PopCap Launches Solitaire Blitz

This week, PopCap Games announced the launch of Solitaire Blitz, their social twist on one of the world’s most popular card games. The aquatically themed social card game debuted in February through a gradual beta launch before becoming available to the entire Facebook user base four days ago.

“We’ve taken the world’s most well-known card game and created an exciting new social version using PopCap’s incredibly popular time-based Blitz mechanic made famous by Bejeweled Blitz and Zuma Blitz,” said Scott Willoughby, marketing manager for PopCap Games. “We’ve evolved a traditionally solitary pastime into a friendly, shared experience that’s fun for all ages.”

PopCap Games is a leading developer, publisher and operator of video games. Based in Seattle, Washington, PopCap was founded in 2000, was acquired by Electronic Arts in 2011, and has a worldwide staff of more than 600 people in Seattle, San Francisco, Vancouver, B.C., Dublin, Seoul, Shanghai and Tokyo. PopCap's games have been downloaded over 1.5 billion times by consumers worldwide, and its flagship franchise, Bejeweled, has sold more than 50 million units.

Become A Character in Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception

Sony is offering the chance for one lucky Irish person to be a part of gaming history and create their own character in Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception for PlayStation3.

In 'Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception' the game characters are not just animations, they're played by real actors, acting out the scenes in a performance capture studio. Sony is offering the chance to be part of Uncharted history and become a playable game character through a new competition launching this Friday 9th March on the Sony Ireland Facebook fan page - The Uncharted Audition by Sony!

However, not only will the winner get to create their own in-game multi-player character, but they will get to do it in L.A. while also meeting the Naughy Dog Inc. creative team behind the game. The winner will also get the unique opportunity to experience the behind-the-scenes of motion capture.

To win, competition entrants will partake in a series of three challenges to prove they have what is takes to be as good as Nathan Drake.

The three challenges which include:
‘Name like Nathan Drake’, creating a compelling name for themselves as an action hero
‘Move like Nathan Drake’, submitting a video of themselves demonstrating their moves and agility
‘Act like Nathan Drake, recording a voiceover to a muted game scene, testing their creativity and voice acting skills

From across Europe, there will be 10 finalists selected to compete at a live event in L.A, where one lucky winner will be chosen to win the grand prize of a trip to the Naughty Dog Inc. studios to be a part of gaming history and leave their legacy in the

The competition opens this Friday 9th March and closes on Sunday 18th March at 24:00 GMT.

The Appys Launch App of the Month

Today, The Appys announced their new plans for ongoing monthly activity throughout the year. In conjunction with Newstalk Breakfast The Appys will now be running 'App of the Month'.

What this means is that each month they will be appointing a guest judge and asking their App development community to submit their work. Entry will be by the same simple process as The Appys themselves and each monthly winner will be featured on Newstalk Breakfast, www.newstalk.ie, Digital Times and all the Appys and Digital Times Social Media Platforms.

The monthly winners will be also be entered into the main Appys competition and get a specially-engraved App of the Month Trophy.

For more information see here.

Coca-Cola Launches Move to the Beat London

Last week, Mark Ronson and Katy B unveiled a giant 25m wide, 10m tall new piece of urban art right in the center of London in the shadow of the Olympic Stadium. The artwork marks the launch of Coca-Cola's Move to the Beat campaign and their London Olympic sponsorship. It was created by Neil Edward, Hadley Ever and Smug, and is situated in Hackney, East London. The Beat Wall, as the piece of art is known, tells the story of how the sounds of sport and music were fused together by Mark Ronson with lyrics and vocals by Katy B, to create the official Coca-Cola song for the Olympic Games.

The song, Anywhere in the World, will provide the soundtrack for mobile and digital platforms and all Coca-Cola events during the games. The Beat Wall is the visual dramatisation of how Mark Ronson travelled the world searching for the inspiration to create it, while meeting young athletes and recording the sounds of their sport to use in the song. The campaign itself is Coca-Cola’s global campaign, focused on teens, to celebrate the beat of London 2012. The campaign ambition is to bring teens closer to the Olympic Games by encouraging their passion for music, and drawing inspiration from London’s musical heritage.

“As the longest continuous supporter of the Olympic Games Movement, our ambition at Coca-Cola is to bring teens closer to the Games and to sport in general,” said Sanjay Guha, Marketing and Olympic Games Director for North West Europe & Nordics. “The Move to the Beat™ campaign is all about bringing the Olympic Games to life in a way that engages a teen audience, bringing the social side of the Olympic Games to teens everywhere by tapping into their passion for sport and music live online and providing access to fantastic content via Track the Beat.”

The unveiling of the Beat Wall also marked the launch of the Beat Facebook app and the Move to the Beat television commercial. The Track the Beat app engages teens by encouraging them to ‘collect beats’ through Facebook to gain access to exclusive content and prizes. Teens will be able to discover the beats that feature in the Move to the Beat song, download wallpapers and screen savers of imagery from the wall. The Move to the Beat TV ad, which features the song, will be broadcast globally and sees Mark Ronson and Katy B performing alongside some of the international athletes whose sporting sounds have been used to provide the beat of the track.

The athletes whose sounds form the beat of the track and whose images appear on the wall, are:
Darius Knight, 21, table tennis player from Great Britain
David Oliver, 29, 110m hurdler from the United States
Kseniya Vdovina, 24, 400m sprinter from Russia
Dayyan Jaffar, 17, archer from Singapore
Maria Espinoza, 23, taekwondo athlete from Mexico

'Paid Owned Earned: maximizing marketing returns in a socially connected world'

Yesterday I got an email from Nick Burcher about his new book. Nick describes the book, 'Paid Owned Earned: maximizing marketing returns in a socially connected world', as an "exploration of the different aspects of Paid Owned Earned and how everything links together - with the text split into individual chapters around 'Listening', 'Community Management and Content Hubs', 'Content', 'Optimization', 'Seeding and Distribution', 'Broadcast', 'Performance', 'Responding' and 'Measurement'".

He goes on to say, "[that] Paid, Owned, Earned is about the complexity of media channels confronting brands, agencies and advertisers. With a multitude of case studies and original thinking it provides a clear framework on how best to approach the fragmented media landscape."

I was absolutely delighted to find out that Nick has released a free editorial sampler featuring excerpts about linking paid owned and earned media together as well as an exploration of how TV and social can be linked.

Paid Owned Earned by Nick Burcher


The full book blurb:
“The complexity of media that now sees multiple channels accessed through multiple devices has created major challenges for today's marketing and advertising professionals. Consumer time is split between TVs, laptops, iPads, X-Boxes and smartphones, with traditional media, websites, videos, social networks and apps all competing for attention, meaning it's difficult for brands to decide how best to reach and engage their audiences. Paid, Owned, Earned defines the constituents of each area of 'paid', 'owned' and 'earned' media and shows how they are linked together. It proposes a blueprint for how to think and navigate across this space using a framework made up of key elements such as communities and content, social media optimisation, seeding and viral distribution, broadcast mass media, social performance media and measurement.”

Paid Owned Earned is available for pre-order now with an official on sale date of the 3rd March 2012 from from both online and offline retailers.