To the relief of all the organizers, the OMMA conference went off this week without any major hitches, and to my enormous relief, my in-game advertising panel was well-attended and, apparently, interesting. Five major execs, two from in-game ad networks, two from agencies, and one from a professional gaming league, gave the audience a big-picture view of the challenges that in-game advertising presents, and how advertisers can get involved.

It's good to be leaving for OMMA Hollywood this weekend, when we're getting a return to oppressive gray weather after a short spring tease. As a beat reporter, I never made it out to the West Coast for MediaPost's annual shindig, but this year I snuck myself into a moderator's chair, meaning I'll be basking in the L.A. sun come Sunday. On my panel, which is dubbed "The Challenges of In-Game Advertising," we've got a pretty good cross section of the various ways in which advertisers can get close to video gamers.

This week, Sony finally announced a major online initiative for the PS3, after having it leaked on Kotaku, which was promptly blackballed -- and then unblackballed -- apparently for reporting good news about Sony. The initiative is Playstation Home, a virtual world application in which PS3 owners can create avatars, interact with one another, and customize their own virtual space with trophies earned from gaming achievements.

"Second Life Lite" is how Kaneva, a virtual world currently undergoing closed beta testing, bills itself, and it does a pretty fair job at filling that role: The process of creating an avatar is much simpler than in Second Life, and every user is given his own space in the virtual world to decorate and customize (using pre-created furniture that can be textured with picture uploads). Kaneva also has a social networking platform built around it, so that users in-world can have out-world profiles to connect with.

Finally some good news for Sony: In January, the Playstation brand posted its highest numbers in its history, as PS3 sales began to pick up, taking the first few steps toward closing the gap between it and the market leader, the Xbox 360.

I was going to get this column done last night, but I was too busy trying to squeeze as many Gamerscore points as possible out of "Call of Duty 2" before moving on to "Lost Planet." Why would I shirk my duties as a columnist to increase a meaningless number on my Xbox Live profile? Why, free stuff, of course.

Microsoft this week announced an initiative offering to share advertising revenue with game developers who have titles hosted on its MSN Games site. The share is a two-tiered scheme, offering 10% of the takings for simple games, and 20% for more involved games with at least 10 hours of gameplay and ESRB ratings.

This week, online auction house eBay banned the sale of "virtual goods" from massively multiplayer online games. The why of eBay's move is a little bit elusive. Hani Durzi, a spokesman for the company, said that the decision was made due to "legal complexities" surrounding the sale of online goods.

The big rumor in the in-game ad space this week is that Google is looking to enter the space with the purchase of Adscape, an in-game ad technology firm started by three industry veterans.

The longer Linden Lab's Second Life sits in the media spotlight, the more likely it is to burst into flames. This month, the independent gaming press notes a brewing backlash, even as marketers and media companies like Scion, iVillage, Dell, IBM, Song BMG and others rush to join the virtual world.