no time.

So in whatever manner you travel NYC, one thing is for certain – there is allot to do in this town and we can all use a little help in getting around.

Hulu was started in 2007 and at launch it had no content and no viewership. In October of 2007 it then engaged in a private beta and finally in 2008 it launched into a public beta. Hulu in a very short period of time has made a significant impact on video distribution. According to comScore, 28 million people watched content on Hulu, during the month of July.

To put this into some perspective – according to comScore, for the month of July,  ComCast viewership was 62 million and Time Warner came in at 34 million. Google by far is king of this New Media space with a July viewership of 8.9 billion.

So should Old Media be scared? Not yet! The problem is that content providers still make considerable revenue from traditional media distribution. Platforms like Hulu and Google still make little revenue from video distribution. I don’t see this imbalance lasting long. There just needs to be a revenue model that makes sense for content providers to make the leap over to the dark side.

Now Hulu is absolutely free. There are essentially two ways to enjoy Hulu – from your web browser or Hulu Desktop. I am a fan of just watching Hulu on my browser but the Hulu Desktop has a very slick interface; it’s worth the download. Hulu has content from NBC, Fox, ABC, AOL, MSN, MySpace, Facebook, Yahoo!, and Comcast’s fancast.com. There is plenty of content some of which is available in HD. Unfortunately, there are commercials but you are given the length of time the commercial will run. So you can always step away and be back in 30 seconds and no, you can’t fast forward through the commercials. Hulu does give you some very nice options. You can play, pause, fast forward and rewind. You can also embed and share videos – great if you have a personal blog. There is just a rich set of features the Hulu offers – that enhance your viewing experience.

I am a big fan of the ABC show – Defying gravity. I enjoy the fact that, at my leisure, I can watch Defying Gravity whenever and wherever I want. I am always carrying my Mac Book so as long as I have an Internet connection – I can watch my favorite shows. One odd thing that I have found is that although I am not a fan of the ABC show – Lost, I find myself watching it on Hulu. Nope, I am not sure why but I guess it really does not matter.

So instead of me writing about it go check it out for yourself and enjoy.

Photo Credit: TinyPio Photo Share