Fairness would be selling the phones at standard unlocked prices and letting people buy their contracts ala carte. Of course that would also mean much higher phone prices, how many people would buy the iphone or Droid at $600? In the long run consumers would be better off for it, but many seem to want the latest and greatest but don't want to pay more than a couple hundred bucks to get it.
In Verizon's defense, they are likely looking to stop some of the scamming that goes on with newer phones. I know of a couple local discount cellular stores near me that was having employees buy iphones, keep them 30 days so that the return policy is no longer in effect and then pay the early termination fee, for a 32gb 3gs they nearly double their money. Perhaps a better option would be a tiered ETF?
"The member’s movie data exposes a Netflix member’s personal interest and/or struggles with various highly personal issues, including sexuality, mental illness, recovery from alcoholism, and victimization from incest, physical abuse, domestic violence, adultery, and rape."
Isn't this a bit of a stretch. I've rented a rather broad range of films, over the past year some of the films I have watched include Apt Pupil, Lords of Dogtown, Girl Interrupted, A History of violence, A Beautiful Mind, Brokeback Mountain and Super High Me. Evidently I'm a mentally disturbed,abusive, homosexual, drug abusing, skateboarding, autistic nazi and didn't know it.
The woman who was outed wasn't outed by her movie choices but by her paranoia leading to her own disclosure.
This is a rather dangerous precedent. A completely open system would eliminate any need for licensing which is the console manufacturers bread and butter. Most consoles at least in the first couple years sell at a significantly subsidized loss. The PS3 for instance was broken down by isupply shortly after release and was determined to cost around $800 to manufacture, its alot cheaper now as parts and components have come down in price but still supposedly sells at a small loss. How many console manufacturers are going to want to sustain a product model with no clear way to make a profit? If they changed the model to something more like the computer industry will consumers be able to accept at $1000 gaming device?
Homebrew is great, but for the vast majority its just an excuse for piracy. If homebrew were the be all end all...the gp32 would be the top selling handheld in existence rather than a platform no one outside the geek community has heard of. So far no attempts at a truly open console have been successful. I havent seen people beating down the doors to own a Pandora or Evo yet, and if the past is any indication they will never amount to more than an interesting footnote in gaming history.
If anything the only thing that will happen if this holds up is consoles will move even further towards a physical media-less system. Downloads only will eventually replace disks and cartridges eventually being replaced by streaming services like OnLive as manufacturers and developers try to maintain some semblance of control. In the end the "everything should be open" crowd might win but the result would be that we all loose.
Or a mac:) No windows here...but it works fine. It is true though they do lack proper linux drivers at the moment but hopefully they will come or at least offer to open things up so the community can make their own.
Kind of odd that this comes up a day after Ninendo lost the preliminary hearing in a rather important case against Divineo in France.
To summarize Nintendo sued Divineo over the production of flash cards for the Nintendo DS. The judge ruled that consoles should operate more like "windows" and that anyone should be able to develop for them without the companies approval.
In the first round I guess the "homebrew" community will get what it wants...of course if it hold up after appeal it will have the side effect of destroying the console industry (with no need for licensing or control over their platforms there is no revenue stream) but hey at least they would be open right?
Kodak has had their printer line on the market for over a year now, they place the print head on the printer itself and forgo all the smart chip garbage causes some rather anti-consumer issues on other brands of printers. Their cartridges are really cheap compared to others, under $25 for a full set of color and black ink. The print quality is great, and the prices while not as cheap as the lower end HP's and Epson's are reasonable, I paid $120 for my all in one last year and have changed cartridges once and it hasn't skipped a beat.
I'm no MS fan, but Google scares the crap out of me. MS wants to own your desktop and business systems, Google seems to want to own you.
Every time I look at tech news headlines there is some article about google taking over some data collecting and archiving service in areas ranging from pictures of my house to medical records. Every move I make online seems to be tracked by google somehow, not sure I really want them tracking every move offline as well. Privacy is still important to me, and it seems this idea of tracking everything really didn't come to prevalence until google got involved. IMHO big brother and "do no evil" cannot peacefully coexist.
My first IT job was as a basic programmer on the TRS-80 back in the 80's when I was a kid (unique situation where the grown ups had no idea what to do with it but the company thought they needed to do inventory on a computer). Since then I have been called a Web programmer, router jockey, network engineer, NTAC, consultant, etc... The most offensive to me is Engineer, not for me but for those that really are engineers, I have no engineering degree and dont operate locomotives so I qualify for neither. I work in IT, I do alot of things. IT changes so often that there is no box to really put into it as a title description. IT Person works just fine.
I've really never understood the obsession with cool titles, I have worked with others who thought they had to have some goofy title as if it somehow made them royalty. As long as you get a paycheck and are treated with a fair amount of dignity does it really matter?
While an a purely ethics level I don't care for MS's business practices at least they tend to usually just screw other businesses, Google frankly scares the crap out of me. Its pretty easy to avoid MS but avoiding becoming a google statistic is becoming increasingly impossible.
Actually I was in the group I was "ragging" on. I just found that when the shit hit the fan, their was a group that tended to put up with it and a group that didn't. When I went through it I found my workload piling up while co-workers left for greener grass under the assumption that I would be rewarded for my efforts. I and the few left that thought along those lines were rewarded by being the last ones let go before the department was outsourced.
Maybe im just bitter but the "team" you speak of tends to only exist in small companies, in larger corporations, its only in the minds of those willing to drink the kool-aid the reality is that more often than not a non-management position is to the "team" as the red shirt is to Star Trek, disposable, replaceable and likely exploited.
Perhaps the non-degreed just figure they were lucky to be there to start with and didnt have much to loose. I wasn't saying discipline was a bad thing to have...but many times what is seen as disciplined related little to coding methods and more towards the amount of crap an employee is willing to take.
For some reason in my experience the degreed developers tend to be more "disciplined" which at least in the companies I have worked for means they are more likely to allow themselves to be pushed around and are less likely to question methods and proceeders. I am not sure if its the massive debt hanging over their heads or simply the years of being a dedicated student, but they just tend on average to be more willing to keep their mouth shut and keep typing while complaining less about things like overtime, workload, etc.
The article you pointed to mention that 4.1bn of that is from 2002-2005 which would be the original xbox, everyone knows how they were getting bent over on hardware costs last generation. That leaves a 1.2bn loss for the first year that the console was available, 1.89 in year 2 (there is your 3rod issue), 415mn in the 3rd and a 426mn profit last year.
It should be noted that Sony had a 3.2bn loss for their launch year, 1.16bn loss in the next fiscal year and 2.9bn loss for this past fiscal year and are expected to have even bigger losses this year after the PS3 redesign.
Sounds like Sony's drowning, MS is treading water and Nintendo is sitting on the deck of the SS Wii laughing at them both.
Your right, nothing is confirmed but the number of 3rd party prominent players hyping things up on their own kind of assures me that there is at least some substance there. Wii Fit and Motion Plus are great examples and I think your on to something...MS probably does need to bundle in some sort of game likely a mini-game collection similar to wii sports, even the kickball demo and that Milo thing would do...just something that gives you a "natal" experience out of the box. Im expecting game bundles from MS first party studios, perhaps Lionhead or Rare offering up a Perfect Dark or Fable bundle? Of course if Halo Reach ends up with Natal support and ships as a bundle they are guaranteed millions of installs off the bat.
If its that low, Natal actually has a real chance of making a dent in their user base. Addon peripherals are always risky and usually end in less than stellar support but this sounds cheap enough to be bundled not only with the console but with hot titles much like Sony has done with Singstar and the Mics or Eyepets with the camera.
There are already 14 development studios confirmed to be working on natal titles, including Lionhead, Rare, Activision Blizzard, Bethesda Softworks, Capcom, Disney Interactive, Electronic Arts, Konami, MTV Games, Namco Bandai, Sega, Square Enix, THQ and Ubisoft. Not a bad lineup for a peripheral, sounds more like a console lauch than a peripheral introduction.
Nintendo is famous for not buying into the "all-in-one" device and has always focused on games only. Adding 3g sounds interesting but its reality is really limiting. This would likely be only for access to DSi type mini game downloads since actually supporting online gaming with "free" g3 is financially impossible unless the handheld is prohibitively expensive. There is also the added cost of supporting different architectures since there is no real global standard for cellular technology.
Nintendo has been trying to broaden its market with handhelds the same way that they have with the Wii. Games like brain age, professor layton and the Personal Trainer series appeal to and older crowd but the small screen size can make it rather limited. My mother for instance loves her DS but constantly complains about the text being too small or icons being indistinguishable, a larger screen size would be great for her. Based on the included bundle that appears to be the audience they are going for...smart idea IMHO.
The reason the iPhone is so successful is the convenience of the app store, itunes and the sheer amount of content. When apple first started the app store people seemed to talk as if it was simply a waste of time and resources but now its so far ahead of the game that no one seems able to catch up.
I like the Microscope products...their newest version Microscope duo boots off of a USB stick. For machines that dont boot at all they also have a diagnostic card, its basically a pci card that has an led readout that give a series of post codes that can help diagnose if its the board, a card, memory, etc. They can be found at http://www.micro2000.com/
The handiest piece of diagnostic gear I use is actually a simple power supply tester. You would be amazed how many systems that appear to power up are actually suffering from a dead -5 or +5 rail on the powersupply. Many tend to think if the fans spinning the powersupply is ok but thats often not the case. The best part is they are cheap...around $10 for a basic one.
I can sympathize with that, about 5 years ago my wife was diagnosed with an incurable but non-debilitating illness, it can and is treated medicinally. I happened to be unemployed at the time after being laid off and cobra had run out...I had been actively looking for work but had to take medicare to get by until I found a job. After I found one, I tried to go from medicare to the same companies paid healthcare and was told my wifes illness was a pre-existing condition (even though it was discovered while covered by the medicare side of the same company) and I havent been able to get her coverage since. In the meantime my bills keep outpacing my ability to pay them and keep a roof over my familes head. IMHO thats broken.
Verizon has been notorious for seriously resticting its network usage on both the wired and wireless sides. When your able to shape things to minimal usage, its easier to have 5/9 service and minimize congestion.
First of all this is coming from a Mac user. In fact im typing this on my macbook now.
Evidently the Mac Stores outside my area are quite different than the ones here. Here they are rather pretentious sterile cubes with one or two employees willing to show you why you really need that $3000 loaded macbook pro rather than the $999 macbook so junior can do his homework faster. 3-4 other people standing around and one guy at the Mac Genius table arguing with a guy that dropped his Iphone in water and expects a free replacement anyway. I have yet to find any employees outside the genius bar that actually know anything beyond their scripted demo, and the guy at the bar is usually too busy explaining something mundane to be of much help if you do not have a scheduled appointment.
Have the "I'm A Mac" commercials permeated the consciousness of Microsoft to the point that they themselves feel that no one but nerds and suits use windows? What good is a mac entrenched hipster selling windows?
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Fairness would be selling the phones at standard unlocked prices and letting people buy their contracts ala carte. Of course that would also mean much higher phone prices, how many people would buy the iphone or Droid at $600? In the long run consumers would be better off for it, but many seem to want the latest and greatest but don't want to pay more than a couple hundred bucks to get it.
In Verizon's defense, they are likely looking to stop some of the scamming that goes on with newer phones. I know of a couple local discount cellular stores near me that was having employees buy iphones, keep them 30 days so that the return policy is no longer in effect and then pay the early termination fee, for a 32gb 3gs they nearly double their money. Perhaps a better option would be a tiered ETF?
"The member’s movie data exposes a Netflix member’s personal interest and/or struggles with various highly personal issues, including sexuality, mental illness, recovery from alcoholism, and victimization from incest, physical abuse, domestic violence, adultery, and rape."
Isn't this a bit of a stretch. I've rented a rather broad range of films, over the past year some of the films I have watched include Apt Pupil, Lords of Dogtown, Girl Interrupted, A History of violence, A Beautiful Mind, Brokeback Mountain and Super High Me. Evidently I'm a mentally disturbed,abusive, homosexual, drug abusing, skateboarding, autistic nazi and didn't know it.
The woman who was outed wasn't outed by her movie choices but by her paranoia leading to her own disclosure.
This is a rather dangerous precedent. A completely open system would eliminate any need for licensing which is the console manufacturers bread and butter. Most consoles at least in the first couple years sell at a significantly subsidized loss. The PS3 for instance was broken down by isupply shortly after release and was determined to cost around $800 to manufacture, its alot cheaper now as parts and components have come down in price but still supposedly sells at a small loss. How many console manufacturers are going to want to sustain a product model with no clear way to make a profit? If they changed the model to something more like the computer industry will consumers be able to accept at $1000 gaming device?
Homebrew is great, but for the vast majority its just an excuse for piracy. If homebrew were the be all end all...the gp32 would be the top selling handheld in existence rather than a platform no one outside the geek community has heard of. So far no attempts at a truly open console have been successful. I havent seen people beating down the doors to own a Pandora or Evo yet, and if the past is any indication they will never amount to more than an interesting footnote in gaming history.
If anything the only thing that will happen if this holds up is consoles will move even further towards a physical media-less system. Downloads only will eventually replace disks and cartridges eventually being replaced by streaming services like OnLive as manufacturers and developers try to maintain some semblance of control. In the end the "everything should be open" crowd might win but the result would be that we all loose.
Or a mac :) No windows here...but it works fine. It is true though they do lack proper linux drivers at the moment but hopefully they will come or at least offer to open things up so the community can make their own.
Kind of odd that this comes up a day after Ninendo lost the preliminary hearing in a rather important case against Divineo in France.
To summarize Nintendo sued Divineo over the production of flash cards for the Nintendo DS. The judge ruled that consoles should operate more like "windows" and that anyone should be able to develop for them without the companies approval.
http://www.assentek.com/communique-presse-nintendo-vs-assentek-linker
In the first round I guess the "homebrew" community will get what it wants...of course if it hold up after appeal it will have the side effect of destroying the console industry (with no need for licensing or control over their platforms there is no revenue stream) but hey at least they would be open right?
Kodak has had their printer line on the market for over a year now, they place the print head on the printer itself and forgo all the smart chip garbage causes some rather anti-consumer issues on other brands of printers. Their cartridges are really cheap compared to others, under $25 for a full set of color and black ink. The print quality is great, and the prices while not as cheap as the lower end HP's and Epson's are reasonable, I paid $120 for my all in one last year and have changed cartridges once and it hasn't skipped a beat.
I'm no MS fan, but Google scares the crap out of me. MS wants to own your desktop and business systems, Google seems to want to own you.
Every time I look at tech news headlines there is some article about google taking over some data collecting and archiving service in areas ranging from pictures of my house to medical records. Every move I make online seems to be tracked by google somehow, not sure I really want them tracking every move offline as well. Privacy is still important to me, and it seems this idea of tracking everything really didn't come to prevalence until google got involved. IMHO big brother and "do no evil" cannot peacefully coexist.
My first IT job was as a basic programmer on the TRS-80 back in the 80's when I was a kid (unique situation where the grown ups had no idea what to do with it but the company thought they needed to do inventory on a computer). Since then I have been called a Web programmer, router jockey, network engineer, NTAC, consultant, etc... The most offensive to me is Engineer, not for me but for those that really are engineers, I have no engineering degree and dont operate locomotives so I qualify for neither. I work in IT, I do alot of things. IT changes so often that there is no box to really put into it as a title description. IT Person works just fine.
I've really never understood the obsession with cool titles, I have worked with others who thought they had to have some goofy title as if it somehow made them royalty. As long as you get a paycheck and are treated with a fair amount of dignity does it really matter?
While an a purely ethics level I don't care for MS's business practices at least they tend to usually just screw other businesses, Google frankly scares the crap out of me. Its pretty easy to avoid MS but avoiding becoming a google statistic is becoming increasingly impossible.
Actually I was in the group I was "ragging" on. I just found that when the shit hit the fan, their was a group that tended to put up with it and a group that didn't. When I went through it I found my workload piling up while co-workers left for greener grass under the assumption that I would be rewarded for my efforts. I and the few left that thought along those lines were rewarded by being the last ones let go before the department was outsourced.
Maybe im just bitter but the "team" you speak of tends to only exist in small companies, in larger corporations, its only in the minds of those willing to drink the kool-aid the reality is that more often than not a non-management position is to the "team" as the red shirt is to Star Trek, disposable, replaceable and likely exploited.
Perhaps the non-degreed just figure they were lucky to be there to start with and didnt have much to loose. I wasn't saying discipline was a bad thing to have...but many times what is seen as disciplined related little to coding methods and more towards the amount of crap an employee is willing to take.
For some reason in my experience the degreed developers tend to be more "disciplined" which at least in the companies I have worked for means they are more likely to allow themselves to be pushed around and are less likely to question methods and proceeders. I am not sure if its the massive debt hanging over their heads or simply the years of being a dedicated student, but they just tend on average to be more willing to keep their mouth shut and keep typing while complaining less about things like overtime, workload, etc.
The article you pointed to mention that 4.1bn of that is from 2002-2005 which would be the original xbox, everyone knows how they were getting bent over on hardware costs last generation. That leaves a 1.2bn loss for the first year that the console was available, 1.89 in year 2 (there is your 3rod issue), 415mn in the 3rd and a 426mn profit last year.
It should be noted that Sony had a 3.2bn loss for their launch year, 1.16bn loss in the next fiscal year and 2.9bn loss for this past fiscal year and are expected to have even bigger losses this year after the PS3 redesign.
Sounds like Sony's drowning, MS is treading water and Nintendo is sitting on the deck of the SS Wii laughing at them both.
Your right, nothing is confirmed but the number of 3rd party prominent players hyping things up on their own kind of assures me that there is at least some substance there. Wii Fit and Motion Plus are great examples and I think your on to something...MS probably does need to bundle in some sort of game likely a mini-game collection similar to wii sports, even the kickball demo and that Milo thing would do...just something that gives you a "natal" experience out of the box. Im expecting game bundles from MS first party studios, perhaps Lionhead or Rare offering up a Perfect Dark or Fable bundle? Of course if Halo Reach ends up with Natal support and ships as a bundle they are guaranteed millions of installs off the bat.
You mean something similar to Sony's initial funding deals for 40 PSN titles and their newer pub fund program which exchanges funding for exclusivity?
http://www.gaming-age.com/news/2006/11/1-2
http://www.ps3informer.com/playstation-3/news/sony-will-pay-devs-for-psn-exclusivity-010110.php
If its that low, Natal actually has a real chance of making a dent in their user base. Addon peripherals are always risky and usually end in less than stellar support but this sounds cheap enough to be bundled not only with the console but with hot titles much like Sony has done with Singstar and the Mics or Eyepets with the camera.
There are already 14 development studios confirmed to be working on natal titles, including Lionhead, Rare, Activision Blizzard, Bethesda Softworks, Capcom, Disney Interactive, Electronic Arts, Konami, MTV Games, Namco Bandai, Sega, Square Enix, THQ and Ubisoft. Not a bad lineup for a peripheral, sounds more like a console lauch than a peripheral introduction.
Really? I paid under $500 for my mini...and under $1000 after tax for my macbook...you must be shopping at the wrong apple store.
Nintendo is famous for not buying into the "all-in-one" device and has always focused on games only. Adding 3g sounds interesting but its reality is really limiting. This would likely be only for access to DSi type mini game downloads since actually supporting online gaming with "free" g3 is financially impossible unless the handheld is prohibitively expensive. There is also the added cost of supporting different architectures since there is no real global standard for cellular technology.
Nintendo has been trying to broaden its market with handhelds the same way that they have with the Wii. Games like brain age, professor layton and the Personal Trainer series appeal to and older crowd but the small screen size can make it rather limited. My mother for instance loves her DS but constantly complains about the text being too small or icons being indistinguishable, a larger screen size would be great for her. Based on the included bundle that appears to be the audience they are going for...smart idea IMHO.
Geez I know Sparc has been slowly dying for last decade but this is getting kinda desperate.
The reason the iPhone is so successful is the convenience of the app store, itunes and the sheer amount of content. When apple first started the app store people seemed to talk as if it was simply a waste of time and resources but now its so far ahead of the game that no one seems able to catch up.
I like the Microscope products...their newest version Microscope duo boots off of a USB stick. For machines that dont boot at all they also have a diagnostic card, its basically a pci card that has an led readout that give a series of post codes that can help diagnose if its the board, a card, memory, etc. They can be found at http://www.micro2000.com/
The handiest piece of diagnostic gear I use is actually a simple power supply tester. You would be amazed how many systems that appear to power up are actually suffering from a dead -5 or +5 rail on the powersupply. Many tend to think if the fans spinning the powersupply is ok but thats often not the case. The best part is they are cheap...around $10 for a basic one.
Wish they would take a look at the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas and do the same for patent reform.
I can sympathize with that, about 5 years ago my wife was diagnosed with an incurable but non-debilitating illness, it can and is treated medicinally. I happened to be unemployed at the time after being laid off and cobra had run out...I had been actively looking for work but had to take medicare to get by until I found a job. After I found one, I tried to go from medicare to the same companies paid healthcare and was told my wifes illness was a pre-existing condition (even though it was discovered while covered by the medicare side of the same company) and I havent been able to get her coverage since. In the meantime my bills keep outpacing my ability to pay them and keep a roof over my familes head. IMHO thats broken.
Verizon has been notorious for seriously resticting its network usage on both the wired and wireless sides. When your able to shape things to minimal usage, its easier to have 5/9 service and minimize congestion.
First of all this is coming from a Mac user. In fact im typing this on my macbook now.
Evidently the Mac Stores outside my area are quite different than the ones here. Here they are rather pretentious sterile cubes with one or two employees willing to show you why you really need that $3000 loaded macbook pro rather than the $999 macbook so junior can do his homework faster. 3-4 other people standing around and one guy at the Mac Genius table arguing with a guy that dropped his Iphone in water and expects a free replacement anyway. I have yet to find any employees outside the genius bar that actually know anything beyond their scripted demo, and the guy at the bar is usually too busy explaining something mundane to be of much help if you do not have a scheduled appointment.
Have the "I'm A Mac" commercials permeated the consciousness of Microsoft to the point that they themselves feel that no one but nerds and suits use windows? What good is a mac entrenched hipster selling windows?