The Cultural Gutter, named for the Wilde quote, has reprinted my interview with comic writer Scott McCloud.

I spoke with McCloud while he was in the middle of a cross-North America road trip with his family, promoting his newest comic-book investigation, Making Comics.

I wonder if the television commercial for EA Sports’ NHL08 is going to spark a sales bump for this song, from one-hit wonder Rockwell.

I’m a bit amazed that the Web site, Spinner is an AOL property, because it is such a great site, and because AOL was so resistant to adapting to what the Web became.

“Spinner” is big and brash, and – most importantly – is not overloaded with modules and flashing ads and distractions.

Just a nice, clean, three-column layout with plenty of white space so I can actually look around, and find interesting things.

My favourite discovery at “Spinner” is The DL Show, which has a catalogue of short, clever videos starring musicians who are promoting albums.

You must watch the episode in which Debbie Harry teaches at the Punk Rock Pre-School, and explains the origins – and future – of punk rock.

Scotland’s KT Tunstall subjects herself to a Star Trek trivia test, and Ted Leo, of the Pharmacists, sits down for an interview … with a member of the AOL HR department.

As a colleague wrote to me: “This is how to do a music page.”

He’s right.

In the September 27 issue of Calgary’s FFWD Weekly is my round-up of games I saw at E3 in July that got me excited.

Now the eagle-eyed among you will notice that there is a two-line preview of Halo 3 in this column, which published two days after the new game from Bungie was released.

That’s because this article was to have been published much earlier in September, when the preview would have been more of a preview, and less of a joke.

MindHabits Trainer, a video game which claims to “helps people to train to focus on finding warmth and support in their lives, therefore boosting self-confidence and reducing stress,” was the winner of Telefilm Canada’s Great Canadian Video Game competition.

The presentation was made at the opening of Vancouver’s VidFest, and I was there to cover the event for the Straight.

Get the entire story over here.