Video gamers unite!

Okay, so I've never been much of a video gamer.

But this spring break gave me the opportunity to broaden my gaming horizons. The first half of my week-long break was spent at home. Although I had a lot of homework, I knew things around the house could easily get dull and decided to seek out some entertainment for the duration of my visit.

Luckily, I decided to bring my PlayStation 3 along (my cherished Christmas gift- primarily for its ability to play high definition Blu Ray discs).

The first night at home went just as expected. It was great to come home and catch up with my mom, dad, and grandmother. Since this was my first time being home all semester, my mom made a delicious home cooked meal. Everything was great.

But things went downhill fast. Ten o' clock hit and everyone was off to bed. It was my first night of liberation-- the first night during my break-- and I was bored.

But, there was hope. I had a solution. I would buy a video game!

I hopped in my car and drove off to the store. I arrived and spent nearly twenty minutes perusing the (surprisingly limited) selection of games. Did I want to spend the next few days as an action hero, a sports superstar, military gunner? I stood wide-eyed in front of the display case, examining the foil covered game packages and imaging the experience each offered me.

I finally settled on an older game, God of War. I'd heard good things about it, and decided to give it a shot.

I found the electronics manager of the store and walked back towards the game section. "That one," I said as I pointed to the box. She begrudgingly whipped out her key and retrieved the game from behind the glass case.

I raced home and unwrapped it, sliding the disc into its slot on the console.

I spent the next two days as a bone crunching, sword swinging anti-hero named Kratos. The game, based on Greek mythology, allowed me to fight enemies like the cyclops and minotaurs as I searched for Pandora's box. The game was both a ton of fun and a complete waste of time. I enjoyed it so much that I had it beaten in only two days!

I'm not alone. In fact, over half of Americans play video games in some capacity (console, phone, internet, etc.). Interestingly enough, more and more of these gamers are women. And now, through game apps on devices such as Apple's iPhone and on social networking sites such as Facebook, gaming is more widespread than ever before.

Video games are a continually growing industry. Despite the recession, the video game industry brought in a record $5.53 billion dollars in U.S. sales in the month of December. It seems Americans are more addicted to video games than ever.

So, although I do enjoy playing a video game every now and again, the world of video gaming is one I will happily leave behind after spring break.

SUPER BOWL ads!

This year's Super Bowl was seen by approximately 106 million people, making it the most watched television program ever (only second the 1983 finale of MASH- what??).

In case you missed the game, the New Orleans (pronounced "'Naw-leens" in the Creole dialect) Saints toppled the Indianapolis Colts in a very close, entertaining match up. The half time show was an entertaining bit of programming, featuring the rockin' (albeit aged) musical stylings of The Who.

But who cares? Everyone knows why we really watch the Super Bowl- for the commercials! And here were a few of my favorites this year...

My Favorites:

1. Doritos: Play Nice

One of the many Doritos commercials this year, and one of my favorites.
Why it's funny- I love this kid. Although I can't quite relate to the idea of some new sleazy guy coming after my mom, I've got to respect this kid's tenacity. "Don't touch my mama, and don't touch my Doritos." Yeah, that'll sell chips!

2. Shutter Island trailer
Okay, okay. I admit, this is not a new ad. But I can hardly contain my enthusiasm for Scorsese's latest. I'm not typically a horror/thriller type of guy, but this is a film that I can get behind. What's more, Di Caprio's performance looks promising and early reviews are full of praise.

My Not-so-favorites:

1. Tim Tebow and Mom
Why it was bad- This "pro-life" commercial, which caused all the public outrage and debate, turned out to be relatively tame. Former University of Florida quarterback Tim Tebow and his mother talk about Tebow's birth in a foreign country, and her decision to keep the baby. Yawn.

2. Alice in Wonderland trailer
It makes no sense. With a resume featuring films such as Edward Scissorhands, James and the Giant Peach, and The Nightmare Before Christmas, Tim Burton should be the perfect person to newly interpret this classic. Regardless, this is one movie I can't get excited about. The film, set for release in March of this year, just looks creepy (and not in the good way typical of Burton's style) and overdone. And Johnny Depp scares the hell out of me in all that makeup. I'll have to wait on the early reviews for this one.

Kids are hooked in, too

A recent study by the Kaiser Family Foundation comes with some pretty unsurprising news: kids are media fiends. But even already knowing this, the numbers are startling.

According to the report, kids (ages 8 - 18) are spending, on average, about 7 and a half hours per day interacting with some form of entertainment media. Television, movies, music, Internet, video games, etc. Kids are logging a lot of screen time.

And since most of us are multitaskers (for example, checking email or sending a text message while watching t.v.), the number could actually be as high as a combined total of almost 11 hours of media consumed each day.

This is a continuing trend. Five years ago, the same study estimated approximately six and a half hours of media consumption per day.

The question- how consumed with our media will we become? How long will this trend continue? Are we too addicted?

Apple's new swag

Apple is a fun company. iMacs, Macbooks, iPods, iTunes, etc. Apple makes a lot of cool products.

And this month, it looks like another new product may join Apple's lineup. Apple's long-awaited and highly anticipated tablet computer is likely going to be released later this month. Although Apple has yet to officially announce the tablet, some writers are already declaring dates when it will be officially unveiled. For example, Fox News journalist Clayton Morris has already "confirmed" the tablet will be released January 27th (read his full article).

As for the tablet itself, it will probably look much like the iPod/iPhone, only bigger. With Apple already owning a easy, reliable, and profitable way to distribute media, the iTunes store, the Apple tablet is poised to compete fiercely with e-readers, such as the Nook and the Amazon's Kindle. The tablet may even offer models with 3G wireless service, allowing users to search the web on the go.

The Apple tablet will be a truly on-the-go machine. Although the device will likely sport USB 2.0 ports to support mouse a keyboard use, the tablet should come with a new type of on-screen tactile keyboard, allowing users full mobility. Some writers even believe the tablet has the potential to revolutionize several fields, ranging all the way from healthcare to finance (read the article). The price will likely be moderately accessible to consumers, probably costing around $800- between the price of an iPhone and a Macbook.

This all sounds pretty cool, right? Still, it's all speculation. We'll just have to wait.

i love netflix.

Hey. Welcome to the Brew, my social media/tech/anything-cool-that-I-want-to-talk-about blog. My name is Jack.

Tonight, I want to talk about Netflix.

For those of you who don't know (but who hasn't at least seen those commercials?), Netflix is a business that, for a monthly fee, sends you movies to watch and return through the mail. Pretty cool, right?

I found myself using the free trial as a (poor) college freshman to get my hands on movies for my film class, and check out some of the harder to find foreign 'flicks. Recently, my parents started up a subscription as well and they're nuts about it. They love always having a new movie to watch.

About a year or so ago, Netflix stepped up their game when they started offering streaming movies online. This opened up an entire library of movies Netflix members could watch instantly on their computers. The bad new- who wants to watch a movie on their computer screen? BUT THEN! The brilliant people at Netflix decided to let Xbox and Playstation owners stream movies directly from their gaming consoles. The great thing about this- these gaming consoles are already attached to your television! Voilà! You've got an instant decked out media center with tons of movies to watch on demand!

And now it gets even better, as Netflix is just beginning to allow owners of the Nintendo Wii game console to stream Netflix movies as well. This is big news for the popular Wii console, which is the fastest-selling home console in history. In fact, Nintendo sold over 3 million of them last month alone. If you ask me, it won't be too long before we're all streaming movies right into our living rooms. Netflix is changing the way we watch and receive movies.

And I couldn't be happier.