Way back in August 2000, we put 4 short videos of the Double Dutch Divas on Streetplay, part of our jump rope coverage.  Well, some 10 years later, we fixed them up a little (putting them all together, for one thing) and posted them on our new YouTube channel.

The video quality may not be great like Hulu, but the message of fun still shines through after a decade has passed.

Perhaps better known as the impresario of the Sex Pistols, Malcolm McLaren had a hit with “Double Dutch” in 1983 (a follow-up on “Buffalo Gals,” his take on what we called rap back then).

He definitely helped shape a lot of the music scene back then, mixing and matching genres.  Sadly, he died today at the age of 64.

The ongoing newsfeed search for “stickball” has turned up this gem today: a suite of “street games” for your Wii gaming console!

Go Play City Sports by Majesco Entertainment

Video courtesy of NintendoWorldReport.com; read their review of the game

I’m not sure whether this is great–keeping the games alive for future generations–or whether it’s just more fodder for the oft-heard argument that videogames keep kids indoors getting fat sitting on the couch.  And it’s true: this is at least the second street game-based videogame available (MLB Stickball is the first I know of). I don’t know my take on this yet: maybe this will encourage kids to go outside and play the games they rehearse on the Wii. And I love my Wii, so it would be a little duplicitous to say an ill word against it.  But I do wish that the “handball” depicted here were the Ace-King-Queen version, though (where the ball hits the ground before hitting the wall).  And where’s skully?

I mainly wish the milieu depicted by publisher Majesco Entertainment weren’t so shabby; it’s an insult to people who actually lived (or live) in the city as a child.  The implication is that the street is a dirty, ragtag place that (thankfully) the shiny white Wii box is saving you from having to experience firsthand.  Hey, when I grew up, that setting was my home, and it was the greatest place to be in the world.