Software publishers competing in the CD-ROM arena are enlisting marketing partners and the big names of show business in their struggle to gain shelf space.

For example, Knowledge Adventure of La Crescenta, Calif., stands to benefit from its relationship with one of the biggest. In conjunction with MCA/Universal, it has created a promotion with Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park. The company's 3-D Dinosaur Adventure will be sold with the video release (street Oct. 4), at a price not yet disclosed.

In a separate deal, the company is partnering with Spielberg to produce educational multimedia titles, according to chief financial officer Frank Greico. He sees the link between Hollywood and Silicon Valley as a natural.

"I think, as the industry moves more toward film-type productions, [software publishers] will be thinking about interactive product while the movies are being filmed," Greico said. "If you could design a product to coincide with the movie release, the potential is great. But you still need a lot of marketing muscle to get above the noise."

Marketing muscle was one of the recurring themes of "The Interactive Multimedia Forum" seminar recently held by Kagan...