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Gizmondo's Spectacular Explosion
Over at Wired, Randall Sullivan writes about the spectacular breakup of Gizmondo. The discussion of the short-lived portable console's reign begins, of course, with the well-known car accident: a perfect metaphor for an imploding company. The article goes on to discuss the sordid past of Bo Stefan Eriksson, and how his role with Gizmondo never stopped his collusion with some of society's more sordid elements. From the article: "It wasn't long before Eriksson imported his wingmen from the Uppsala Mafia. Johan Enander, who had served more than two years for crimes including grand theft and extortion, handled security for Gizmondo functions. Peter Uf, who had spent more than five years in prison for fraud, was named a Gizmondo director. The company opened a glass-fronted corporate headquarters next to Farnborough Airport, and expensive Ferraris and McLarens dotted the parking lot. To add to the glitter, in 2004 Gizmondo purchased a 75 percent interest in a London modeling agency called Isis, ensuring that there would be plenty of beautiful young women at its parties and events."
and in the mag, the illustrations are awesome. However, I did feel that there's so much more information than presented. The story could have easily been a feature, but ended up being just another good Wired story...
I guess it's like the old saying goes: if you can't dazzle 'em with brilliance, bamboozle 'em with bosoms.
Now this sounds like a company to work for. Ferraris, models and a board room full of ex-cons. How did the nerds become so cool?
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driving some ostentatious ride for the tiny-penised, and you secretly wished horrible things upon him? Well now your retribution can be realized--look no further. The wreckedexotics.com site, referenced in the article, is just amazing.
The whole car cash seem to have planed in some way are they trying to cover up some conspiracy?
This is just genius. Can we say organized crime-backed money laundering schemes?
http://www.wreckedexotics.com/special/enzo/
I blame geof's speakers.
All in all, the (re)telling of this story underscores one thing in my mind: You can do almost anything if you have the balls. Errikson may have needed a few attempts (and jail sentences) to get the act down, but eventually he walked and talked like a successful gangster.
Sadly, the mindset to work such blatent lies seems to coincide with a juvenile need to collect shite and "play fancy." This is by far one of the most telling aspects of the story: It was motivated by intense greed.
I've been richer and poorer than now, and I have to say that Satisfaction for me derives from doing, not having. Strinking a balance between luddite and materialist, one has to find a way of extracting value from life without just collecting overly-expensive things.
wow with a GTA killer like Colors you would think gizmondo would do great.
The war with islam is a war on the beast
The war on terror is a war for peace
Don't believe me? Get yours today, FREE!
Just giving a heads up to those that don't want to visit sites that have infected files. As far as having only 3 posts, you gotta start somewhere. So what, I'm new to the site. And at least I am not posting as an "Anonymous Coward". And the other post IS NOT in another thread. I responded to someone ELSE linking the SAME URL. There was another thread just yesterday about the infecting of other video sites in the exact same way. Why would I NOT post about finding one linked in this very same forum? Your unusually heavy use of expletives, the anonymity your hiding behind and the lack of an intelligent response leads me to believe you may have some hidden motive behind your response. What might that be?
If this whole story would be made into a movie, I would go see it. Forget the video game angle, the whole swindling of money and wooing investors is a good enough plotline for me. It could be done in circular time, with a wrecked Ferarri Enzo and an officer to the scene. Then it unfolds.
On a side note, I noticed the names of the launch games, one being "Mommy, Can I mow the Lawn?". That just seemed to ridiculous to be a serious launch title. Sounds like it was made up to tell investors off. I can picture in the office:
"uh, yeah, we have, um, a launch title or 2 for the Gizmondo. It's called uh (looks outside office window), Mommy, can I mow the lawn? Total PSP killer!".
I read the whole 6-page spiel and was more entertained by the whole scam story than the game console itself. The same can be applied for the Phantom console.
So, any other scam artists want to release a game console?
*WARNING* The following link is posted merely as proof of my previous statement. It is an infected file. If you do not have sufficient adware protection, DO NOT VISIT THIS LINK! I am in NO WAY attempting to dupe anyone or facilitate the infection of anyones machines by posting this. I am merely providing PROOF. http://cds.zango.com/download.aspx?Id=bf265f33e036 180a63a5920ee72e45b3406ae13a26575e42dc73a200d593bf 75a7004a5dd3616f3d1f33285651b319bb0ee6be4361b1fd
This link is labeled as "Insane Bike Stunts" updated May 30, 2006. Its is a direct cut and paste from the http://www.wreckedexotics.com/videos/ page.
If you look further, ALL the links on that page are Zango downloads. I have the feeling that the moron that just referred to me as an "asshole" has some hand in it as well. Why would he verbally protect a site that is apparently supplying Zango with an outlet for said files?
Not the fact that the company's whole product was a game console wrapped around a GPS, where the actual game play was a secondary concern to getting kids to carry around a tracking device for their parents?
I mean, "Momma, can I mow the lawn?" What kind of game title is that?
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
I just searched the page for the "zango" links you so abhor. Know what I found? A: Bupkis.
Clean the spyware off your machine and you'll stop seeing Zango links. Then, with any luck, you'll be able to live down this embarassing ordeal. As long as you don't install any more spyware, that is.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
Also check out the hilarious "Where are they now?"
c tion=feature&sub=gizmondo&page=gizmondo_part2
http://www.gamerevolution.com/static/index.php?se
I dunno. I'm seeing those zango links also, and I'm pretty sure my machine isn't infected.
See the "car crash videos" link in the upper-right corner of the article? That takes you to the page with the Zango links.
Interesting. It looks like the videos themselves are zangofied. Which is real easy to defeat by not accepting the DRM. (And people wonder why I hate Windows Media formats.)
Of course, the real issue is that no one is pointing to that page, yet this fellow is hell-bent on his Zango warnings for those pages. So either he's already infested (seems likely to me), or he likes to make mountains out of mole hills. Whatever.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
I dunno; the infected videos are advertised in the article. If I were running an insecure browser and media player, I might have been glad of the warning.
I hear ya about the format, though. Executeable code launched from a movie? Whose brilliant idea was that?
Is there some sort of bizarre conversion problem for the online version of Wired? This article is missing commas, hyphens, semicolons, and other punctuation all over the place; in places, it almost hurts to read. If these aren't technical errors, Wired needs to hire a few more hacks and a few less hackers.
What astounds me is that with the criminal backgrounds and the way things were being run they still actually managed to create a product. The phantom console people had none of that and still have produced nothing but vapor...pretty amazing IMHO.
I cannot see the word "Gizmondo" without being reminded of this awesome commentary on it from a year ago, back when its goofy pricing plan was announced. (The fifth item is a bit eerie in its prescience.)
The Internet is full. Go away.
First off, assuming that EVERYONE posting here happens to be sitting in front of their own linux/mozilla loaded machine at the time they post is pretty naive. My employer wouldn't be too happy with my loading up his machines with my personal choice of software.
Sure, you may not even see stuff like that when your browsing, but others can and probably do. At the time I posted, I was sitting in front of a borrowed machine. And, for circumstances of my own, have been doing so for far too long. Matter of fact, ALL the machines I am using currently happen to be MS loaded, so I was careful about what I was looking at and where I went. I posted my response to the link for the benefit of those not as savvy as you.
Well, thats not true at all. I couldn't really care less, unless of course, I am using a borrowed machine. That brings me to my main reason for responding to your post.
If you had read the main page YESTERDAY, you might have seen a story about Zango implanting video files in social websites, that were, in reality, adware downloads. I simply found it very odd that the first link I had an interest in also happened to be full of the very same thing. My choice of words, however unfortunate, was akin to exclaiming "The cat just dragged a disembowled rat into the house, the moron!". Nothing more. Your entirely too sensitive.
As far as the count of my posts, as I stated, you gotta start somewhere. Having posted only three times previously doesn't mean I was BORN 3 days ago. On the other hand, there is nothing that says someone with 2000 posts cannot be a complete idiot. Are you saying that the VOLUME of ones statements outweigh the content?
I don't profess to be a "techie". And that is exactly the reason I visit this website. To learn something and maybe share my two cents occasionally. Do you have to LIKE my two cents? Nope.
Any comparisons between the fraud schemes behind Gizmondo production and the development cycle of the Phantom console are completely unfair.
After all, the Gizmondo device actually EXISTED.
This is a great story, and I feel a bit of local pride. Uppsala, finally we aren't just known for good stuff like Linneaus, 18th centry scientists and mySQL! :-)
However, the description of Eriksson and the images are pretty glamorising, he looks like a Sin City tough guy. I was told by one of his old classmates that he used to be known as Fat Steve in school, and if you look up the images from the net where he stands next to the car, he still looks pretty chubby and he has a surprisingly open and boyish face.
The old classmate in question also said that he wasn't very smart, at least in the old days... wily, perhaps even clever, but like many criminals totally unable to comprehend consequences of their actions and doing long time planning.
Being bitter is drinking poison and hoping someone else will die
The funniest thing is, Phantom investors must be feeling jealous right now that those guys actually delivered the console they promised instead of just ripping off the invested money.
"This whole thing could have been avoided if Eriksson had just been satisfied driving a Trans-Am."
I know I am!
nothing like >300 hp for a dime and a nickel!
How much is your data worth? Back it up now.