Queen Elizabeth to miss Commonwealth Games

Queen Elizabeth II will not attend the Commonwealth Games in New Delhi in October, Buckingham Palace confirmed Sunday -- the first time she has missed the event in decades.

Prince Charles, her eldest son and the heir to the throne, will represent the 84-year-old Head of the Commonwealth instead at the October 3-14 Games.

"It is correct to say that the Queen will not be attending the Commonwealth Games this year," a palace spokesman said. "The volume of Her Majesty's engagements, coupled with other overseas commitments, means she will not be able to attend."

Pac-Man 30th anniversary

It's the Pac-Man 30th anniversary this weekend, and Google is celebrating as only Google can: with a free online game embedded in its homepage logo.

The ever-changing Google logo - called the Google Doodle - which often celebrates holidays and notable birthdays, was updated Friday to look like a screen from a classic Pac-Man game.

But in a delightful twist, the logo actually is a Pac-Man game.  Alongside the "Google Search" button, today the site offers an "Insert Coin" button.

Online games outrank everything in popularity – Reveals a new teen survey

A recent survey conducted mostly among a group of teen males has revealed some interesting findings about the internet surfing behavior of male teenagers across the world. The survey was conducted among a large number of males across various social community sites such as facebook and some popular online forums.

More than 45% of male teenagers claimed to spend more than 60% of their browsing time in playing online games. The most popular games played by them include online flash games, multiplayer games and even social networking site games such as Farmville, Mafia wars and others. Another 25% of the teenagers said they were active in some sort of online games and maintained a character there.

Indian Sports Betting | Betting in India | Sports Betting India

The huge popularity of the Indian Premier League's Twenty20 tournament has created a storm of betting by cricket-mad fans, but because betting is technically illegal in India, at least some of the action has gone to offshore websites.

The Economic Times in London investigated the phenomenon this week, reporting that major UK-licensed bookmakers like William Hill and Paddy Power are accepting online bets from India.

The article quotes Rupert Adams, a spokesperson for William Hill, who estimated his company will make GBP 4 million on the current IPL series alone.

Can’t gamble online? Go to a Rummy site

While online gambling of any kind is illegal in India, the handful of Rummy sites that allow you to play for cash are not flouting the law. This is because a Supreme Court ruling of 1967 (State of Andhra Pradesh vs K. Satyanarayan) states that Rummy cannot be called a “game of entire chance” and “is mainly and preponderantly a game of skill”.

Websites like Games24x7.com allow players to play Indian Rummy for free as well as for cash stakes. Games24x7 is basically a multi-player format with cash stakes of between Rs 25 and Rs 1,250 per match and regular tournaments where players can win larger sums. The Games24x7 site flaunts its biggest winners on its front page, putting player “sjey7203” at the top with an overall earning of Rs 20,900.73.

Digital River Buys Fatfoogoo For $10 Million

E-commerce company Digital River announced its acquisition of Fatfoogoo, an in-game and online commerce service provider specializing in virtual goods, with a cash transaction of approximately $10 million.

Founded in 2006 and based in Vienna, Austria (with offices in the UK and U.S.), Fatfoogoo offers its clients the ability to implement publisher-to-player and player-to-player transactions in online games and virtual worlds through white label turnkey solutions or individually configured modules.

Minneapolis-headquartered Digital River offers a platform for online businesses, including software and game publishers, to handle a range of tasks like site development and hosting, order management, fraud management, export controls, tax management, physical and digital product fulfillment, multi-lingual customer service, advanced reporting and strategic marketing services.

Bingo.com LTD sells 25.9% to Unibet for $2.25 Million

European facing and Malta licensed online gaming giant Unibet; hosting gaming family of popular online bingo site Maria Bingo has announced to have closed a private placement with Bingo.com Ltd holding company of the generic bingo  domain bingo.com worth $2.25 million for 25.9% of bingo.com. The news come to follow with the announcement made earlier this year that bingo.com would be switching networks as it would be migrating from Malta licensed Cozy Gaming hosting company of the Best Bingo Network and 3 others which amongst other host popular online bingo sites gonebingo.co.uk and harrysbingo.co.uk.

“Bingo.com is pleased to have secured a private placement from Unibet,” said Tarrnie Williams, Bingo.com’s CEO. The generic domain name and a strong liquid gaming network are just some of the contributing factors which are assuring that bingo.com will further more succeed on its new home. On the other hand Unibet CEO Petter Nylander announced that he is pleased with the deal as he very much believes that the generic URL (domain bingo.com) in addition to the wide acceptance and increasing popularity of bingo on the internet nowadays called “online bingo”, “bingo online” or “internet bingo” will be contributing factors to the ever growing success of bingo.com under its new idendity.

Online Gaming News, May 2010

Crossword Rummy Challenge – Play Rummy Online and Win Free Books or Music CDs!

5th May 2010, Mumbai, India: Games24x7.com in association with Crossword Book Store today announced the launch of Crossword Rummy Challenge (CRC), an online rummy tournament where winners get free gift vouchers from Crossword Book Stores.

This is a great chance for all book and music lovers to show their skills in playing rummy online on Games24x7.com and get a chance to win free gift vouchers. These free gift vouchers worth thousands can be redeemed against your favorite books, music CDs, stationery and more.

What is Crossword Rummy Challenge Tournament?

The gamble in gaming

 It is no more only ‘time’ that Indians are investing in gaming, now it is money too. Be it the famous ‘FarmVille’ on Facebook or the ‘T20 Fever’ of Indiagames—the culture of spending real currency in online games is picking up.

Facebook has encouraged social gaming culture globally with games like ‘FarmVille’, ‘Poker’, ‘Mafia Wars’, ‘FishVille’ and ‘Cafeworld’. From its total population of 400 million users on Facebook, about 200 million are hooked on to ‘FarmVille’. Any developer can build their applications on Facebook.

Career in Gaming Industry

If your dream job is to work in the video game industry then the future is looking brighter with industry players seeing a pick-up in the number of jobs becoming available although salaries remain flat.

"Hiring is up from last year, but the market is rough," said Marc Mencher, president of Gamerecruiters.com.