It’s that time of year again, but with a little twist. Every year I try to promote Child’s Play, the charity set up by Gabe and Tycho over at Penny Arcade which, since 2003, has raised over $2 million for sick kids in hospitals. That’s a pretty staggering way for gamers to show the positive side of this industry, in spite of the continually negative media coverage. This year I’m stoked because I can actually afford to contribute properly myself.

For those who don’t know the deal, here’s how it works. The charity has connections with various children’s hospitals around the world (in the UK it’s Alder Hey), so you pick one and can then view an Amazon wishlist showing the products the hospital would like to obtain. Choose an item and pay, the hospital receives it and a host of children’s lives are immeasurably improved as they await daunting surgeries and treatments. With each successive year donations have increased but in the current economic climate Gabe is expecting donations to drop below last year’s total. I’d love it if you could help prove him wrong.

Now that the news has had sufficient time to spread, I can safely offer huge congratulations to Andy and Irina on their engagement. Their cocktail party last weekend became a much bigger celebration following Andy’s proposal on Friday. Unfortunately I didn’t get to take any romantic snaps of the couple (or the ring) so I guess you’ll have to imagine it instead.

And finally you may have heard that the Home Office recently caught up with the times and announced the establishment of new cybercrime police unit with specialist training to handle online fraud in particular. Unfortunately they have been given the rather unimaginative title of Police Central e-crime Unit (or PCeU which looks rather like a sneeze). I strongly suggest that, with Tom Clancy having sold the rights to use of his own name to Ubisoft*, the Met proceed to acquire a license and rebrand the unit Tom Clancy’s Net Force. How else can they be taken seriously?

* Yes, that is quite likely restricted to videogames since his book publisher will presumably continue to flood the market with books not actually written by him.