Welcome to the world of advergaming, the practice whereby advertisers market to kids by creative attractive games chock full of brand name promotions. This article explores several advergaming sites, including Nick.com, where a required plug-in is "a technological trojan horse for pushing slick ad messages on my 11-year-old son." Advertisers know what educators seem to have forgotten: that online gaming will catch and hold a child's attention. "Groove Alliance claims one game it developed for AT&T's long-distance service -- a Super Monkey Ball-inspired game in which players roll the AT&T's logo through 3-D mazes -- clocked an average playing time of 12 minutes." It's a problem, but I don't forsee the day when web filters block advertising aimed at children the way they block adult material. Really, the only answers are education in media awareness for children and the development of viable non-commercial alternatives, such as the game described immediately below.
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