According to reports, Rockstar Games' Grand Theft Auto 4 (Xbox 360, PlayStation 3) helped the U.K. economy in April. Yeah, we know the game put up some pretty good sales numbers but was it really enough to give the economy a boost? Anyway, to find out more about this, head on over to the full article for more information.

With EA's deadline for Take-Two Interactive coming up fast, a lot of people are eagerly waiting for Take-Two's reply to the game publishing giant's takeover bid. Whatever happens, though, it seems like Rockstar Games president and co-founder Sam Houser actually sees a few good things about an alliance with EA.

Don Mattrick, the former worldwide president of studios at Electronic Arts, has signed on with Microsoft. During his EA stint, he oversaw franchises such as Need for Speed and The Sims. Mattrick left EA in 2005. According to GamesIndustry.biz, Mattrick will take on an advisory role, working for Microsoft's entertainment and devices division.

Mattrick, however, will not be a full-time Microsoft employee and will continue to work out of Vancouver rather than at the company's Redmond offices. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Xbox boss Peter Moore said that Mattrick will "assist Microsoft on a broad array of tasks including helping its own game studios."

Well, it looks like Google is once again finding new ways to integrate itself into our everyday lives. And its new target? In-game advertising.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Google is planning to acquire Adscape, a company which specializes in in-game advertisements. Though there has still been no official word about the matter, many are guessing that negotiations may already be happening. Meanwhile, a Google spokesperson did say this:

We are always considering new ways to extend Google's advertising program to benefit our users, advertisers and publishers. In-game advertising offers one such possible extension among many others.

It has also been noted by members of the industry that Google may have taken a fancy to Adscape because of its AdverPlay technology which allows "two-way communication between in-game ads and the outside world".

Considering that other Google applications are already starting to make their appearances in the world of gaming, could this mean that those Google text advertisements that we usually see on webpages will soon become part of the wall graffiti in your next round of CounterStrike?

Google is apparently looking to move its advertising business into the realm of video games. CNN Money reports that Google Inc. is in talks to acquire Adscape Media Inc, a closely held San Francisco firm who has developed technology that allows for the placement of ads over the Web in video games.

The Wall Street Journal cites several people familiar with the mater and reports that Google is negotiating to buy Adscape and that a deal could be reached as early as next week. For now, here's what a Google spokesperson said:

We are always considering new ways to extend Google's advertising program to benefit our users, advertisers and publishers. In-game advertising offers one such possible extension among many others.

Some members of the industry note that Google is eying Adscape because of its AdverPlay technology which enables "two-way communication between in-game ads and the outside world."

Terms being discussed are still not known. However, there was a similar deal sometime ago that we can look at to get an idea of how things will shape up. Last year, Microsoft acquired Massive Inc, a company known for the delivery of in-game ads, for almost US$ 200 million.

It is also reported that Google is discussing a possible agreement with CBS Corp that would include brokering TV and radio advertisements.

Google has declined to comment on any talks.

In a recent interview conducted by The Wall Street Journal, Microsoft founder, and soon to be ex-leader, admitted to enjoying a variety of videos that were put up on the web on sites like You Tube. These videos are commonly uploaded by people who do not own the copy rights to the video. Technically, this amounts to video piracy which is the bane of organizations like the RIAA and MPAA.

The following excerpt from the Interview shows that Gates, like many less famous accused video pirates, says he was not doing this maliciously.

Interviewer: You watch physics lectures and Harlem Globetrotters [on YouTube]?

Gates: This social-networking thing takes you to crazy places.

Interviewer: But those were stolen, correct?

Gates: Stolen's a strong word. It's copyrighted content that the owner wasn't paid for. So yes.

I wonder if  Mr. Gates would come to the defense of some of the people that are currently being sued by the MPAA for pirating their intellectual property? We all recognize that piracy is wrong. However, the point is that it is not necessarily appropriate for large corporate-owned organizations like the MPAA to apply the amount of legal force that they do to individuals regardless of their intent and the damage or lack of damage caused by the situation.

With the MPAA and the RIAA routinely bringing lawsuits against teenagers and even twelve year-old kids, it has become obvious that some perspective, a little restraint and some common sense would go a long way toward bringing a level of fairness to the issue of copy protection.

In case you have no idea who bunnie is and what his connection with the Xbox 360 is, well what we could teall you is that he is one of the many hackers who helped push the Xbox to its current state. According to him, he recently completed his PhD thesis on supercomputer architecture, and that accomplishment gives him more time to play with the Xbox.

Recently, a Wall Street Journal article tackled bunnie's dabblings on the Xbox 360. Although he mentioned that most of the article info was accurate, there are just some things that he has to clarify.

First of, he wants to clarify the "bunnie v. specialist" issue. He says that "hacking the 360 is not a race between me (bunnie) and The Specialist; the “bunnie v. Specialist” tag line is a result of the WSJ’s editorial latitude and their perspective on the scene...I give The Specialist huge props for his DVD firmware hack; it’s a great hack and I respect his work a lot. When we found out about his work we were very excited and appreciated the great contributions he’s made in furthering an understanding of the overall security system of the 360."

Second, he also wanted people to know that "while I  (he) have been dabbling in the Xbox360, I’ve been a bit delinquent lately–very busy with my day job, and I haven’t touched the Xbox360 to do any real work on it for a couple months. I owe Speedy22 an apology for not being more diligent about sending him micrographs of the XCPU, but really, right now the pictures aren’t very interesting because all the metal is still on the chip...I also owe tmbinc an apology, I was supposed to run a set of experiments on the “virgin” ROM images that I never got around to. If you still need those results, I’ll get to it."

As for his future Xbox 360 hacking plans, he plans on working on a refined technique that will "gain access to the polysilicon layer  of the XCPU while being non-destructive to the function of the chip. Such access is currently thought to be a major stumbling block to extracting the necessary keys for decrypting firmware images on the Xbox360–and the first step toward homebrewing code on the Xbox360."

But if you are expecting homebrews soon, well, it might take a long period of time before that happens. Still bunnie remains optimistic about it. With that, let's wish him the best of luck to all his future plans that aims to improve the Xbox gaming experience.

We've been told that Microsoft is not developing an Xbox handheld. But you know how it is in the gaming world, rumors of a portable device that might compete with the iPod or the portable gaming machines just won't die down. Naturally, it's one hot topic that was discussed at the Wall Street Journal's D: All Things Digital Conference in Carlsbad, California by no less than Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates.

Though Gates didn't make an announcement, he did say: We are looking at various ways to bring more to that space. There is a lot yet that hasn't been done. This implies that Microsoft may just be preparing to challenge Apple's iPod and Sony's PSP with one multipurpose device. If all the features of iPod and PSP could be put in one portable package, then Apple and Sony should have a reason to worry. Or should they?