I quit

Leaving RTL II

After eight years in their newsroom, I have handed in my notice at the private German television station RTL II. As of November, I will become technology editor with the public sector station 3sat, based in Mainz, Hesse.

I usually do not post personal matters, but this is the single most important change in my professional life so far. It will also greatly affect this blog, as I will no longer be dealing with general daily news and current affairs. Instead, I will be exclusively focussing on technology-related topics, particularly IT, multimedia and computer and videogames.

I will work for their weekly technology show called ´Neues´. If you do speak German, you should check it out. It is a great program and airs on 3sat as well as ZDF and the ZDF-Infokanal.

Leaving Cologne

This will involve me leaving Cologne behind and moving to Frankfurt. Below is the flyer for my farewell party. Just so you understand the title, ´Alaaf´ is a salute used in the Cologne carnival. It rhymes with the word ´half´.



Looking back

As a technology editor, I will no longer deal with videogames only on the side. So this change will undoubtedly have a positive impact on my blog. Since this blog is nearing my 500th post, isn´t this a good time to look back at this blog´s various achievements?

I revealed that Wii would be significantly underpowered compared to the competition. I revealed that ´Zelda: Twilight Princess´ would use Wiimote functionality, rather than being merely a Gamecube game playable on Wii. In fact, Shigeru Miyamoto told me exclusively and in person.

I was also first to interview Pablo Belmonte, creator of the ´Nintendo On´ video. And I brought you the first developer comments regarding the Wii - by Peter Molyneux and Yuji Naka, no less.

And, of course, I ousted numerous fakers (like Seriousgamer007 and Kenton Bailey) and I played ´Red Steel´ before almost every other game journalist. I even told you the name before it went public by linking to this image.

I told you more than two months in advance that Rockstar´s ´Table Tennis´ was coming to Wii and my long-time readers knew about a ´Star Wars´ game featuring lightsaber action more than a year before it was finally announced. Finally, I recently revealed that the Wii´s friend codes will be game-specific.

Looking forward

What is more: I had a real blast writing all this stuff for you and I greatly appreciate all of you good people coming here. I apologize for the recent lack of updates, but both looking for a new job and moving to Frankfurt has kept me tremendously busy. Things will get back to normal over the next few weeks. And, as a technology editor, I am sure that I will be able to post even more exclusives than I have been able to so far.