Talking about that annoying message, is there a Firefox Addon for Firefox 4 that automatically closes that upgrade box? That spammy upgrade dialog box has been the reason for me to stop using Firefox unless I am in need of using one of those plugins.
Because they want to force the online economy into your single player game.
What you earn in single player can be sold online, and you can buy online to make your single player easier.
I think that last part is the key. They would had been able to make single player entirely unable to contribute to the online economy, but they want to make sure you cant opt out of the online economy, they want to make sure y ou are always tempted to spend your money online.
I don't care, they can keep their game. There are plenty other games out there I still have to beat and this one wont be in the list.
Brand loyalty tends to be driven by satisfaction. It can work as momentum to get over a batch of bad products, but even that starts dying down if the window of bad quality lasts too long (look at RIM.)
Saying "I want the next version of this product" is very very far from "i will buy the product, here is the money, i will sign my soul that i wont backpedal even if you just bring me an inferior product than i already have"
So yea, pre-purchases of unannounced products is rather stupid, but thats not what we are talking about here.:)
Or they simply love the product they own, find it reliable, high quality and are expecting the next generation to be the same but faster and plain better.
Any brain dead monkey would know an iPhone 5 (or 4Gs) will have at minimum the same processing power increase the iPad 2 had over the iPad 1, and that was no trivial bump.
Attempting to leave all "evil" talk behind, this seems to reinforce (for me) Googles obsession with having every bit of your personal information and making sure it's pure. Another example is how they forced Android manufacturers to drop third party location service apps because they posed a threat to their ability to collect your location data.
Now they are threatening the world that has come to depend on Google apps and email for their daily digital life that they must be willing to surrender full personal identification or face loosing access to said tools.
For years I have depended on Gmail despite my opinion on Google. After all "what's the worse that can happen with them collectin some data from my email"? Their spamm filter and free IMAP access felt well worth that. Now it seems that having my business email is one of those things. I don't feel comfortable with Google so easily cutting my email off so I am very likely to switch to a paid service ASAP.
The way we treat disease is by ignoring cures, developing expensive treatments, and enslaving the patients to life-long pill taking to keep the disease in check while they are milked of their hard earned money.... Even anti-virus software makers are that evil...
If EA loses, most iOS and Android developers lose. As far as EA cares, a loss will be a minor annoyance. So don't think this would be anywhere near a "win-win."
I would say : Wouldn't the fact that everyone is infringing on the patent without ever being aware or having heard of such a patent existing have something to say about "being obvious to someone skilled in the field.."?
The "without ever being aware" is key in how patents work. You dont have to know about them to infringe them. The key, though is, a patent you can infringe accidentally by just typing a URL into a control, should really be considered trivial and invalidated.
Fun thing is, anyone with a brain that examines the case will likely at least dismiss the ad linking cases as not infringing, you have to apply that patent extremely loosely to dare claim such an action actually steps inside the patent. The problem is surviving the court battle without going bankrupt.
My guess on the current state of this case is that they are very well aware they will loose the case if Apple is allowed to step into the case, so what they are now doing is going after anyone they can to get settlements as soon as possible since a settlement is a legal contract that is not broken by loosing a case against another party. So in theory, if you agree to pay these guys their fees, and sign any paperwork agreeing to do so, and they loose their patent in the lawsuit, it wont be trivial matter to stop paying them.
Many retailers, specially large ones, have the power to return unsold units. Many large chains will even receive stock they never asked for and be forced to return it or try to sell it. Since the return may be a bit of a pain they may give the product a bit of floor space and see if it moves at all before sending it back.
So "shipped" is only accurate enough if the product is in such high demand that you can't manufacture them fast enough, as is the case with Apple and the iPad.
"Shipped" means to stores. Note: this number does not discount stores getting unwanted inventory and returning it. They shipped your Best Buy 100 units and the manager returned them because they were not moving? No matter, those 100 count as "shipped."
I think they still call the old bulky laptops with stylus sensitive screens that turn around and weight 20 pounds and spinning hard drives to be "Tablets." After all, they are called TabletPCs.
For a long time i been thinking we should never have called these touch screen flat devices "tablets". We need a new term to distinguish them from the horrid thing that is a TabletPC. Slate? Pads? Touch Computing? I dont know, something other than Tablet.
Shipments are done based off expectations, not demand. Restocking is based on demand, but even then you may have large chains receive stock they did not request. Large supply chains have deals in place where should the hardware not sell, they will just return it, so other than space and time, they don't loose much money by accepting to carry products that don't sell.
If non-iOS tablets were selling so well, manufacturers would be more willing to just state how many they have actually sold and stop avoiding the question every time it comes up.
How about games like World of Goo, released DRM free and facing 90% piracy rates? Bootleggers (I dislike the piracy term, pirates kill people) copy things just because they don't want to pay for them and they know they can copy them without going to jail, worst thing they will get is a notice from their ISP to stop it.
There is no other excuse for bootlegging. If you disagree with some company's moral decisions, be it price point, content type or DRM, how about these people also grow some balls and stick to moral grounds themselves and entirely disregard said product instead of bootlegging it?
I used to get a lot of garbage and spam (not necesarely commercial spam, but spam is spam!) in my.edu email back in the day. As soon as people realized they were able to forward huge emails with huge TO lists, my email address ended in the hand of what I would think to be every single email user in america at the time.
Constant stupid jokes and chain letters with "forward or be cursed" signatures as far as the early 90s, that I can remember.
My fist email was school provided, one of the long institution.something.lol.gov.edu ones.
When Hotmail launched I got an account there, but i was already facing big spam. I think it started in the form of chain letters with huge TO lists virally spreading your email address to hundreds of unknown people that were very likely to send more chain letters. Mind you, I don't think I ever been victim of extremely high levels of corporate spam of any type (reputable companies nor enlargement pill variety.)
But clean inboxes where even half my emails were interesting to read have always sound like a fairytale to me.
As far as I have used email (early 90s) spam has been an issue. I think I get less junk now than I used to get in 1995, thanks to advancements in server side junk mail filters.
Funny thing you mention MMOs, since you cant buy them used unless you are doing specifically to buy a character that is level capped and potentially the best gear possible.
If people want them back, they can address their governments as to why they're not available and perhaps have a referendum on the matter. Just a though, and I'm not sure whether or not it's a particularly good one.
So, the proper course of action is for citizens to go to their government and tell them "please, take away our consumer rights so we can give money to this foreign company"?
This is not a stupid case of link searching, or a censorship issue. This is something the Taiwanese government has dictated to be a basic consumer right. Heck, I'd love if such a thing was made law here too.
You have to do more than just claim that something is evil. You have to make an actual point about why this is evil.
Put yourself in their shoes. You're a business, and want to operate in some jurisdiction. They have rules you don't like. You can either a) abide by the rules, b) choose not to operate there, or c) campaign to have the rules changed. All of these area reasonable options, none of them are evil, and Google chose B.
Stop being so alarmist.
There may be a point here. If I was a Taiwanese Android App Developer I would really be annoyed at Google right now. If my income was cut because Google did not agree with a 7 day refund law, I would really think Google to be evil.
Here is a good question: Did Google ask the developers who's income are in the line if they would rather have their personal apps opt-into compliance and give a 7-day refund window? Are they planning to do this?
This is not even close to the Chinese censorship issues. In this case the Taiwanese government wants to actually protect consumers rights to return products if they are not satisfied with them. Google's answer is, then we will just not set an embargo? You can have our free ad supported apps, but not our commercial products until you learn to give up your money for good, even if the software ended up being buggy and unsatisfactory?
There are various issues there, for one that these "puppy mills" are legal, they do the bare minimum to stay within the law. Anyone with common sense will know what they do is cruel, but they still stick within legal parameters. They are not illegal operations that would ignore the law.
The other is that there are plenty of families with un-spaded pets that give birth to pups and will give them in for adoption. Most cities have an unofficial spot where families gather to find adoptive homes for their pets, and chains like PetSmart host weekly or monthly events where you can get sheltered pets.
There are plenty of ways to get a pet dog without buying one.
Comparing this to the war on drugs is hyperbolic, since pets are not being outlawed, just a specific distribution channel and source is.
Slashdot Mirror
Talking about that annoying message, is there a Firefox Addon for Firefox 4 that automatically closes that upgrade box? That spammy upgrade dialog box has been the reason for me to stop using Firefox unless I am in need of using one of those plugins.
Because they want to force the online economy into your single player game.
What you earn in single player can be sold online, and you can buy online to make your single player easier.
I think that last part is the key. They would had been able to make single player entirely unable to contribute to the online economy, but they want to make sure you cant opt out of the online economy, they want to make sure y ou are always tempted to spend your money online.
I don't care, they can keep their game. There are plenty other games out there I still have to beat and this one wont be in the list.
Exactly. same way Google does not allow carriers to include third party location services (this was covered quite a bit over various news sites)
Also makes me ponder, does any android phone ships with a different browser or default email client?
Brand loyalty tends to be driven by satisfaction. It can work as momentum to get over a batch of bad products, but even that starts dying down if the window of bad quality lasts too long (look at RIM.)
Saying "I want the next version of this product" is very very far from "i will buy the product, here is the money, i will sign my soul that i wont backpedal even if you just bring me an inferior product than i already have"
So yea, pre-purchases of unannounced products is rather stupid, but thats not what we are talking about here. :)
Or they simply love the product they own, find it reliable, high quality and are expecting the next generation to be the same but faster and plain better.
Any brain dead monkey would know an iPhone 5 (or 4Gs) will have at minimum the same processing power increase the iPad 2 had over the iPad 1, and that was no trivial bump.
Great post.
Attempting to leave all "evil" talk behind, this seems to reinforce (for me) Googles obsession with having every bit of your personal information and making sure it's pure. Another example is how they forced Android manufacturers to drop third party location service apps because they posed a threat to their ability to collect your location data.
Now they are threatening the world that has come to depend on Google apps and email for their daily digital life that they must be willing to surrender full personal identification or face loosing access to said tools.
For years I have depended on Gmail despite my opinion on Google. After all "what's the worse that can happen with them collectin some data from my email"? Their spamm filter and free IMAP access felt well worth that. Now it seems that having my business email is one of those things. I don't feel comfortable with Google so easily cutting my email off so I am very likely to switch to a paid service ASAP.
The way we treat disease is by ignoring cures, developing expensive treatments, and enslaving the patients to life-long pill taking to keep the disease in check while they are milked of their hard earned money.... Even anti-virus software makers are that evil...
If EA loses, most iOS and Android developers lose. As far as EA cares, a loss will be a minor annoyance. So don't think this would be anywhere near a "win-win."
I would say : Wouldn't the fact that everyone is infringing on the patent without ever being aware or having heard of such a patent existing have something to say about "being obvious to someone skilled in the field.."?
The "without ever being aware" is key in how patents work. You dont have to know about them to infringe them. The key, though is, a patent you can infringe accidentally by just typing a URL into a control, should really be considered trivial and invalidated.
Fun thing is, anyone with a brain that examines the case will likely at least dismiss the ad linking cases as not infringing, you have to apply that patent extremely loosely to dare claim such an action actually steps inside the patent. The problem is surviving the court battle without going bankrupt.
My guess on the current state of this case is that they are very well aware they will loose the case if Apple is allowed to step into the case, so what they are now doing is going after anyone they can to get settlements as soon as possible since a settlement is a legal contract that is not broken by loosing a case against another party. So in theory, if you agree to pay these guys their fees, and sign any paperwork agreeing to do so, and they loose their patent in the lawsuit, it wont be trivial matter to stop paying them.
Many retailers, specially large ones, have the power to return unsold units. Many large chains will even receive stock they never asked for and be forced to return it or try to sell it. Since the return may be a bit of a pain they may give the product a bit of floor space and see if it moves at all before sending it back.
So "shipped" is only accurate enough if the product is in such high demand that you can't manufacture them fast enough, as is the case with Apple and the iPad.
"Shipped" means to stores. Note: this number does not discount stores getting unwanted inventory and returning it. They shipped your Best Buy 100 units and the manager returned them because they were not moving? No matter, those 100 count as "shipped."
I think they still call the old bulky laptops with stylus sensitive screens that turn around and weight 20 pounds and spinning hard drives to be "Tablets." After all, they are called TabletPCs.
For a long time i been thinking we should never have called these touch screen flat devices "tablets". We need a new term to distinguish them from the horrid thing that is a TabletPC. Slate? Pads? Touch Computing? I dont know, something other than Tablet.
Shipments are done based off expectations, not demand. Restocking is based on demand, but even then you may have large chains receive stock they did not request. Large supply chains have deals in place where should the hardware not sell, they will just return it, so other than space and time, they don't loose much money by accepting to carry products that don't sell.
If non-iOS tablets were selling so well, manufacturers would be more willing to just state how many they have actually sold and stop avoiding the question every time it comes up.
Bull$#!%!
How about games like World of Goo, released DRM free and facing 90% piracy rates? Bootleggers (I dislike the piracy term, pirates kill people) copy things just because they don't want to pay for them and they know they can copy them without going to jail, worst thing they will get is a notice from their ISP to stop it.
There is no other excuse for bootlegging. If you disagree with some company's moral decisions, be it price point, content type or DRM, how about these people also grow some balls and stick to moral grounds themselves and entirely disregard said product instead of bootlegging it?
I used to get a lot of garbage and spam (not necesarely commercial spam, but spam is spam!) in my .edu email back in the day. As soon as people realized they were able to forward huge emails with huge TO lists, my email address ended in the hand of what I would think to be every single email user in america at the time.
Constant stupid jokes and chain letters with "forward or be cursed" signatures as far as the early 90s, that I can remember.
My fist email was school provided, one of the long institution.something.lol.gov.edu ones.
When Hotmail launched I got an account there, but i was already facing big spam. I think it started in the form of chain letters with huge TO lists virally spreading your email address to hundreds of unknown people that were very likely to send more chain letters. Mind you, I don't think I ever been victim of extremely high levels of corporate spam of any type (reputable companies nor enlargement pill variety.)
But clean inboxes where even half my emails were interesting to read have always sound like a fairytale to me.
As far as I have used email (early 90s) spam has been an issue. I think I get less junk now than I used to get in 1995, thanks to advancements in server side junk mail filters.
Funny thing you mention MMOs, since you cant buy them used unless you are doing specifically to buy a character that is level capped and potentially the best gear possible.
They don't have an automatic system, but they do allow refunds through manual support tickets addressed by a human being.
They are a rare thing mainly because apps that get too many request tend to get fraudulent and taken out of the App Store quickly.
And yet, Apple's App Store complied with the 7 day policy.
BTW, Apple does refunds, but they are a manual thing with support tickets and human intervention. They don't have an automated system in place.
If people want them back, they can address their governments as to why they're not available and perhaps have a referendum on the matter. Just a though, and I'm not sure whether or not it's a particularly good one.
So, the proper course of action is for citizens to go to their government and tell them "please, take away our consumer rights so we can give money to this foreign company"?
This is not a stupid case of link searching, or a censorship issue. This is something the Taiwanese government has dictated to be a basic consumer right. Heck, I'd love if such a thing was made law here too.
You have to do more than just claim that something is evil. You have to make an actual point about why this is evil.
Put yourself in their shoes. You're a business, and want to operate in some jurisdiction. They have rules you don't like. You can either a) abide by the rules, b) choose not to operate there, or c) campaign to have the rules changed. All of these area reasonable options, none of them are evil, and Google chose B.
Stop being so alarmist.
There may be a point here. If I was a Taiwanese Android App Developer I would really be annoyed at Google right now. If my income was cut because Google did not agree with a 7 day refund law, I would really think Google to be evil.
Here is a good question: Did Google ask the developers who's income are in the line if they would rather have their personal apps opt-into compliance and give a 7-day refund window? Are they planning to do this?
This is not even close to the Chinese censorship issues. In this case the Taiwanese government wants to actually protect consumers rights to return products if they are not satisfied with them. Google's answer is, then we will just not set an embargo? You can have our free ad supported apps, but not our commercial products until you learn to give up your money for good, even if the software ended up being buggy and unsatisfactory?
How many languages is that disclaimer clear on?
There are various issues there, for one that these "puppy mills" are legal, they do the bare minimum to stay within the law. Anyone with common sense will know what they do is cruel, but they still stick within legal parameters. They are not illegal operations that would ignore the law.
The other is that there are plenty of families with un-spaded pets that give birth to pups and will give them in for adoption. Most cities have an unofficial spot where families gather to find adoptive homes for their pets, and chains like PetSmart host weekly or monthly events where you can get sheltered pets.
There are plenty of ways to get a pet dog without buying one.
Comparing this to the war on drugs is hyperbolic, since pets are not being outlawed, just a specific distribution channel and source is.