Water Cooler Games
Water Cooler Games served as the web's primary forum for "videogames with an agenda" — coverage of the uses of video games in advertising, politics, education, and other everyday activities, outside the sphere of entertainment.

The site was maintained at watercoolergames.org from 2003-2009, where it was edited by myself and Gonzalo Frasca. It is now archived here in full.
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My New Column: Videogame Snapshots
by Ian Bogost September 13, 2008
categories: Casual Games

Gamasutra has published my latest "Persuasive Games" column, this one on the videogame equivalents of snapshots.

The Brownie brought photography to the people, but not without some help. The snapshot concept was borrowed from a hunting term for shooting from the hip, but Eastman contextualized the act for the masses. For its advertising, Kodak coined the "Kodak moment" and encouraged photographers to "celebrate the moments of your life," as they still do today. Eastman's promise was "You press the button and we do the rest." What if something similar were possible for games, a sort of video game snapshot?

You can read the whole thing over at Gamasutra.