INTERVIEW: Microsoft’s Neil Thompson – The Age Debate: Part 2
GamesIndustry.Biz writes: "Continuing the GamesIndustry.biz build-up to the release of the Byron Review, part two of the exclusive interview with Neil Thompson looks at the difficult task of getting the industry message out to the wider public.
Here he discusses the role of parents and mainstream media, whether or not retailers are doing a good job of age rating enforcement, and what the benefits are to a pan-European system."
Q: Newspapers need to sell copies, and something that seems to work for them at the moment is videogame controversy – mainstream media holds a lot of sway over general public opinion as well?
A: Well, I wouldn’t pour all of mainstream press into one bucket, and say that’s how all of them approach it. I think there are some media outlets that approach it in a reasonably balanced way, and there are others who obviously have a different sort of agenda, and do tend to sensationalise.
Usually it’s on a case-by-case level – once people get to understand the complexities of each case, they realise there is no simple answer as to why these things happen, it’s a mixture of things.
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