Oh Snap! No iPods for North Korea. How embarrassing, this is the sort of thing that basically says the rest of the world is powerless to effect any sort of change in North Korea or similar countries. But that is not necessarily evidence of anything bad. Instead it is evidence that ultimately it is up to the people of those countries to effect their own regime change. It may take 5 years, 10, or 100, but it is up to them. There is little we can do other than offer moral support. The disaster in Iraq will hopefully stand as a lesson of just how not to effect change in repressive governments, but oh, wasn't Vietnam supposed to do that too?
Definitely too high. A $30 game is not going to move much with the casual crowd. Part of the reason for the success of the casual segment are the low, impulse buy range, prices of which $19.99 is usually the upper limit. Once you get out of that range, it's no longer a casual purchase. So I'd question the strategy of going to bigger budgets if it means the retail price of the games goes to more than $20.
A million sales won't be a surprise. The fun begins when/if the Wii begins to vastly outnumber the PS3s available. Ramping up really fast will no doubt attract a lot of development that doesn't want to wait around for there to be enough PS3s. This time next year may well tell the tale of who wins this round of console wars.
The first Final Fantasy game was supposed to be Hironobu Sakaguchi's last game before leaving the industry. His previous work hadn't done so well, or something like that, so he was planning to get out of the games business. Final Fantasy ended up being a big hit, and the rest is history.
With apologies to any women waiting in line, lining up for a game console is just a modern day display of good old fashioned machismo. There have always been badges of honor associated with doing physically difficult things, no matter how silly or unnecessary. Human beings have a need to test their limits, and occasionally show off to members of the (usually) opposite sex, or at least one's peers. So I say just let them have their fun!
It may be that the IT job market will pick up in the US and wages will rise again. But I don't think anyone is going to bite on this until they see it actually happening. For now, I'd advise young people to stay away from tech unless they really love it and have a backup plan.
All of the conspiracy and divide and conquer is all very fun, but seriously, Microsoft doesn't need to work that hard to make more money. The Novell deal is probably just what it looks like, a way for Microsoft to make some money from the Linux market. They don't need to destroy it or any such nonsense. Windows isn't going away any time soon, and sorry Linux isn't taking over either. But Microsoft does have to be careful of running afoul of the GPL in any case, so making deals with companies like Novell, may be a way to get a piece of the market without GPL or antitrust entanglements.
No surprises here. As long as there's no penalty for using the patent and legal system as an ATM, companies like NTP will continue to do so. Even as their patents are being found to be invalid, they continue to sue. Oh well, I guess allegedly evil companies and allegedly evil lawyers have to keep busy.
I second that. YesAsia is pretty good. But they don't carry all of the niche/techie sort of toys that Lik-Sang did like coder cables and some truly exotic console mods. I only wish I'd imported some of that stuff before they closed.
Just more crazy speculation on my part, but could this partnership be a prelude to a future Microsoft buyout of Novell? Such a buyout would kill two big birds with one stone. First it would get Netware completely off the table as a competing NOS, not that it has been much lately, but there are still a lot of Netware installations out there. And two, it would get them into the Linux world with one of the best distros around, which also happens to be one of the corporate favorites. A grand strategy, I think, if true. This opening partnership approach might even steer them clear of antitrust entanglements during any subsequent buyout/merger.
Heh! I guess there's some money to be made, because, despite all of the criticisms, it looks like E3 is just not going to die. No one ever voluntarily leaves money on the table. And to stay competitive, the game publishers and developers will get sucked back into this new E3. LOL, same as it ever was!
Of course offshoring combat software opens a greater likelihood of threat! Duh! That doesn't mean that home grown coders won't ever betray trust either, but if we can spend billions of dollars on rockets and bombs, then surely we can spend what it takes to use our own developers to write and test combat software! The very thought of important defense software being written in foreign countries, that may or may not remain friendly, is patently absurd. There are just some things you should do for yourself.
Maybe it is just a PR stunt, or maybe they really are starting to think that doing business in oppressive countries isn't really a profitable proposition after all. Moralism aside, it is probably difficult to make money in any country where the rule of law is not consistently respected. The problem of piracy is well known in China. But there is also the problem of an increasingly oppressive government that wants to restrict the access their citizens have to information and the tools to share that information with others. That could bring regulations and a capriciousness, that makes doing business there more difficult and unpredictable than it is worth. And there is always the specter of negative press back home with the potential to affect the bottom line. Maybe adding all of this up dispelled the illusion of huge profits to be made in China.
First, I think that it's a good idea for as many Windows users as possible to get IE7. It's a good update for a number of reasons. But anyone working support lines is going to have their hands full, because it is different enough (at least the way it installed on my systems) that most Windows users are going to be traumatized. Really, most Windows users don't think of IE as a web browser, IE is the Internet. When IE7 is installed, their "Internet" is going to be broken in ways that will scare and annoy many of them and send them reaching for the telephone.
I guess it's official then, end of the line for Windows XP except for patches until end of life. By 2008, Jane Consumer will have bought a new PC with Vista on it, or won't even care if some post-PC device is providing the desired functionality at lower cost and greater ease of use. I personally don't want to tangle with anymore XP service packs anyway. So if SP3 is canceled, it really won't matter anymore.
Nothing particularly evil about selling tutorials or strategy guides. Just let the market decide. If these online guides are worth anything, then people will buy, if not, they won't. It'll be interesting to see how these online guides develop in the console world and if the games begin to be built with hooks for the optional guides that will allow the player to easily try out what he/she just learned. No one wants to be nickel and dimed to death, but if the guides add real value and aren't just a cynical afterthought, then good things could be ahead.
This probably refers to the Japanese term, bishonen, which means "beautiful boy". Just think of Orlando Bloom who plays Legolas in the LotR movies. You'll also see this in Japanese RPGs such as the Final Fantasy series. I guess some guys are too macho to play as bishonen, eh?
Too bad for Lik-Sang. They sold a lot of cool stuff and was definitely near the top of the list if you wanted to import consoles or games. While one can understand Sony's behaviour from a certain point of view, it still seems really odd to go after a company that actively promotes their products. If Sony is in such bad shape, that the perceived losses due to Lik-Sang's activities are significant to them, then I wonder if the end of Lik-Sang is a prelude to the end of Sony if the PS3 transition goes poorly. Just how close to the edge of failure is Sony? Will Korean archrival Samsung come in and buy what's left if Sony totally tanks? Yeah, that Samsung part is total wild outta the a** speculation, but it is widely known that Sony is not in the best of shape.
I started using IE7 this morning, and so far it's pretty good for the usual stuff I do. I'm not planning to stop using Firefox regularly, but at least for those times I must use IE, it won't suck so badly anymore. IE7 seems to be pretty fast and stable on my machine relative to Firefox 1.5.7.
As a fan of green tea, I'll certainly give this a shot. But they'd probably better lay off of the calorie burning claims lest they run afoul of the FDA in the US at least. So if Red Bull gives you wings, will this drink burn your handles, (love handles that is)?
Heh! Maybe Cheaters on G4 could do a special where they follow people who are cheating on spouses/bf/gf who are addicted to WoW. Nahhh, it's only interesting if the spouse/bf/gf actually cares!
Absolutely! I think the market is going to send this to the trash bin pretty darn quick too. Tech people won't touch this stuff and those that aren't will likely flood the returns desk when they cannot play the disk after they lose the USB key. Making things harder for the end user will never sell. In the end, most consumers don't care about DRM or even know what it is, but they do know the difference between difficult and easy. Easy will win almost every time, except maybe where sex is involved.
Well it looks like EA is doing their part to kill off that pesky PC gaming once and for all. I'm sure that there is all kinds of spying going on on users during online console games, but at least none of that involves (potentially) the kinds of other private crap I have on my PC. As usual, hacks will be born to get around the spyware, but isn't anyone getting a little tired of this yet? I know I am, soon the only game I'll be playing on my PC is solitaire!
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Oh Snap! No iPods for North Korea. How embarrassing, this is the sort of thing that basically says the rest of the world is powerless to effect any sort of change in North Korea or similar countries. But that is not necessarily evidence of anything bad. Instead it is evidence that ultimately it is up to the people of those countries to effect their own regime change. It may take 5 years, 10, or 100, but it is up to them. There is little we can do other than offer moral support. The disaster in Iraq will hopefully stand as a lesson of just how not to effect change in repressive governments, but oh, wasn't Vietnam supposed to do that too?
Definitely too high. A $30 game is not going to move much with the casual crowd. Part of the reason for the success of the casual segment are the low, impulse buy range, prices of which $19.99 is usually the upper limit. Once you get out of that range, it's no longer a casual purchase. So I'd question the strategy of going to bigger budgets if it means the retail price of the games goes to more than $20.
A million sales won't be a surprise. The fun begins when/if the Wii begins to vastly outnumber the PS3s available. Ramping up really fast will no doubt attract a lot of development that doesn't want to wait around for there to be enough PS3s. This time next year may well tell the tale of who wins this round of console wars.
It's for the customer!
The first Final Fantasy game was supposed to be Hironobu Sakaguchi's last game before leaving the industry. His previous work hadn't done so well, or something like that, so he was planning to get out of the games business. Final Fantasy ended up being a big hit, and the rest is history.
With apologies to any women waiting in line, lining up for a game console is just a modern day display of good old fashioned machismo. There have always been badges of honor associated with doing physically difficult things, no matter how silly or unnecessary. Human beings have a need to test their limits, and occasionally show off to members of the (usually) opposite sex, or at least one's peers. So I say just let them have their fun!
I guess it's not really real until someone takes it apart! Now I believe!
It may be that the IT job market will pick up in the US and wages will rise again. But I don't think anyone is going to bite on this until they see it actually happening. For now, I'd advise young people to stay away from tech unless they really love it and have a backup plan.
All of the conspiracy and divide and conquer is all very fun, but seriously, Microsoft doesn't need to work that hard to make more money. The Novell deal is probably just what it looks like, a way for Microsoft to make some money from the Linux market. They don't need to destroy it or any such nonsense. Windows isn't going away any time soon, and sorry Linux isn't taking over either. But Microsoft does have to be careful of running afoul of the GPL in any case, so making deals with companies like Novell, may be a way to get a piece of the market without GPL or antitrust entanglements.
No surprises here. As long as there's no penalty for using the patent and legal system as an ATM, companies like NTP will continue to do so. Even as their patents are being found to be invalid, they continue to sue. Oh well, I guess allegedly evil companies and allegedly evil lawyers have to keep busy.
I second that. YesAsia is pretty good. But they don't carry all of the niche/techie sort of toys that Lik-Sang did like coder cables and some truly exotic console mods. I only wish I'd imported some of that stuff before they closed.
Just more crazy speculation on my part, but could this partnership be a prelude to a future Microsoft buyout of Novell? Such a buyout would kill two big birds with one stone. First it would get Netware completely off the table as a competing NOS, not that it has been much lately, but there are still a lot of Netware installations out there. And two, it would get them into the Linux world with one of the best distros around, which also happens to be one of the corporate favorites. A grand strategy, I think, if true. This opening partnership approach might even steer them clear of antitrust entanglements during any subsequent buyout/merger.
Heh! I guess there's some money to be made, because, despite all of the criticisms, it looks like E3 is just not going to die. No one ever voluntarily leaves money on the table. And to stay competitive, the game publishers and developers will get sucked back into this new E3. LOL, same as it ever was!
Of course offshoring combat software opens a greater likelihood of threat! Duh! That doesn't mean that home grown coders won't ever betray trust either, but if we can spend billions of dollars on rockets and bombs, then surely we can spend what it takes to use our own developers to write and test combat software! The very thought of important defense software being written in foreign countries, that may or may not remain friendly, is patently absurd. There are just some things you should do for yourself.
Maybe it is just a PR stunt, or maybe they really are starting to think that doing business in oppressive countries isn't really a profitable proposition after all. Moralism aside, it is probably difficult to make money in any country where the rule of law is not consistently respected. The problem of piracy is well known in China. But there is also the problem of an increasingly oppressive government that wants to restrict the access their citizens have to information and the tools to share that information with others. That could bring regulations and a capriciousness, that makes doing business there more difficult and unpredictable than it is worth. And there is always the specter of negative press back home with the potential to affect the bottom line. Maybe adding all of this up dispelled the illusion of huge profits to be made in China.
First, I think that it's a good idea for as many Windows users as possible to get IE7. It's a good update for a number of reasons. But anyone working support lines is going to have their hands full, because it is different enough (at least the way it installed on my systems) that most Windows users are going to be traumatized. Really, most Windows users don't think of IE as a web browser, IE is the Internet. When IE7 is installed, their "Internet" is going to be broken in ways that will scare and annoy many of them and send them reaching for the telephone.
I guess it's official then, end of the line for Windows XP except for patches until end of life. By 2008, Jane Consumer will have bought a new PC with Vista on it, or won't even care if some post-PC device is providing the desired functionality at lower cost and greater ease of use. I personally don't want to tangle with anymore XP service packs anyway. So if SP3 is canceled, it really won't matter anymore.
Nothing particularly evil about selling tutorials or strategy guides. Just let the market decide. If these online guides are worth anything, then people will buy, if not, they won't. It'll be interesting to see how these online guides develop in the console world and if the games begin to be built with hooks for the optional guides that will allow the player to easily try out what he/she just learned. No one wants to be nickel and dimed to death, but if the guides add real value and aren't just a cynical afterthought, then good things could be ahead.
"Bishy"?
This probably refers to the Japanese term, bishonen, which means "beautiful boy". Just think of Orlando Bloom who plays Legolas in the LotR movies. You'll also see this in Japanese RPGs such as the Final Fantasy series. I guess some guys are too macho to play as bishonen, eh?
Too bad for Lik-Sang. They sold a lot of cool stuff and was definitely near the top of the list if you wanted to import consoles or games. While one can understand Sony's behaviour from a certain point of view, it still seems really odd to go after a company that actively promotes their products. If Sony is in such bad shape, that the perceived losses due to Lik-Sang's activities are significant to them, then I wonder if the end of Lik-Sang is a prelude to the end of Sony if the PS3 transition goes poorly. Just how close to the edge of failure is Sony? Will Korean archrival Samsung come in and buy what's left if Sony totally tanks? Yeah, that Samsung part is total wild outta the a** speculation, but it is widely known that Sony is not in the best of shape.
I started using IE7 this morning, and so far it's pretty good for the usual stuff I do. I'm not planning to stop using Firefox regularly, but at least for those times I must use IE, it won't suck so badly anymore. IE7 seems to be pretty fast and stable on my machine relative to Firefox 1.5.7.
As a fan of green tea, I'll certainly give this a shot. But they'd probably better lay off of the calorie burning claims lest they run afoul of the FDA in the US at least. So if Red Bull gives you wings, will this drink burn your handles, (love handles that is)?
Heh! Maybe Cheaters on G4 could do a special where they follow people who are cheating on spouses/bf/gf who are addicted to WoW. Nahhh, it's only interesting if the spouse/bf/gf actually cares!
Absolutely! I think the market is going to send this to the trash bin pretty darn quick too. Tech people won't touch this stuff and those that aren't will likely flood the returns desk when they cannot play the disk after they lose the USB key. Making things harder for the end user will never sell. In the end, most consumers don't care about DRM or even know what it is, but they do know the difference between difficult and easy. Easy will win almost every time, except maybe where sex is involved.
Well it looks like EA is doing their part to kill off that pesky PC gaming once and for all. I'm sure that there is all kinds of spying going on on users during online console games, but at least none of that involves (potentially) the kinds of other private crap I have on my PC. As usual, hacks will be born to get around the spyware, but isn't anyone getting a little tired of this yet? I know I am, soon the only game I'll be playing on my PC is solitaire!