The Roots of Your Angry Birds Obsession

Earlier this year, Newzoo, the games industry researcher, showed in an infographic that in the first quarter of 2012, some 37 million Americans paid to play mobile games – either via purchasing games or by making in-game purchases.

Over the next 12 months it will be interesting to see how much this growing segment will represent of the $78 billion Video Game Industry.

That being said, if you were ever curious about the genesis of your flash-obsessions with Angry Birds, Words with Friends, Trivie and FlickGolf, BuzzFeed just released an awesome article about the beginning of Pong and Atari.

The throw-back images included in this long read are themselves worth the trip over and there are some great cameos scattered throughout that story. But even more interesting is how much impact a simple idea can have in the world.  Definitely worth a lunch-hour read sometime!