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AI-powered Elmo and Cookie Monster are shilling $25 video messages on Cameo
Cameo has added a pair of superstars to its stable of celebrities available for personalized video greetings. AI-powered Cookie Monster and Elmo, who may or may not have fallen on hard times, will shamelessly plug their services on the six-year-old platform, offering to count to your kid’s age or rattle off words that start with the same letter as your child’s name for $25 a pop.
HBO Max has yanked 200 episodes of 'Sesame Street'
It'd take Count von Count quite a while to tally up all the content Warner Bros. Discovery has removed.
Roku will stream the first season of 'Game of Thrones' for free
If you and your nearest and dearest have been meaning to check out Game of Thrones but haven't gotten around to it yet (or don't have an HBO subscription), you can stream the first season for free on Roku over the holiday season. The monstrously popular series' first 10 episodes will be available at no cost during Roku's second annual Stream-a-thon, which runs December 26th to January 1st.
HBO moves 'Sesame Street' to its more expensive Max service
The streaming-rights war rages on, with beloved children's show Sesame Street being the latest title caught up in the custody battles (sort of). After securing a five-year deal for the exclusive streaming rights to the show in 2015, HBO was the only place you could watch new episodes for the first nine months after they aired. Following that period, you'd be able to also watch them on PBS. Deadline is reporting that a new agreement announced today would make Sesame Street's entire 50-year library available online. Episodes that were previously on HBO will be moved to HBO Max along with the entire existing collection -- that's more than 4,500 episodes, although it's not clear how many of these will be available to watch at the same time. The exclusive rights also cover annual specials and character-driven short-form collections.
Daily Roundup: Apple Watch details, a new MacBook and more!
Happy Monday! Buckle up, because it's Apple news all the way down today. The highly anticipated Apple Watch goes on sale April 24th and depending on the model, prices start anywhere from $350 to $10,000. The Cupertino company also surprised us by revealing details on its new ultra thin MacBook with a retina display. Get all the details on these stories and more in today's Daily Roundup.
Daily Roundup: LG G Flex2 review, Halo motorbike helmets and more!
Curved phones, cool helmets and cookies, oh my! All this and more in today's Daily Roundup. Let's get right to it after the break.
Cookie Monster: The Engadget Interview
It'd be wrong to say that the cast of Sesame Street just discovered the internet. As it is, the show's characters have dozens of games and mobile apps, with a large video archive that goes at least as far back as "Me Lost Me Cookie At The Disco." It would seem, though, that someone over at the Sesame Workshop has been working to bring Big Bird and co. into the twenty-first century. For starters, Big Bird only just issued his first tweet ("tweet" -- get it?) last week. Meanwhile, PBS Kids just premiered Cookie Monster's first movie, The Cookie Thief, and, in an effort to promote it, also came up with this ingenious gif generator that basically lets Cookie take over your browser.
Cookie Monster wants to take over your browser
The entire Engadget staff is pretty excited about Cookie Monster's first PBS Kids movie "The Cookie Thief," (which premieres this Monday, February 16th). In celebration, our entire site is now a veritable sea of Cookie Monster GIFs! Well, sorta.
Sesame Street hits CES with augmented reality app for kids, we go hands-on (video)
At this year's CES, Qualcomm's got a big show -- but not all of it has to do with bleeding-edge performance and kick-awesome graphics. In fact, the San Diego company has a bit of a family side. It's partnering with Sesame Street to highlight its Vuforia platform, an Augmented Reality-based SDK that gives developers handy tools to make the most out of their apps. The program on display, called Big Bird's Words, is a word recognition tool to help children learn vocabulary. As you'll see in the video below, Big Bird himself lets the young 'uns choose a word and, using the rear camera, hunt around for it in a real-world environment. If the camera picks up an incorrect word, Big Bird indicates that you need to keep looking. Since this is just one application on the platform, this particular concept could be used for a plethora of different types of apps, such as dictionaries and translation programs. %Gallery-175380% Joseph Volpe contributed to this report.
Bert and Ernie TomTom voices tell you how to get, how to get to Sesame Street (video)
While some may seriously doubt their driving credentials, Bert and Ernie are the latest additions to TomTom's voice navigation library. The two muppets join the slightly more sinister likes of Darth Vader and Jeremy Clarkson, who've already offered up their distinctive vocal talents to the in-car navi. Grab your rubber duckie and see how the recording session went down after the break.
Kinect adds Sesame Street and National Geographic to Xbox Live, makes motion control wholesome fun
Kinect -- it's the Xbox 360 peripheral that just keeps on giving, now with more edutainment. Yes, that collision of worlds typically yields cringe- and boredom-inducing interactive experiences. Not so with this marriage of MS' motion-controlling sensor and the fine folks behind TV mainstays like Sesame Street, National Geographic and Disney. The newly inked content partnerships will see the creation of specifically tailored episodes of Kinect Nat Geo TV, in addition to a season's worth of Kinect Sesame Street TV for Xbox Live, letting your youngins play virtual connect the dots with Elmo. Plans are also underway for a virtual storybook effort, codenamed Project Columbia, aimed at indoctrinating children into the fundamentals of reading, and Rush, a videogame that'll lead adults and their tots alike through Pixar's virtual worlds. These various family-friendly titles and TV shows are set to rollout sometime next spring, so if you need to get your little ones' blood pumping (and slim down those love handles while you're at it), it looks like X's prepping to mark that spot. Official presser after the break.
DS and Wii go back to Sesame Street in Ready, Set, Grover!
(Warning: there's a monster at the end of this post.) Warner Bros. is continuing to get mileage out of its Sesame Street license, announcing a new fitness-themed game for Wii and DS. Sesame Street: Ready, Set, Grover! is a set of exercises designed by Grover himself, "to help his Sesame Street friends get up and go!" Kids will be able to row, jump, and play "Grover Says" along with Elmo and Abby. The Wii version comes with a Grover version of the Sesame Street Wiimote covers introduced last year, which covers all unnecessary buttons. And the DS version includes a "jumbo click stylus." The games are designed to be playable by toddlers on their own, but they also include a "Parent's Page" so parents can see what the little ones did. The Griptonite-developed games will be out this summer.%Gallery-122808%
Sesame Street: Once Upon a Monster preview: Tickle me, Double Fine
"One of the things that I'm personally really passionate about -- the reason I'm in this industry -- is that I want to see our medium be more than it is already," Double Fine's Nathan Martz, and project lead on Once Upon a Monster, confided in me at a Microsoft press event yesterday. "Our human experience is so broad and yet our industry deals with such a narrow slice of it." Martz explained that the project was conceived with the express purpose of generating joy. "I wanted to explore emotions," Martz said of his goal going into development. "For me, the best one is joy. The early example of this is a girl I was dating at the time. She asked me if I had a 'happy' song, a song that you hear and it just makes you feel great. Everybody has a happy song, and that was originally the name of this project: 'Happy Song.'" I'll admit it: Playing a bit of Once Upon a Monster was a happy experience, one I think would be even more so for families and kids a little younger than myself.%Gallery-116735%
Sesame Street Kinect game being developed by Double Fine
Sesame Street: Once Upon a Monster will be brought to you this autumn by the letters D, F and K. Warner Bros. Interactive announced this morning that the children's television institution will be transformed into an "interactive experience" for Xbox 360's Kinect. The game will be developed by Double Fine Productions, the studio that's recently taken a new path with bite-sized downloadable titles like Costume Quest and Stacking. Accompanied by Cookie Monster, Elmo and other fluffy residents of Sesame Street, you'll explore a "living storybook" (entitled Once Upon a Monster). Parents and children can get active in this journey through a set of minigames that encourage "dancing, jumping, flying and more." From this initial announcement, it appears the game will be like an interactive Sesame Street episode. If Double Fine nails it, it holds serious potential for the studio that's only come close to having a break-out hit. Of course, if the series does take off (and remember, there's flying!) how is mom supposed to enjoy a quiet moment in the kitchen and a bottle of wine if she actually has to play along? Whatever happened to the good old days of television as babysitter? %Gallery-116735%
No Comment: Sesame Street's iPogo and the App for That song
If you had a smart pogo stick, wouldn't you want it to run apps? It just makes sense, in a strange sort of way. Thanks to Sesame Workshop and those lovable Muppets, here's your Tuesday No Comment. Click the image or Read More to see the video. [via Switched Tumblr, Laughing Squid & Minyanville]
How to get to Sesame Street: through your Wii, DS or PC
Warner Bros. Interactive has announced two new games (Two games! Ah, ah!) based on the evergreen Sesame Street franchise. Sesame Street: Elmo's A-to-Zoo Adventure and Sesame Street: Cookie's Counting Carnival will help preschoolers learn the alphabet and math this fall on the Wii, DS and PC. The Wii and DS games will use what WB is calling "gameplay helpers." On the Wii, that means fuzzy Cookie Monster or Elmo slipcovers that cover up unused buttons on the Wiimote. For the DS version, it's a big, clicking stylus for small, uncoordinated hands. Parents and kids alike would do well to resist the urge to jam cookies into the Cookie Monster Wiimote.
New Sesame Street games on the way, saysa Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment has inked crayoned a deal with Sesame Workshop to produce a new series of games based on the beloved edutainment property, Sesame Street. According to an AP report, the partnership is designed to capitalize on a "big open hole in the market," which is easily filled with children and their open-minded parents. "This is the first generation of parents who grew up as gamers," said WBIE senior vice president of marketing, Russel Arons. "Unlike prior generations where people weren't sure of the value of video games, these are people who know there's value and fun for the whole family." Warner Bros. has yet to announce specifics -- like target platforms or release dates -- but has allegedly expressed interest in the motion controllers set to arrive on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 later this year (presumably, the desire to work on Nintendo's Wii goes without saying). Terry Fitzpatrick, Sesame Workshop's executive vice president of distribution, believes that the casual-friendly input "makes it very easy and is developmentally appropriate for preschoolers, as opposed to dealing with a very complex controller." With Microsoft's Project Natal eliminating the controller entirely, we're sure to see some wonderful numeracy games involving Cookie Monster shoveling as many baked treats into his face as possible. We do that in front of the TV every day, so we may as well get points for it.
Wii pay-per-view programming introduced in Japan
Not only are we still waiting for the TV Guide Channel that Japanese Wii users have been indulging in for the better part of two years, but now Variety is reporting that Nintendo has teamed up with a dozen corporate partners to tease us with a Japanese pay-per-view service for the console. Premiering last Saturday, Wii no Ma (Wii's Room) currently has 120 titles, including episodes of Sesame Street and Pocket Monsters, available for prices ranging from ¥30 - ¥500 ($.35 - $5.63). According to Variety, titles can also be viewed on your Nintendo DSi handheld, a device known for its sonority and large, appealing display. No word yet on when we can enjoy a Stateside version, but we'll let you know as soon as we hear something. In the meantime, there's always PlayOn.
Found Footage: Sesame Street does the iPod dance
Big Bird, Grover Elmo, Cookie Monster, Snuffy (my bad) and the Sesame Street gang have been cool since I left my crib for the big-boy bed. Here they give some love to their favorite music player. Not too shabby for a bunch of 40-year-old dudes (except Elmo, who is young enough to be hip to the iPod). Snuffy isn't in this one as they couldn't find earbuds to fit. My mistake, I guess they could. Honestly, I surprised that Apple hasn't used this. Sunny days to all. Thanks to Chris Hollomon for the tip!
Sesame Street gives gaming the thumbs up
Thanks to the recent shift in video games towards introducing more movement in control, our favorite pastime has just gotten the thumbs up from the Joan Ganz Clooney Center at Sesame Workshop, which wrote, "Well-designed digital games show significant potential to promote children's growth and healthy development. They can foster skills and knowledge that help children with academic learning, as well as habits which contribute to better health."We're happy that The House That Big Bird Built approves. In turn, we'd like to remind everyone that reading is totally horse apples and completely F.P.O. (that's "For Poindexters Only"). So there.
