As social gaming companies get snatched for e
ver-escalating amounts, the wave of acquisitions and investment money has turned to makers of mobile videogames.
Over the last two weeks, there have been three substantial buyouts and investments in the mobile market — and the transactions could signal the beginning of a larger trend in use of mobile devices for gaming.
It was pretty much a foregone 
conclusion that the Kindle would be a hot seller in the fourth quarter. The combination of the holiday season and a new, lower priced device made it a certain hit.
But no one was expecting it to be this hot.
When Hulu announced plans to finally 
make its streaming service available beyond the PC, people cheered – until they heard the details. Subscribers to Hulu Plus would have to pay a $9.95 monthly fee and still watch the embedded ads in programs? That was a bit much to swallow.
Hulu may finally be about to acknowledge those complaints.
Critics might have sniped at Sony for not
releasing Move sales figures in conjunction with last week’s NPD data, but the company is fighting back.
John Koller, head of marketing for Sony’s PlayStation division, says the company shipped 1 million Move units to North American retailers in the peripheral’s the first 30 days. And while the company isn’t releasing hard sales numbers, Koller says it’s quite happy with the reception.
Critics have been lukewarm over
“Medal of Honor” and Electronic Arts is still taking heat for the early (and since-reversed) decision to make the Taliban playable in the multiplayer mode, but the game is still selling strong.
EA has announced the game sold 1.5 million units in its first five days on store shelves. CEO John Riccitiello added in an interview on Fox Business that the game has already surpassed $100 million at retail.
Read more at Variety’s Technotainment blog
Hollywood’s locked in an ongoing battle with 
online piracy – and that’s one that’s not likely to end soon. But if you’re curious about what films are the most pirated these days, TorrentFreak has the answer.
The site, which monitors and compiles the most popular Bit Torrent downloads has put together a list of the biggest cinematic downloads this week. And the most popular with pirates was only the second most popular with theatergoers – while last week’s number one film – “Jackass: 3D” – is nowhere to be found. (Whether that’s due to the film’s choice to show in 3D or some other factor is a matter ofdebate.)
Add THQ to the publishers 
expanding their operations into Canada. The company behind WWE games and last year’s “Avatar” has announced plans to open a development studio in Montreal – and has grabbed one of the country’s top developers in the process.
Patrice Désilets, formerly creative director on the “Assassin’s Creed” franchise at Ubisosft, will join the company next summer. (He’s currently riding out a non-compete from Ubisoft.)
Read more at Variety’s Technotainment blog
Retail video game sales might be 
floundering in 2009, but Steam, the largest digital distributor of PC games, is have a banner year.
Valve Software, maker of the “Half-Life” franchise and the owner of Steam, say active accounts at the service have topped 30 million – with new growth of 178 percent in the past 12 months. At its peak, the number of simultaneous players has reached 3 million.
Having established a position of power in the film 
rental industry, Redbox is deepening its move into the videogame world.
The company, which has been running a limited test of game rentals, is substantially expanding the experiment, adding game rentals to thousands of its self-service kiosks in the West, Midwest and East Coast.
September’s retail sales numbers for the video 
game industry might have stunk up the joint something terrible, but there’s one bright spot to be found.
The NPD Group, for the first time, has released a new spending report that incorporates not only retail sales, but used games, game rentals, subscriptions, digital full game downloads, social network games, downloadable content, and mobile game apps.
Chris Morris: Journalist 