It’s a fair comment, and there are people that think they can play guitar just because they play Guitar hero/Rock Band etc, but on the flip side – there are people that have been inspired to learn an instrument solely because of the franchise.

I personally had no interest in playing an instrument until I bought Guitar Hero 3 for PS2. After that I bought a real guitar, I’m absolutely hopeless at playing it – but the games motivated me to give playing a real instrument a go.

Ok its fun with some friends, but I can imagine kids spending their evenings THINKING they can play like Jimmy Page when in fact they are completely utterly wasting their time. Its like the dance machine game, for your hands.

Never bought the products, and never believed in them. I kind of resent them too.

http://www.musicvita.com – MusicVita: Social Network for Music and Music Hub – Music Freak

Thanks for making this a little more clear for me.

“Federal Trade Commission revised their “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials” (click here to download), urging bloggers who review products, from a book or DVD to a video game system, to disclose if they received the product for free when giving an endorsement. According to the Washington Post, breaking these new guidelines could generate up to $11,000 in fines. (There are no penalties directly associated with violating the rules. But the FTC could seek a cease-and-desist order. If you ignore that, the fines start coming in.) These new guidelines will be put into effect on December 1, 2009″

Instead, IGN brands the hell out those areas, muddying the distinction.

The difference is totally obvious if you actually read the article.

The first issue is the name:
PlanetQuake is a site about Quake.
PlanetTonyHawk is a site about Tony Hawk
Grand Theft Auto Hood is a site about Grand Theft Auto
Music Hub is a site about … No, not about Music games!

If it was called Guitar Hero Hub, the most major component of the problem wouldn’t even be there.

The second issue is the clarity of separation of advertising and editorial. No one expects a fan site to be totally impartial, but there’s a difference between a sincere fan testimonial and a paid advertisement, and the author is clearly arguing that Music Hub doesn’t make that distinction clear.

If you read a magazine and there’s an advertisement, it’s clearly visually an advertisement. “Advertorial” content must be clearly delimited. No one is surprised when a developer blog claims they’ve made the best game of all time, but it’s important that if a third party source makes such claims that we know it’s not because they were bought and paid for.

http://club.ign.com/b/about?username=NextWeek&which=boards
http://planetthesims.gamespy.com/static.php?page=site/staff

Now, correct me if I am wrong, but if your job title is “Staff” or “VaultStaff”, how can that not point to anything but incrimination or at least suspicion?

What about the title “Site Director” under “Staff List” ?

Even if they are not, it gives one pause to think that not everything is on the level or particular clear with this issue

Shawn Elliott is our king.

kinda fucking disgusting, but i stopped reading games news since EGM died.

Why does the title of the hub page have the following text:

“Music Hub: Guitar Hero 5, Band Hero, DJ Hero Official News, Videos, Guides and News”

Official news? Surely that means the page is an official outlet and NOT a fansite. Fansites, as far as I know, are not a source of official information. Furthermore the City of Heroes Vault has no “Official” in its header leading further credence as the Hub as an outlet for the Hero franchise and specifically – Activision.

Both Jeff Green and Shawn have always been vocally against this type of thing – EVEN while working for Ziff Davis.

Listen to old GFW podcasts and it comes up fairly often (the big one that comes to mind was the discussion about the Jeff Gertsmann scandal)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Gerstmann

It should also be kept in mind that although editorial has control over editorial content, they don’t necessarily have control over advertising / marketing content. Hence the problem.