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Shows how the gaming industry is now bigger than film, music and video, with PlayStation better than all other divisions of Sony combined. Points out the implications for advertising: gaming can deliver huge audiences on a global scale, but gamers are proactive and cynical about conventional marketing ploys. Shows how media, like the UK’s “Sun” newspaper, are including gaming content, while the supremacy of American Hollywood‐type entertainment may decline in the face of gaming’s popularity. Recounts an early example of a highly successful video game and brand promotion; this was virtual heroine Lara Croft’s celebrity endorsement of Lucozade, a British soft drink that in 1999 was reinventing itself as a sports drink with appeal to the 18‐24 year old market.

There is a great deal of interest in the environment these days, and while much of that interest focuses on saving the world, a lot of it relates to learning about nature. Field guides are among the most popular natural history guides for the general public; it sometimes seems that almost every household must have at least one lurking in a corner. There are an incredible variety of field guides available for inquiring naturalists. The well‐known Peterson, Golden, and Audubon series and the typical bird, flower, and tree guides are just the tip of the iceberg.

With the advent of the COVID-19 and increased access to Internet technologies, students tend to use e-learning technologies for improved academic results, and since then, improving student engagement in a virtual space became a difficult task for educational institutions globally. The present study aims to examine the effect of key e-learning factors (i.e. perception, hedonic motivation (HM), usefulness, empowerment and attitude) on student engagement among open and distance learners (ODLs) of the central region of India.

Simple random sampling was applied to collect data from ODLs of Chhattisgarh. ODLs who are using e-learning platforms for at least one year were chosen to be the participant in the study. The authors collected 1,137 responses using both online and offline modes of collection.

The test results indicated that usefulness, HM and attitude factors were found to have a significant relationship with student engagement in e-learning, while perception and empowerment variables did not contribute to the engagement of students.

The present study is novel in its approach. It clarifies the key factors to student engagement which might increase the students' level of involvement in e-learning technologies, if these factors are addressed tactfully by the educational institutions or concerned administration.