Something tells me that the kind of people who would resort to dating robots exclusively would not be the kind of people who would ever have a change to mate to begin with.
Not to mention that the Sun and Milky Way are moving as well. If you time travel for even one nanosecond, you'll probably be in some other remote part of the universe.
My guess is the same reason people still use crappy software; they aren't aware of alternatives. Still, the optimist in me hopes that the reason for declining sales is because mainstream taste hasn't been shot so much that people will actually want to buy the latest garbage the RIAA spoon-feeds them, even if they listen to it out of a perceived lack of choice or just to be popular (which is why I'm guessing dorm students blast their stereos so loud that you can hear them from the other side of the hall).
Suggesting that "piracy" is the primary contributor to slipping RIAA profits is a bit naive. Tune in to your local Top 40 station and you'll see that most music today isn't even worth listening to, much less buying.
The only way to find out how much media those who were studied decided to buy legally is to ask, which is of course is like asking someone if he or she smokes pot. The illicit nature of the act will cause anyone you survey to immediately deny doing such a thing in the first place and many may even appear to take a very pro-enforcement side just to shake off any suspicion.
I think the need for cheaper legal services is more critical. The sheer amount of "Injured in an accident?" and other similar ads seem to have awareness covered, at least in a general sense.
So? It will still be supported by Microsoft (and consequently developers) until April 2009, and nothing prevents you from buying from resellers. Hell, the next Windows I plan on purchasing, assuming I ever need to, is Windows 2000 Professional.
I remember that much of my high school populace didn't upgrade from portable CD players to MP3 players until early 2006. Shows just how poor they really were. I remember my school banning them along with cell phones because OMG YOU CAN RECORD TEST ANSWERS AND BURN THEM TO A CD!!!1
One is that Windows having 85% of the OS market means it has 85% of the gaming market. This is false; consoles are much more than 15%. It's pretty obvious that consoles have a larger share of the overall gaming market than PCs. However not every PC game can be successfully ported or developed on the console with the same kind of success (FPSs, RPGs, etc) that can be found in the PC market. Likewise, many games are unfit for the PC. I think that lumping consoles and PCs as being in the same market is unfair for that reason.
The second assumption is that if you target the 85%, you have the best chance of maximizing your audience. This may also be false. For example, if you release a FPS game on the PC, you will be up against literally dozens of competitors. If you release a FPS game on the Mac, you will be up against 1 or 2 competitors. If you can get 70% of the smaller Mac market, that might get your game to a bigger audience than getting 5% of the larger PC market. Well, market share is a big reason, but it isn't the only reason. Personal preference of the market for a particular OS also has to be taken into account. You have to ask yourself if the audience that buys Macs instead of Windows machines is the kind of audience that will even play your game. If it turns out that your Mac-exclusive game isn't very popular with the typical Mac user, but would do well under Windows or some other OS, then clearly you are targeting the wrong platform.
Cease selling != cease supporting. I remember games supporting Windows 98SE long after it ceased being sold because the market share was still so much larger during Windows XP's early years. I can envision a similar scenario with Windows Vista and Windows XP, especially since it seems that we've "peaked" in terms of general-use hardware performance this time around.
Actually widest audience = as many platforms as possible. Well, yes, but porting adds to the costs of development. Considering that any market has a significantly larger amount of failures than successes, I would imagine it's far more important that a game is guaranteed initial success on a single popular platform before investing in ports for other systems. Even if the development team behind the game can afford to port it, the overall gain may be negligible compared to the costs in the eyes of the company. And of course you also have companies that just don't care about porting no matter how much potential may be there.
I don't follow the progress of the gaming industry, but I'm guessing that most developers will be either releasing DirectX 9/Windows XP ports of their games for quite some time or eventually abandoning the PC market and focusing exclusively on consoles to combat this problem. If Microsoft isn't willing to step up to the plate and fix these issues with Vista than the market will move on to something else.
As for Halo 2, I believe that a hack was released that allows for it to run in Windows XP.
What "death" of XP are you referring to? XP is still the preferred OS for gaming and will probably remain in that position for at least another year or two.
Making a game is expensive, so logically you want to release it to the biggest audience you can so that you can reap the most profit (or at the very least make enough to hit the break-even point). Windows, with 85% of the OS market, has the most promise of giving you the highest audience in PC gaming.
Sorry about the delayed reply. Spring Break and whatnot.
Well it could be growisofs, but I'd try the discs with the same burner and different software first. I remember having buffer issues with ImgBurn and they were fixed with an upgrade, so yes it is certainly possible that growisofs is to blame. However I have never had any problems with growisofs (other than cdrtools/cdrkit's lack of verification tools) so the issue could be with Ubuntu itself. Do CDs burn fine in Ubuntu or is it just DVDs?
I also noticed that you said you got coasters when you burned at 8x. Try a lower speed like 2.4x. It might just be that the software isn't very good at working with your burner at high speeds.
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So suddenly the BitTorrent protocol is illegal now?
Something tells me that the kind of people who would resort to dating robots exclusively would not be the kind of people who would ever have a change to mate to begin with.
Except then you wouldn't be allowed to retire. Imagine having to work forever.
Not to mention that the Sun and Milky Way are moving as well. If you time travel for even one nanosecond, you'll probably be in some other remote part of the universe.
My guess is the same reason people still use crappy software; they aren't aware of alternatives. Still, the optimist in me hopes that the reason for declining sales is because mainstream taste hasn't been shot so much that people will actually want to buy the latest garbage the RIAA spoon-feeds them, even if they listen to it out of a perceived lack of choice or just to be popular (which is why I'm guessing dorm students blast their stereos so loud that you can hear them from the other side of the hall).
Suggesting that "piracy" is the primary contributor to slipping RIAA profits is a bit naive. Tune in to your local Top 40 station and you'll see that most music today isn't even worth listening to, much less buying.
The only way to find out how much media those who were studied decided to buy legally is to ask, which is of course is like asking someone if he or she smokes pot. The illicit nature of the act will cause anyone you survey to immediately deny doing such a thing in the first place and many may even appear to take a very pro-enforcement side just to shake off any suspicion.
Wikipedia is a free encyclopedia. Just edit the article yourself using a proxy server.
I think the need for cheaper legal services is more critical. The sheer amount of "Injured in an accident?" and other similar ads seem to have awareness covered, at least in a general sense.
So? It will still be supported by Microsoft (and consequently developers) until April 2009, and nothing prevents you from buying from resellers. Hell, the next Windows I plan on purchasing, assuming I ever need to, is Windows 2000 Professional.
I remember that much of my high school populace didn't upgrade from portable CD players to MP3 players until early 2006. Shows just how poor they really were. I remember my school banning them along with cell phones because OMG YOU CAN RECORD TEST ANSWERS AND BURN THEM TO A CD!!!1
"Independent" is a relative term. It can mean unsigned artists, artists signed with non-RIAA labels, or artists not signed by a major label.
Oh, shit. There goes the planet.
duh,
duh,
duh,
DUH DUH
(duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh)
Cease selling != cease supporting. I remember games supporting Windows 98SE long after it ceased being sold because the market share was still so much larger during Windows XP's early years. I can envision a similar scenario with Windows Vista and Windows XP, especially since it seems that we've "peaked" in terms of general-use hardware performance this time around.
I don't follow the progress of the gaming industry, but I'm guessing that most developers will be either releasing DirectX 9/Windows XP ports of their games for quite some time or eventually abandoning the PC market and focusing exclusively on consoles to combat this problem. If Microsoft isn't willing to step up to the plate and fix these issues with Vista than the market will move on to something else.
As for Halo 2, I believe that a hack was released that allows for it to run in Windows XP.
I believe the question is why there aren't more native ports rather than why there aren't more gamers that use WINE/CrossOver/Cedega.
Well, nothing stops them from using OpenGL instead. Last time I checked, OpenGL does run in Windows, even if it requires third-party drivers to do so.
Of course, I'm not a graphics developer, so there is probably more to this than simple vendor lock-in.
What "death" of XP are you referring to? XP is still the preferred OS for gaming and will probably remain in that position for at least another year or two.
Making a game is expensive, so logically you want to release it to the biggest audience you can so that you can reap the most profit (or at the very least make enough to hit the break-even point). Windows, with 85% of the OS market, has the most promise of giving you the highest audience in PC gaming.
Sorry about the delayed reply. Spring Break and whatnot.
Well it could be growisofs, but I'd try the discs with the same burner and different software first. I remember having buffer issues with ImgBurn and they were fixed with an upgrade, so yes it is certainly possible that growisofs is to blame. However I have never had any problems with growisofs (other than cdrtools/cdrkit's lack of verification tools) so the issue could be with Ubuntu itself. Do CDs burn fine in Ubuntu or is it just DVDs?
I also noticed that you said you got coasters when you burned at 8x. Try a lower speed like 2.4x. It might just be that the software isn't very good at working with your burner at high speeds.