That all sounds well and good in theory, but the fact is that these rules and regulations exist.
Now if someone wants to challenge whether or not that's legal is one thing, but the fact is that those rules exist for private and public universities.
Not to mention that if public universities are funded and run by the state, what's my tuition for? Can anyone walk into a classroom of the street and participate and receive credit? Are the dorms open to anyone who wants to walk in off the street? Can the homeless line up for lunch in the cafeterias since everything is funded by the state?
Alright well forgive me, you didn't use the word Germany, just Nazi. Close enough.
If you read all of my post, you'd realize that I said I AGREE with you that it was excessive force after he was handcuffed. The police were DEFINITELY out of line in re-tasering the guy after he was already down, cuffed, and immobile. They should be punished and lose their jobs as they most assuredly took it too far.
HOWEVER, before the guy was cuffed, before he was under control, the police had to do their job. Now it's hard to tell from the video whether the guy was already leaving the library of his own free will or whether he just refused to leave because he didn't have his student ID on him - most of the video you can't actually see the altercation, you just hear yelling and shit.
How do you propose the police should have handled this? The university apparently had clear rules - you want to use the library then you must be a student and be able to prove that you are a student by way of providing your student ID card. What happens when someone breaks those rules? Ask them to leave nicely, and then do nothing if they refuse?? Gang tackle the person and cuff them, but refuse any use of non-lethal force to assist in that submission? What happens if someone with malevolent intentions decides to use the library as their staging ground? If they can't produce ID do we just apologize for inconveniencing them and continue about our day?
Let me reiterate again, once the guy was down and cuffed it should have been over. They should have dragged the guy kicking and screaming if that's what it took. But the police had to take SOME action to subdue the guy, one way or the other. Hindsight is 20/20 but at the time things were unfolding, who knows what this guy was doing or what his intentions were. All the police knew was that he was in the library, couldn't produce the ID necessary to justify his presence there, and he refused to leave. Unfortunately, as I said, we can't see what happened BEFORE the guy was cuffed because it's not on the video, but the police had to do something.
From my experience, universities have the right to restrict access to campus areas so that only students of the actual university can use those resources.
Granted, certain universities may allow complete access to any bum who walks in off the street, but that clearly wasn't the case here. If anyone was allowed to use any university resource without any identification that would be one thing, but it's obvious that this university requires that you be a student to use their resources, hence the requirement that you must have a student ID on you if you're in there.
Not that I agree with the cops on this one - at the most 1 taser should have been used and they should have dragged him out - but your analogy is 100% crap.
This isn't Nazi Germany and it's not like this guy was pulled out of his home or private residence. He was on private property and wasn't able to provide the identification necessary to justify/allow his continued presence there! Most, if not all, college libraries have similar policies to this one: you either need a student ID to even enter the building or you've got to be prepared to produce a student ID that verifies you're paying tuition and deserve access to the school's resources.
Now, once he was handcuffed we agree. I don't see any need to taser someone who's already incapacitated or "relatively controllable" - meaning they could have dragged him out. The video even shows two cops carrying the guy by the arms at one point, which they should have done as soon as he was cuffed. They didn't need to require that he walk himself out; dragging would have been fine.
That said, it sounds like you're just pissed off at government/authority in general with the Nazi comments. You don't have unlimited rights on someone else's private property, and you sure as hell aren't guaranteed unfettered access to that private property. The Nazi comments are just typical of an anti-government, anti-police, once-upon-a-time-hippy sentiment.
God forbid you would ever need those Nazi's help if someone broke into your dorm room or vagrants flooded the campus and harassed the students.
Am I the only one here who recalls being bent over and blowing into the system/cartridge, daring to hope that it might start up this time if I only I blew hard enough?
Well unless they offer a free upgrade to people that already bought the system, then this is likely to just piss people off - it would piss me off!
So I go out and buy a Wii, and then in 2-3 years I've got to drop another $250 (or more) in order to play in HD - which will presumably dominate the television market at that time? It gets even worse if you've got to replace your controllers, cables, and maybe even games (if the ones they make now don't support an HD upgrade).
So now my nice, $250 system is antiquated and I've got to go out and replace it all in order to keep up with my upgraded home entertainment system. Come on now.
I think that it's possible for your strategy to work, but it's going to create such a head-ache for Nintendo that the work/reward ratio probably wouldn't be worth it, especially when they're poised to sell so many regular Wii's anyways.
At the very best, I see them "pulling a Microsoft" and maybe releasing their next-gen system 1 year before MS and Sony do in the next round in order to penetrate that HD-lovin' market.
Personally, I'm getting the regular version because I'd never watch the extra movies and all that jazz; but I have several friends who will most definitely be buying the "most premium" edition available. They enjoy that stuff a lot more, might as well offer it to them.
Exactly - and to tell you the truth, I really don't mind in-game ads that much, as long as they're placed in realistic context.
If I'm racing around in Burnout!, sure, show me some real billboards with some real companies. A Pepsi or Coke billboard makes the game feel a lot more realistic than a Buzz Cola billboard or some other made up name.
Now, do I need Cheerio's ads in a futuristic warfare simulator? Not particularly.
This is what companies do when they're given access to brand new markets or distribution options - they're going to throw a bunch of new ideas/concepts at us and they'll see what we'll buy.
This shouldn't be very shocking to anyone. For the first time, these developers can reach the console audience sans middle-man, which means that they can develop and offer products that distribution costs alone once prohibited. It never would have been worth developing bite-size tutorials that would ship on CDs to retail outlets and then to the consumer - retail markup, distribution costs, and physical materials would have been far too prohibitive. Now they can create material and just upload it.
The problem now is sorting out what gamers are willing to pay for, and at what price. If they don't try a whole bunch of new ideas and offer diverse products, then we'll never see anything REALLY cool come out of this. And of course many ideas will flop - this one looks like a prime candidate - but we've still got to cut these guys some slack as they determine what's realistic to sell online.
I wouldn't be surprised if Sony and Nintendo offered something similar once their platforms launch, which makes me wonder what the point of this all is...
As an earlier poster noted, this is probably aimed more at helping companies produce in-game ads for future titles, rather than really tracking what people play. Although, IMHO, in-game ads for real products add a level of realism to the games, as long as they're realistically place - i.e. something on a television in the background, billboards with real products as you drive through cities, etc...
What I don't need is Mr. Kool-Aid busting through the wall of my safehouse in GTA 4, though. "Oh YEAH!"
So, if a manager has time to spy, but his projects are all being completed on time, then we need to give the manager more work because he's obviously got time to waste.
If an employee has time to surf the net, but his projects are being completed on time, then we should leave him alone and dismiss the idea of any foregone productivity out of that employee?
What's with the double standard here? Sure, there has to be some middle ground. If employee's are getting their work done and have time to surf the net, then that's all well and good - to a point. But keep in mind that most companies invest in technology and better equipment in order to INCREASE productivity - not so the employees can get their work done faster and then screw around with the extra time that they find themselves with.
It's very easy to look at the managers like they're overbearing pricks, but you have to keep in mind that any strong company must strive for growth - constant growth. If a manager is suspicious that his employees are spending too much messing around, then by all means look into it! What good is a manager if you're not going to listen to his advice/concerns? And to top it all off, you not only want to disregard this manager's concerns, but you insist that the fact that he even IS concerned is a sign that HE'S slacking off!
Personal time to play on the net is one thing, but give me a break! If I ran my company according to the above advice, my A/R and ordering department would be completely backed up and we'd end up taking a huge productivity hit. Not to mention that I'd basically be telling my managers, "Hey, don't monitor or worry about what your workers do in the office, or else YOU'RE going to get more work, because it's obvious that your wasting your time if you're concerned with your departments productivity.
Sorry to reply to my own post, but it's also worth mentioning that the above temperatures and vital statistics that meat manufacturers are required to attain are also CONSTANTLY monitored by the USDA and FSIS.
Before ANY processing can occur, the manufacturing process must be validated by the Quality Control department, and then that validation must be approved and the equipment/plant inspected by the USDA or FSIS officers. The validation processes are VERY scientific in nature and are often double and triple checked by outside firms before being published for approval.
Any production process must be validated and it must be scientifically PROVEN that any pathogens present would not only be killed by the process, but that they're re-growth would be impossible.
The pathogens that you need to worry about when you're talking beef and pork will be no more likely to occur no matter where the beef comes from.
The biggest chance that you have for contamination occuring takes place when raw product, already chopped/sliced/ground is delivered to manufacturing plants. From that point on, most meat is treated as though it were already contaminated. What I mean by that is that no matter how "safe" you "know" your raw material is, you must still meet certain USDA and FSIS (Food Safety and Inspection Service) "kill standards" when meat is processed.
Whether you're talking regular, home grown cattle or cloned cattle, all meat must be cooked to AT LEAST 160 degrees Fahrenheit internal temperature in order to kill any possible pathogens. In addition to that, most meat is treated with anti-microbial agents or even "zapped" with irradiation technologies to achieve at least a 6-8 Log reduction in pathogen counts at some point in the processing cycle, depending on which technology you use.
Furthermore, meat products are required by law to achieve a certain Water Activity level before they can be sold on the market. The Water Activity is a measure of the potential water energy available in a product that would sustain microbial growth after processing and packaging. Beef Jerky, for example, MUST attain a Water Activity level of.85 or below, with most Inspectors and regulatory agents demanding Water Activity of.80 or below. At these levels, it is impossible to meat pathogens to grow, and it doesn't matter if the meat is "au natural" or clones.
Safety is not an issue here - what surprises me the most is that there won't be package labeling requirements if you use cloned animals. Labeling requirements are so strict as it is, that I can't believe that new requirements won't pop up and get forced on the industry - which, IMO, would be a good thing.
What they need to be worrying about is the market saturation potential over in Europe. I'm sure plenty of gamers that held off from the 360 and were planning to hold off on the Wii did so because they figured, "Hey, it'll be in November, no problem - I can wait."
Now they hear, "Oops... it's gonna be another half year, sorry" - except that the Sorry wasn't even included! It was more like, "You've waited before, we know you'll wait again, deal with it." They're relying on purchases of the hardcore gamers who've been waiting for a PS3 and alienating them at the same time.
And, while Sony will surely be improving and tweaking the PS3 during those 5 months, don't assume that MS and Nintendo are just going to sit there twiddling their thumbs waiting for Sony to play catch-up. I'm sure that the 360 and the Wii will also get worked on during that time frame by their respective parent companies.
What it comes down to is that MS and Nintendo have now got 5 more months to steal away as many PS3 loyalists as possible, and with the SLEW of bad news that has been coming out about the PS3 and Sony in general, I wouldn't be surprised to see some loyalists start dropping off the bandwagon as they reach their boiling point and decide that they're not waiting any longer for a system that has really failed to distinguish itself to the point that it's worth waiting for.
Also, don't write this off as a fanboi response, which most PS3 lovers will. I have the PS, PS2, Xbox, GC, and 360. I'm planning on getting a Wii and WAS planning on getting a PS3. I probly still will get the PS3, but it has something to prove to me now, whereas 8 months ago I trusted in Sony's past performance.
MS investing a lot of time and research/development into online-ready "mini-apps" does not necessitate a trade off in the quality or time spent developing their desktop OSes.
Look at the Xbox. Microsoft is a big enough of a company that it can afford to branch off into another market and create a whole new division dedicated to new services/products without the other aspects of their business suffering (not any more than usualy, anyway).
Although we may be talking about a change in company culture as well - which most definitely does change a company from the ground up - expandinding into new fields and with new products and service offerings doesn't mean that we should expect an entirely Microsoft that completely departs from it's desktop offerings.
Not to mention that I don't see too many businesses that currently use desktops in their office switching things over to cell phones in the near future.
Well I know for DAMN sure that my employees do not need to be viewing ANY video material, DRM'ed or otherwise, while they're working for me. My office needs require data entry and tracking, and I'm sure that most typical "offices" are the same way - I don't hire office employees to watch movies and surf YouTube on my dime, I'm sorry.
If switching over to Vista will STOP my employees from screwing around on video websites and whatnot, then that's just an additional bonus in my eyes!
I would guess that I'd choose to upgrade 2 to 3 systems with full, decked-out hardware upgrades as far as presentation needs are concerned.
Of course it can be good.
War sims, like America's Army, can obviously be put to good use in training and preparing soldiers for urban settings, teaching them to think critically in a "big picture" sense and visualize the entire battlefield, etc...
The more important question is does violence "teach" gamers anything in a real world sense of the issue, and I'd say the answer is a resounding no.
Not that they're incapable of it, but rather that games today aren't developed to teach us life-long moral lessons. For the stickler that's going to point me towards a lonely moral-laden game, suffice it to say that popular games aren't made with this intention, or, conversely, games with a moral intention don't become popular.
Until there's an audience of a reasonable size that is demanding this sort of moral game that induces self-reflection, it shouldn't surprise anyone that those types of games don't get supplied, at least not in any significant quantity.
Well I think that a difference between the Xbox and the 360 is that this time around Microsoft is getting a lot of 3rd party support for RPGs for their system - they just haven't been released as early as other titles.
Although it's a solitary player on the field, Oblivion was a great RPG, although a bit overwhelming.
Bioshock, from Irrational Games, will be coming next year (I believe) and was so impressive that it won IGN's Overall Game of the Show award for E3 '06. I don't know how much stock you put in IGN's reviews, but it is an impressive looking game nonetheless.
The 360 will also be seeing more Japanese RPGs come over to the system on the American side. Blue Dragon and Lost Odyssey are being released in Japan, with Blue Dragon set to hit this side of the Atlantic next year as well.
A lot of this information can be found at this IGN article actually, with a preview of the upcoming RPGs for the 360: http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/716/716474p1.html
I've got a 360, an XBox, a PS2, and wouldn't be surprised if I own a PS3 down the line, if the games are there, so I don't consider myself too biased one way or the other. I do love RPGs, though, and I can tell you that I'm really excited about some of these upcoming titles for the 360 - much more so than I ever was about an RPG on the Xbox.
Limited or Non-Existant pre-orders may be GOOD... at least for the retailers.
Who doesn't like long lines snaking around their stores? If the Wii is a successful product - which I think it's fairly safe to assume it will be - then it's release will likely mimic the releases of previous "next-gen" systems (I say "next-gen" using the term completely relative to a console's particular time-frame; N64 was, to a degree, "next-gen" for its time).
Especially recently, major console releases have seen incredible demand, so much so that consumers are often lined up outside of the doors at opening time, waiting to get their hands on the new console or game. All of that foot traffic in stores is only going to lead to increased sales of unrelated items within the store as people (a) mull about while they wait for their chance to get their system or (b) try to find something else to entertain themselves with when they realize they won't be getting a Wii.
Not to mention that the retailers avoid any chance of broken promises to their customers, which is obviously an entire issue in and of itself.
Slashdot Mirror
That all sounds well and good in theory, but the fact is that these rules and regulations exist.
Now if someone wants to challenge whether or not that's legal is one thing, but the fact is that those rules exist for private and public universities.
Not to mention that if public universities are funded and run by the state, what's my tuition for? Can anyone walk into a classroom of the street and participate and receive credit? Are the dorms open to anyone who wants to walk in off the street? Can the homeless line up for lunch in the cafeterias since everything is funded by the state?
Alright well forgive me, you didn't use the word Germany, just Nazi. Close enough.
If you read all of my post, you'd realize that I said I AGREE with you that it was excessive force after he was handcuffed. The police were DEFINITELY out of line in re-tasering the guy after he was already down, cuffed, and immobile. They should be punished and lose their jobs as they most assuredly took it too far.
HOWEVER, before the guy was cuffed, before he was under control, the police had to do their job. Now it's hard to tell from the video whether the guy was already leaving the library of his own free will or whether he just refused to leave because he didn't have his student ID on him - most of the video you can't actually see the altercation, you just hear yelling and shit.
How do you propose the police should have handled this? The university apparently had clear rules - you want to use the library then you must be a student and be able to prove that you are a student by way of providing your student ID card. What happens when someone breaks those rules? Ask them to leave nicely, and then do nothing if they refuse?? Gang tackle the person and cuff them, but refuse any use of non-lethal force to assist in that submission? What happens if someone with malevolent intentions decides to use the library as their staging ground? If they can't produce ID do we just apologize for inconveniencing them and continue about our day?
Let me reiterate again, once the guy was down and cuffed it should have been over. They should have dragged the guy kicking and screaming if that's what it took. But the police had to take SOME action to subdue the guy, one way or the other. Hindsight is 20/20 but at the time things were unfolding, who knows what this guy was doing or what his intentions were. All the police knew was that he was in the library, couldn't produce the ID necessary to justify his presence there, and he refused to leave. Unfortunately, as I said, we can't see what happened BEFORE the guy was cuffed because it's not on the video, but the police had to do something.
From my experience, universities have the right to restrict access to campus areas so that only students of the actual university can use those resources.
Granted, certain universities may allow complete access to any bum who walks in off the street, but that clearly wasn't the case here. If anyone was allowed to use any university resource without any identification that would be one thing, but it's obvious that this university requires that you be a student to use their resources, hence the requirement that you must have a student ID on you if you're in there.
Not that I agree with the cops on this one - at the most 1 taser should have been used and they should have dragged him out - but your analogy is 100% crap.
This isn't Nazi Germany and it's not like this guy was pulled out of his home or private residence. He was on private property and wasn't able to provide the identification necessary to justify/allow his continued presence there! Most, if not all, college libraries have similar policies to this one: you either need a student ID to even enter the building or you've got to be prepared to produce a student ID that verifies you're paying tuition and deserve access to the school's resources.
Now, once he was handcuffed we agree. I don't see any need to taser someone who's already incapacitated or "relatively controllable" - meaning they could have dragged him out. The video even shows two cops carrying the guy by the arms at one point, which they should have done as soon as he was cuffed. They didn't need to require that he walk himself out; dragging would have been fine.
That said, it sounds like you're just pissed off at government/authority in general with the Nazi comments. You don't have unlimited rights on someone else's private property, and you sure as hell aren't guaranteed unfettered access to that private property. The Nazi comments are just typical of an anti-government, anti-police, once-upon-a-time-hippy sentiment.
God forbid you would ever need those Nazi's help if someone broke into your dorm room or vagrants flooded the campus and harassed the students.
Your NES still works?!
Am I the only one here who recalls being bent over and blowing into the system/cartridge, daring to hope that it might start up this time if I only I blew hard enough?
Well unless they offer a free upgrade to people that already bought the system, then this is likely to just piss people off - it would piss me off!
So I go out and buy a Wii, and then in 2-3 years I've got to drop another $250 (or more) in order to play in HD - which will presumably dominate the television market at that time? It gets even worse if you've got to replace your controllers, cables, and maybe even games (if the ones they make now don't support an HD upgrade).
So now my nice, $250 system is antiquated and I've got to go out and replace it all in order to keep up with my upgraded home entertainment system. Come on now.
I think that it's possible for your strategy to work, but it's going to create such a head-ache for Nintendo that the work/reward ratio probably wouldn't be worth it, especially when they're poised to sell so many regular Wii's anyways.
At the very best, I see them "pulling a Microsoft" and maybe releasing their next-gen system 1 year before MS and Sony do in the next round in order to penetrate that HD-lovin' market.
People like choices - at least many of us do.
Personally, I'm getting the regular version because I'd never watch the extra movies and all that jazz; but I have several friends who will most definitely be buying the "most premium" edition available. They enjoy that stuff a lot more, might as well offer it to them.
Options are good, IMO... at least to a degree.
Exactly - and to tell you the truth, I really don't mind in-game ads that much, as long as they're placed in realistic context.
If I'm racing around in Burnout!, sure, show me some real billboards with some real companies. A Pepsi or Coke billboard makes the game feel a lot more realistic than a Buzz Cola billboard or some other made up name.
Now, do I need Cheerio's ads in a futuristic warfare simulator? Not particularly.
This is what companies do when they're given access to brand new markets or distribution options - they're going to throw a bunch of new ideas/concepts at us and they'll see what we'll buy.
This shouldn't be very shocking to anyone. For the first time, these developers can reach the console audience sans middle-man, which means that they can develop and offer products that distribution costs alone once prohibited. It never would have been worth developing bite-size tutorials that would ship on CDs to retail outlets and then to the consumer - retail markup, distribution costs, and physical materials would have been far too prohibitive. Now they can create material and just upload it.
The problem now is sorting out what gamers are willing to pay for, and at what price. If they don't try a whole bunch of new ideas and offer diverse products, then we'll never see anything REALLY cool come out of this. And of course many ideas will flop - this one looks like a prime candidate - but we've still got to cut these guys some slack as they determine what's realistic to sell online.
MajorNelson.com already does something like this, although it's just for 360 games that are played while connected to Live!
x -Live-Activity-for-week-of-10-9.aspx
http://www.majornelson.com/archive/2006/10/14/Xbo
I wouldn't be surprised if Sony and Nintendo offered something similar once their platforms launch, which makes me wonder what the point of this all is...
As an earlier poster noted, this is probably aimed more at helping companies produce in-game ads for future titles, rather than really tracking what people play. Although, IMHO, in-game ads for real products add a level of realism to the games, as long as they're realistically place - i.e. something on a television in the background, billboards with real products as you drive through cities, etc...
What I don't need is Mr. Kool-Aid busting through the wall of my safehouse in GTA 4, though. "Oh YEAH!"
So, if a manager has time to spy, but his projects are all being completed on time, then we need to give the manager more work because he's obviously got time to waste.
If an employee has time to surf the net, but his projects are being completed on time, then we should leave him alone and dismiss the idea of any foregone productivity out of that employee?
What's with the double standard here? Sure, there has to be some middle ground. If employee's are getting their work done and have time to surf the net, then that's all well and good - to a point. But keep in mind that most companies invest in technology and better equipment in order to INCREASE productivity - not so the employees can get their work done faster and then screw around with the extra time that they find themselves with.
It's very easy to look at the managers like they're overbearing pricks, but you have to keep in mind that any strong company must strive for growth - constant growth. If a manager is suspicious that his employees are spending too much messing around, then by all means look into it! What good is a manager if you're not going to listen to his advice/concerns? And to top it all off, you not only want to disregard this manager's concerns, but you insist that the fact that he even IS concerned is a sign that HE'S slacking off!
Personal time to play on the net is one thing, but give me a break! If I ran my company according to the above advice, my A/R and ordering department would be completely backed up and we'd end up taking a huge productivity hit. Not to mention that I'd basically be telling my managers, "Hey, don't monitor or worry about what your workers do in the office, or else YOU'RE going to get more work, because it's obvious that your wasting your time if you're concerned with your departments productivity.
Come on, now...
Sorry to reply to my own post, but it's also worth mentioning that the above temperatures and vital statistics that meat manufacturers are required to attain are also CONSTANTLY monitored by the USDA and FSIS.
e ntations/wsc_2005_006_0000_Buege.pdf
Before ANY processing can occur, the manufacturing process must be validated by the Quality Control department, and then that validation must be approved and the equipment/plant inspected by the USDA or FSIS officers. The validation processes are VERY scientific in nature and are often double and triple checked by outside firms before being published for approval.
Here's an example I quickly pulled from the internet. Although it isn't an actual validation paper - most of those are kept under strict confidence - it will give you an idea of what is required and the process of validation. Warning, it's a PDF!
http://www.meatscience.org/meetings/WSC/2005/Pres
Any production process must be validated and it must be scientifically PROVEN that any pathogens present would not only be killed by the process, but that they're re-growth would be impossible.
The pathogens that you need to worry about when you're talking beef and pork will be no more likely to occur no matter where the beef comes from.
.85 or below, with most Inspectors and regulatory agents demanding Water Activity of .80 or below. At these levels, it is impossible to meat pathogens to grow, and it doesn't matter if the meat is "au natural" or clones.
The biggest chance that you have for contamination occuring takes place when raw product, already chopped/sliced/ground is delivered to manufacturing plants. From that point on, most meat is treated as though it were already contaminated. What I mean by that is that no matter how "safe" you "know" your raw material is, you must still meet certain USDA and FSIS (Food Safety and Inspection Service) "kill standards" when meat is processed.
Whether you're talking regular, home grown cattle or cloned cattle, all meat must be cooked to AT LEAST 160 degrees Fahrenheit internal temperature in order to kill any possible pathogens. In addition to that, most meat is treated with anti-microbial agents or even "zapped" with irradiation technologies to achieve at least a 6-8 Log reduction in pathogen counts at some point in the processing cycle, depending on which technology you use.
Furthermore, meat products are required by law to achieve a certain Water Activity level before they can be sold on the market. The Water Activity is a measure of the potential water energy available in a product that would sustain microbial growth after processing and packaging. Beef Jerky, for example, MUST attain a Water Activity level of
Safety is not an issue here - what surprises me the most is that there won't be package labeling requirements if you use cloned animals. Labeling requirements are so strict as it is, that I can't believe that new requirements won't pop up and get forced on the industry - which, IMO, would be a good thing.
It IS a big deal - at least it should be to Sony.
/2 cents
What they need to be worrying about is the market saturation potential over in Europe. I'm sure plenty of gamers that held off from the 360 and were planning to hold off on the Wii did so because they figured, "Hey, it'll be in November, no problem - I can wait."
Now they hear, "Oops... it's gonna be another half year, sorry" - except that the Sorry wasn't even included! It was more like, "You've waited before, we know you'll wait again, deal with it." They're relying on purchases of the hardcore gamers who've been waiting for a PS3 and alienating them at the same time.
And, while Sony will surely be improving and tweaking the PS3 during those 5 months, don't assume that MS and Nintendo are just going to sit there twiddling their thumbs waiting for Sony to play catch-up. I'm sure that the 360 and the Wii will also get worked on during that time frame by their respective parent companies.
What it comes down to is that MS and Nintendo have now got 5 more months to steal away as many PS3 loyalists as possible, and with the SLEW of bad news that has been coming out about the PS3 and Sony in general, I wouldn't be surprised to see some loyalists start dropping off the bandwagon as they reach their boiling point and decide that they're not waiting any longer for a system that has really failed to distinguish itself to the point that it's worth waiting for.
Also, don't write this off as a fanboi response, which most PS3 lovers will. I have the PS, PS2, Xbox, GC, and 360. I'm planning on getting a Wii and WAS planning on getting a PS3. I probly still will get the PS3, but it has something to prove to me now, whereas 8 months ago I trusted in Sony's past performance.
https://secure.partyaccount.com/faq/us_legislation .htm
Touche.
I've been there before - like each time I buy new sunglasses, the old ones turn up under the sofa...
You've heard of online shopping right?
I mean come on - you waited a few months for those games and never thought... Amazon?
MS investing a lot of time and research/development into online-ready "mini-apps" does not necessitate a trade off in the quality or time spent developing their desktop OSes.
Look at the Xbox. Microsoft is a big enough of a company that it can afford to branch off into another market and create a whole new division dedicated to new services/products without the other aspects of their business suffering (not any more than usualy, anyway).
Although we may be talking about a change in company culture as well - which most definitely does change a company from the ground up - expandinding into new fields and with new products and service offerings doesn't mean that we should expect an entirely Microsoft that completely departs from it's desktop offerings.
Not to mention that I don't see too many businesses that currently use desktops in their office switching things over to cell phones in the near future.
Well I know for DAMN sure that my employees do not need to be viewing ANY video material, DRM'ed or otherwise, while they're working for me. My office needs require data entry and tracking, and I'm sure that most typical "offices" are the same way - I don't hire office employees to watch movies and surf YouTube on my dime, I'm sorry. If switching over to Vista will STOP my employees from screwing around on video websites and whatnot, then that's just an additional bonus in my eyes! I would guess that I'd choose to upgrade 2 to 3 systems with full, decked-out hardware upgrades as far as presentation needs are concerned.
Of course it can be good.
War sims, like America's Army, can obviously be put to good use in training and preparing soldiers for urban settings, teaching them to think critically in a "big picture" sense and visualize the entire battlefield, etc...
The more important question is does violence "teach" gamers anything in a real world sense of the issue, and I'd say the answer is a resounding no.
Not that they're incapable of it, but rather that games today aren't developed to teach us life-long moral lessons. For the stickler that's going to point me towards a lonely moral-laden game, suffice it to say that popular games aren't made with this intention, or, conversely, games with a moral intention don't become popular.
Until there's an audience of a reasonable size that is demanding this sort of moral game that induces self-reflection, it shouldn't surprise anyone that those types of games don't get supplied, at least not in any significant quantity.
Well I think that a difference between the Xbox and the 360 is that this time around Microsoft is getting a lot of 3rd party support for RPGs for their system - they just haven't been released as early as other titles. Although it's a solitary player on the field, Oblivion was a great RPG, although a bit overwhelming. Bioshock, from Irrational Games, will be coming next year (I believe) and was so impressive that it won IGN's Overall Game of the Show award for E3 '06. I don't know how much stock you put in IGN's reviews, but it is an impressive looking game nonetheless. The 360 will also be seeing more Japanese RPGs come over to the system on the American side. Blue Dragon and Lost Odyssey are being released in Japan, with Blue Dragon set to hit this side of the Atlantic next year as well. A lot of this information can be found at this IGN article actually, with a preview of the upcoming RPGs for the 360: http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/716/716474p1.html I've got a 360, an XBox, a PS2, and wouldn't be surprised if I own a PS3 down the line, if the games are there, so I don't consider myself too biased one way or the other. I do love RPGs, though, and I can tell you that I'm really excited about some of these upcoming titles for the 360 - much more so than I ever was about an RPG on the Xbox.
Limited or Non-Existant pre-orders may be GOOD... at least for the retailers. Who doesn't like long lines snaking around their stores? If the Wii is a successful product - which I think it's fairly safe to assume it will be - then it's release will likely mimic the releases of previous "next-gen" systems (I say "next-gen" using the term completely relative to a console's particular time-frame; N64 was, to a degree, "next-gen" for its time). Especially recently, major console releases have seen incredible demand, so much so that consumers are often lined up outside of the doors at opening time, waiting to get their hands on the new console or game. All of that foot traffic in stores is only going to lead to increased sales of unrelated items within the store as people (a) mull about while they wait for their chance to get their system or (b) try to find something else to entertain themselves with when they realize they won't be getting a Wii. Not to mention that the retailers avoid any chance of broken promises to their customers, which is obviously an entire issue in and of itself.