Glenn Chapman
AFP technology correspondent
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/ 9 March 2007

Gears of War wins gaming ‘Oscar’

Gears of War designed for the Xbox 360 console was on Wednesday crowned best game at a video-game industry version of the Academy Awards, complete with red carpet and adoring fans. Winners were unveiled Oscars-style at the Seventh Annual Game Developers Choice Awards ceremony in San Francisco.

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/ 5 March 2007

The future of gaming

Video-game makers from around the world gathered in San Francisco on Monday to collaborate about the future of play. The 20th annual Game Developers Conference is the largest gathering of its kind and is dedicated to the ”art, science, and business of games”, according to its organisers at CMP Technology firm.

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/ 24 February 2007

Virtual terrorists strike in Second Life

In an explosive display, virtual-world banes now mirror the havoc of the real one as terrorists have launched a bombing campaign in Second Life. People controlling animated avatar members of a self-proclaimed Second Life Liberation Army (SLLA) have set off computer-code versions of atomic bombs.

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/ 7 February 2007

Apple wants to set the music free

Apple’s Steve Jobs posted an open message to record studios on Tuesday, asking them to abolish security software that prevents music bought online from playing on different types of MP3 players. Apple would embrace eliminating technology that prevents songs downloaded from its iTunes music store from being played on iPod rivals, he said.

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/ 19 January 2007

MySpace sued over sex traps for teens

MySpace defended itself on Thursday against new lawsuits charging it had failed to protect five girls from being lured into sex traps by predators on the popular teen social website. The suits demand unspecified millions of dollars in damages from MySpace for "negligence, recklessness, fraud" and misrepresentation.

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/ 13 January 2007

Xbox 360 proves to be holiday favourite

The Xbox 360 bested the Wii and PlayStation 3 in United States holiday-season sales as Microsoft scored what analysts on Friday expected to be a lasting victory in the new-generation video-game-console war. In a twist, Sony’s prior generation, the PlayStation 2, outsold all the freshly launched consoles.

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/ 31 December 2006

Broken promise ends year on sour note for YouTube

YouTube was poised on Saturday to ring in 2007 on a sour note by missing a deadline to deploy a system to prevent piracy of copyrighted music on the video-sharing website. Creating and installing an "advanced content identification and royalty reporting system" was at the heart of a precedent-setting agreement between YouTube and Warner Music Group in September.