donation
Latest
WoW Insider Show live tomorrow featuring special guest host Kevin D.
Yes, after a short and tumultuous journey into the world of video last week, our podcast returns to its audio roots, and this week, Turpster and I welcome a special guest host, direct from Brigwyn's Child's Play charity auction. Listener Kevin D. was kind enough to step up and donate a very generous amount of money to Child's Play, and for that (and because he's a cool guy), we'll be welcoming him on the show. He's got a few things he wants to talk about, including how guilds work together, how to balance WoW and life, and why people are or aren't shy as they play the game. And of course we'll answer a few of your emails (you can send those to theshow@wow.com now), and during the meat of the show, we'll talk about the most popular posts from the last week.Should be a lot of fun, and hey here's this: by the time we go live, we'll all know whether we have BlizzCon tickets or not. Scary, no? Join us over on the our Ustream page at May 30, 2009 3:30 PM EDT var date_span = document.getElementById("date"); var date = new Date(date_span.innerHTML); var monthname=new Array("Jan","Feb","Mar","Apr","May","Jun","Jul","Aug", "Sep","Oct","Nov","Dec"); var weekday=new Array("Sunday","Monday","Tuesday","Wednesday","Thursday", "Friday","Saturday"); var year = date.getFullYear(); var day_of_month = date.getDate(); var month = monthname[date.getMonth()]; var day = weekday[date.getDay()]; var hour = date.getHours(); if (hour > 11) { if (hour > 12) {hour -= 12} am_pm = "PM"; } else { am_pm = "AM"; } var minute = date.getMinutes(); if (minute < 10) { minute = "0"+minute; } date_string = day + ", " + month + " " + day_of_month; date_string += " at " + hour + ":" + minute + " " + am_pm; offset = -date.getTimezoneOffset()/60; if (offset >= 0) { offset = "+"+offset; } date_string += " in your time zone (GMT"+offset+")"; date_span.innerHTML = (date_string); , or you can jump after the break to see an embedded feed. And if you don't make it, don't worry -- we had some unfortunate issues with all of the video last week, but I can guarantee that this week, our audio will be back in the feed ready for your ears on Monday.Should be a lot of fun -- we'll see you on Saturday afternoon.
Myndflame loot being offered for donations
If you're a machinima regular, you're probably familiar with Myndflame. The name can refer to the machinima website, where a wide and varied group of authors gather to share their work, comment on one another's pieces, and generally do the hang-out thing. Or, the name can refer to a specific set of artists, who put together pieces like Illegal Danish. That group's got a lot going on.The Myndflame team is offering a few select pieces of swag over on their official site, as rewarsd for charitable donations. They've got a few limited edition shirts available, as well as a couple discontinued CDs. The purpose of this offering, of course, it to help provide for the ongoing development of the Myndflame community. They've been working with Blizzard to promote a better understanding of machinima and machinima law, as well as working to try and get more people involved in machinima creation.The items have a little history to them. The shirts were produced for the Myndflame team, and one was given away at Blizzcon 2008. The remainder are the only ones left from that print run, and remain crispy clean and unworn. The CDs are only available digitally nowadays, so it seems likely these originals come from someone's personal stash. If you know someone who's a fan of the Illegal Danish series, these might make a nice gift -- Clint's offered to sign and personalize anything you get.
Sony to donate up to $10,000 in celebration of Earth Day
Want to do something green? Why not play a video game or watch a movie? Sony will donate $1 to Conservation International for each "unique paid transaction" made on the PlayStation Store on Earth Day (April 22), with a maximum contribution of $10,000. Each purchase must be made from the PlayStation Video Store.The PlayStation Store currently features a "Save Our Earth" section featuring a rather eclectic mix of sort-of-Earth-related games, including PixelJunk Eden, Flower, Flock! and er, Burn Zombie Burn.
Indie MMO donates 5% of all in-game purchases to charity
A browser-based RMT MMORPG is giving players a chance to become real life heroes through charity. Domain of Heroes is announcing their integrated charity system feature that donates 5% of all in-game purchases to the cause of a player's choice.Players have already donated over $500 to Child's Play and Women In Games International since the system was launched. Child's Play supplies toys and games to over 60 hospitals around the world, while WIGI promotes the inclusion and advancement of women in the games industry."It's a great way for players to have a direct influence on where their donation dollars go, while raising awareness for game-related charities in general," said Aaron Murray, Technical Director and Founder of Tandem Games. "Both Child's Play and WIGI are very excited to see this level of ongoing commitment from a company. We hope other companies will follow suit and share their revenue with deserving charities."Domain of Heroes claims to be the MMO for working people and is accessible from almost any browser on almost any platform without the need for plugins (e.g., Flash, Java appletc, etc.). You can choose from 3 factions, 30 races, 27 classes, and learn over 150 skills. An MMO with that many options that you can play almost anywhere? I don't think we'd ever get any work done!
Carbonite going free, continuing development
The guys behind Carbonite have finally responded to Blizzard's new addon policy, and probably not in the way you might have guessed: they're continuing development, and they're making the addon free. Carbonite was rumored to be the addon that started all of this trouble: they had a partial version up for free download, and were charging for the full version of the addon, which apparently Blizzard didn't appreciate. But rather than shutting down the addon completely, they've decided to go free for everyone, and they're continuing development -- version 3.00 is supposed to be out next week.It's worth noting that they still have a number of donate buttons on their download page, which Blizzard is supposedly fine with -- all Blizzard wanted was the donate buttons out of the game itself. And of course, if you find this addon (or any other) helpful, you should definitely support the people who make it.Reaction on the addon's forums is grateful as expected -- lots of people figured that this addon would be shutting down for good, so many are glad to see it will be continuing development. And one developer does say that Carbonite will be removing any obfuscation from their code, as per the new policy, so it's possible that other addon developers will be able to more easily hook into their code and use their techniques. Of course, whether the addon will still be financially worth it for the devs remains to be seen but for now, they're going along with the new policy and widening their audience at the same time.Thanks to everyone who sent this in!
Nintendo of Italy donates handhelds to hospital
In the latest show of charity for Nintendo, the company's Italian division donated a DS to every child in the pediatric ward at San Paolo Hospital. Nintendo also gave copies of Nintendogs, New Super Mario Bros., and Pokemon Diamond and Pearl for the kids to enjoy, as well as a few Wiis. Some cynics might cite ulterior motives for Nintendo's actions, but the fact is, you can't argue with a smile on a sick child's face. Check out the video (with music that Super Mario Galaxy fans might recognize) of the event embedded above to get a nice feel-good start to the weekend.[Update: The video is now after the break because of its autostarting tendencies. Be warned, if you check past the break, the video will autostart.]
Nintendo of Australia makes one little girl's Christmas extra-special
var digg_url = 'http://www.digg.com/nintendo/Nintendo_makes_one_little_girl_s_Christmas_extra_special'; Everyone likes an uplifting story during the holidays, don't they? Heck, we like to read or hear about them any chance we get. And this story is no different, as one little girl in Australia suffering from arthrogryposis, a degenerative muscle disease, recently got a wonderful gift from Nintendo.After trying a family friend's console and having a great time, that same wonderful friend wrote to Nintendo directly and got little Taylor a console sent to her, free of charge. As you might imagine, she was absolutely thrilled to receive something that can keep her active without pushing her so hard, but also something that brings a smile to her face and is quite fun. Merry Christmas, little Taylor![Via The Tanooki]
Pure Digital announces million camcorder giveaway for non-profits
At under $200, Pure Digital's recently announced Flip Video camcorders are already pretty inexpensive, but the company now looks to be trying to make them even cheaper for non-profit organizations -- as in free. That's the goal of the company's just announced Flip Video Spotlight program, which aims to give up to one million of the camcorders to non-profits and other non-governmental organizations over the next five years. Apparently, the initiative (which is set to get underway this December) will operate as a donor matching program, with donors (or the organizations themselves) able to purchase so-called Flip Video Spotlight Kits, which Flip Video will match one-to-one. Much like the OLPC program, Flip Video sees virtually no end to the benefits of its camcorders, with Pure Digital CEO Jonathan Kaplan saying the company believes "video can help change the world."
I'll bank on it
Recently I donated a character slot to the cause of guild management. One of our guild officers thought it was a good time to start a guild bank system, and since I had an extra character sitting around (goodbye Fela, I'll miss you) I offered my services for managing the guild bank. So we created Donations, an officious little gnome with a penchant for bureaucracy. Our system is highly organized, thanks to minds that are substantially better at these things than mine. We built the donations system along the gold standard. Each item donated is assigned a point total based on how much gold it is worth in the auction house. I downloaded Auctioneer, and that has cut my research time in half. The guild bank accepts certain crafting supplies along with monetary donations. Any greens or blues donated are auctioned and the player is given points corresponding to the amount of money it sold for. The points are a lot like DKP, you spend them on items or gold whenever you need them. The more points you have, the more points you can spend on items donated to the guild bank, or withdraw in the form of cash should you need to pay for some hefty purchase in the future – epic flying mounts anyone? So far the system has been pretty successful in its beta phase. Several of us, myself included, were able to save enough points for mounts for our alts. I am hoping that when Blizzard instigates its guild bank system in the future it is something that is this intuitive. I know personally I like being able to get value from items that I cannot use (exactly how much Knothide leather does an Alchemist need?), and it's important to me that we are able to provide supplies to those in the guild who need them. What are you guild bank systems like? Do you tithe, or are the donations all voluntary? And what would you like to see in the guild bank system Blizzard is proposing as an addition to the game?
Corporations finding green in going green
A select few have already discovered just how lucrative going green can be, but for mega-corps around the globe, this year's Earth Day was just as much about earning green as it was recycling. While throngs of companies have already instituted programs to recollect and recycle customer's obsolete gear, outfits are now looking for easy money in selling scrap material, used plastics, hardware components, and "refurbished PCs," all while tooting their own horn and eliciting a good bit of positive PR love along the way. According to IDC analysts, the global demand for such junk unusual treasures is on the rise, making it easier for companies such as Dell, Apple, and Sony to flip the returned hardware for extra cash. Furthermore, some say that these in-your-face recycling programs could even entice users to scrap their current PCs faster than they otherwise would, which could also lead to more business with said companies as they plunk down for yet another computer that they honestly didn't need. Sure, the motives behind going green in the tech industry could be swaying, but as long as hardware retirement and disposal is being handled in an environmentally-friendly way, we suppose there's not much room to repine.
Joystiq at the Pokemon launch party in NYC
Thousands of Pokemon fans stormed the Nintendo World Store for their incredible Pokemon Diamond & Pearl launch party. Getting into the event was no easy task, as the line stretched across a New York avenue. Once inside, fans were treated to equally long lines to purchase the game, and a myriad of activities to partake in. A scavenger hunt had Pokemaniacs survive the heat and go through all the stations set up for fans.Junichi Masuda and Shigeru Ohmori from Game Freak stopped by to answer fan's questions and sign autographs. In spite of the surprising success of the Pokemon franchise, the two were incredibly humble and seemed jovial in the presence of their adoring fans. Children (of all ages) crowded the plaza for a chance to meet some of the people responsible for this global phenomenon.To end the festivities, Nintendo made an incredible donation to Earth Day NY: a giant check (is there any other kind?) for $10,000 was presented to the eco-friendly charity. The event was a blast, and everyone appeared to be in high spirits. Considering the thousands of people in attendance, it's safe to say that the Pokemon phenomenon is still going strong.%Gallery-2731%
Child's Play receives a huge donation from Nintendo [update 1]
Nintendo sent out an avalanche of Nintendo DS handhelds and games to the Penny Arcade headquarters last week, donating the towering collection to Child's Play. The gamer-run charity has been donating toys, games, and other gifts to children's hospitals since 2003. Since then, the altruistic group has raised millions of dollars for its partner hospitals.Nintendo made sure to provide something for everyone with its donation, delivering DS systems in every color and handing out hundreds of copies of Nintendogs, Big Brain Academy, Mario Kart DS, and many other titles. Gabe posted photos of the mountainous shipment and assured readers that the DS Lites will find their way to the gracious hands of kids in children's hospitals soon.[Update 1: According to Penny Arcade's other half, Tycho, the systems and games were actually bought from Nintendo at a deep discount, using the money raised by the Child's Play charity. We apologize for this misinterpretation.]
Hollywood Arts eBaying Halo 3 cameo
Got extra cash burning a hole in your pocket and feeling the need to give? The Hollywood Arts charity is auctioning off all kinds of video game related goods including one sweet Halo 3 cameo donated by Bungie. Other auctions include a tour of Bungie Studios, a Red vs Blue package, and a signed WoW package. But it looks like you'll have to empty out your college savings fund, because the Halo 3 cameo auction starts at $1,000 and is sure to go up within' the coming week. But remember, 100% of all the auction money will be donated to the Hollywood Arts making this one of those win win situations. Also, be sure to note that the winner of the Bungie Studios tour auction gets to bring a friend with and my schedule is open for the rest of the year. You know ... just saying.
