According to a post on the official EVE Online Web site, Apocrypha 1.3 will be deployed on Monday during downtime from 8 a.m. to noon GMT. Here's what you can expect to see in the patch:

This latest patch in the Apocrypha series contains some fantastic changes for core memory and lag reduction on Tranquility. Tech 3 production and reverse engineering will be receiving a major boost in terms of increased radar sites in wormhole space, increased drop rates of Tech 3 datacores along with increasing the runs on the blueprints from reverse engineering jobs. Starbases will see significant improvements with the deployment, anchoring, on-lining and un-anchoring of starbase towers and structures to be improved for all players.

You can read the full patch notes after the jump.

The staff of EVE TV has announced the team of player experts who have been chosen to act as PvP commentators for the Seventh Alliance Tournament. Crovan and Kil2, veterans of the sixth tourney, will return as the lead experts, while TeaDaze, Trzzbk and Ryas Nia will be flying to CCP Headquarters in Reykjavík, Iceland for the first time to be commentators for the tournament final.

Signups for the competition are set to open on July 3. More information can be found on the signup page. The Seventh Alliance Tournament is scheduled to take place in early September.

It seems as if everywhere we turn, someone has a problem with video games these days. Even the President of the United States, it appears. Addressing the American Medical Association last week, President Barack Obama outlined a series of "preventative care" issues deemed important to modern health care reform. Limiting the amount of time that kids spend playing video games is a small part of that plan. "The second step that we can all agree on is to invest more in preventive care so that we can avoid illness and disease in the first place," Obama said at the press conference, referring to his reform plan. "That starts with each of us taking more responsibility for our health and the health of our children. […] It means going for a run or hitting the gym, and raising our children to step away from the video games and spend more time playing outside."

Sure, it's not exactly a defining topic of the speech, or even a full paragraph's worth. But it does indicate—at the very least—that modern video game culture has the attention of the Obama administration, in some capacity. It doesn't read like a "call to arms" against video games as a whole. More so, it seems as if the administration is urging the AMA to recognize video games as a potential "health hazard" (if only in the sense of physical fitness and mental well-being). The question remains: "Does the government believe video games—including MMOs—pose a risk to public health?"

For those of you who like to watch G4TV's MMO Report, you may have heard that CCP Games, the guys who made EVE Online, will be delivering a keynote address at the 2009 Game Developers Conference Europe, and it's titled "CCP: Winning the War." More importantly, they state in their press release that "as a testament to the industry’s potential for growth despite widespread economic turmoil and as an inspiration for up-and-coming independent studios, Petursson will give an exclusive first look at the company’s latest project, which is currently in pre-production." In other words, this means that they may be finally beginning serious development of World of Darkness, an MMORPG based on the universe created by White Wolf, Inc.

You may remember in 2006 when CCP Games merged with White Wolf, Inc. and announced that they were planning to make a World of Darkness MMORPG. To further support the theory that their upcoming MMO will be World of Darkness, in 2008, The Atlantica Journal-Constitution went and visited the CCP Games Headquarters and observed at the end of their tour that "after the release of Eve Online’s expansion in March [2009], the company will focus on creating another multi-player game based on the popular World of Darkness fictional universes created by White Wolf." I guess World of Darkness fans should keep their fingers crossed until August!

The new Alliance Tournament section of the EVE Online Web site went live today in preparation for the seventh PvP tourney, which will take place in September. CCP Claw has written an in-depth blog entry outlining the changes that will be implemented in this year's event.

First off, signups won't be first-come, first-served this year. Instead, 16 teams from the sixth Alliance Tournament will be automatically qualified, and the remaining 48 teams will be randomly drawn to give everyone a fair chance. You can read the full signup rules here.

Also, there's a bunch of changes to the rules. Logistics Ships are legal again, with a max of one per team; each ship will be limited to a maximum of two to create some variation in tactics; the points values have been altered; and Tech 3 ships and haulers have been added to the points table. You can read the full rules here.

Claw's full blog entry is below. According to the post, CCP is still looking for expert commentators to talk about PvP during the tournament. Applications are open until Sunday, and the selected players will earn a free trip to Iceland. More information on applying to become a commentator can be found here.

CCP has announced that Hilmar Pètursson, the company's Chief Executive Officer, will be delivering a keynote address titled "CCP: Winning the War" at the Game Developers Conference Europe 2009. According to the press release, "Pètursson will discuss CCP's rise to success from relative obscurity and how the small Reykjavik-based studio overcame the stigma of producing a niche product that’s now one of the largest massively multiplayer games (MMOGs) in the world: EVE Online."

While it will be interesting to see what lessons Pètursson can share through CCP's success, perhaps the most exciting news is that he will be giving "an exclusive first look at the company’s latest project, which is currently in pre-production."

According to the GDC Europe Web site, Pètursson's address will inspire other studios and "share his views on an industry that is still flourishing despite the economic turmoil." The convention will be held Aug. 17-19 in Cologne, Germany. You can read the full press release after the jump.

The Seventh Alliance Tournament is set to be held in September, but first CCP is looking for some EVE PvP experts to act as commentators for the battles. You'd have to be available to comment on the qualifying rounds from your home on the weekends of Sept. 5-6 and and 12-13, as well as be flown to Reykjavik, Iceland to join the team at CCP headquarters during the finals from Sept. 20-21.

You need to be at least 21 years old, know your PvP and have a sense of humor to apply. You have until 11:59 p.m. GMT on June 14 to submit your application. Those who make it through to the second round of eliminations will need to attend a voice chat interview on June 20. All the details on how to apply can be found in this dev blog entry or below.

The votes have been tallied and the delegates for the third Council of Stellar Management have been selected. Nine players have been chosen to sit on the council, and they will bring topics up to CCP that they feel need work in EVE Online. With 2,967 votes, Valentijn Geirnaert of the Netherlands is officially the CSM chairman.

The first meeting of the new council will be held in EVE tomorrow, May 30. It is closed to the public, but you'll be able to read the minutes. The members will then be flown to Iceland the week of Aug. 28 to meet with CCP.

As always, the dev blog entry is filled with interesting statistics regarding the voting process. For example, 27,848 votes were cast, with male voters making up 97.1% of the group and most votes coming from veteran players who have had their accounts for two years. Also, 38% of the players from Bulgaria voted in the election.

You can view the full list of CSM delegates, as well as the five alternates, here.

The staff over at Beckett Massive Online Gamer has released its list of the top 20 most influential people in MMOs in 2008, and Rob Pardo, the executive vice president of Blizzard, nabbed the top spot. EVE Online's Hilmar Petursson, Sony Online Entertainment's John Smedley and Cryptic's Jack Emmert earned the second, third and fourth spots, respectively.

According to Doug Kale, the magazine's editorial director, 10 of the 20 influential people are new to the annual list. "The newest star is Todd Coleman of KingsIsle Entertainment. Todd helped launch one of the hottest new MMOs in 2008, Wizard101, which now has over 2 million registered users," Kale said.

You can read the announcement, as well as the full list of influential people, after the jump.

Has your client been locking up when passing through stargates recently? Well, as we reported last week, that problem should be fixed in today's patch. The other changes in the patch are as follows:

• The reprocessing window will no longer re-position itself when opened.
• Several server side issues have been fixed that were causing proxy servers to crash.
• Database procedures have been optimized for mission spawning.
• An exception error will no longer be generated when switching between full screen and windowed mode.