A controversial video game broke sales records on its opening day to make it the biggest entertainment launch in history, according to its publisher.

Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 sold 4.7 million copies in the UK and US alone within 24 hours of its launch on Tuesday, generating a revenue of £186 million, Activision said.

US-based Activision chief executive Mike Griffith said: "The Call Of Duty franchise has become a cultural phenomenon, showing the power of video games as an entertainment medium.

Thousands of gamers have been barred from playing Xbox Live by Microsoft in an attempt to clamp down on piracy.

The US computing giant said it had banned consoles because owners had modified the equipment to play games without paying for them.

People whose Xboxes have been blocked will have to buy new machines if they want to connect to Xbox Live.

The internet service allows the 20 million gamers signed up to compete against each other via the web.

The latest handset to challenge the market supremacy of Apple's iPhone is hoping to attract users with one of the biggest screens on the market.

The HD2 will hit UK shops later this month and its manufacturer, Taiwanese firm HTC, hopes to attract buyers with a 4.3 inch touch screen display.

HTC Corporation chief executive Peter Chou said he was "excited" about the handset's launch.

West Midlands Police have announced they will be taking to the Twittersphere in their battle against crime.

Bobbies will be using all manner of new media including micro-blogs and Facebook in a bid to connect with communities.

Chief Insp Mark Payne, said: "Our research has shown that large groups of people are now using social media and not just the young.

"We will continue to communicate with the people we serve across the West Midlands in traditional way, but social media is another opportunity for us to listen and pass on information."

Some officers in the force are in the early stages of setting up blogs to 'talk' to the neighbourhoods where they work.

Chief Insp Payne said: "Twitter means we get can get short messages out to people quickly to let them know about initiatives we are carrying out in their area.

"We can use tweets as a way of directing people to more detailed information which may help prevent them becoming a victim of crime."

Let's take a look at what the police might say on twitter, given so much of that posted is either textspeak, what people had for breakfast and 'meaningful' observations on life:

@hungrybobby Receive intelligence local chippie @oceanbar is closing early proceed under blue lights to collect lunch for station

@Bluepatrol LO LO LO Whats going on ere thn?

@arrestingoffice @criminalelement UR ncked

@hungrybobby Member public takes picture of panda car in disabled bay outside @phillpotssandwiches arrest person for obstructing officer

Very rarely do I sign up to Twitter news feeds - mainly because they're so relentless.

You just get bombarded with update after update and everything else can get a bit swamped.

Naturally they are, of course, automatically generated.

And yesterday Sky News came a cropper after it updated twice within a two minute period.

Unfortunately that two minute period was the silence at 11am on November 11th, when the nation came to a halt to remember our war dead.

In apologising the news giant said: "We are sorry our automated feeds engine posted two updates during the Twitter silence for Armistice Day. They were promptly deleted."

Follow me on Twitter at: http://twitter.com/BenHurst

A political row broke out over levels of violence in a video game as shops opened early for its release today.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, which went on sale at midnight, is expected to break sales records.

Crowds gathered in London's Leicester Square for a "premiere" complete with tanks and military costumes ahead of the epic hitting the shelves.

Described in press material as featuring "gripping and heart-racing action as players face off against a new threat dedicated to bringing the world to the brink of collapse", the game reportedly allows players to plot terror attacks against civilians.

Modern Warfare 2, developed by US company Infinity Ward and published by Activision, is rated as mature, for its "blood, drug reference, intense violence and language".

Labour MP Keith Vaz called for action to ensure the 18-certificate game did not end up in the hands of children, while fellow Labour former digital minister Tom Watson said it would be better to support the UK's video gaming industry.

Mr Vaz, the Home Affairs Select Committee chairman, told MPs during Commons question time: "It contains such scenes of brutality that even the manufacturers have put in warnings within the game telling people how they can skip particular scenes."

He asked what steps ministers were taking to ensure that violent games did not fall into the hands of children and young people.

"It's not about censorship, it's about protecting our children," he added.

Junior culture minister Sion Simon said the clearest recommendation of the Byron review - which last year looked into the risks faced by children from inappropriate video games - was that content suitable for adults should be labelled and sold as such.

"The game you refer to is a Certificate 18 game," he said.

"It should not be sold to children and the Government's job is to make sure that adults ... can get what adults should be able to and children are not in danger of being subjected to adult content."

Mr Watson said he had seen the game and it "wasn't pleasant, though no worse than many films and books".

BT is currently plugging its new up to 20Mb broadband service.

For some unknown reason, scooters play a large part in this campaign - why - who knows?

The communications giant has created a team of BT super scooter taxis, which will land on the UK's busiest commuter routes, "allowing commuters the opportunity to 'beat the rush with BT to work" by hitching a lift.

And in true Pr style, they've got TV lovely and erstwhile George Clooney girlfriend Lisa Snowdon to pout alluringly on said scooters.

So here's the pic - it may inspire you to fork out for 'up to' 20Mb broadband. And then again, it might not.

You decide.

It's coming up to Christmas - you're putting out a festive game. So how many pr puffery boxes can you tick?

Theme - festive - yes! Christmas Carols.

It's a game! Kids will want to buy it - yes! Get them in the pictures.

Spurious reality show pop star contestant, turned attempted tv presenter, whose career has, er slowed a bit - present and correct.

And the results, dear readers are below. I give you the launch of, A Christmas Carol the video game on the Nintendo DS modelled by Suzanne Shaw.

An image of Birmingham is to appear on millions of desktops all around the world.

The city's iconic Selfridges building is one of the official wallpapers for Windows 7.

As most computer users never do anything like downloading anything different, it is fair to say that it will adorn the screens of countless users.

Below: the release client Windows 7 wallpaper selection:

A slightly bigger image of the Selfridges shop:

According to reports, Nintendo's profits have plunged in the last six months.

The figures, showing a 52 per cent drop in profits, were described as 'disappointing' by commentators, and blamed on waning sales for the Nintendo Wii console.

Apparently price cuts to the Playstation 3 have hit sales of the hitherto all conquering Wii.

My own opinion on this is that you can only sell so much of one thing before everyone who could possibly want one, er, has one.

Don't forget that the Nintendo Wii has sold 56 million around the world.

Also don't forget that it was launched in the UK in December 2006 - and three years is a long time in the gaming industry.

I wouldn't be surprised if the Nintendo Wii 2 was imminent - after all, manufacturers rarely give much away before bringing to market a new item of technology because it will hit the last sales of their previous product, which are still clogging up the shelves in the run up to the launch.