Microsoft’s 2008 E3 press conference is over and there was some major announcements. Mainly that the entire Xbox 360 Dashboard is being overhauled and a new Xbox (Live) ‘Experience’ will be born

GamerScoreBlog provide an over view of some of the features in the new experience:

• Play from hard drive.  Copy your games from the game disc and play directly from the hard drive.  Not only will the drive not spin, but load times are quicker, as well.  Of course, you will still need the disc in the tray to prove you own the game.  

• Access Xbox LIVE Marketplace on the Web.  Browse and purchase Marketplace content whenever you want from Xbox.com and it downloads automatically to your console.  Purchase that new map, television episode, the latest Xbox LIVE Arcade game or set up a movie to watch when you get home from work.

• Dashboard built into the new Xbox Guide.  For everyone who loves the blades interface, it’s not going away; they are now built directly in to the new Xbox guide. Every feature and option is available right from the guide.  You can even access your full games library at all times.  No matter where you are (in dash or in game), immediately call up your games played list and directly launch a game.    

• LIVE Party system.  Create a party of up to eight friends, and stay with them from one game to another, or watch a Netflix movie together, or share a slideshow of your personal photos.  It works with all Xbox 360 titles, not just upcoming games.  LIVE Party allows up to eight  people to chat in the dashboard, so you can meet up before playing.

• Xbox LIVE Primetime. This whole new category of games is going to give you more reasons to get online with your friends.  Games will support everything you’d expect, like Achievements and leader boards, but many of these games will include real prizes.  You can invite your friends, and even set a reminder for an upcoming show.  Each game is broadcast simultaneously, so everyone is answering the same questions.  Many events will have a live host, calling the shots as they happen.  

• Avatars. Your online identity started as a Gamertag – it then grew into a personalized Gamercard. Now, it has evolved even further into avatars.  You can express your style, check out new outfits and share this with the community.  Avatars will also be integrated into Xbox LIVE Arcade games, LIVE Party, as well as retail games.    

• New display support. Because you asked for it, we are adding 16X10 over VGA or HDMI, and support for 1440×900 or 1680×1050.

Some shots of the new Avatars, Dashboard and Xbox Experience can be seen here courtesy of Engadget

Other news included a few deals with major movie studios to bring more content to the Xbox Live Marketplace, a few launch dates and demo’s of the obvious games and then most suprisingly the announcement that Final Fantasy XIII will be coming to the Xbox 360! – This now means there are only a few exclusives left in Sony’s camp (and nothing really that big if MGS 4 really is the final one)

A full stream of the Microsoft Press conference is available here

About a year ago (August 2007) the Times Online posted an article entitled “Walking to the shops ‘damages planet more than going by car’” which made the claim that more greenhouse gas’ are produced by someone walking to the shops (and the extra food they need to eat) than by someone who drives there. After having a discussion with a housemate who thought I had made the whole claim up I dug out the article and sent it to him, I also thought I might as well blog about it.

The main claim in the article is the following:

“The sums were done by Chris Goodall, campaigning author of How to Live a Low-Carbon Life, based on the greenhouse gases created by intensive beef production. “Driving a typical UK car for 3 miles [4.8km] adds about 0.9 kg [2lb] of CO2 to the atmosphere,” he said, a calculation based on the Government’s official fuel emission figures. “If you walked instead, it would use about 180 calories. You’d need about 100g of beef to replace those calories, resulting in 3.6kg of emissions, or four times as much as driving”"

And also:

“What if, instead of beef, the walker drank a glass of milk? The average person would need to drink 420ml – three quarters of a pint – to recover the calories used in the walk. Modern dairy farming emits the equivalent of 1.2kg of CO2 to produce the milk, still more pollution than the car journey.”

While looking for the article again I also found a counterview/follow up to it entitled “Walking vs. Driving: Which is the Better Choice?“ which alters the calculations done based on a different diet and concludes that walking is better:

“The study works with a given distance, 1.5 miles, with all caloric expenditures for an 189-pound, 35-year-old male, and car based calculations for a 2,853 pound Nissan Sentra. They then examine the emissions using the varying dietary trends. They certainly agree with Goodall’s assertion that high meat content diets are higher in carbon emissions. However, when exploring the typical American diet where beef and pork contribute about 10% of total daily caloric intake and dairy products about 7%, (statistics they determine using existing studies), they find that walking is the better choice by a factor of four”

So its not particularly clear whether or not the claim is true and to make a conclusive statement would need alot more reesearch and analysis into the many other factors involved with the production of the vehicle, storage of the food etc. But it does make you reconsider exactly what is good for the environemt.