The Entertainment Consumers Association (ECA) has sent an email blast out to it database of readers encouraging them to use Twitter to get their followers to speak up and sign the Gamer Petition that will be sent to the U.S. Supreme Court before it is to decide the California case on violent games.

An email from Brett Schenker, the ECA's online advocacy manager:

A Chicago White Sox player was so excited about the release of Halo: Reach that he stood in a line at a Chicago store waiting for the midnight release.

Brent Lillibridge, a second baseman for the Sox, tweeted from his place in line that he was channeling his inner nerd, according to a story on ESPN:

"Most important night of the year Halo coming out at 12 tonight and yes I'm in a line to get it... Jokes please," Lillibridge tweeted at approximately 11 p.m. (CT) Monday.

Needless to say, teammate Mark Teahan wasn't amused and responded with his own tweet:

"Brent, get to bed. Take Gavin, Thornton & Putz with you. Halo will survive the night without you," Teahen tweeted, referring to pitchers Gavin Floyd, Matt Thornton and J.J. Putz.

Lillibridge was unfazed:

Ubisoft’s new DRM scheme, which requires a constant Internet connection to authenticate game sessions, had a bit of a hick up this weekend.

Ubi posted to its Twitter feed this morning apologizing to “anyone who couldn’t play ACII [Assassin’s Creed II] or SH5 [Silent Hunter 5] yesterday.” While the company originally blamed the outage on “exceptional demand,” Ubi stated on its Twitter feed that their servers were “attacked, which limited service from 2:30pm to 9pm Paris time.”

Ubisoft added that “95% of players were not affected, but a small group of players attempting to open a game session did receive denial of service errors.”

Joystiq also points us towards a thread on the Ubisoft forums in which the affected “5%” voice their displeasure.

GP: On a related note, I grabbed Battlefield: Bad Company 2 for the PC this weekend and during the install was prompted to choose my favored method of DRM—disc-based or online authentication (I chose disc-based). In a perfect world there would be no need for DRM, but if it is required, this method of offering the user a choice at least goes a little way towards lessening the impact (and might make DRM-based gaming functionable on an Army base or a cruise ship). Bad Company 2 uses Sony’s SecuROM technology.

As another aside, while the DRM tech worked fine, Bad Company 2 had its own online problems for a little bit yesterday, though their issues appeared to be Punkbuster-related.


|Thanks PHX Corp and DarkSaber!|

Showcasing incredible turnaround time, a browser-based game based on the exploits of Balloon Boy has already hit the Internet, a mere day after the tale of an apparent soaring child dominated network airwaves and Twitter hashtags.

The game was developed by three 25-year olds— Immad Akhund, Jude Gomila, James Smith—inspired by the events that unfolded in Colorado yesterday. A counter at the top of the website asks “How Many $$$ of Tax Payer Money Can You Waste?” and tracks scores. Players dodge seagulls and gather rainbows while floating through the sky in their dirigible.

No word yet if the developers are working on a follow up game entitled Attic Boy.

Outspoken God of War designer David Jaffe posted a video rant against used game sales on Saturday, but apparently removed it from YouTube the following day.

We caught up to Jaffe's video yesterday morning while scanning our daily RSS intake (left). By late afternoon when we checked back to gather some quotes for this article, it was gone. In its place was a YouTube message reading, "This video has been removed by the user."

A short time later, when we looked again, we couldn't even access his blog. A system message from Blogger read: "This blog is open to invited readers only."

It's unclear why Jaffe's video was taken offline or why he locked his blog. While Jaffe's video argument against used game sales was punctuated by occasional f-bombs, that's not unusual for his freewheeling commentaries. Prior to being locked, readers of Jaffe's blog were engaged in a lively response to his video, both pro and con.

The used game issue is a passionate one indeed, and Jaffe has addressed it previously on his blog. For his part, Jaffe takes the standard industry line that games are bad for developers and publishers. In the deleted video, he said (we're paraphrasing from memory here) that he didn't begrudge consumers the right to buy used games, but that game creators deserved a cut of used game sales. He said that some have defended used game sales by comparing buying a used game to buying a used car. However, Jaffe said that was a bad analogy because while playing a used game is the same experience as playing a new game, driving a used car is a different experience from driving a new one.

GP: Hmmm... We tried to reach Jaffe via Twitter to ask him about the missing video, but it appears that his Twitter account is no longer active. We hope that Jaffe has not decided to stop interacting with gamers. While we don't always agree with his rants, they are provocative and entertaining.

Not for the first time, potential 2012 Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich (left) has mentioned Nintendo's Wii on Twitter.

Gingrich, who formerly served as Speaker of the House and was the driving force behind the conservative Contract with America in the mid-1990's, Tweeted yesterday about playing Nintendo's system at a family gathering. Twitter user Konabess offered some follow-up advice and Gingrich responded. Here's how the conversation went:

NewtGingrich: Wii bowling in stevens point wisconsin home of point beer and callista's brother and his family; seven year old is proving tough competition

 

konabess: @newtgingrich keep your elbow in and follow through!

 

NewtGingrich: @konabess good advice I will try this Any advice for wii golf

As GamePolitics reported in March, Gingrich gushed about the Wii his wife Callista received as a birthday present. In February Gingrich dangled the chance to win a Wii as a means of enticing supporters to sign up for the launch of a media campaign.

Partially Via: Kotaku

Gov. Mark Sanford went missing recently, apparently of his own accord. And while his South Carolina political colleagues expressed concern over who was minding the state during Sanford's absence, God of War series designer David Jaffe weighed in with a brief criticism of the Guv's disappearing act on Twitter.

Jaffe, who lives in California, often seasons his tweets with profanity. He commented on Sanford's AWOL status yesterday afternoon:

If UR a governor and U just kind of take off for a few days and no one knows where then u prob. should not be the f***ing governor.

Twitter users can follow the outspoken GoW creator at @djaffe on Twitter. As for Sanford, news reports say that he will be back in the office today.

The National Institute on Media and the Family, which seems to have adopted video game addiction as its primary game-related issue of late, recently used its Twitter account to point to a Frontline video report on gaming in South Koria. 

Part of the report examines the struggle of an adolescent boy to balance his game play with the other facets of his life and looks at the government-run anti-game addiction camp he attends.

Click here for the video.

If you've been up all night playing Resident Evil 5 and you're a little freaked out by the experience and you happen to live in Boston, fear not; the local constabulary has your back. The Boston Police Department has vowed to alert the public to any and all zombie attacks.

That reassuring news comes by way TruTV's Dumb as a Blog, which chronicles an exchange of tweets between @Boston_Police and another Twitter user. Here's how it went down:

Boston_Police:  INJURED OFFICER: Officer from district 4 transported to Beth Israel Hospital, human bite to arm, suspect in custody.

willcady:  @Boston_Police if that was a zombie bite, would you tell us?

Boston_Police:   @willcady Yes, absolutely

Via: The Consumerist

Perhaps more than any freshman congressman in recent memory, Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) has a knack for getting his name mentioned by the media.

Here at GamePolitics, we've covered Chaffetz for his Rock Band duet with Stephen Colbert. The Republican Congressman is also an active Twitter user (jasoninthehouse) and just a tad to the right of Attila the Hun. After all, he is from Utah.

But his conservative rants got the best of GP yesterday and we couldn't resist sending him a jab via Twitter:

Will you be doing anything with Rock Band again any time soon? Otherwise I may have to stop following your updates.

Chaffetz is nothing if not a good sport. He quickly followed up with a private tweet and we couldn't help but laugh:

I suck at Rock Band. Best if I stick to Halo.

By the way, Chaffetz isn't kidding about his Rock Band suckitude. Check out that 24% score from the Colbert show appearance. In any case, it's reassuring to know that at least one member of Congress enjoys a round of Halo now and again.

Yesterday GamePolitics utilized Twitter to provide live coverage as anti-war demonstrators staged a rally and march against the U.S. Army Experience Center in Philadelphia. The experimental recruiting facility located at Franklin Mills Mall uses an elaborate video game setup equipped with high-end gaming PCs and Xbox 360s to attract potential recruits.

For those who didn't catch yesterday's Twitter feed, I've pasted it below as it offers a detailed chronological picture of how the protest evolved; ultimately it would end with the peaceful arrest of seven protesters by police (see pic at left).

Here's the Twitter feed, including my answers to some questions by readers at the end. My tweets are in blue:

# LIVE Twitter coverage of protest march against US Army video game recruitment center in Phillly today. Please RT: http://tinyurl.com/cy9olkabout

# Heading down to Philly now to cover protest march against Army video game recruitment center

# Scattered showers here in philly, but I don't think it will interrupt the protest march targeting the US Army video game recruiting ctr

# Rain has stopped and sun is out. Weather will not interfere with today's protest march against US Army video game recruiting center in phila

# Protest starting soon. My crowd estimate is maybe 100, so somewhat less than what protest organizers were hoping for. There is at least [one counter protester here] (this message was truncated by Twitter)

# Looks like a peaceful crowd as u might expect for antiwar protesters. Generally older, average age 40+

# Philadelphia PD is on hand, both uniformed and plainclothes. They are low profile, seem to be coordinating w protest leaders (click "read more" below for the rest of the report)

He leg-wrestled Stephen Colbert and even played a Rock Band duet with the popular Comedy Central host, but freshman Utah Congressman Jason Chaffetz (R) offered GamePolitics no comment on his state's controversial video game/movie legislation.

The measure is now on Gov. Jon Huntsman's desk, awaiting signature.

GamePolitics tracked Rep. Chaffetz down on Twitter, where he is jasoninthehouse. To be fair, since he is a federal legislator and HB 353 is a state bill, we didn't really expect he'd be fully briefed - and he wasn't. But the media-savvy - and tech-savvy - Chaffetz is a good sport, as our private Twitter exchange demonstrates:

GamePolitics: Hey, Rep. Chaffetz, any thoughts on HB 353, video game/movie bill now on Gov. Huntsman's desk for signature?

jasoninthehouse: Just not familiar with it... State bill... I have been focused on the federal ones

GamePolitics: Fair enough, but what if I told you that among its provisions was a ban on leg-wrestling with fake news show hosts?

jasoninthehouse: That is funny. I should abide by this and not do any more leg wrestling....I am obviously not very good at it.

GP: For the record, I must point out that the text of my direct messages to Rep. Chaffetz disappeared into the Twitter ether, so I've paraphrased them from memory. Rep. Chaffetz's responses are verbatim. Beyond that, it's nice to see an approachable Congressman on Twitter - especially one with a sense of humor.

Conservative Newt Gingrich has been posting on Twitter about a Nintendo Wii that his wife, Callista,  received as a birthday present.

The former House Speaker, a hardcore mobile Twitter user, has mentioned the Wii at least twice since last evening:

# Callista got a wii from the cushmans and the lubbers for her birthday A lot of bowling golf and tennis to come ...about 18 hours ago from TwitterBerry

 

# @amlebus callista got a wii for her birthday yesterday. She is excited and wants to golf and bowl with our grandchildren    ...about 7 hours ago from TwitterBerry   

Last week we mentioned that readers could follow GP on Twitter and many of you jumped on board.

Today I wanted to follow up by letting you know that Hal Halpin, President of the Entertainment Consumers Association is on Twitter as well. Click here to follow Hal's Tweets.

If you're not on Twitter, check it out!

FULL DISCLOSURE DEPT: The ECA is the parent company of GamePolitics.

If you're on Twitter, you can catch important GP news alerts (as well as occasional random musings) by following GamePolitics.

If you're not on Twitter, check it out!