I’m back from vacation with little time to post, as I’m running off to meetings and digging out of the requisite backlog of e-mails. But I just saw this item that relates to our ongoing coverage of video game advertising. This is an interesting area to watch that currently has relatively little business activity (especially in local ads) but is starting to heat up and could represent a powerful ad medium in the future. Parks Associates estimates a $400 million in-game advertising market by 2009.

Today’s news involves in-game ad placement company Massive (purchased by Microsoft earlier this year), which announced the formation of a new unit that will work on interactive product placement in online games. Toyota Motor Sales is the first advertiser on board and we expect more. Toyota’s Yaris will be featured throughout the game play of Funcom’s multiplayer game "Anarchy Online." Massive will continue to push further into the gaming market with Microsoft’s muscle and its positioning as a console provider (Xbox).

Look for more deals from Massive and more Massives to enter the market (and more TKG coverage).