The Entertainment Software Association spent nearly $1 Million on game lobbying in Q4 of 2008 and totalled over $4 Million for the entire past year.

The organisation dedicates resources to a wide area of issues ranging from parental control and government rating systems over anti-piracy matters to obtaining green cards and work visas for skilful foreign workers.

Doesn't really sound familiar? That's because you don't live in the United States or you are an uneducated nitwit so here is an explanation of what lobbyists do on Wikipedia.

Basically, lobbyists try to influence government decisions to the advantage of the special interest group they represent. This can be done in many ways but a very popular one is funding campaigns of soon to be influential politicians in return for some favours on certain issues.

So in my eyes, lobbying on green cards and practical stuff is a positive thing but imagine some very conservative party throwing tons of money at the issue of game censorship and before you know it we are all playing My Little Pony games.

In other news: