Get Your Wire Service on the Wii

Moving the Wii one step closer to the center of users lives, Nintendo plans to launch the Wii News Channel featuring AP news stories and photographs.

p> In a move aimed to make it’s popular new Wii gaming console that much more the center of its owners’ lives—and further widen the systems’demographic appeal—Nintendo today announced it plans to launch the Wii News Channel this Saturday, offering Wii users with broadband Internet service thecapability to access news stories and photographs via the Wii version of the Opera Web browser.

Nintendo began offering the Opera Web browser for the Wii in late December, 2006: the trial version of the software is available now, with a final version expected in March, 2007. The browser will remain free to Wii owners until June 30, 2007, at which point it will be available for 500 Wii Points from the Wii Shop Channel.

The forthcoming Wii News Channel will primarily feature news stories and photographs from the Associated Press; news will be available in multiple languages, although Japanese-language news will come from Goo; financial terms of the deal were not disclosed, although Nintendo’s agreement with the AP runs for two years.

Users will be able to navigate to news via an interactive on-screen map; zooming into areas of interest to the user. The Wii News Channel will be available to Wii owners for free, and Nintendo says there are currently no plans to offer advertising or sell promotional space on the service.

The Wii console has been a strong success, and a boost to Nintendo’s bottom line. A recent report from market research firm NPD estimated Wii sales have exceeded 1.1 million units since the system’s release on November 19, with more than 600,000 of those sales occurring in December.