Strauss Zelnick is here to stay

It's well known that Strauss Zelnick has been heavily involved in Take Two's operation since he and his cohorts took over the company last year when the old board and management team was ousted. Zelnick, of course, used to run BMG back when its short-lived interactive division released the first "Grand Theft Auto" from current Take Two subsidiary Rockstar.

On Friday, he got the go-ahead to be officially involved in day-to-day operations by switching from non-executive chairman to executive chairman. What does that mean? Basically, it's now his job to be involved in the company's day-to-day operations along with CEO Ben Feder (whose contract has been extended through 2012). It also means Zelnick, whose career has included music and movies, is dedicating himself pretty whole-heartedly to the videogame biz (at least until some big media conglom swallows up Take Two). And with the kind of growth videogames are seeing compared to other media businesses, who can blame him?

(It's worth noting that executive chairmen are pretty unusual in the business world these days, where if the CEO and chairman aren't the same person, the chairman is usually not involved in day-to-day operations. But two major videogame companies now have one: Take Two and Electronic Arts, where former CEO Larry Probst remains executive chairman.)