Crytek foresees 'the end of free game demos' The CEO of indie studio Crytek has defended EA's divisive 'premium downloadable content' strategy, while also predicting the extinction of free game demos. In an interview with Develop, Crytek's co-founder Cevat Yerli said he wasn't sure that a demo of Crysis 2 was going to be released. He also said demos are "a luxury" that becomes "prohibitively expensive" for game studios to make. Develop - also see Julio's rant
An open letter to Apple regarding the company's approach to conversation with its peers and its community Dear Apple: We miss you. Once upon a time, back before you got real popular, you used to take part in the public square. You may have been less forthcoming than most, but at least your employees would speak at industry events, have unscripted conversations with journalists, and engage in the world a bit here and there. Searchblog
Spam suspect uses Google Docs; FBI happy FBI agents targeting alleged criminal spammers last year obtained a trove of incriminating documents from a suspect's Google Docs account, in what appears to be the first publicly acknowledged search warrant benefiting from a suspect's reliance on cloud computing. Wired
World robot population reaches 8.6 million I arrived at the 8.6 million estimate based on data from the latest edition of World Robotics, a great numbers-filled report prepared annually by good folks at the International Federation of Robotics, or IFR. The report came out late last year – I finally had time to take a look at it – and refers to the robot market up to the end of 2008. IEEE Spectrum
Web coupons know lots about you, and they tell For decades, shoppers have taken advantage of coupons. Now, the coupons are taking advantage of the shoppers. A new breed of coupon, printed from the Internet or sent to mobile phones, is packed with information about the customer who uses it. The NY Times