ALKHOBAR, 10 June 2008 — Summer vacation is just about here and the Internet is going to be a big part of summer fun this year! There are great resources online for kids of every age and often online fun can go offline and become the foundation for wonderful family activities too.

The first thing to check out are all the new activities HP has put online that tie in with the just released DreamWorks animated film “Kung Fu Panda.” If you haven’t heard of Kung Fu Panda then let me tell you that you’d better hurry up and “Prepare for Awesomeness.” In brief, Kung Fu Panda is a movie about a bungling panda, Po, who aspires to be a Kung Fu warrior. With the upcoming Summer Olympics in China, the movie comes at a time when there’s a lot of focus on Asia.

HP played a big role in enhancing the creativity of animators working on the film. HP technology powered 400 workstations and the largest and most powerful render farm ever used to take creative elements in Kung Fu Panda to new heights. Rendering is the process through which a computer-generated animation is created. Kung Fu Panda required more than 24 million render hours – four times as many as Shrek. That tells you that the action on the movie screen will be amazing.

Now the IT giant is making sure that Kung Fu Panda fun doesn’t end at the movie theater. Go to http://hp.com/kungfupanda for downloadable activities and crafts, and a choreographed “The Panda” dance that the whole family can learn. Many of the activities help children learn about Asian culture. The crafts include 3-D characters, customizable backpack tags and puzzles. My favorite thing to make was the “Cootie Catcher.” To learn the dance, just follow along with the how-to video. It’s so easy that in no time, even dads with two left feet like the panda, Po, will be able to get down like all get out.

Other websites are joining in on the “Pandamonium.” At Nickelodeon’s kid-friendly website, kids can create a personalized, mash-up Kung Fu Panda video that incorporates music and video, which they can share with their friends and family or post to the Kung Fu Panda Great Wall, where others can vote on their favorites. There’s also a new panda game to play. Click to www.nick.com/games/gotw/play.jhtml.

Once your children can’t handle anymore “Pandamonium,” bring on the penguins. Help your child sign up for Disney Club Penguin (www.clubpenguin.com). This is one of the most popular and fastest-growing online worlds for children. At Club Penguin, cartoon penguins become children’s avatars. The penguins waddle around, chat, play minigames, and participate in other activities with one another in a snow-covered virtual world. Club Penguin is designed for six to 14-year-olds but is open to children of all ages. The site is free to use and enjoy, however a subscription membership at $6 monthly provides access to additional features that enhance the Club Penguin experience. Club Penguin’s goal is to provide a fun and safe online experience through the use of sophisticated filtering technology and a team of highly-trained moderators. Third-party advertising of any kind is prohibited.

Club Penguin has new parent features which allow adults to log-on and view their children’s account history (including any bans and account payments), change their children’s passwords and choose whether their children can chat by selecting from pre-approved phrases or by typing in their own messages. An integrated timer, which lets parents set the time of day and duration of a child’s visit to Club Penguin, will be released later this month. All these features help parents manage the time their children spend online

Club Penguin’s newest mini-game, Paint By Letters, gives children a fun way to practice reading, spelling and keyboarding through creative storytelling. In the game, players type along with the on-screen words and make choices on what they want to see next to help bring the stories to life. By correctly typing to fill in the text, players complete each line of the story and activate the accompanying, animated, graphic images and sound effects. There’s a surprise in store on every page, and throughout each book, children can choose from a selection of different words, allowing them to change the elements of the story and the pictures that go with it as the story unfolds.

With so many kids going online this summer, it’s vital to mention Internet safety here. When it comes to technology, some kids think they know it all and others are simply fearless enough to be willing to try anything. Just as it’s important for parents to discuss topics such as cigarette smoking and drug abuse with their children, having a chat with them about Internet safety is a necessity.

In June, with the support of the Internet Keep Safe Coalition, Comcast is providing new resources at www.comcast.net/security which include:

*A “For Parents” page which features content rich tips for parents on Internet Safety.

*A “For Kids” page that includes games designed to get kids interested in staying safe online.

*A new Frequently Asked Questions section written by Dr. Michael Rich, Director of the Center on Media and Child Health at Children’s Hospital Boston and Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School.

*A downloadable brochure for parents titled, “How to Talk to Your Kids About Internet Safety.”

*An Internet Safety Contract for parents and their children designed to help families establish an open dialog about Internet safety and set ground rules for the use of the Internet both inside and outside of the home.