MSNBC.com has come up with an ingenious  way to entertain yourself before the film begins. They strategically place motion sensors throughout the cinema that can tell which way the crowd is moving, so enabling the audience to strike a ball and paddle with a paddle a la that prehistoric video game “Breakout.” The goal is to break the wall of news on the screen provided by MSNBC.com, There's an advergame version one can play as well.

Both these techniques are novel ways in which to advertise a product subtly under the guise of entertainment. And of course advergames abound these days, and, generally speaking, they bring more traffic to websites:

# 50% of recipients play the advergame, for an average of 25 minutes.
# 90% of players who receive a challenge from a friend play the game and respond back with their score or statistics.
# According to the Entertainment Software Assn., 42% of gamers say they play online games one or more hours per week.

How accurate these data are is a moot point, but the fact remains the advergame and its kin are a useful tool in our arsenal.