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As 2016 draws to a close, it's been nice to look back over the year that was and reflect on what it meant for the art and business of game development.
Trying to pin down what the last twelve months meant for everyone involved would be a fool's errand, of course; the best we can do is hope that the year treated you well, and shine a light on some of the most notable events, trends and games that shaped the industry as a whole.
Gamasutra staff have been doing just that for the past few weeks, and today we draw that work together in a unified whole that aims to offer you a useful retrospective of the year that was.
Since the game industry is driven by developers, it seems only appropriate that we kick things off with a look back at the standout game makers of 2016. Below in alphabetical order are the 10 individual developers and studios, selected by Gamasutra's writers, that exceeded our expectations and pushed creative, commercial and cultural boundaries this year.
Last year, we praised Blizzard for surviving and thriving amid massive sea-changes in the industry, and 2016 only continues that trend for the company.
The rollout of Overwatch has so far been one of the company’s most successful commercial endeavors, launching the game industry giant into a new genre and successfully locking down most of the audience for the “hero shooter” genre.
But that’s not all the company’s been up to. After enduring a wave of criticism for the World of Warcraft expansion Warlords of Draenor, Blizzard made changes to its production model to successfully turn around its latest expansion Legion in a record amount of time, shortening the years-long gap between expansions to a single year. Given that Blizzard has been attempting this since the days of The Burning Crusade, the company’s ability to drastically respond to changing market forces needs to be commended, even when it’s in a genre they won long ago.
But lastly, Blizzard deserves extra praise for creating more diverse characters in its games and responding to the desires of its playerbase. While you could point to Overwatch’s diverse cast as proof enough of this effort, the fact that the company emphasized these values at The Game Awards this year stands as a shining example for representation the game industry, and how it can serve a global audience at the highest tiers of commercial success.
Concerned Ape (Eric Barone)
Eric Barone set out to create a game that was both an ode to Harvest Moon and also addressed some of the problems he found in the recent games of that series.
Instead, he ended up single-handedly developing something that breathed new life into a genre that had mostly been dominated by Harvest Moon since the '90s. Barone’s game, Stardew Valley, quickly found success after its launch earlier this year and managed to sell over a million copies in just two short months.
What makes Barone’s accomplishment with Stardew Valley especially notable is the fact that he developed the game entirely on his own. Every inch of the game - the code, art, story, music - was carefully crafted by Barone across Stardew Valley’s four-year development.
To accomplish this, he’s been operating in a state of pure crunch since announcing the project on Steam Greenlight in 2014. Before launch, Barone said he worked on Stardew Valley for 10 hours every day. Now that his game is out in the wild that number has jumped to 15 as he works on bringing Stardew Valley to more platforms and creating new features for the more than 1 million players that have fallen in love with his idyllic and captivating game.
One of the trends we observed in 2016 was how a few studios finally shipped games after a decade in development. Among these developers is D-Pad Studio, which deserves special praise for finally bringing the charming platformer Owlboy to the world.
Owlboy, in its creators’ own words, is a game that’s better judged by older games than the cutting edge of today, but the level of polish, craft, and interaction that’s present in this game would be considered stunning for any game studio. The fact that it was in the oven for 10 years, while some of its developers worked in flower shops and held down contract jobs? That’s nearly unthinkable.
It’s no accident that Owlboy’s story is about perseverance and pluck in the face of impossible odds—that it’s able to sell that story after surviving 10 years of gameplay is an astonishing and inspiring feat. Over the past decade, D-Pad exhibited something beyond the abstract idea of "passion" for a project; the studio showed a mastery of art and craft -- along with a heavy dose of commitment -- that is an inspiration to anyone working in a creative field.
First things first -- many teams at Sony pitched in to make the uniquely beautiful and affecting The Last Guardian over the course of its lengthy development cycle. But the finished product bears the unmistakable imprint of the people at GenDesign, a studio created by Fumito Ueda and some of the core team members who previously worked with him to create Ico and Shadow of the Colossus.
Every single person who worked on making this ambitious game a reality should take immense pride in the result. But it’s the team at GenDesign who get our nod for creating a worthy successor to two of the most celebrated games in the history of the medium.
The Last Guardian is a continuation of the main theme of Ueda's previous games: exploring the bond between the player and a companion that they alternately rely upon and protect. This year, GenDesign inspired not only players, but also game developers, reminding once again that something as technical as game development can bring forth a work of art that reflects our innate, emotional tendencies as human beings.
Hello Games earned its place on this list for a couple of reasons. For one, No Man’s Sky was –
and remains – an ambitious project, particularly for the small independent team at Hello Games, whose previous games were a couple of fun, arcade motocross affairs.
Procedural generation in video games has been a hot topic, particularly in the last few years, and we’ve seen great examples of it. But Hello Games took that concept and created an experience that will be remembered as an inflection point for procedural generation, showing how the technique can be used to create countless visually emotive, living worlds and inhabitants.
The other reason Hello makes it on our list is because of its perseverance in the face of adversity. As has been well-documented, the launch of No Man’s Sky was tumultuous to say the least. Hello Games and individuals within the studio have received online abuse and death threats, all of which, no matter your opinion on the game’s marketing, are inexcusable and indicative of some deep-seated problems in the relationship players have with developers.
Instead of letting these sizable challenges defeat it, Hello instead listened to legitimate criticisms, put its nose to the grindstone, and recently released the expansive “Foundation Update,” which, along with smaller, frequent updates, has since helped nudge the conversation around No Man’s Sky to be about actually playing and enjoying No Man’s Sky.
On one hand, Hello Games in 2016 was a terrifying case study of what could happen when a portion of a fanbase turns into a mob; the situation has really spooked some game developers, particularly small ones like Hello. On the other hand, Hello's year is inspiring, because if this small studio with big ambitions could at least begin to turn such a difficult situation around, then maybe other developers can persevere too.
In the beginning, there were video games. Many were good, and in their wake came countless sequels, spin-offs and franchises.
Now, decades into the game industry’s lifespan, we’re knee-deep in remakes, remasters and reimaginings of older games, many of which fail to capture or improve upon what made the original work significant.
That’s not true of Doom, which id Software released this year to remarkable critical acclaim. Players, critics, and fellow developers praised the game (id’s first new release in half a decade) as a surprising return to form, one that breathed new life into the first-person shooter genre. It reminded us why the original Doom was so arresting, so influential, that for a time FPS games were known simply as “Doom clones.”
It’s no mean feat to create a genre-defining game. It’s arguably even harder to look back on such a work 20+ years later, accurately assess what makes it great, and use those elements as a foundation to build something new. This year id accomplished just that, and for that we recognize the studio as one our top developers of the year.
Hitman is the franchise that Copenhagen-based IO Interactive is known for. So messing with that winning formula is a risky endeavor.
But sometimes change is required in order for even a popular series to remain viable. This year, IO announced that the next main installment in the Hitman franchise would be released episodically – one driving factor being the increased margins of purely digital releases when compared to disc-based traditional releases.
The decision had to be sold hard internally: shareholders, the development team, publishing teams, sales, marketing, and other parties all needed to be convinced. And then once that battle was won, an even bigger challenge awaited, as the fans had to be won over and convinced that this major shift wasn’t going to ruin their favorite franchise.
The transition wasn’t without its challenges. But the studio eventually learned how to effectively communicate a complicated business model to its audience, learned a greater understanding of accountability, and in the end created a new, market-proven variation of the episodic business model. That’s an accomplishment that may well reach beyond the walls of IO Interactive, and influence other studios that need to remain competitive – and maintain their existing fanbases – in an unforgiving market.
A popular game alone isn’t necessarily enough to land a developer on this list, but Niantic certainly deserves to be recognized for creating something that rapidly become a cultural phenomenon.
When the augmented reality game Pokemon Go launched this past summer, servers struggled to keep up with traffic that was nearly 50 times greater than the developer’s pre-launch predictions. Even so, the 70-person development team was able to weather the storm to create one of the stand-out social game experiences of recent time.
Niantic was able to create a game with this level of success by leveraging both the inherent popularity of the Pokemon brand and past experiences with their previous location-based game Ingress.
The gyms and Pokestops of Pokemon Go were largely built on crowdsourced landmark information provided by Ingress players since that game launched in 2012. It’s doubtful Pokemon Go would have done as well as it has without both the lessons learned and the resources Niantic gained through Ingress.
Pokemon Go could’ve easily been a one-and-done game that fizzled out shortly after launch, but the decisions made by Niantic in development, during launch, and following release ensured that it instead became a cultural icon that is as much a social experience as it is a video game.
As virtual reality continued to be one of the most talked about trends in 2016, Owlchemy Labs and its efforts in the VR space need to be recognized. This small studio out of Austin, Texas has proven to be a forerunner in the field of interactivity in VR, as exhibited by its game Job Simulator.
Don’t be fooled by its cartoony graphics and general absurdity: Job Simulator is absolutely the most intuitive room-scale VR game with the best affordance design on the market right now. That's all due to Owlchemy's world-class approach to design and development in a new generation of VR.
The studio is also keenly aware of the challenges facing the VR market, perhaps most notably the difficulty of showing people who aren’t in VR what it’s like to be in a VR game. Owlchemy recently showed off an advanced (i.e. mind-blowing) mixed reality method dubbed “depth-based realtime in-app mixed reality compositing.” Still in development, the fancily-named technique could have a huge impact on the effectiveness of VR marketing.
Owlchemy also seems to know that a rising tide lifts all boats, as the studio shares its own lessons learned, and is an active member within the VR development community. It's an important attitude to adopt, as VR is still a fledging space that needs to continuously advance if it’s to become more than just a flash in the pan.
Witching Hour Studios
Our own Katherine Cross praised Witching Hour Studios earlier this year for boldly stepping onto the world stage with a unique Singaporean style, but we wanted to celebrate the Southeast Asian developer for a variety of reasons. For one, its debut Masquerada: Songs and Shadows proved to be a thoughtful and engaging role-playing game that deftly mixed social issues with typical RPG design.
For another, they’re the only developer on this list that had to go toe-to-toe with its own government to ensure it could bring a gay character to life in their game.
As we reported back in 2015, Witching Hour Studios first skirted the government’s laws about depictions of gay characters in media mostly via brief encounters at shared events. But as we discussed with creative director Ian Gregory, this evolved into a conversation with the government about the role media plays in Singaporean culture, and how gay characters should be depicted in games like Masquerada.
In the U.S., we recognize domestic game companies that understand the importance of workplace diversity (e.g. Electronic Arts was just named the most LGBTQ-friendly workplace in America). But it's also important to recognize the effort of a smaller studio overseas that's grappling with a humanitarian issue while shipping a noteworty RPG.
Click the link to page 2, and read our list of the top trends of 2016
Here, Gamasutra editor-in-chief Kris Graft takes a look at the trends that shaped the video game business in 2016.
Nintendo takes its first real steps into mobile
It’s something that was a long time coming, but was still difficult to fathom: Nintendo, a company that on a fundamental basis is about creating hardware and software that complement one another seamlessly, was going to start making games for mass market, non-dedicated hardware.
First there was Miitomo – a slightly gamified (sorry) social app developed in a partnership with mobile game giant DeNA. It’s a fascinating, appropriately Nintendo-like approach to social interactions on phones. Although it was a flash in the pan when it launched this spring, it was a bright flash that hinted at the kind of audience Nintendo could draw on mobile devices. (Remember when we were all totally into Miitomo for those two days?)
Then came Pokemon Go's explosive success. While it was developed by Niantic (and remember, Nintendo only owns about a third of the Pokemon franchise), the Pokemon brand and Nintendo are inextricably linked. By mid-year, Nintendo was just starting to hint at the impact it may have once it put more significant resources into mobile.
And this week, we’ll be seeing what can be considered the first “real Nintendo game” on smartphones with the iPhone release of Super Mario Run. Directed by Nintendo stalwart Takashi Tezuka, the game is getting special attention from Apple, which seems determined to make it a success.
It’s a smart tack by Nintendo as it finally acknowledges that mobile games have wooed-away the mainstream audience once owned by the Wii and DS/3DS. Supplemented by the upcoming launch of the Switch console, Nintendo’s slow but sure move to mobile this year is laying the foundation for a potentially robust 2017. [Written just prior to Super Mario Run's launch.]
Coming to grips with the commercial VR market
It’s true – last year we noted virtual reality in our top trends list, but the way the VR market has developed over the course of 2016 makes VR once again impossible to ignore, albeit in a different light.
Whereas 2015 was a year in which a select few had access to VR, 2016 was when VR became commercially available. Valve and HTC’s Vive is out, Oculus Rift hit shelves and recently added Touch controller support, and PlayStation VR had a strong launch with a more mainstream console crowd.
Maybe we'll leave this guy in 2016.
With these commercial launches, actual reality is beginning to sink in for VR developers. So far, what we’re seeing is that it’s difficult to make money on a VR game, which shouldn't be a surprise to people familiar with new markets with small addressable audiences. We’re also seeing developers try to mitigate the risk of getting into VR here in the early days, often by shoehorning existing games into VR (a practice that often doesn’t yield the best results). VR devs are also experiencing first-hand the difficulty in marketing and selling a game meant to be played while actually inside a digital realm. Those are just a few of VR's now very real challenges.
All of last year’s handwavey theories about the practicality, usability, and overall viability of VR games have been put to the test by the live consumer market over the last several months. Through all of the challenges, however, the VR dev community, along with platform holders, still seem extremely committed to the medium. That could be enough to make 2017 the year VR truly solidifies its position in game dev, if not a wider addressable market.
Game consoles have a mid-life crisis
Game consoles have, once again, found themselves in an awkward position. They need to keep up with the times, but also simultaneously avoid wrecking the entire console game dev ecosystem by launching new proprietary hardware.
In 2016, Sony and Microsoft revealed exactly how they would attempt to navigate these tricky times, by announcing the PlayStation 4 Pro and the Scorpio, a souped-up version of the Xbox One. These new, more powerful iterations of their launch counterparts are meant to tackle higher-resolution 4K televisions, enable fancy HDR effects, improve framerates, and be ready for processor-intensive VR games.
More like late-life coolness.
Dedicated hardware continues to be the console market’s greatest strength, and also its Achilles’ heel. The fundamental question associated with the incremental-update trend is whether or not people will buy enough of these updated consoles to warrant console makers to continue such upgrades. The answer lies somewhere in the value proposition.
It’s also possible that more powerful consoles are a stop-gap as Sony and Microsoft continue to make moves toward video game and media strategies that no longer rely on dedicated hardware. We see Sony continuing to develop PlayStation Network, and making PlayStation play nice with PCs, and there’s Microsoft that’s increasingly integrating Xbox One and Windows 10. This isn’t to mention developments in cloud-based games, the logical goal of which is to use a network as the backbone for streaming and distribution on non-dedicated platforms like TVs and PCs.
I'm getting ahead of myself. In any case, for now we’ll humor PS4 and Xbox One, who’re snapping up that new Corvette convertible to let their graying temples blow in the breeze.
A new kind of crowdfunding takes shape
Part of making video games is getting money to make them. It’s not as sexy as the more creative aspects of game development, but typically essential for commercial endeavors.
This year a new kind of funding that’s been in the works for years finally went into wider practice in the U.S.: equity crowdfunding. Companies like Fig, Gambitious, and Indiegogo ramped up or introduced crowdfunding initiatives this year, with studios including ArtCraft (Crowfall), Double Fine (Psychonauts 2), Flying Wild Hog (Hard Reset Redux) turning to equity crowdfunding as a solution.
There're no good images of equity crowdfunding, so here is a watermarked stock photo of money bags.
In case you’ve missed it, here’s what it is: In traditional, Kickstarter-style crowdfunding, backers pledge a certain amount of money, and project owners offer up rewards – like a copy of a game or a spot in the game’s credits – depending on how much money a backer contributes. Once a campaign hits its funding goal, pledgers’ cash is released to the team behind the project to go towards work.
Equity crowdfunding operates in a similar fashion, except instead of “backing” a project, backers become legally-bound investors in the project, potentially receiving an actual monetary return on investment. This style of crowdfunding is fraught with legal complications (equity crowdfunding rules in the U.S. were just finalized late last year), but the real investment aspect is appealing to people who might like to fund video game development and who wouldn’t mind making a bit of extra money.
While not as explosive as when Double Fine blew open Kickstarter’s doors for game devs in 2012, equity crowdfunding is a measured yet notable trend that more game developers may turn to as other funding options (like Kickstarter) dry up.
The post-indiepocalyptic game industry
Last year, we noted the “indiepocalypse,” which was less of a real extinction event and more about fear and uncertainty as game markets matured and became increasingly crowded, competitive, and unforgiving.
2016 was the year that these fears and gut feelings began to creep into observable reality: As the quality bar rises on indie games, so do development costs; discoverability continues to be an issue as games flood the market; hits become bigger and fewer, squeezing out more indies; game devs have more and more in common with struggling artists and musicians; and so on.
Indies at the beginning of 2016 vs. indies at the end of 2016
While that sounds a bit depressing, at least there’s no mushroom cloud hanging in the sky just yet. The good news is that this year, there is less “omg the sky is falling on indie games,” and more “these are the problems – now that I can see them, I can try to solve them, or at least work around them.” Indie games might be headed for winter, but think about what your spring will look like.
Indies will need all the support they can get from platform holders as the new reality unfolds. Some have been more proactive than others – where Valve has continued to implement and address issues with its storefront (namely discoverability on Steam), others like Apple have done little to address the hurdles in front of small developers. Newer distribution platforms like itch.io also offer fertile ground for developers looking to avoid the worst degrees of noise.
While crowding markets are still a major concern, this year we see making a living as an indie is more complicated than just "fixing" discoverability. The road ahead is still difficult, full of potential pitfalls. But at least in 2016, the challenges became more apparent, and hopefully with that, so has a way forward.
Click the link to page 3, and read our list of the top event of 2016
Gamasutra editor Alex Wawro continues by looking back at some of the biggest events that shaped the industry in 2016.
Pokemon Go hits hard
Let’s start with a showstopper: Niantic and The Pokemon Company’s launch of Pokemon Go this summer.
We tend to shy away from calling out game launches among our top events of the year because they rarely have significant lasting influence on the game industry; Pokemon Go is an outlier, a free-to-play augmented-reality game that became a bit of a pop culture phenomenon.
Game industry execs sat up and took notice, to be sure, but Go's canny marriage of the broadly appealing Pokemon license with proven F2P AR mobile game tech got everyone from South Korean tourism officials to U.S. presidential candidates to the staff of an animal shelter in Muncie, Indiana talking about (and presumably, playing) the game.
A crowd of Pokemon Go players. Not pictured: the rest of this giant crowd of Pokemon Go players.
Before Pokemon Go, AR game design a relatively niche topic in the game industry; after Pokemon Go, it’s a pretty safe bet that AR games and experiences are being talked about in design meetings, conference halls and board rooms around the world. We expect to see significant investment and innovation in the AR game space in the years to come, and the lion's hare of that interest (if not all of it) is due to the high-profile success of Pokemon Go.
The game engine business gains a new challenger: Amazon
The game engine business in general was real interesting this year, but Amazon’s decision to field its own competitor against established players like Unity and Unreal was the event likely to have the biggest impact on the game industry in the years to come.
Amazon’s Lumberyard is a strong competitor out of the gate: built on CryEngine tech, it’s basically free for devs to use and capable of targeting a wide variety of platforms -- including VR. More importantly, it plays nice with Amazon’s extant tech: Amazon Web Services and Amazon’s Twitch.tv streaming platform, for example, which together support and entertain a significant portion of the Internet.
Acres of virtual lumber, rendered in Lumberyard.
That doesn’t mean it’s the best engine on the block, of course -- nobody but you knows what tools are right for the game you want to make. But Lumberyard’s remarkably robust debut this year has very quickly brought Amazon into the game engine market as a major player, and that’s likely to have a significant impact on the industry going forward.
Vivendi pulls off a hostile takeover of Gameloft
Big, headline-grabbing hostile takeovers are notably rare in the game industry, so Vivendi’s successful conquest of Gameloft this summer was kind of a big deal. But beyond the takeover itself (which Gameloft's board warned was "likely to destabilize the company and its teams"), this is significant because it appears to be a major step in Vivendi's plan to re-enter the game industry in a big way.
Vivendi has had a hand in the industry for some time, of course, but it lost a lot of clout a few years back when it gave up ownership of Activision Blizzard. That decision proved pretty profitable for Vivendi, and the fact that it’s now invested some of its profits in wresting control of Gameloft is a big deal.
It also presages further shakeups in the industry, as Vivendi has made no secret of its plan to acquire both Gameloft and Ubisoft, uniting them under its banner. The fact that both companies were founded and run by members of the Guillemot family (though the family stepped away from Gameloft "with regret" following Vivendi's takeover) lends the whole affair another layer of human drama.
We don't know what the takeover looked like, so here's a stock photo.
In the face of Vivendi's encroachment, Ubisoft chief Yves Gillemot has publicly stressed how valuable he believes the company's "creative independence" to be and stated that a takeover "threatens the construction and pillars of Ubisoft." The company is one of the largest in the game industry, employing thousands of game makers around the world, and when you consider their fates along with all the Gameloft stakeholders who have had the course of their careers altered by Vivendi's takeover, it seems likely this acquisition has impacted the industry in ways we can't yet fully appreciate.
Disney gets out of games -- again
Disney surprised many of us this year by abruptly canning its Disney Infinity game franchise, effectively exiting the console game business.
This was a surprising and saddening move, since it meant the closure of Disney-owned Infinity developer Avalanche Software and the loss of roughly 300 jobs. It also spelled the end for a (seemingly popular and profitable) toys-to-life game franchise which had benefitted from Disney's collaboration with developers across the game industry, from Team Ninja to Sumo Digital to United Front Games (which itself closed down this year, months after Infinity was canned.)
Plus, this means Disney is now basically out of the business of making games. This isn't the first time we've seen Disney cut and run when it comes to game development -- the company has a history of killing game studios, including Junction Point, Propaganda Games and LucasArts -- but it does seem to be the last time we'll see Disney actively involved in anything other than licensing and mobile game publishing for the foreseeable future.
The end of Disney Infinity also spoke to a broader shift in the game industry away from toys-to-life games, which boomed in the wake of Activision's success with Skylanders but brought with them tricky concerns like shelf space and toy manufacturing costs. The market for games with physical toy accessories isn't doomed -- the Skylanders and Lego Dimensions games continue to appear on store shelves, and by all accounts Nintendo's Amiibo business is brisk -- but Disney's abrupt exit significantly shook some stakeholders' faith in toys-to-life.
Shelves full of Disney Infinity toys are a thing of the past.
Game industry analyst Joe Dodson told Gamasutra he was "shocked" by the decision, noting that he had been following the company because he believed it to be a leader of the toys-to-life market as a whole.
""We've been following the toys-to-life sector very closely, because the revenue growth since 2011 has been explosive. And Disney Infinity was a huge part of that growth. It was the market leader, it had ridiculously strong licenses," Dodson said earlier this year. "And in 2016 it's gone."
Tencent acquires Supercell
$8.6 billion. That's how much Chinese tech giant Tencent spent this year to buy a majority stake in Supercell, the Finnish mobile game company known best for F2P titans Clash of Clans and Clash Royale. Money is what powers the game industry, and when so much of it gets thrown around in a single deal we have to sit up and take notice.
Supercell's handful of hit mobile games have seen outsized success.
According to market analysis firm Newzoo, this deal immediately made Tencent the world leader (among publicly-traded companies, at least) in game revenues. Just behind it in the #2 spot is Activision Blizzard King, which rose to that position on the back of its $5.9 billion purchase of King in 2015.
The King acquisition was one of the biggest events of last year because it portended a shift in how major players in both the console and mobile game markets do business. This Supercell acquisition is likely to do the same, as it affords Tencent a commanding presence in a market it has struggled to penetrate: Western mobile games.
This may not affect most developers' day-to-day lives, as it seems like it would be in Tencent's best interest to allow Supercell to continue doing the work that made it so highly valued in the first place. But in the long run, this consolidates revenue in a way that's likely to shape how the game industry evolves. Tencent now controls the biggest revenue generators in both PC (League of Legends, operated by Tencent subisidiary Riot Games) and mobile (Supercell's Clash of Clans and Clash Royale) game markets. What will it do with all that money? We're about to find out.
Click the link to page 4, and read our list of the top games of 2016
Here then are Gamasutra's Top 10 Games of 2016.
Clash Royale by Supercell
Clash Royale is an imperfect game, but the concept is excellent. It's a light PVP RTS were action takes place primarily in two lanes. There are dozens of units to choose from, making up an 8-card deck, meaning combinations are myriad.
At its best, the game is about precise placement of units to psyche out your opponent, turn your defense into a big push, and create new niches in the metagame for your deck to thrive in.
While it is a PVP game, and you can win or lose trophies during your daily battles (which is stressful), the clans are where I feel the game really shines. You can have a clan of up to 50 people, and there you can experiment with new deck combinations, trade cards with allies, and generally play around with strategies risk-free.
My clan consists of about one third Gamasutra and Insertcredit.com alumni, and two thirds some community from West Sumatra who found our clan somehow. It's great! Across language barriers, we all increase each others' skills.
Ultimately, a light PVP RTS is a great idea, and I personally enjoy using cards others don't, to make for a deck that surprises people when it works (three musketeers up in here). The free-to-play aspects of the game are pretty light, and the game can be played with minimal investment so long as you've got a clan to spend your time with. As long as new cards continue to keep the game fresh, I'll keep playing. (crying king emote). - Brandon Sheffield
Doom by id Software
Publisher: Bethesda Softworks
It was a long time coming, having gone through one major, unreleased iteration in Doom 4, but Doom 2016 delivered on what made the original so revered. It stands tall among today’s shooters, but retains the elements that make Doom, Doom. Fast, gory, precise, and overall super crunchy, Doom uses the franchise’s legacy as a strong inspiration rather than a template to blindly follow.
id Software identified the spirit of Doom, stuck to those core values throughout development, and conveyed that in an FPS that pays homage while feeling thoroughly modern. It’s the best-feeling shooter of the year. (Also: that Mick Gordon metal soundtrack, yeah.) - Kris Graft
Firewatch by Campo Santo
Firewatch is a game about two people talking in the woods, and I love it. It’s a great example of how a team can craft a game with vibrant, believable characters and meaningful choices without falling back on anointing the player as the savior/destroyer of the world.
Firewatch protagonist Henry is an unremarkable man with a bit of paunch and a bad few years under his belt; the game strikes a great balance, design-wise, between showing who Henry is (by fading in on him writing a letter, for example, or automatically annotating the map with his musings as the game progresses) and affording the player room to tell his story through dialogue choices.
The results of those choices are wonderfully delivered, too; nailing comedic timing and emotional subtext in voice acting is tricky business, but I think performers Rich Sommer (Henry) and Crissy Jones (Delilah) pulled it off beautifully here. The story of my time with Firewatch is utterly trite and totally true: whether you love or hate the ending, the best part is the journey. - Alex Wawro
Job Simulator: The 2050 Archives by Owlchemy Labs
Job Simulator on the Vive was one of my first experiences with VR, and honestly, I think it’s one of the best games to use to introduce someone to virtual reality. It offers a choice of jobs to experience - such as mechanic, chef, or office worker - and then guides players through completing comical approximations of tasks that represent each job.
For example, as the chef you might crack eggs to bake a cake and then add in a literal flower rather than flour to complete the dough. The little tasks through Job Simulator also give players a lot of freedom to just have fun doing really dumb things in VR.
There are a lot of neat VR games that let you explore dramatic stories and solve complicated puzzles, but sometimes you just want a game that lets you throw raw steak at your floating robot boss. - Alissa McAloon
The Last Guardian by GenDesign (And SIE Japan)
Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment
The Last Guardian is so full of technical flaws, some of which could be attributed to a tumultuous, famously long development cycle, some of it due to choices made by Fumito Ueda. The camera is awful, the level design is incredibly unintuitive, your beastly companion Trico is unwieldy. So that leaves me to ask, why does this belong on my list?
The best answer I can come up with is that Ueda’s vision of companionship shined bright enough that The Last Guardian’s flaws didn’t matter much to me. Trico is the most emotive companion ever in a video game – even when uncooperative, it’s easy to just chalk that up to a streak of disobedience that any dog or cat owner is familiar with (classic “it’s not a bug, it’s a feature!” scenario).
Having a companion like Trico gives you motivation and reason to push through obstacles, both intentionally- and unintentionally-designed. No other game this year had an NPC that I cared about more than that stubborn cat-bird-dogasaur. - Kris Graft
Mafia 3 by Hangar 13
Publisher: 2K Games
If you traveled back in time six months and told past-me that Mafia III would be one of my favorite games of the year, I’d have cheerfully A) asked after your wondrous time machine and B) said you were nuts.
Hangar 13’s debut game appears, on its surface, to be an unremarkable open-world game about gangsters, with little to set it apart from all the other open-world gangster games beyond a novel setting.
But what a setting it is! I lived in Louisiana for a time, and while the city we called home bore little resemblance to Mafia III’s simulacrum of late-’60s New Orleans, there are little details that feel right: the color of the light, for one, or the stark flatness of the landscape.
The game’s design also does a great job at conveying, through systems, some small piece of what I think it must feel like to be a mixed-race man living in the South. For example, there are two separate on-screen indicators that show the player where danger is -- one is a standard red reticle that appears during combat and spikes in different directions to indicate where enemies (and damage) are coming from, while the other is a blue reticle that shows the player where nearby police are and how strongly they’re looking at you.
In just about every other open-world game, that latter indicator would only appear when the player had committed a crime and was being hunted by police. In Mafia III, the police indicator is a constant -- it will always appear and show you that the police are watching you, even if you’ve done nothing wrong.
It’s a simple but effective system, one that serves a useful gameplay purpose (by informing the player when they should step carefully) while also fostering an oppressive feeling of judgment. - Alex Wawro
Overwatch by Blizzard Entertainment
I paid zero attention to Overwatch before its launch, but it has dominated my free time since releasing earlier this year. The hero shooter is remarkably easy to pick up, thanks in no small part to a diverse cast of playable heroes. Currently, there are twenty-three characters to choose from, though Blizzard has been periodically adding to that roster since the game's release.
Overwatch quickly picked up a following in the competitive community but despite this, it still remains a game that can be enjoyed by players of different skill. With such a wide library of heroes to choose from, it's easy to find a character to start learning.
The game itself has a way of teaching players organically which characters work best in which situation, and there are no pay-to-win microtransactions built into the game. I admire Overwatch for its massive eSports presence, but I consider it one of my top ten games of this year for being a competitive game that is equally appealing to casual players. - Alissa McAloon
Stardew Valley by Concerned Ape
Publisher: Chucklefish Games
I’ve been playing fantasy farming simulators for well over half my life at this point and I still have no idea how they’re as fun as they are. For the longest time, the Harvest Moon series has all but dominated that genre, but somehow ConcernedApe (AKA Eric Barone) has beat Harvest Moon at its own game.
Barone’s game Stardew Valley captures nearly everything long-time fans love about the Harvest Moon series. Players start on an overgrown farm with nearly nothing, and are able to create a thriving farm through a little thing called resource management.
Planting the right crops and taking good care of animals is the simple way to explain the farming side of the game, but there’re a lot of deeper strategies involved. Players have gone as far as to set up elaborate spreadsheets detailing the exact profit per month generated by different types of crops. It’s honestly amazing.
Stardew Valley merges those basic farming mechanics with a crafting system and basic RPG-like leveling as well to create a game that players can easily dump hundreds of hours into. Personally, I’m sitting right around 140 and I’ve only played maybe four in-game years. - Alissa McAloon
Titanfall 2 by Respawn Entertainment
Publisher: Electronic Arts
There’s often a steep contrast between military-themed shooters like Titanfall 2 and other shooters on this list like Overwatch or Doom. Where games like those emphasize playfulness or joy on the surface, military shooters—even science fiction-themed ones—take inspiration from military design to make heroic or dire moments, but lose something in raw playfulness.
Thankfully, that isn’t the case for Titanfall 2, one of many shooters that deserves to be celebrated in 2016 for featuring innovative design, but one in particular that deserves to be championed because it returns the joy of movement and velocity to a genre that’s adapted somberness.
It’s a game that constantly encourages the player to experiment with speed and carves individual levels and scenarios that have such a strong identity it almost feels like Valve’s classic Half-Life levels.
Across multiplayer and single-player (which shouldn’t even have existed, given how much Titanfall stretched itself thin trying to be a dedicated multiplayer game like Overwatch) Respawn has mixed a dash of charm and with a love of physics to create a game that fundamentally understands why shooters can still showcase top-notch design.
Plus it helps that BT-7274 is a REAL PAL. - Bryant Francis
Thumper by Drool
The marketing term used for Thumper has been “rhythm violence,” and it’s absolutely fitting. Thumper rewards precision visually and aurally, making you feel like you’re not just tapping buttons to a beat, but rather influencing the composition of the percussion-heavy music, at the same time destroying everything in your path.
When you play Thumper, you’re just pressing a button and combining that with a direction, at designated points on a track. That physical simplicity allows you to lose your senses to the game, as you’re shoved down the throat of a grotesque monster. Thumper is the perfect intersection audio-visual intensity; it’s synesthesia on a hard drive. - Kris Graft
Gamasutra contributors also each wrote up a personal top-ten list -- and you can read them here: Kris Graft, Alex Wawro, Bryant Francis, Katherine Cross, Chris Baker, Alissa McAloon, Chris Kerr, Phill Cameron, and Brandon Sheffield.


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Issues of Philippines with Indo-Asean Services Agreement
Recently, the other countries of ASEAN group have blamed Philippines for delay, when it refused to make any meaningful offer to open up its services market to Indian professionals. Thus, the country has been playing the spoilsport in the recent India-Asean services negotiations in Indonesia. In this context, India’s Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma had a bilateral meeting with his Filipino counterpart Gregory L Domingo to push India’s cause. But but Philippines did not show much flexibility.
- The Philippines says that it had to protect its services sector as it was vulnerable and the country’s laws did not allow opening of the sector. its worth note that all other members of Asean are making offers to India for opening up their services sector, an agreement can be signed only when all countries are agreeable to the entire pact.
- India and the Asean implemented a free trade agreement in goods in 2010, but the Asean has been dragging its feet on a services and investments agreement that was to follow.
- India stands to gain substantially from a services agreement as there is a lot of scope for IT, healthcare, education and other professionals in the Asean countries.
- It benefited much less from the goods agreement, as the Asean region already had low tariffs on goods and the FTA would not lead to steep reduction in duties.
- Bilateral trade between the Asean and India jumped 24% in 2010 to $ 51.3 billion. India’s exports grew at 33% to $23.1 billion while imports from the Asean increased by 18% to $ 28.2 billion. Foreign direct investments (FDI) inflows from the Asean touched $14.25 billion in May 2011 and accounted for 10.36% of India’s total FDI.
India’s Deals in service till now:
- India is negotiating bilateral deals with individual Asean countries to gain access into the Asean services market. It already has a deal with Singapore and Malaysia and is negotiating ones with Indonesia and Thailand.
The Asean includes Brunei, Cambodia, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Singapore, Vietnam and the Philippines.
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domain: news


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Uncovering Barriers to Branchless Banking: A Synthesis of Consumer Capability Research in India, Malawi, Philippines, and Zambia
Publisher: Microfinance Opportunities
Publisher: United Nations Capital Development Fund (UNCDF)
Agribusiness SMEs in Malawi: Assessment of Small and Medium Enterprises in the Agricultural Sector and Improved Access to Finance in Malawi
Understanding the Challenges and Opportunities in Promoting Savings Among Low-Income Individuals in Lesotho, Malawi, and South Africa
Publisher: FinMark Trust
Publisher: The Rockwool Foundation Research Unit
Sri Lanka-based fintech Genie has partnered with Bank of Ceylon to act as the financial acquirer and digitize payments through its mobile wallet solution.
The unprecedented crisis triggered by the coronavirus pandemic has severely dented Sri Lanka’s economy, causing a steep fall in the earnings from tourism, remittances and outflow of foreign investment, the nation’s central bank has said.


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Google rolls out Android 7.0 Nougat for Nexus devices
The company said over the next several weeks, the Nexus 6, Nexus 5X, Nexus 6P, Nexus 9, Nexus Player, Pixel C and General Mobile 4G (Android One) will get an over-the-air software update to Android 7.0 Nougat.
Any devices enrolled in the Android Beta Programme will also receive this final version.
This means the update will miss the Nexus 5 and 7 tablets. The official Google blog also said, “There are many tasty devices coming from our partners running Android Nougat, including the upcoming LG V20, which will be the first new smartphone that ships with Android Nougat, right out of the box.”
According to news reports, the upgrade will be rolled out for devices such as HTC10, HTC One 9A, HTC One M9 and Sony Xperia Z3.(more)


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Tokens were taken from a blockchain “bridge” utilised in the BNB Chain, according to a tweet from Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao.
The largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world, Binance, has a connection to a blockchain that was the target of a $570 million theft, according to a representative for Binance on Friday. This is just the latest in a string of attacks that have hit the cryptocurrency industry this year.
Binance Smart Chain Latest News :-
The BNB Chain, which was formerly known as Binance Smart Chain until February, was using a blockchain “bridge” when tokens were stolen, according to Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao in a tweet. Blockchain bridges are devices that are used to move bitcoins across various apps.
According to data from CoinGecko, the BNB cryptocurrency, formerly known as Binance Coin, is supported by BNB Chain. It is the fifth-largest token in the world by market cap with a value of almost $46 billion.
A spokeswoman for Binance stated in an email that about $100 million worth of BNB was “unrecovered” and that “the majority” of it was still in the hacker’s digital wallet address.
Zhao estimated the stolen cryptocurrency to be worth $100 million. Later, according to a blog post by BNB Chain, the hacker withdrew 2 million BNB tokens, which are valued approximately $570 million.
Read Also: Facebook has sent a warning to one million users regarding stolen usernames and passwords
Cyber Security on Cryptocurrency :-
Thefts, which have long plagued the cryptocurrency industry, are now targeting blockchain bridges.
13 distinct bridge hacks, largely this year, resulted in the theft of about $2 billion in cryptocurrency, according to a report released in August by the crypto analytics company Chainalysis.
One of the biggest cryptocurrency heists ever took place in March when hackers stole over $615 million from Ronin Bridge, a system used to transfer cryptocurrency into and out of the game Axie Infinity. The United States connected the theft to North Korean hackers.
BNB Chain tweeted that its blockchain has been shut down for several hours before being restarted at about 0630 GMT.
By getting in touch with the blockchain’s “validators,” which are organisations or people who confirm blockchain transactions, BNB Chain was “able to halt the event from spreading,” according to its blog post. Without providing any information, BNB Chain claimed that there are 44 validators spread throughout numerous time zones.
In order to prevent future attacks and increase the number of validators, BNB Chain claimed it will establish a new “governance system.”
A “community-driven, open-sourced and decentralised ecosystem” is how BNB Chain is referred to on the Binance website.


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The second day of a three-day strike by Amazon warehouse workers near Madrid coinciding with the e-commerce giant’s Prime Day promotion escalated significantly on Tuesday, with trade unions telling Spanish newspaper Público that police in riot gear had charged the strikers multiple times on supposed grounds they were blocking traffic. Police arrested at least two participants in the protest, with one worker allegedly hit in the face with a truncheon and losing teeth as a result.
One photo shared by Alberto Rodriguez, a member of Spain’s Congress of Deputies, appeared to show a blood-soaked shirt in front of the Amazon warehouse in Madrid province’s San Fernando de Henares municipality.
Videos flagged by Público appeared to capture at least one beating by police.
The workers at the Madrid facility, nearly half of whom are temps, had previously gone on strike in March. This week, they are demonstrating not only against what they said were grueling work conditions, low compensation, and conditions placed on time off, but the expiration of a collective bargaining agreement in 2016 that Amazon has taken advantage of to chip away at previous levels of benefits, according to the Financial Times.
Público wrote that other than the actions of police, union representatives said the protest was peaceful. According to El Diario, union delegate Douglas Harper contested police accounts of organized attempts to block traffic and said that the charges began after a woman, a minor, that was with the strikers left the sidewalk onto the road.
Público added that the demonstrations appear to have significantly cut down on Amazon’s ability to fulfill shipments from the warehouse. According to the Washington Post, labor organizers say 96 percent of the warehouse’s workforce joined the strike, while the Financial Times reported the Confederación Sindical de Comisiones Obreras union (Spain’s largest) said that only 80 workers of the 1,400 in Madrid were left at their posts on Monday during the Prime Day promotion. Amazon contested those figures, telling both papers that a majority of workers opted to continue working.
According to the Financial Times, similar strikes in Germany saw some 2,500 to 3,000 “of the company’s 16,000 workers in its largest market outside the US” walk out on Monday, per figures provided by services union Verdi. However, Amazon similarly disputed those numbers.
As the Amazon workers in Spain, Germany, and another cohort in Poland went on strike this week, CEO Jeff Bezos ascended to the rank of wealthiest man in recorded modern history.


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The biggest buyers of gold aren't buying like they used to
Mario Tama/Getty Images
Central banks bought an estimated 166 tonnes of gold and sold 22 tonnes in the first half of 2016, making a net purchase of 144 tonnes, according to Macquarie analysts.This was not much changed from the net purchases they made in 2013 and 2014, but less than the 179 tonnes they bought at the same time last year, Matthew Turner and his team wrote in a note this week. Advertisement
"There is still no appetite for sales, but outside of Russia and China few purchasers either," Turner wrote. "The outlook is for lower but still substantive net purchases."
Macquarie noted that Venezuela's gold buying is a big caveat.Amid an economic and debt crisis, Venezuela swapped and sold its gold reserves to raise money, sending its stockpiles to a record low, according to the FT.
Central banks buy gold to diversify their reserves. And because they own massive stockpiles of gold, investors watch central-bank buying and selling to gauge sentiment towards the precious metal.
On Wednesday, gold futures fell 1%, or $14.35 an ounce, to $1,331.75 amid a sell-off across precious metals.


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SA Company News:
The Johannesburg Stock Exchange All-Share Index gained 1.8% to close at 71 534. Clicks reported that its half-year earnings jumped by 26%, as sales picked up by 13.6% over the six-month period ended February 2022. Headline earnings per share rose from 370.6 cents in the 2021 half-year, to 466.9 cents in 2022. The company’s interim dividend was up 26.3% to 180 cents per share. Payment to shareholders will take place on Monday, 4 July 2022. Clicks share price was lower by 0.33% to R320.00. In a trading update from Dis-chem, the company signaled that it anticipates earnings increase of between 24.5% and 29.5% for the year and its headline earnings per share will be between 96.9 cents and 100.8 cents for the year ended 28 February 2022. Dis-Chem will release its results for the twelve months ended 28 February 2022 on 23 May 2022. Pepkor said its headline earnings will be between 22.3% and 31.9% higher for the six months to end-March 2022. The increase in EPS and HEPS is attributed to improved operational performance as well as the successful implementation of the Steinhoff global settlement and included the settlement of all claims and
litigation of former Tekkie Town owners and management against Steinhoff and Pepkor.
Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (OUTA) is suing the National Energy Regulator (NERSA) over its award of generation licenses to Karpowership, threatening to further delay a program to add power to the national grid to alleviate current outages. The contract allows for Karpowership to supply South Africa with 1 220 megawatts of electricity from gas-fired power plants as part of an emergency program to procure 2 000 megawatts of power. OUTA believes that NERSA did not act in the best interests of the country when they granted permits to the Turkish company last year. Producer Price Inflation (PPI) rose 11.9% year-on-year in March 2022, accelerating from a 10.5% increase in the previous month and above market expectations of 10.8%.
The US economy’s gross domestic product fell 1.4% in the first three months of 2022, well below market forecasts of a 1.1%, following a 6.9% growth in Q4 2021. Risks to global growth from China’s increasing lockdowns in Beijing and volatility in energy markets due to Russia’s cut of natural gas supplies to European countries, as well as soaring inflation and global supply chain constraints clouds the outlook further for global economic growth.
European stocks gained on good corporate earnings. Standard Chartered jumped 15.2% after upbeat quarterly earnings. Hang Seng is up 3.26% to 20 931, led by Chinese tech stocks after reports of a possible resolution to the Sino-U.S. audit dispute. JD.com and Alibaba each rose as much as 14%. The Shanghai Composite gained 2.39% to 3 045. Samsung Electronics posted a 60% rise in first-quarter net profits, largely driven by steady memory chip demand and smartphone sales. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 1.85% to end at 33 916 points, while the S&P 500 gained 2.47% to 4 287 Amazon was down 9% in extended trading after reporting a surprise loss due to its investment in Rivian, while Apple declined more than 2% after the company warned of supply constraints.
Gold is up 1.76% to $1 908/oz, while Platinum gained 1.91% to $921/oz. Brent crude was 4% firmer at $108.26 a barrel.
The rand traded at R15.88 against the US Dollar, R19.92 against British Pound and R16.75 against the Euro. The Euro is flat against the US Dollar to trade at $1.05.
|Commodities $||Cross Currencies ($)||Major Indices|
|Source: Moneyweb & Investing.com|


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It takes a whole lot of money to keep the fourth richest person in the US safe, CNET reports. According to Quartz—citing a regulatory filing made Wednesday—Facebook paid $4.26 million last year to keep founder Mark Zuckerberg safe. That was actually down from 2014, when the company paid $5.6 million for his "overall security program." That program includes personal security for Zuckerberg and his homes—he owns multiple properties in Palo Alto and Hawaii. All told, Facebook spent $16 million on protecting Zuckerberg over the past five years. (That total also includes private air travel for Zuckerberg.)
Facebook claims the security is necessary as "specific threats" have been made against Zuckerberg. “He is synonymous with Facebook and, as a result, malicious and negative sentiment regarding the company or its products is directly associated with, and often transferred to, Mr. Zuckerberg,” Quartz quotes Facebook's lawyers as saying. Still, the amount paid to protect Zuckerberg is high, even for billionaire tech geniuses. Amazon only paid $1.6 million for Jeff Bezos' security in 2015.


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2024 is shaping up to be an eventful year for global politics, international conflict, and major sporting competitions, all of which typically drive consumer demand for access to high-quality journalism and reporting.
For subscription-first publishers, a busy news calendar presents an opportunity not only to reach and engage new paying subscribers but also to develop and deepen relationships with existing audiences during a period of heightened news interest.
Elections are due to be held in 76 countries, impacting over 4 billion people, including those in major news markets across Europe, India, and the U.S. Tensions continue to mount in the Middle East and Taiwan while Russia’s war in Ukraine persists. And sports fans around the world are preparing for the Summer Olympics in Paris and the European football championship in Germany.
For the past two years, publishers have dealt with a relatively quiet news cycle compared with the bumps they enjoyed in the runup to the 2016 U.S. election and during the onset and fallout of the coronavirus pandemic in 2020 and 2021. News publishers across the board found converting and retaining subscribers increasingly challenging during 2022 and 2023 as the market for their subscription offerings matured and consumers controlled their spending more tightly in the face of economic uncertainty.
Many publishers now expect those difficulties will subside somewhat in the months ahead, however, as major global events draw consumer attention back to the news and – hopefully – their paid offerings. INMA predicts that news publishers’ reader revenues will increase 13% on average by Q3 2024, compared with Q1 of 2023. It also expects an average news brand will see a 10% increase in both digital subscriber volume and revenue in the first quarter of 2024 compared to 2023.
It remains to be seen which publishers and brands might benefit from a news cycle bump most. It stands to reason that household news brands with large existing subscriber bases could fare best, while smaller or niche publications might see organic demand grow to a lesser degree. Toolkits research suggests subscription demand remains strong generally, and that concerns about “peak subscription” are so far unfounded as consumers continue to add to their subscription portfolios. Some publishers say they’re particularly hopeful that an eventful year might help them unlock incremental growth among the 63% of consumers who say they’ve never held a digital publication subscription.


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Bill asks shoppers to help clean up check-out prices
ULSTER COUNTY: A proposed law encourages shoppers to be supermarket detectives.
Be it a packet of noodles or a bar of chocolate, you could get a super refund if you catch a discrepancy between the shelf price and the price that rings up at the check-out counter.
Ulster County officials, cracking down on the 25 to 30 big supermarket chains that have come into Ulster in the last 10 years, say they get hundreds of complaints relating to the difference in shelf or sale price and the scanner price.
Ulster County is weighing a law that would empower consumers and clean up pricing in supermarkets. The proposal, which will soon be voted upon by the county Legislature, says consumers who detect a difference in pricing get a super refund — 10 times the difference in price, up to $10 — and they get the item for free.
Customers would have a scanner at their disposal to check the prices. The store would be forced to cough up the "super refund" in one hour.
"If this law comes, the stores will stop playing games," said Sandra Contreras, who has shopped in Ulster County supermarkets for more than eight years. "I pick up items which say a certain price and when I take it to the counter they change the price. And mostly they take it back and don't sell it to you."
Officials hope that the proposed law would minimize such distasteful shopping experiences.
There's a surprise in all this. Guess who is pushing the law? The supermarkets themselves.
Supermarket managers have an ax to grind. Under the proposed law, if a store proves that it has 98 percent accuracy at the checkout counter in annual audits conducted by the county's Weights and Measures department, the store gets a waiver. It does not have to price each item on the shelf. All it has to do is to stick to shelf pricing.
The current law, passed in 1991, requires that each item in a supermarket should be tagged and marked.
"In a store of our size we are talking of 40,000 different items on the shelves," said Dennis Martin, district manger for Hannaford Bros. in Kingston. "In a high volume supermarket there is a higher chance for error in pricing."
Usually, supermarkets use night crews to tag items manually in a time-consuming process.
Supermarket managers say it's in their best interest to reward customers if they find an error and to stick to shelf pricing, which is mandated by the state.
Weights and Measures officials, who enforce fair pricing in supermarkets, see a "win-win" situation. "The consumers will do the policing for me by checking on the stores," said Ulster County Weights and Measures Director James DeGasperis.
"The stores are happy because they don't have to mark everything, and the customer is happy too."
will hold a public hearing on the proposed law at 6 p.m. Oct. 4 at the county
Legislature's office, 244 Fair St.
The "supermarket super refund laws" are being
promoted on a county-by-county basis by the Food Industry Alliance, a statewide
trade association representing food stores across the state.
Five counties, including Erie and Oneida, already have similar
laws in place and two others, like Ulster, have legislation in progress.
Sullivan County has an item-pricing law which the alliance is
seeking to replace with a new law. Orange County does not have any legislation
relating to supermarkets.


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8 Circuit Studios has announced the release date of space multiplayer shooter Project Genesis. The game will be released in early access on April 24, 2020 and will be sold on Steam for $ 29.99.
Also, the developers launched the pre-alpha stage, an invitation to which everyone can receive. To do this, you must register on the official website.
Project Genesis combines two types of gameplay in one game. You can participate in space battles in open space from a third person or participate in ordinary mundane first-person matches. Teams have to fight each other for superiority in several popular modes.


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Digital Media and Gaming to Lead the Indian M&E Industry The digital segment in Indian media and entertainment industry is projected to reach INR 621 billion by the financial year 2024, says a report
You're reading Entrepreneur India, an international franchise of Entrepreneur Media.
Spurred by increasing content consumption, thanks to smartphones clubbed with dirt cheap data, over-the-top (OTT) video and audio segment of the Indian media and entertainment industry (M&E) has seen a compounded annual growth (CAGR) of 38.5 per cent between FY2015 and FY2019, touching INR 17,300 crore in FY2019, according to India's Digital Future: Mass of Niche's, a report by KPMG India.
According to the report, the OTT or digital segment in the Indian M&E industry has witnessed highest growth compared with other segments such as television, films, animation and VFX, gaming and music, among others.
However, in terms of total revenue, television continues to be the largest entertainment medium, with print and films at second and third positions, respectively. But, in the next five years the scenario is expected to change with digital media and gaming taking the lead, shows the report.
The digital segment is projected to reach INR 62,100 crore by FY2024, to become the second-largest segment in terms of total revenue. At the same time, the gaming segment is expected to grow the highest at a CAGR of 32.2 per cent between FY2019 and FY2014.
Focus on Regional Content
Affordable data is only one aspect of greater Internet inclusion in India, says the report. Increasing regional content, spurt in rural penetration, cheaper smartphones and better gender parity with more female viewers consuming content are some of the other factors that are influencing the growth of digital media in India.
"The support for growing digital infrastructure and a focus on personal content consumption has set the scene for M&E sector to produce more content than ever before across different language and genres," said Umang Bedi, president, Dailyhunt, in the report.
Source: KMPG Report
Above all, growing regional focus of more and more OTT platforms is set to drive digital consumption in India. "Content in regional languages has been restricted to select movies along with a handful of original shows, if any. However, dubbing has emerged as an effective tool for players to quickly expand the breadth of original and movie content available across multiple regional languages such as Tamil, Telugu, Bengali, Kannada, Malayalam and Marathi. For example, Prime Video has dubbed popular Hindi originals such as Inside Edge and Breathe in Tamil and Telugu. In addition to originals, Prime Video has also tried to increase depth in their regional library by dubbing English movies such as Alpa and Rampage, among others, in Tamil and Telugu. Similarly, Hotstar has used dubbing to launch the Hindi web-series Criminal Justice in six regional languages—Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Bangla, Malayalam and Marathi," the report stated.


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Thanksgiving is no longer a one-working day party in the festive year. It is the get started of a 5-day function dubbed Cyber Week or Cyber 5. The celebration consists of Thanksgiving followed by Black Friday, Tiny Organization Saturday, Tremendous Sunday, and Cyber Monday. Black Friday and Cyber Monday are the Friday and Monday adhering to Thanksgiving.
Not just Cyber week, Thanksgiving also marks the official graduation of the holiday period by itself. Chatting about BFCM, the development begun when prospects, who required to get their browsing carried out ASAP to reduce their favorite goods from likely out of inventory, commenced purchasing for Xmas right at the end of Thanksgiving.
There’s usually substantial demand for goods these types of as toys, dwelling furnishings, mattresses, and clothing on Black Friday. At the identical time, Cyber Monday is recognised for low charges on tech-associated items, like smartphones, laptops, TVs, gaming consoles, and VR devices.
With the advancement of e-commerce, transforming tendencies, and customers’ rising procuring wants, BFCM 2022, just like the final pair of many years, has develop into a lot more than just a few of times by setting up months right before and extending weeks following.
Consequently, the greatest opportunity to provide in far more prospects to your keep, positively effect them, and in the long run increase income margins is now.
Below are some tips and tips for you to make the most effective out of BFCM 2022.


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News & Reviews: Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra
Dec 08, 2020
There are plenty of rumours going around about the Samsung Galaxy S21 series. Here are the new leaks about the front panel and camera specs for the devices, which includes the Galaxy S21, Galaxy S21+, and Galaxy S21 Ultra.
Dec 05, 2020
It seems that @UniverseIce has recently tweeted on the user’s Twitter account, showcasing what to expect from the upcoming Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra’s camera. Based on the tweet, it seems that the aforementioned smartphone’s 10X optical variable camera will have a larger aperture, and a 10MP 1.22um sensor.
Nov 15, 2020
It seems the Internet is hell-bent on exposing every detail of the Samsung Galaxy S21 series before it launches. Plenty of leaks have appeared in recent weeks, and now some rather detailed specs on the Galaxy S21 series have been leaked online.
Nov 13, 2020
It seems that a report by bgr.com seems to hint that there could be a possibility Samsung might discontinue the Samsung Galaxy Note series, due to the fact that the upcoming S21 Ultra will come with S-Pen support. While there is no information on whether the S21 Ultra will come with a built-in stylus, our source did mention that the device will definitely support it.
Nov 11, 2020
A few days ago, there is a rumour about Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra posted by Ice Universe. From the previous leaks, the device could sport an HM3 sensor 108MP, laser autofocus, and no ToF. Here are some new leaks tweeted by the same person as well.
Nov 06, 2020
Based on a statement by @UniverseIce on the user’s Twitter account, it seems that the upcoming Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra, which is due to be unveiled somewhere around the end of this year or early next year, will most likely feature minor improvements compared to the Galaxy S20 Ultra. While not much is known in regards to the exact release date, the user’s tweet gives us a better idea on what to expect when the Galaxy S21 Ultra is officially available for purchase in Malaysia.
Oct 29, 2020
Earlier rumours have been telling us that Samsung will announce their latest flagship series as early as possible. The upcoming Samsung Galaxy S21 (or S30) is said to be launched in January next year rather than late February or March. When the launch date has been moved forward, that means leaks of the smartphone series will arrive earlier as well. Today, the first look of the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra's penta camera setup has been found online.
Oct 12, 2020
A few weeks ago, there's a rumour that said there could no more Note series after the Samsung Galaxy Note 21 launch next year. Here is another new rumour about the Samsung Galaxy S series might no longer be the premium lineup and it could be replaced by the Galaxy Fold series.
Sep 15, 2020
If no major disruptions happen, Samsung will release its next Galaxy S series smartphones in the first quarter of 2021 as usual. While some have claimed that it will probably be named the Galaxy S30 series, most rumours are calling it the Galaxy S21 series so far. And one rumour says that one of the models will have two zoom sensors.


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Xbox One’s Unfortunate Story Change During E3 2013
Story: David Peveto
July 10, 2013
During the second week of June, the Electronic Entertainment Expo - more commonly known as E3 – took place in Los Angeles and provided the video game industry an opportunity to display their products for the upcoming year.
Microsoft had by what most industry leaders would have considered an excellent press conference on the morning of Monday June 10 showing off the games and features of their brand new console, the Xbox One. Despite this strong reveal, Microsoft suffered a brutal misstep which has created a controversy taking place on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter.
During the demonstration of a launch title called “Killer Instinct,” a Microsoft community manager and a producer of the game played against each other when one of them launched an impressive combo and was winning the match handedly. This match led to banter and trash-talking back and forth and an unfortunate joke which had some misogynistic and violent sexual connotations. View the comments that begin at 0:27 made by the producer.
Shortly after the presentation finished, people who watched it, including several luminaries of the game development and publishing world, took to Twitter to both criticize and support Microsoft and the producer of the game for putting this content in their presentation which between television and Internet streaming went out live to millions of people.
"Let's bring a woman on stage and joke about how she's bad at games, and say stuff like 'relax, just let it happen, it'll be over soon'"??— Jonathan Blow (@Jonathan_Blow) June 10, 2013
Even if it was unintentional, Microsoft should've realized they shouldn't make a rape joke in an environment already toxic with misogyny.— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) June 10, 2013
@Jonathan_Blow It's not a rape joke. The fact that you take it as such adds fuel to the already large social justice fire.— Kyle Gardner (@KahlGardner) June 11, 2013
This led to several articles from some of the largest news outlets in the gaming industry like Kotaku and N4G but also several stories on national news outlets like NBC, CBS, and the Huffington Post.
All of this took even more of the focus from what was generally considered to be an excellent keynote and shifted the focus further and further from the message that Microsoft wanted to have in the media: the Xbox One will have good games. These articles began to spread virally, thus producing comments and other opinion pieces. At the time of this publication, the articles produced had been shared more than 10,000 times on Facebook and Twitter.
The story got so far out of hand that Microsoft had to release a statement on their Facebook page two days after the original issue stating the comment was unintentional and offensive and they apologized. They have since made no mention of the incident in any releases or interviews about “Killer Instinct” or the Xbox One’s launch this November.
The major takeaway from this whole experience is viral spreading of information and opinion is difficult to get under control under the best of circumstances for any company. However, when the company’s main target consumer is technology savvy and they are presenting at a high-profile trade show where every major journalism outlet has their eyes on everything that is said, you need to have your message very much in line and on topic.
The few weeks preceding E3 had been a trying time for the Xbox brand, between a much reviled Xbox One press conference and a feature set and restrictions on their consumers regarding the digital rights to their purchases. These announcements have not gone over well with the gaming public; as a result, people are watching everything that Microsoft does very carefully.
President of Sony Computer Entertainment Worldwide Studios, a direct rival to Microsoft due to their Playstation product line, Shuhei Yoshida said the consumer backlash and anger towards the Xbox One was a major factor that decided the decisions they would make going forward into this next generation of video game consoles. While speaking with Japanese gaming magazine, Famitsu Yoshida said that while they “were thinking about what we had to bring across and how to bring it across, it was a very useful source."
In all, companies must consider the ways which their messages could be interpreted (or misinterpreted) and the group of people listening to the content. In a time when the video games industry is trying to change decades of being perceived as a boys club and the gaming public is divided on the power of words in their media, Microsoft faces an uphill battle to not only bring themselves out of their difficult troubles with the console launch, but also to change the perception that Microsoft is ambivalent to the issues of rape culture in games.


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AOL’s Advertising.com acquires Buysight
- Staff New York Business Journal
New York-based AOL said the transaction further expands the Advertising.com Group’s position in advertising technologies across display, mobile and video. The group includes Advertising.com, Adtech, the AOL On Network, Goviral and Pictela.
Founded in 2008, Sunnyvale, Calif.-based Buysight is focused on retargeting using intent-based Dynamic Creative Optimization and advanced machine learning technology. More specifically, Buysight uses online data to render more tailored advertising for marketers and consumers in real time.
“The acquisition of Buysight brings proven Dynamic Creative Optimization and machine learning capabilities which will further enhance AdLearn, our market-leading optimization engine, and its ability to provide brands and performance marketers a comprehensive and integrated optimization solution across channels,” Ned Brody, chief executive of the Advertising.com Group, said in a statement.
"The Advertising.com Group’s platforms bring even greater intelligence and scale to Buysight’s data-driven performance advertising business,” said Buysight CEO Armin Ebrahimi. “Our retargeting and mid-funnel advertising products for online retailers, with the added power and reach of Advertising.com, represent best-in-class solutions and a comprehensive approach to driving real revenue gains for our clients.”
In a statement on its web site, Buysight said its leadership will remain at the helm and there should be little disruption while it gets folded into AOL.
"The new opportunities and strength that this acquisition brings should be felt quite soon, and we look forward to expanding our offerings for clients and partners on both sides," the company said.
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NORFOLK, Virginia — The last year has brought a significant amount of change to MacArthur Center.
On Wednesday, Eddie Bauer announced its exit from the mall. It joins a list of closures, including Nordstrom, Banana Republic, Chico's, Pottery Barn, Williams-Sonoma, Yankee Candle, and Zales.
People who live near the mall said they have their eyes set on the future.
While many are disappointed by recent closures, Lelia Vann, the President of the Downtown Norfolk Civic League said she sees opportunity.
“We live here, we go there, we want it to be successful,” said Vann.
That's why on Monday night, she and other members of the civic league met with Jim Wofford, the General Manager of MacArthur Center
Wofford gave them an update about the direction the mall is going.
“He talked about maybe office spaces on some of the floors inside of the mall,” said Vann.
“He talked about opening it up so you don't feel so closed up when you're on the inside. I mean, he had a lot of great ideas.”
But like many downtown residents Vann said she is anxious to see what will happen to the former Nordstrom site, which is owned by the City of Norfolk.
Vann said she’s had several discussions with residents and other members of the civic league about what kind of store they’d like to see move into the former Nordstrom.
“A lot of people want a big Target here,” said Vann.
“We actually believe if you had a Target in the mall, people that live or work here would swing by there and shop before they went home.”
Vann said a grocery store would would be great to have as well.
But so far, representatives for the city and the mall have said it’s still too early, and there is no official update to give about what may fill the vacant space.
Vann and other community leaders have put together a survey for residents. It includes questions about which stores they’d like to have and if they’d like to make the mall dog-friendly.
Vann said they passed the survey questions onto Wofford.
“We got with him and he welcomed that survey,” said Vann. “He plans to use that for a community forum that he would like to have.”
13News Now requested an interview with Wofford, but he declined.
Karen Winters Husselbee, marketing director for the mall provided this statement:
Our highest priority is ensuring MacArthur is delivering the shopping and entertainment experiences our community wants. We’re listening and we’re communicating their wishes to our leasing department and prospective tenants. We’ll be sure to share updates!


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In an era where you can buy just about anything you could possibly think of online, Southampton Town is hoping that a new initiative will remind local consumers that the area’s businesses depend on us to stay open. Back in 2016, Southampton Town Councilman Stan J. Glinka, the Town’s Business Advisory Council (BAC), and the Southampton Business Alliance launched a “Think Local” campaign with the goal of encouraging residents and visitors to support local businesses and raise awareness of how doing so benefits the community.
To support the campaign, Councilman Glinka and the BAC have partnered with Southampton Village Chamber of Commerce, Southampton Arts Center, East End Restaurant Week and Union Cantina for “Stay Out Late-Starry Night” on Thursday, March 30th.
“The Business Advisory Council has been working on the ‘Think Local’ initiative for some time and one of the items that kept coming up was promoting certain nights of the week that businesses within our Hamlets and Villages would stay open later, especially during the winter months,” shared Councilman Glinka.
During the “Stay Out Late-Starry Night” event, participating businesses will stay open until at least 8 p.m., and some participants will be offering special discounts and giveaways. The goal of the evening is not only to inspire residents and visitors to shop locally, but also to entice the entire Town to remain open later year round.
“This pilot event in Southampton Village has had a very positive response from the local business community, with more than 20 businesses within the Village participating,” added Councilman Glinka.
Bean to Tween, Besim’s Fine Cigars, Cashmere Outlet, Christopher Fischer, Club Monaco, Dazzelle, Gym Source, J Crew, Jill Lynn & Co., Kevin Maple Salon, Little Lucy’s Accessories, London Jewelers, Ralph Lauren, Rotations Bicycle Center, Sea Green Designs, Stevenson’s Toys, Therapy, Union Cantina, Vineyard Vines and White’s Apothecary are among those partaking in the event. In addition to extending its normal hours, White’s Apothecary will present refreshments, travel sized products and mini La Mer facials from 6 to 8 p.m.
“As the owner of a retail store on Jobs Lane and the President of the Southampton Chamber of Commerce, I’m very excited about the Southampton Town Business Council’s ‘Stay Out Late-Starry Night’ event,” noted Shannon Willey, who owns Sea Green Designs.
The event’s timing coincides with East End Restaurant Week, so diners at Le Charlot Southampton, Red|Bar Brasserie, Shippy’s Pumpernickels Restaurant East and Union Cantina (or one of the other 20 plus East End-based restaurants) can enjoy a three course meal for under $30 at the Southampton eateries and then head to their favorite local shop for a little post dinner retail therapy.
“We are hoping that by getting many retailers together to stay open on this one night during Restaurant Week we will draw people to Southampton Village to enjoy shopping, dining, and the events the Southampton Arts Center will have taking place that night,” explained Willey.
Along with the Restaurant Week promotion, Union Cantina will treat diners to live music and happy hour prices all night long. “With Union Cantina being an integral part of the Southampton Village community, I find it important to help promote community engagement initiatives such as this one, and to attract more people to our great local shops, restaurants and cultural institutions,” shared Union Cantina owner Ian Duke. “We are hoping that by being a major promoter of this event, we will influence our fellow Southampton businesses to stay open late, all year-round, which will benefit both us locals and visitors.”
Additionally, Southampton Arts Center will host a screening of Exhibitions on Screen: Vincent van Gogh – A New Way of Seeing at 8 p.m.
“Southampton Arts Center is pleased to take part in ‘Stay Out Late – Starry Night,’ which also happens to be the birthday of Vincent van Gogh,” shared Amy Kirwin, Director of Programs at Southampton Arts Center. “We took that inspiration and found an incredible documentary to show, Exhibition On Screen: Vincent van Gogh – A New Way of Seeing, which offers exclusive access to the van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam and explores the dramatic story and iconic work of one of the world’s most beloved artists.”
Participants would love to see local businesses extending their hours on a regular basis. “We hope people will make a night of it by shopping, dining, and joining us for the film,” added Kirwin. “The Center is often open later, so we are very excited to be in the company of these other businesses to encourage the community to stay out late.”
“With the businesses working together, I would love to see this be a recurring event that people could look forward to as a great night to visit our Village,” added Willey.
For more information, contact Councilman Glinka at 631-287-5745.


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Flying the flag for South Australia, Adelaide-based fitness couple Kayla Itsines and Tobi Pearce are racing up the 2017 Financial Review Young Rich List, which was announced today. The successful, business-savvy duo, aged 25 and 26 respectively, take places 40 and 41 on the List, with shared wealth of $63 million. This sees Itsines rises 11 places on the Young Rich List – she was #51 in 2016.
As the only South Aussies represented on the list, it also makes them the most successful Adelaidians under the age of 40, which is the cut off age for the list.
Itsines and Pearce co-own Bikini Body Training Company which launched Sweat, an app that earned the pair $16 million revenue in 2016. This year, they launched a new app with Itsines joining forces with Sjana Elise Earp (Body and Mind yoga program) and Kelsey Wells (Self post-pregnancy program).
Itsines was named by Forbes as the world’s most inﬂuential ﬁtness identity and has also released a number of books including The Bikini Body 28-Day Healthy Eating & Lifestyle Guide.
Topping the Young Rich List for 2017 is Atlassian co-founders Mike Cannon-Brookes and Scott Farquha, with combined wealth of $6.08 billion.
The technology duo’s rise in wealth follows a surge in the share price of their software company Atlassian on the US NASDAQ exchange market. Cannon-Brookes and Farquhar have topped the Young Rich List a record six times, jointly taking out the #1 spot in 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 – and again this year.
Cannon-Brookes and Farquhar’s wealth total as of 2017 equals more than 10 times the wealth of the next two placegetters on this year’s Young Rich List.
The third and fourth spots on the 2017 Young Rich List are occupied by another technology duo – Dave Greiner and Ben Richardson – with a combined wealth of $607 million. Greiner and Richardson are co-founders of Sydney web marketing services company Campaign Monitor.
Number five on the List in Melbourne property developer Tim Gurner, who runs development company Gurner.
Gurner, whose wealth sits at $465 million, hit the headlines in May this year after saying that young Australians would struggle to buy a home when they were “spending $40 a day on smashed avocados and coffees and not working.”
Coming in at #6 is co-founder of online foreign exchange trader Pepperstone, Owen Kerr, with wealth of $368 million. He sits one place above New York-based technology and property identity Ori Allon, who ranks at #7 with wealth of $364 million.
Number eight is Sydney retailer and biotechnology company founder Sam Prince with wealth of $318 million. Prince owns both Mexican fast food chain Zambrero and emerging genetics testing company Life Letters.
Rounding out the top 10 is husband-wife duo Collis and Cyan Ta’eed, who sit at #9 and #10 respectively with combined wealth of $216 million. The Ta’eed’s are co-founders of online graphic marketplace Envato.
The 100 members of the 2017 Financial Review Young Rich List have enjoyed a stunning rise in wealth this year, with a booming property sector, technology market and beauty industry boosting overall wealth to a record $13.2 billion.
Technology remains the dominant sector for 2017 with 38 people on the List, followed by financial services with 12 and retail with eight.
There are 27 debutants on the 2017 Young Rich List, including global fitness and health star Emily Skye (#83, $32 million) and Airtasker co-founders Tim Fung and Jonathan Lui (#66 and #67, $41 million).
The youngest debutants are HiSmile co-founders Nik Mirkovic and Alex Tomic. The Gold Coast duo, aged 22 and 24 respectively, debut at #58 and #59 with combined wealth of $46 million.
There are nine women on the 2017 Young Rich List, up from eight in 2016. Notable names include Canva CEO Melanie Perkins (#17, $128 million), model Miranda Kerr (#62, $44million) and fitness guru Kayla Itsines, who jumps 11 places up to #40 with shared wealth of $46 million.
The Financial Review Young Rich List, recording Australia’s wealthiest self-made citizens aged 40 and under, has been published annually since 2003.


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BLOG: Louis Vuitton Debuts on China’s Xiaohongshu (“Red”)Posted by in China, Communications, Digital, Inspiration, Latest News, Marketing, Trends
In early May 2019, the world’s largest luxury brand, Louis Vuitton (LV), has partnered with the Chinese social media platform, Xiaohongshu (or called “Little Red Book” or “Red”), to launch its official account. The French fashion house is the first luxury brand to have an official presence on this female-led platform, and mainly covers beauty trends, shopping guides and all aspects of lifestyle.
So far, LV has posted thirteen pictures and twelve videos, and amassed over 47.8k followers and 37.8k likes and collections. It has featured Chinese influencer, Mr.Bags, talking about the New Wave Chain Pochette, as well as pictures of celebrities including Junyan Jiao, an actress; Mengyao Xi, a Victoria’s Secret model, who displays jewellery in a video; and Chengcheng Fan, the little brother of Fanbingbing, a Chinese actress.
This latest digital wonder has 200 million-plus users, 60 percent of whom are from tier-one and tier-two cities, and more than 70 percent are China’s post-Nineties generation or young Millennials. This platform has attracted a large number of popular celebrities such as Yun Lin, Bingbing Fan and Yuqi Zhang. These celebrities have been sharing their reviews of skincare products and recommending clothes and accessories, which offers guidance to consumers and also provides new promotional approaches for brands. It is reported that Xiaohongshu is expected to double its revenue to $2.9 billion next year. More luxury brands are expected to join the platform.
Therefore, getting on with Xiaohongshu is undoubtedly a wise step for Louis Vuitton, and it has increased the exposure of this fashion brand. When searching the keyword “LV” in Xiaohongshu, more than 182,000 posts come up, which shows that this brand has been a trending topic.
According to the latest report of Guotai Junan Securities, the market of Chinese female consumer has reached 670 billion dollars. In the past five years, the total expenditure of female consumers in China has increased by 81%, of which 55% comes from online, far exceeding the overall proportion of online shopping from all consumers. The rise of “She Economy” has also driven high-end luxury goods to speed up the distribution of online channels. For example, Sandro, Maje and MOSCHINO settled in Jingdong; Givenchy and Armani launched flagship stores in Tmall; Bally also officially partnered with Luxury Pavilion, an exclusive luxury platform.
According to statistics, in 2025, Chinese consumers, of whom the post-Eighties and post-Nineties generations are a significant portion, will account for 40% of global luxury consumption. In terms of specific purchase decisions, they relied more on the social media and e-commerce platforms. 54% of the young respondents said they would refer to buyers’ comments, while only one-third of the post-Seventies would do this. This means that social media such as Xiaohongshu and Weibo, as well as e-commerce platforms such as Jingdong and Tmall, are becoming important drivers of consumers’ luxury purchases.
If you want some advice on your Chinese social and digital media strategy, talk to us today: firstname.lastname@example.org.
The article was written by Chong Peng.Tags: China, Chinese market, Little Red Book, Louis Vuitton, Luxury, LV, Social media, Xiaohongshu


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Black Friday starts at the end of this week, but if you want to get shopping today, here are some exclusive deals (more…)
iPhone 5c users will be able to purchase a dock for their new device soon.
No pre-orders are slated for the iPhone 5s, as it will be available to order on Sept. 20.
The majority of Apple’s rivals have bought sponsored tweets to target the iPhone 5S, iPhone 5C.
Apple decided to keep the iPhone 4 as part of its iPhone offering in China.
TELUS has offered a promo to double the data on select SharePlus data options.
The online Apple Stores now list the iPod touch, iPod nano and iPod shuffle as available for purchase in the new Space Gray colour as well.
Here are the new ringtones and alert tones you can look forward to in iOS 7!
Apple has published the iPhone event keynote video
Promo videos for the new iPhones and their key features are now available on the Apple website.
Apple has increased prices for AppleCare+ incidents to $79, a jump by $30.
Apple-designed leather case for iPhone 5S is available in the Apple Store for $45. The iPhone 5C case costs $35.
Apple has just released the iOS 7 Golden Master (GM) for developers, …


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Copper enamel home decor
Promoting India's rich craft heritage for more than 35 years now, Dastkari Haat Samiti has been at the forefront of supporting the crafts community and building a thriving artisan-buyer ecosystem. Coming once again to Pune, after a prolonged pause because of the pandemic, the much-loved artisan-driven crafts bazaar has found a new location in the burgeoning city that should be more central for friends, both old and new, to reach the bazaar from different locations. The art festival which is being hosted at Dutch Palace, 16, Bund Garden Road will be on till November 21, between 11 am 8 pm.
The organisation has been working with them from the first day of the lockdown to ensure they received adequate rations and support systems. It has financially aided those who were in distress and could not pay their rent, school fees, urgent medical treatment and other needs. These artisans, despite being under financial and personal challenges, never stopped working as they hoped to display their craft to the patrons in the post-pandemic world.
With 90 stalls with a diverse range of weaves, hand block prints, embroideries, crafts in grass, bamboo, metal, wood, and other plant material, jewellery, stationery, ceramic and terracotta, and traditional art from tribal Gond to Kalighat, Phads to Pattachitra and Pichhwais, the stalls will offer glimpses of India.
At the art show, a host of new craftsmen will be displaying their craftsmanship and labour of love from across India’s hinterlands. Some of the main highlights are:
- Fine mats from Medinipur and baskets from Sitapur, brought by the Mon Ami Foundation.
- A rare new grass weaving group making fine basketry called Aadim Janjati Samhu from the inner Naxal-ridden forests of Jharkhand.
- Plaited fabric tableware from Project 1000.
- A new Patachitra artist Sirajudullah Chitrakar with scrolls and songs from West Bengal,
- Gold Leaf embossed Pichhwais from Rajasthan
- Glass objects and jewellery by Mahesh from Firozabad
- Lilaben Parbu Impa from Kutch with extra fine Soof embroidery
- EkiBeki created by Vishpala Hundekari with an array of artistic stationery
- Stationery made of handmade paper in the most organic of raw materials - Elephant Poo from Jaipur!
- Kotpad, Odisha, fabrics and saris in rare natural dye colour
Music, food and much more
No celebration of crafts is complete without musical afternoons and evenings and a lavish spread of cuisines representing the food diversity of India. In this edition, Mura Lala Marwada, the amazing Coke Studio-featured singer with his group, will complete the cultural experience of a true craft mela. In addition, do try out some interesting snacks from our Amritasari and Rajasthani stalls.
“Craftspeople have created the best and we have also tried to put our best foot forward. Now it's the customers and craft lovers who can help to sustain India’s rural livelihoods and cultural heritage to step forward and join us in making this a truly happy journey for makers and buyers,” says Jaya Jaitly, President at Dastkari Haat Samiti.


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August 5, 2008
China's CGOG to invest US$10 million poultry plant in Mozambique
CGOG Africa, the Mozambican subsidiary of China Grains and Oils Group Corp, will invest US$ 10 million in a project to produce chicken in the Dondo district of the central province of Sofala.
Provincial officials said the Chinese-led project also includes the construction of a grain factory and a chicken-processing plant. The venture, which will initially produce 30,000 tonnes of chicken meat annually, will also create 50 jobs, he added.
The operations are expected to start within this year.