Microsoft/Sony Playing Nicely?

Xbox Marketing Manager Aaron Greenberg has told the folks over at GameReactor they are “talking to Sony” about the potential for crossplay between the two consoles. Crossplay is a term to describe inter-platform gamers to play against each other on games, regardless of what console they are playing. He reiterated to GameReactor that he feels the industry is moving towards a ‘customer first’ focus. Making note of Minecraft users being able to play people from Xbox One, iPhone and Nintendo Switch.

Of Sony Greenberg said:

“We’re talking to Sony. We do partner with them on Minecraft and of course we’d like to enable them to be part of that one community, and unite gamers… We’re hopeful that they’ll be supportive of it.”

While Playstation aren’t so keen, back in June Jim Ryan, Playstation global sales and marketing head told Eurogamer:

“It’s certainly not a profound philosophical stance we have against this. We’ve done it in the past….We’re always open to conversations with any developer or publisher who wants to talk about it. Unfortunately it’s a commercial discussion between ourselves and other stakeholders.”

With the PS4 being the most popular console and by a long margin too, it makes little sense for Playstation to be up for this and total sense for Microsoft.

Apple Offering Movies 2 Weeks After Release?!

Apple are really trying to get movies into your home a lot faster than they already are…..at a premium though.

Bloomberg are reporting that alongside Apple, Comcast are in talks (independently) with movie studios to offer $50 movie rentals approximately 2 weeks after their theatrical debut, then waiting a further 4-6 weeks you can get the same movie for $30. Apparently, the deals, if successful, could be finalized early next year.

Movie theatres have an interest in maintaining exclusivity for movies for as long as possible, concession sales of popcorn, drinks and sweets keep theatres alive, if a family is able to buy their tickets at home, the theatres life is in real danger. Deals with Apple/Comcast would give movie studios to push on with movie downloads, which could also threaten theatres, by giving them an ultimatum of agree to a deal or we will start selling downloads.

Will Apple finally get their way? Only time will tell.

NHS Offering Cinema Tickets

The NHS are tempting people to get healthier with the lure of free cinema tickets (and they are getting expensive) amongst other incentives such as discounts on shopping and fitness gear.

A user would use a mobile app to track exercise and encourage them to hit targets to earn the goodies, thus reducing pressure on the NHS.

The NHS is working with 10 new housing developments with the aim to put “great health at the heart of urban design and planning” the scheme is over several ideas by city planning researchers at Citiesmode for the Halton Lea Site in Cheshire. Even going as far as implementing public gym equipment, running tracks drawn on to the pavement, cooking lessons, free bikes and even an outdoor cinema.

It’s all very much a concept scheme at the moment, but we think that this idea sounds absolutely incredible! The final proposal and implementation strategy for the Halton Lea site is expected to be published in January 2018, so we’ll see how this unfolds!

Joker is getting his own movie!

Joker is getting his own movie and Martin Scorsese is producing…..how cool is that!

The Todd Phillips directed film is yet to be cast but Deadline are reporting htat the project is in the very early stages of development, but Todd Phillips and Scott Silver writers of The Hangover and 8 Mile respectively are penning an original script. The film is said to pay homage to 1980’s Scorsese films, with a gritty feel being said to be attached to the movie, kind of like a Taxi Driver, Raging Bull kind of feel. We’re really intrigued as to what a Phillips/Scorsese film can bring to the DC Universe and the Joker character and we’re expecting big things.

Iconic Movie Car Quiz

Iconic Movie Car Quiz

Do you know your cars?

Are you a film fanatic?

Get quiz’ical and put your movie knowledge to the test with the Iconic Movie Car Quiz!

This quiz is full of iconic movie cars in retro 8-bit design!

There are 9 questions about 9 different cars.. How well do you know iconic movie cars?

 

iconic movie car quiz

We loved it! If you want to play click here!

Twitter Verified Dating

Loveflutter “Blue” is a premium dating app aimed exclusively at Celebs which requires you to have a blue tick to sign up to.

It’s creators claim that it’s all about authenticity and weeding out bots and catfishes. “Blue” latches on to Twitter’s verification methods to get around this and connect to ‘real’ celebs. Yet not all blue ticks are famous people, apparently of the 150,000 blue ticks 25% of them belonged to journalists and media personalities, this was back in 2015 before you could apply to get verified! (Ironically Loveflutter and the apps co-founders aren’t verified on Twitter) Despite rolling out in San Fran, LA, NYC, LDN and Tokyo, the app won’t go live until there’s a 1000 local members on the app.

 

Amazon Becoming A Fully Fledged Movie Studio?

Amazon has seen to be buying and producing films and hiring indie film studios to distribute their movies in cinemas. But! That is all due to change with it’s next release, with it’s next move edging it closer to a fully fledged movie studio. According to Variety Amazon Studios are distributing Woody Allen’s Wonder Wheel, due out in December, by itself. What does this mean? Well it will have complete control over how the film is released. That’s everything from marketing to the rollout in cinemas.This helps propel Amazon into the stratosphere after the production company won three Oscars in January, Manchester By The Sea took in $62M globally (budgeted at $10M)

 

Twitter Subscription

Twitter are introducing a £75 ($99) a month service that allows you to promote tweets to a wider audience automatically and users interested in this service get the first month for free.

On sign up, subscribers can tweet as they would normally and then the programme would automatically choose tweets to promote. Those who it promotes to us based on similar interests, location and whatever a user picks. Such as ‘up to’ the first 10 tweets posted each day. Users who pay for this service will also see their accounts promoted as a suggested account.

The aim is to take some of the effort out of regular Twitter Ads, they will also send subscribers bi-weekly reports of Tweet engagement and new followers.

To download Twitter please click here Apple / Android

 

HP VR Backpack

There’s a backpack that will help you get the training you need on the job!

HP are launching the Z VR backpack that’s designed for professionals on the job, creatives, or soldiers who want to train on a virtual battlefield (and we’re not talking call of duty here) The backpack is incredibly powerful packing , vPro-enabled quad Core i& and a Quadro P5200 graphics card card with 16gb of video memory! It works primarily with HTC Vive Business edition, but you don’t have to use it with it, if your company uses Oculus Rift then it will play nicely.

HP are partnering with a bunch of companies to create a Mars Home Planet Project that focuses on VR for around the world collaboration to create infrastructure that will build a strong colony, from building massive structures to designing clothing. The sense is to give a user what it’d be like to live on mars. The sense of this ‘game’ is to give the users a sense of how powerful the backpack is and the uses that your company could use this for, such as designing a car or planning architecture, either in the same building or around the world.

Soundcloud survives money scare

New investment saves music platform

 

Over the past weeks the future for the music app Soundcloud has been uncertain, but after a £135 million investment it seems the music platform has a bright future.

Soundcloud is popular with emerging music artists and it faced closure faced closure if the new funding was not approved by Friday.

Concerned users had been backing up their Soundcloud uploads, worried the site would go offline.

After the major investment, Alexander Ljung, the company’s chairman said that ‘Soundcloud is here to stay’.

Chance the Rapper who is one of the highest profiled users has also been very vocal in supporting Soundcloud.  

In September, acquisition talks with Spotify failed to materialise and although the company is to make some major cutbacks in the upcoming months it’s clear that Soundcloud is popular with the musical community and it’s ‘here to stay’.