The Writers Guild of America (WGA) has awarded the very first Videogame Writing Award to D3Publisher of America and Vicious Cycle Software's Dead Head Fred for the PSP. As expected, the entire team behind the video game was very excited to hear the news. For more information, head on over to the full article.

There's always a first time for everything - even a first time for being nominating for a video game writing award. Who has privilege of receiving this prestigious nomination from the Writer's Guild of America? None other than writers Dave Ellis and Adam Cogan, the men responsible for bringing us the story of D3 Publisher's and Vicious Cycle's Dead Head Fred. More about these writers and their remarkable achievement after the jump.

If you fancy some off-topic humor for some easy viewing over the weekend, here's something to tune into: Late Night with Conan O'Brien and their recent segment with Rock Band.

Turns out that the WGA strike had left them with a lot of free time on their hands... Which makes us think that, yeah, video games really are benefiting from the writers' strike.

Weren't able to catch your TV programs because of the writer's strike? Well pick up your controller and play video games. At least, that's what Joseph Olin, president of the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences, thinks will happen to you and every other stranded TV viewer left high and dry by the strike. Olin believes that the strike will actually help the video game industry. Read more in the full article.

The "pirate checks" that are performed by Windows XP machines with WGA installed have been stopped by Microsoft. The decision to bury the details about Windows Genuine Validation (WGA) in the endless legalese of a confusing EULA caused a backlash from consumer rights organizations and sparked class action lawsuits in the US.

Computer repair facilities and technicians also complained that Microsoft left them holding the bag by not telling them about the implementation of and functionality associated with its WGA software update to Windows XP. "I bought my software legitimately, I validated it, I go to Microsoft for updates, and if they want to check it then, that's okay, but coming back every day is too much," said Ian Smith, an XP user who has been adversely affected by the situation.

Microsoft certainly has the right to protect its intellectual property, but it was not a good policy for them to hide the true nature of the WGA update from customers.

It was largely the unified and overwhelming reaction of the market against the WGA update that finally caused Microsoft to capitulate and disable the daily phone home feature of the program.

Unfortunately, the rest of the features of WGA remain in tact. Including "occasional" phoning home to Microsoft to verify that the copy is genuine, (annoying) on screen "helpful reminders" for users who have a  copy of XP that doesn't pass muster, along with the eventual possibility of Microsoft deciding one day to create a new add-on to WGA that would disable the functionality of a users system all together unless Microsoft gives it the OK.