• Video game site Kotaku features a video of Jane McGonigal, author of Reality Is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World, answering a question often presented to gamers: "When we are on our deathbeds, will we regret the hours we spent playing games?" She points to research conducted on people who were on their deathbeds that seems to suggest otherwise.
• U.S. publisher Gamewright has interviewed Laurie Keller, author of The Scrambled States of America, which was later turned into a game of the same name by Gamewright when Keller couldn't do so. An excerpt:
It had never occurred to me to turn The Scrambled States of America into a game but Gamewright contacted my publisher, Henry Holt, and said that they were interested in doing so. They asked me if I had any ideas for a possible game and unfortunately I didn't. So they came up with the entire concept themselves and I was blown away! They made it fast-paced and fun and even added more educational elements than were in the book.
• Anthony Simons is back in his Pawnstar blog with yet another theme-based round-up that reaches back further in time than is normal for such things. This time he looks at town planning and building, with both aspects of theme being included in the games featured.
• The history of Abe and Rena Nathanson's Bananagrams was featured on the CNBC program "How I Made My Millions" in the U.S. The first publication run for this now ubiquitous game? Fifty copies. Total number of copies sold to date? Five-and-a-half to six million copies.