The thing is, I don't really feel Blizzard is wrong in not wanting other people to produce alternatives to its own servers. This isn't based on any understanding of the law (of which I have very little), but rather on what I feel is morally right. I feel Blizzard deserves to control how the game plays, offline or online. Incredible amounts of creativity, thinking, time, work and money went into making Diablo II (or any other Blizzard game), and I just don't see why anyone else should have the freedom to change how their games play. Bought Diablo II and became disappointed with the inflexibilty or slugishness of their servers? Fine, vow to never buy another Blizzard game again and set to create your own opensource game, client, protocol and server included.
Don't try to take control from Blizzard by letting people use their client with your server. Blizzard sees it necessary for keeping their business to have that control exclusive to them, and you may not like it, or agree with it, but you need to respect it. Especially if you decide to play their games. This isn't an operating system we're talking about. Where an operating system is just a middleman, something to build upon, there is (usually) nothing more to a game than itself. You take it as it is, or not at all. Some game developers choose to give the user further liberties through game editors and programming interfaces, and that's great, but those liberties should be given, not taken by force.
I'm sure this is going to be a very unpopular opinion with many of you, all I'm asking for is if you disagree with me, explain why instead of flaming, so that I can take your opinion seriously.
kinda makes the US look like microsoft, doesn't it? honestly, you can't expect microsoft to feel bad about what they're doing to other businesses when they live in a country that does the same to other entire countries.
You've got it totally out of chronological order with the Treo. First of all, the treo is available, advertised, and making its way to my home scheduled to arrive today. Hy-tek has been pushing the release of the Treo for over a year, in the process angering many people waiting for it. The message on treoplayer.com was put there a couple of months ago, and rumor has it eDigital has decided taking matters into its own hands. Either way, it's selling and in stock at eDigital's online store. CNet's also planning to place a review for it on computers.com next week.
On a related note, the Classic XP3 player sold by circuit city uses the same base design as the true, and sports a few extra features like recording and extended battery life. I read a few reports of problems with it though, usually due to the fact the case is made out of plastic instead of aluminum like the Treo.
It's true this is not really news as far as technological implementation is concerned. It doesn't offer any one feature that hasn't been available in other hard-drive based players in the last two years. But as someone who's been keeping very close watch on this market for very long, and having owned an archos jukebox, a pjb100 and now a wonderful, wonderful iPod that won't bloody talk to my PC I'm glad to see the Treo mentioned on Slashdot. Assuming it doesn't have any glaring problems (I'm gonna find out tomorrow:) it's the biggest leap in space&features to price ratio in a new HD based player that I can remember.
The treo's been delayed for an entire year, and now that it's out it doesn't seem like eDigital is going out of its way to let people know about it, and at least for now, you can only order it online. Letting the right crowd know about it here is exactly the sort of thing that's gonna make other companies with similar products rethink their price tag.
Slashdot Mirror
Don't try to take control from Blizzard by letting people use their client with your server. Blizzard sees it necessary for keeping their business to have that control exclusive to them, and you may not like it, or agree with it, but you need to respect it. Especially if you decide to play their games. This isn't an operating system we're talking about. Where an operating system is just a middleman, something to build upon, there is (usually) nothing more to a game than itself. You take it as it is, or not at all. Some game developers choose to give the user further liberties through game editors and programming interfaces, and that's great, but those liberties should be given, not taken by force.
I'm sure this is going to be a very unpopular opinion with many of you, all I'm asking for is if you disagree with me, explain why instead of flaming, so that I can take your opinion seriously.
Thanks, Nir
kinda makes the US look like microsoft, doesn't it? honestly, you can't expect microsoft to feel bad about what they're doing to other businesses when they live in a country that does the same to other entire countries.
On a related note, the Classic XP3 player sold by circuit city uses the same base design as the true, and sports a few extra features like recording and extended battery life. I read a few reports of problems with it though, usually due to the fact the case is made out of plastic instead of aluminum like the Treo.
The treo's been delayed for an entire year, and now that it's out it doesn't seem like eDigital is going out of its way to let people know about it, and at least for now, you can only order it online. Letting the right crowd know about it here is exactly the sort of thing that's gonna make other companies with similar products rethink their price tag.