Are there one million trained and skilled IT workers in the USA that are currently unemployed? If not, this is just a great jobs package for China and India.
this is posted by kdawson. You really expected it to be impartial? The guy only posts anti-copyright anti-content producer, pro-piracy bullshit. Its like digg, but pretending to be for grown-ups.
Firstly, bedroom coding was NEVER dead. Fuck it, I should know, I was doing bedroom coding games back when I used to read articles in Develop magazine about teams under 100 couldn't make games, and I kept doing it when Peter Molyneux was warning everyone it was suicide to start a small dev company, and I'm still doing it now. The fact that mainstream media such as the guardian doesn't read our press releases doesn't mean we don't exist. Suddenly, because there are some indie games on console games, people think "indie gaming is back!".
Bullshit.
True INDEPENDENT gaming will always be at home only on the PC and the Mac, and maybe the iphone, because these are the platforms with no barrier to entry. If your game is for XBLA or PS3 or Wii, then your game idea and code has to be approved by a committee of suits at one of those companies. That's about as un-independent as it gets. True indie gaming is where someone owns the whole company, has invested their own money to fund, sell and promote the game, and earns all the revenue. The minute you have a 'distribution and publishing partner', things begin to compromise.
That's not to say that you don't get some awesome games from 'indies' on consoles, but to herald it as the home of indie gaming is just wrong.
A kdawson post from anti-globalism? gimme a break, you might as well just rename the site to 'socialistworker.org' if you are going to take the anti-capitalist rants like this seriously.
so how is that working out in the USA? you guys sure showed your government how you felt when they tried to open guantanomo bay, introduced the patriot act and started an illegal war in the middle east didn't you?
Yeah, that showed em! And to think, they might have got away with all that crap if you guys didn't have your guns...
anyone who equates having to pay for music with the war in vietnam needs to get some perspective. Nobody is forcing people to go fight and be killed in a foreign country. It's just that if you want the new Britney Spears album you have to pay for it. How can ANYONE compare such things....
I don't get it? When a large company prosecutes an individual, the individual is ALWAYS INNOCENT? Is that what you are suggesting? BTW does anyone here actually think this woman did NOT download copyrighted material? Seriously?
Or does it go without saying she's guilty and got caught, and the argument is just about the fine?
You are always telling us how the judge is wrong, yet not telling us how the defendant is innocent. Its the typical digg/slashdot assumption that everyone who gets prosecuted for copyright infringement is innocent and it was their neighbours dog using their unsecured wifi...
looking at the grandstanding and heartstring-pulling petty speeches given by most lawyers in televised cases, and comparing with a system like we have in the UK, where its illegal to even take photos of a court case, and the court proceedings stick totally to the facts of the case, I humbly disagree. In the long run, televised courtroom proceedings just gravitate towards jerry springer style slanging matches and pandering to stereotypes. The law is best debated calmly and seriously, not as popcorn-fodder between ad breaks. No thanks.
The theory isn't silly. It's perfectly valid. My whole business exists in the long tail. I sell a tiny fraction of the games that Maxis sell, but the fact remains I *do* sell some games. Those games presumably give satisfaction to the buyers, and no doubt some of them are people who would have spent that money at EA or Maxis.
There is a market out there for people who buy Kudos but if it didn't exist they would have bought the Sims. The same is true for every product. And you can extend it further. I'm sure some people who Buy Democracy wish it was centred around Spanish politics, and if the tail got longer still and someone made a Spanish-centric version, that would then eat into my sales.
This is all a good thing, it means people get products they really like, as opposed to getting generic dumbed-down stuff everyone 'doesn't mind'.
Have you read the book? or are you just being hip and cool by slagging it off as marketing fluff? I've read the book, it's full of stats, case studies and real world examples showing the long tail in action. It's a well-thought out and well-researched theory that has considerable merit. Just because a book is a bestseller doesn't mean that book is 'wrong'.
They don't operate that way YET. But remember we are in the 'early days' of the web. When me and my wife looks for a new film to rent, we go by the recommendations associated with movies we've enjoyed at sites like amazon. We often end up renting movies that we have never,ever vaguely heard of anywhere, and often really like them.
This is only possible because of Amazon's huge stock list, and computerised recommendation systems. If my 60 year old mother rents a movie, she walks into a B&M store and picks something from their limited stock. Also, if she is going to buy my a Christmas present, it will be from a B&M store, as she doesn't use the web.
The web is slowly getting to become the dominant means of content delivery, but right now a lot of people rely on newspaper, TV and the old blockbuster-focused channels. Eventually, these channels will die out, and the people who aren't net-savvy will die.
The long tail makes a huge amount of sense, the book is just predicting what will be happening over time, not a phenomena that has totally taken over from the old system already. give it time.
The website purchase process is handled by BMT Micro on my behalf. As I understand it that delay is for fraud checking, but I don't know much about the specifics of it tbh. You are right about making the demo save out a game ready for the full version. It's something I had originally planned but never got around to...
wow the big MAC DEMO buttons must not be big enough then. I insult people who insult me. sorry f you expect people to roll over and take abuse on slashdot, but that's not how I do things.
But you keep enjoying your open source games. Personally I enjoy games that are fun, rather than basing my enjoyment on the licensing model used...
Firstly stop using this "we the people" line. Content is not made by aliens or Klingon, its made by people too, people with jobs, bills, rent and so on. You are not fighting 'the man' but just your neighbour or relative or friend who happens to work in the content or software industry.
Secondly, your idea that people should just take what they want and put the ball in the content producers court, is exactly how we got DRM and law suits against file sharers.
Maybe I should just take food from whatever store I like without paying, and 'leave the ball in their court', although I doubt I would be justified then in complaining at 'the man' when the police arrested me.
Excellent post, couldn't agree more. This is why it's so sad to see people like 'thepiratebay' lauded when people discuss piracy and DRM. TPB are not heroes fighting against the evil corporations. they are savvy marketers who sell advertising space to cash in on peoples demand for free stuff.
If people want to stand up for legit usage of stuff like P2P and complain about DRM, then they need to
a) help fight against people like TPB who blatantly use p2p to distribute copyrighted content and
b) Actually NOT pirate content that is DRM-free, to show support for it's removal. Right now, DRM-free or not, your content gets stolen, and there is zero incentive for someone to drop DRM.
people are not 'dumb'. They just aren't that bothered about, or interested in DRM. That doesn't make them stupid, it means they have other priorities. Some people boycott shops because of unethical manufacturing processes or because of animal welfare. By your reckoning, you are 'dumb' to keep eating mcdonalds and drinking at starbucks.
The truth is, not everyone has the same obsession with DRM as people on slashdot.
The net result in sales was zero. It basically doesn't matter to people whether there is DRM or not. Who knows why? Maybe people who rant about DRM will not buy stuff anyway? maybe its a tiny extremely vocal minority who are statistically insignificant in terms of actual sales.
People claim very loudly that DRM doesn't prevent piracy. It doesn't prevent sales either. I'm sure lots of slashdotters would claim that the reason they do not buy X or Y is due to DRM, but the stats suggest otherwise.
People in general will boycott on-line stroes over DRM about as much as people will boycott clothing stores that use child labour. ie: 99% of people don't care, and will not factor it into purchasing decisions.
Despite that, I dislike DRM and still don't use it, but I can't in all honesty make a compelling claim to DRM using companies to ditch it on sales grounds.
the demo has the upsell screen in it. that's the only difference between the two. (apart from save / laod disable and the time limit). I put the entire game in the demo, to avoid pirates complaining and claiming that its not representative...
When you buy a house, you don't see it in all seasons, at night, in flood conditions, you dont try out inviting friends round, or your pets, or try and get shopping delivered to it, or spend Christmas there, or try and park there in rush hour.
It's a limited demo. For a three hundred thousand dollar house vs a £20 game.
face facts, people pirate because they want free stuff and assume they won't get caught, this 'we need to try it more than the demo' stuff is bullshit.
Slashdot Mirror
Are there one million trained and skilled IT workers in the USA that are currently unemployed?
If not, this is just a great jobs package for China and India.
this is posted by kdawson. You really expected it to be impartial? The guy only posts anti-copyright anti-content producer, pro-piracy bullshit.
Its like digg, but pretending to be for grown-ups.
Firstly, bedroom coding was NEVER dead. Fuck it, I should know, I was doing bedroom coding games back when I used to read articles in Develop magazine about teams under 100 couldn't make games, and I kept doing it when Peter Molyneux was warning everyone it was suicide to start a small dev company, and I'm still doing it now. The fact that mainstream media such as the guardian doesn't read our press releases doesn't mean we don't exist.
Suddenly, because there are some indie games on console games, people think "indie gaming is back!".
Bullshit.
True INDEPENDENT gaming will always be at home only on the PC and the Mac, and maybe the iphone, because these are the platforms with no barrier to entry. If your game is for XBLA or PS3 or Wii, then your game idea and code has to be approved by a committee of suits at one of those companies. That's about as un-independent as it gets.
True indie gaming is where someone owns the whole company, has invested their own money to fund, sell and promote the game, and earns all the revenue. The minute you have a 'distribution and publishing partner', things begin to compromise.
That's not to say that you don't get some awesome games from 'indies' on consoles, but to herald it as the home of indie gaming is just wrong.
Exactly. So it seems the guns in the US didn't achieve fuck all.
LOL
why is it not safe? too many people with guns?
BTW I suspect the homicide rate in DC is higher than that of London. So tell me again why guns make you feel safe?
A kdawson post from anti-globalism?
gimme a break, you might as well just rename the site to 'socialistworker.org' if you are going to take the anti-capitalist rants like this seriously.
so how is that working out in the USA? you guys sure showed your government how you felt when they tried to open guantanomo bay, introduced the patriot act and started an illegal war in the middle east didn't you?
Yeah, that showed em! And to think, they might have got away with all that crap if you guys didn't have your guns...
anyone who equates having to pay for music with the war in vietnam needs to get some perspective.
Nobody is forcing people to go fight and be killed in a foreign country. It's just that if you want the new Britney Spears album you have to pay for it.
How can ANYONE compare such things....
so everyone found guilty of shoplifting should be let off, by your argument...
Do you actually think she is innocent of what she was charged with?
I don't get it?
When a large company prosecutes an individual, the individual is ALWAYS INNOCENT?
Is that what you are suggesting?
BTW does anyone here actually think this woman did NOT download copyrighted material?
Seriously?
Or does it go without saying she's guilty and got caught, and the argument is just about the fine?
so.... how many cases HAVE you won Ray?
Any?
maybe more time reading the law and less time promoting your ad-infested blog on slashdot might help.
You are always telling us how the judge is wrong, yet not telling us how the defendant is innocent. Its the typical digg/slashdot assumption that everyone who gets prosecuted for copyright infringement is innocent and it was their neighbours dog using their unsecured wifi...
looking at the grandstanding and heartstring-pulling petty speeches given by most lawyers in televised cases, and comparing with a system like we have in the UK, where its illegal to even take photos of a court case, and the court proceedings stick totally to the facts of the case, I humbly disagree.
In the long run, televised courtroom proceedings just gravitate towards jerry springer style slanging matches and pandering to stereotypes.
The law is best debated calmly and seriously, not as popcorn-fodder between ad breaks.
No thanks.
The theory isn't silly. It's perfectly valid. My whole business exists in the long tail. I sell a tiny fraction of the games that Maxis sell, but the fact remains I *do* sell some games. Those games presumably give satisfaction to the buyers, and no doubt some of them are people who would have spent that money at EA or Maxis.
There is a market out there for people who buy Kudos but if it didn't exist they would have bought the Sims. The same is true for every product. And you can extend it further. I'm sure some people who Buy Democracy wish it was centred around Spanish politics, and if the tail got longer still and someone made a Spanish-centric version, that would then eat into my sales.
This is all a good thing, it means people get products they really like, as opposed to getting generic dumbed-down stuff everyone 'doesn't mind'.
Have you read the book? or are you just being hip and cool by slagging it off as marketing fluff? I've read the book, it's full of stats, case studies and real world examples showing the long tail in action. It's a well-thought out and well-researched theory that has considerable merit.
Just because a book is a bestseller doesn't mean that book is 'wrong'.
They don't operate that way YET. But remember we are in the 'early days' of the web. When me and my wife looks for a new film to rent, we go by the recommendations associated with movies we've enjoyed at sites like amazon. We often end up renting movies that we have never,ever vaguely heard of anywhere, and often really like them.
This is only possible because of Amazon's huge stock list, and computerised recommendation systems.
If my 60 year old mother rents a movie, she walks into a B&M store and picks something from their limited stock. Also, if she is going to buy my a Christmas present, it will be from a B&M store, as she doesn't use the web.
The web is slowly getting to become the dominant means of content delivery, but right now a lot of people rely on newspaper, TV and the old blockbuster-focused channels. Eventually, these channels will die out, and the people who aren't net-savvy will die.
The long tail makes a huge amount of sense, the book is just predicting what will be happening over time, not a phenomena that has totally taken over from the old system already.
give it time.
The website purchase process is handled by BMT Micro on my behalf. As I understand it that delay is for fraud checking, but I don't know much about the specifics of it tbh. You are right about making the demo save out a game ready for the full version. It's something I had originally planned but never got around to...
wow the big MAC DEMO buttons must not be big enough then.
I insult people who insult me. sorry f you expect people to roll over and take abuse on slashdot, but that's not how I do things.
But you keep enjoying your open source games. Personally I enjoy games that are fun, rather than basing my enjoyment on the licensing model used...
Firstly stop using this "we the people" line. Content is not made by aliens or Klingon, its made by people too, people with jobs, bills, rent and so on. You are not fighting 'the man' but just your neighbour or relative or friend who happens to work in the content or software industry.
Secondly, your idea that people should just take what they want and put the ball in the content producers court, is exactly how we got DRM and law suits against file sharers.
Maybe I should just take food from whatever store I like without paying, and 'leave the ball in their court', although I doubt I would be justified then in complaining at 'the man' when the police arrested me.
Excellent post, couldn't agree more. This is why it's so sad to see people like 'thepiratebay' lauded when people discuss piracy and DRM. TPB are not heroes fighting against the evil corporations. they are savvy marketers who sell advertising space to cash in on peoples demand for free stuff.
If people want to stand up for legit usage of stuff like P2P and complain about DRM, then they need to
a) help fight against people like TPB who blatantly use p2p to distribute copyrighted content and
b) Actually NOT pirate content that is DRM-free, to show support for it's removal. Right now, DRM-free or not, your content gets stolen, and there is zero incentive for someone to drop DRM.
people are not 'dumb'. They just aren't that bothered about, or interested in DRM. That doesn't make them stupid, it means they have other priorities. Some people boycott shops because of unethical manufacturing processes or because of animal welfare. By your reckoning, you are 'dumb' to keep eating mcdonalds and drinking at starbucks.
The truth is, not everyone has the same obsession with DRM as people on slashdot.
couldnt' agree more. I tried an experiment by ditching DRM:
http://www.positech.co.uk/talkingtopirates.html
The net result in sales was zero. It basically doesn't matter to people whether there is DRM or not. Who knows why? Maybe people who rant about DRM will not buy stuff anyway? maybe its a tiny extremely vocal minority who are statistically insignificant in terms of actual sales.
People claim very loudly that DRM doesn't prevent piracy. It doesn't prevent sales either. I'm sure lots of slashdotters would claim that the reason they do not buy X or Y is due to DRM, but the stats suggest otherwise.
People in general will boycott on-line stroes over DRM about as much as people will boycott clothing stores that use child labour. ie: 99% of people don't care, and will not factor it into purchasing decisions.
Despite that, I dislike DRM and still don't use it, but I can't in all honesty make a compelling claim to DRM using companies to ditch it on sales grounds.
the demo has the upsell screen in it. that's the only difference between the two. (apart from save / laod disable and the time limit).
I put the entire game in the demo, to avoid pirates complaining and claiming that its not representative...
you get a limited demo.
When you buy a house, you don't see it in all seasons, at night, in flood conditions, you dont try out inviting friends round, or your pets, or try and get shopping delivered to it, or spend Christmas there, or try and park there in rush hour.
It's a limited demo. For a three hundred thousand dollar house vs a £20 game.
face facts, people pirate because they want free stuff and assume they won't get caught, this 'we need to try it more than the demo' stuff is bullshit.
This guy did an empirical study;
http://hackvan.com/pub/stig/articles/why-do-people-register-shareware.html
We would love to think the honour system works.
it doesn't.