What about Iwata? He's been saying this for years. That is why Nintendo appears to be taking so many risks.
Or not taking risks. I mean, despite the 'revolutionary' nature of the new controller, is Nintendo doing anything crazy and dramatic like spending tons of money developing truly cutting-edge hardware and selling it at a loss? No, they're not. That would be Microsoft and Sony, as you point out. Nintendo is taking the safe position, targeting a market they know well- people who play cute, fun games to have fun, rather than be dazzled by the latest and greatest. Thus the classic games and really-its-a-game-machine-not-a-media-center focus. They'll make money for sure. Not a ton more money, but they're a mature business and they're not going to lose money, even if they lose market share.
Microsoft doesn't see the Xbox as a mature business, probably correctly, they're in near-startup-mode with the thing. Sony is unfortunate to have to compete with them, but they have bigger plans that involve ruling the next generation of HD-enabled video players. Neither of them really see a problem with making only a little money on their respective ventures when counted in terms of pure hardware sales, they both intend to make money 'selling blades', so to speak.
Where the problem is, and what Charlie here is talking about, is in the smaller development shops that can't afford to develop for PS3 and XBox360, and in the larger companies that might mistakenly make the video game equivalent of... I dunno, the DOOM movie...
The only real difference between Charlie and I ( besides that he's getting stories published and I'm just posting on slashdot ) is that I see this as more of a bit of a down cycle in a mature industry, and he sees it as another crash. Either one of us could be right... I think that in terms of pure $$, the market will actually grow towards the end of next year, and continue to grow for a bit. He's sure right that game publishers are going to continue to be under pressure for a few years, though...
I was a dev for the Atari Jaguar, project manager too.
Thanks Charlie! That's the info I didn't manage to find in my google search on you... I can see how that'd get burried under your more recent writting gigs !
However, the reason I had looked for your gaming industry job history was to get a feel for why you're so bitter and down on the industry. *Jaguar* dev, of all things, no wonder you're bitter, I would be, too ! Hell, you've *earned* that bitterness, developing a great system to see it go down in flames! That must have sucked!
Sorry Charlie, but read your own article, you do sound bitter. I'm not even saying you're wrong, really... the games market is clearly saturated everywhere with the possible exception of the very high end, and that area is seeing incredible pressure as you note, but still... I could be wrong, but I don't think we're talking about a "bust" for the industry really, so much as a leveling and consolidation period for what is now becoming a mature industry. A down period perhaps, but this is no dot-com-style crash. The games industry is a bit more mature and well-supported than that.
I suppose I should have been more clear about that and less flippant. What I meant to say is that I suspect we're seeing a cycle here where the next year or so will look a little rough, the new consoles will come out, things will pick up a bit, but smaller companies and those that make mistakes ( as you point out ) will be bought up. Then things will pick up again for a few years, then the cycle will repeat. Nothing terribly new, not even in the games industry... of course, I could easily be wrong, predicting the future is like that, but your article makes it sound like the sky is falling, when maybe it's really something a bit less dramatic...
BTW, do they let you put a link to a bio somewhere near your article ? That, or some more concrete facts ( like market sales numbers, etc ) would help keep fools like me from discounting your words to the point where we figure you're about as worthy a read as some random slashdot post...
Man, and I thought *I* was bitter... this guy is making me look happy-go-lucky by comparison.
Of course, who cares what this guy thinks? That's probably why he's so bitter... it's bad enough he's been working his whole life to become a writer, now suddenly his opinion is worth about as much as some dude on blog*.com...
I'll pay attention when more articles like this start originating from developers, project managers, and game industry execs. Oh, and when whole-dollar-sales of video games start to dip. Call me when all of that happens. Until then, can we ignore crackpots ? That'd be nice. Thanks.
Something friends with PVRs have told me is they ended up watching a lot less TV once they started using one
That is *definitely* not the case in my house. Truth be told, we probably watch about the same amount of TV we always did, if not more, and we watch for the same reason we always did - it's 'down time'. We're relaxing in the living room after dinner and want a couple of hours of mindless enterainment before bedtime.
The *only* difference with a PVR is that you're watching *exactly* what you want to watch, *exactly* when you want to watch, with the ability to fast-forward, pause, reverse and replay. That's *it*, but it makes a big difference.
I don't 'surf' anymore. I spend a lot less time watching 'most extreme building projects' and ( most regretably, I think ) random nature-shows, but I miss very few episodes of The Daily Show, South Park, The Venture Brothers, and I don't have to stay up late to see The Late Show.
For some people, especially those with limited ( read: over-the-air-broadcast ) TV choices, this may mean they watch less. On the whole, though, you watch exactly as much TV as you want, good or bad, but at least with a PVR, it's shows you *want* to watch, not just whatever happens to be on at the time.
I wouldn't recommend buying one to anybody else until PS3 comes out and MS drops the price of the console. Also, there is no killer-app that's worth the price, and graphics aren't any better than what you would get from a well-equiped PC.
Dude. Thank you. Seriously. You've just justified every thought and every discussion I've ever had about why I'm not rushing out to buy one of these.
Ya, right, intended effect to create a buz... wtf does that mean? Why wouldn't they put out as many xbox 360's as they could? Does this make any sense to you?
Fake shortages happen *all the time*, and in this case, one has been predicted, and makes sense to a *lot* of people. It's fully orchestrated.
I'd give you more links, but I trust you can google "Xbox 360 sell out" and related phrases yourself. Microsoft has themselves stated that they'll have a small initial supply and release *small* shipments. They could have started with a large supply, and could rapidly ramp up production ( as long as they have enough parts, I suppose ), but they've purposely choosen not to follow that route.
Frankly, it's *exactly* what Sony did for the PS2 launch, and Microsoft has taken that winning play from Sony's playbook.
Stuff like this happens all the time, particularly in manufacturing of high-end items, and this is just one more example.
I don't know, maybe it didn't work... has there been an buzz about the Xbox360 today?;-)
the idea that Sony didn't know what the software actually did makes things worse.
More to the point, they *could* have known, and *should* have known, but the fact seems to be that they just don't *care*.
I mean, if users don't know what rootkits are, why should Sony care if their DRM uses one? That's their opinion, really!
They're interested in cutting down on copying of CDs using computers. First4Internet had a package that would do it. Done deal. How much did Sony Music poke under the hood of the copy-protection package they bought? Probably releasing it on such a limited number of discs was their idea of "testing" it.
Fortran consistently outbenchmarks C in numerical applications. One reason is, the compiler can optimize more aggressively in the absence of pointer aliasing. Fortran doesn't have pointers.
The guy using pointers in seriously time-sensitive numerical computation loops should be strung up anyway. My C code can be optimized pretty aggressively as long as I use fix-length data structures, as Fortran is limited to.
. C is banned in some numerical shops because it has earned a reputation for resulting in code that engineers can't maintain.
Is that *really* the reason, not just the justification? These shops obviously haven't seen the poorly written, convoluted, uncommented Fortran routines I've seen... or they're FORTRAN experts looking to protect their turf, most likely...
Don't get me wrong, FORTRAN is fine for many uses, but it's neither portable nor easy to maintain, and it's performance benefits have been way over-hyped, at least in my own personal benchmarking experience. Fill two fixed-length arrays with doubles and multiply them, it's going to be just as fast whichever language you write the routine in, and the I/O is going to be a hell of a lot easier to code ( and friendlier to the user ) using C libraries... if I/O doesn't matter to you, then fine, use FORTRAN, just don't hire me to maintain it...
still haven't seen any statement from Sony that would lead me to believe they were entirely ignorant and if they were that's still an issue.
Well, they have made statements that they were just using third-party software and didn't really *care* or think the consumers would *care* what the software did... and I guess that's sort of the point, if they knew or not, they didn't care...
I'm not saying it was one person acting as a lone wolf... I said it was one person in charge, as it always is, giving general marching orders like "get some sort of strong DRM on our CDs, people are copying them like crazy!" and not wanting, in typical pointy-haired-boss fashion, to be bothered with the details.
I do think it's *possible* that, since we're talking about the music division here, nobody really understood what First4's software actually *did*... I don't think they cared to know. No idea if that's what really happened, and either way, there is *definitely* still an issue here. Apparently, since they're offering to replace the discs, they now are aware of that. All of those lawsuits and all of that bad press probably helped drive the message home.
In short, people will wait for the next-gen offerings from Nintendo and Sony.
You're not kidding. Heck, my PS2 still has a lot of good game-hours left in it. I'm likely to wait until well *after* the PS3 has been our for a while, check out the offerings and value among the competing next-gen packages, and pick up a system in *2007*, after it's easier to determine where the best games and value can be found.
I can wait...
If initial reports and prices on ebay are any true indicator, people might have to wait anyway if they don't already have an Xbox360 in hand... between a planned sell-out and possibly intentional small supply over the holidays, it's not looking likely that you'll be walking into some mega store and picking one of these up before the new year...
When I checked this auction, with 2 minutes to go, the Xbox360 premium package was bid up to $2550.
http://cgi.ebay.com/Microsoft-Xbox-360-Premium-Pac k-Game-console-NEW_W0QQitemZ8234635572QQcategoryZ6 2054QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
I'm in complete and total shock. I would have never pictured myself saying this, but I wish I had pre-ordered an Xbox360... so I could sell it on eBay and more than quadruple my money in one day !
WTF?!? I mean... they're going to make more... you have to pay $2000 extra to have it *now*?!? That doesn't even include a fricking game!!!
If true, this fits right in with the whole "Apple uses Intel", "Dell uses AMD" twilight zone we've entered... oh, wait... Dell isn't using AMD, and probably this isn't going to mean we can all write code to read Office documents, either...
It'd be nice if someone in Redmond realized that this whole closed document format thing is costing them too much in ill will, though. That would be smart... funny how we're all skeptical about this here. We'll see...
ou can't tell me that the dev that made the software and the legal department didn't know what was going on.
I'm sure the dev that made the software knew what was going on, but he didn't work for Sony. He worked for First4Internet. So some scumbag marketing guy sold some scumbag music-division head at Sony this magic software that keeps people from copying CDs. Nobody involved in the sale cared if somebody got their machine rooted when they put a CD in it, WTF are you putting a music CD in a computer for anyway, in their opinion...
I'm not excusing Sony here. They're dumbasses, to be *charitable*. Still, it is plausable in this case that the Sony Music boss scumbag was just clueless enough that he didn't call over to Sony Computer and have someone with half a brain check out this third-party product. He's not going to know what a rootkit is and the First4 salesjerk sure as hell isn't going to mention it if he does know.
I mean, the guy who signed the contract with First4 and put the order in to have the discs pressed is a music industry hack, is he going to ask for someone else's opinion? Not bloody likely.
And before you ask Dave, no, I'm not a Sony fanboy, I despise their music strategy and their DRM policies are almost as bad as Microsoft and Intel together...
And you can fuck off with the "fanboi" shit as I do not have one on pre-order and may not pick one up until Xmas or so and putting a smiley at the end of your post doesn't make it any less insulting.
Wow, testy... nice attitude. You may choose to take the smiley as not making it any less insulting, but it's meant to signify that what was written is a JOKE...
If you decide that said joke is a little too close too home and decide to be a jerk about it, that's your business, and maybe the JOKE *did* just hit a little too close to home...
Other than the;-), what do you want me to write to more politely ask if maybe you might not be an Xbox fanboy, which MIGHT I ADD, I find *nothing* wrong with... be a fanboy for Apple, Microsoft, Sony, Open Source, whatever you want, just admit it freely when it's the case, and when it's not and you find yourself accused, say "no, I don't think I quite fit the bill, because I think the { iMac, XBox, PS3, Linux, etc } lacks ------".
No need to be a dick, Dave. Really, I just wanted to see if you knew if USB drives could be read on the damn thing, honest...
actually I also wrote out "joke people, not flaimbait !" at which point you proceed to light up your flamethrower...
on the serious side, I ( and apparently a few other folks on this forum ) have never even heard of the video you mentioned, and you seem to know a lot about this Microsoft Connect thing and the Xbox, sooo... it's not a stretch to accuse you of knowing a lot of positive things about the Xbox ( which pretty much yea, makes you a fanboy ), not that it's a bad thing to be, if you are, which sheeesh I guess you aren't... except to look at your post history, you might be after all... you might at least be a Microsoft fanboy if not specifically an Xbox fanboy... and if you want to flame me for that, go ahead, but look at your own frickin' post history before you do, and think about how it looks to someone who doesn't know you.
That explains a lot. This thing goes on forever. I was worried that someone had just way, way, way too much free time.
Of course it's ancient. It talks about FORTRAN... probably the best bit in the whole thing. "Write all your code in FORTRAN."
For what it's worth, as much as this is a joke, it does appear to be what a number of government contractors and research scientists do, if they do it to secure their jobs or not I don't know...
you don't need a Media Center PC all you need is Windows Media Connect.
But you do need a PC running Windows XP...
You've seen a video of an Xbox360 connected to an iPod? You went out of your way to download it? You've had your 360 on pre-order for *how* long ? Just sign your posts "love, Xbox fanboy"...;-) humor, not flamebait, people... there's nothing wrong with liking the Xbox360, it *is* the first HD game system on the market, that *should* count for something, even if the launch titles are a bit weak and not all of them terribly Hi-Def... we've got to *expect* any advanced network interoperablity to be WinXP-only, it *is* after all a Microsoft product...
but, why not actually answer the parent post's critique? Can you just plug a USB hard drive or memory stick containing a bunch of mp3s and mpgs into an XBox and play them, or not?
All of this boils down to why I should rush out and get one and certainly doesn't apply to everyone else.
Precisely. Frankly, I don't see the urgency. Maybe I don't know just *how* behind the times your PC is, but really, maybe it shows my "meh, graphics aren't all that" bias, but... I'm going to happily play PS2 games for the next year and a half, honestly. Will I be a little jealous if I go to a friend's house and they're playing sweet-looking games on a $2000+ PC or an XBox360 or ( later next year ) a PS3 ? Sure I will. Will it kill me? Not even close.
while there isn't one of them which is big enough reason to get the xbox alone, put them together and they are.
Granted. Again, my big point was... folks who are pretty certain to not want to buy both consoles are very, very likely to wait until the PS3 comes out, *unless* there's some killer feature set which makes lots of non-Xbox-owners want to get an Xbox360. I don't think you should really care much what other folks are buying, *unless* you're trying to foolishly predict the future buying habits of millions of individuals... if you're say, trying to figure out what will sell more, PS3s or Xbox360s.
Then, you might want to ask... who is buying an Xbox360 before the PS3 comes out? Will that group also maybe buy a PS3 ?
Thanks for the answer. After looking at your post history, I was afraid it wouldn't be as cool and reasonable as it is.
I want to be able to play console games online.
I'm only vaguely interested in online console gameplay; if a game isn't great without online play, I'm never sure the unevenness of online play will make it fundamentally better... plus, if it costs more monthly/yearly, I'm just not interested.
Better graphics are always a plus.
I agree, but clearly, that's not the real reason you're looking at a new console, is it?
The PS2 makes one crappy DVD player, and my other dvd player broke, so that'll be good too.
Somehow, I'm going to guess that a nice less than $100 player is going to be a better DVD player than an Xbox. Just a guess, really, but still... hardly a reason to get an Xbox360, is it?
I also want to use it to play music files and stream video from my PC to my big screen TV. Why is that suprising?
Because if that was really a big deal to you, you'd already be doing it, since there are products which do that? I've just never heard anyone outside of MS talk about this being a big Xbox feature. How well does that work?
I'm completely sick of PC gaming.
Ok... I came to the same realization and started playing more *PS2* games... not a terribly pro-Xbox360 argument...
I'd take Morrowind, KOTOR, and KOTOR2 over the collection of RPGs available for the PS2. I also like racing games
Personal taste, I guess, don't know those games and not big on RPGs myself, but OK...
I might end up getting the PS3 too.
Ah! Ok, well, now I understand...
HDTV is huge for me. My PS2 just looks sad on my new TV.
Yep. Now I understand completely. What's more, I fully support your decision. If your bank account isn't hurting from buying a nice HDTV, by all means, run out and buy an Xbox360, buy an Xbox Live subscription, buy a few games, and let us all know how it goes. Then, later next year, feel free to pick up a PS3 as well. I salute your ability to just spend, spend, spend on a whim. Good for you.
My point was and is that a *large* percentage of the market lacks the resources to think that way. My PS2 looks better than most signal sources on *my* TV. I'm not about to spend the cash to wire ( or wireless ) my house just so I can play online games from the bedroom or livingroom, and frankly, I'm not going to spend extra cash monthly to play online games, period. Like most people, I barely have time to watch all the crap I Tivo ( or the NetFlix DVDs I get ); the few videos I get off the internet, I'm *fine* watching those on my PC; most of them I can't save to the hard drive easily anyway. I have MP3 players and other solutions for listening to music... I don't see a need for my game machine to do that. Besides, I'm not running WinXP, so I'm sure to be cut out of whatever functionality Microsoft has lined up there anyway.
To me, your list of reasons for wanting an Xbox360 boils down to one thing: you have the cash, so why not ?!? Indeed. I agree. Why not.
But that puts you in the don't-have-anything-better-to-do-with-my-money crowd I mentioned earlier; I don't know if you've noticed, but it's an increasingly smaller crowd these days. My buddies and I are saving our pennies and will ( later ) buy the console that does what we want ( plays fun games, supports HD really well, whatever )... and you, by your own admission, may end up buying both consoles, just because they'll both have good games you'll want to play. Sony can still screw things up for themselves, as most folks probably haven't made a decision and won't until they see both consoles, but I didn't see you list here the reason(s) why everyone should be running out to buy a 360, or the reason why it will dominate the next-gen console market.
Everyone should check out this clown's post history...
Ooooh, good point. I almost feel sorry that I responded to him. For those of you without time to look, it's:
- xbox fanboy rant - slam on Nintendo Revolution fan - "OpenDocument in no way benefits me, as I've tried using Open Office and would only use it as a last resort, and I've never had a problem with incompatibility between version of MS Office. " ( direct quote; this topic contains a lot of belittling MS-bashing, defending Word document format lock-in, etc ) - defending shortness of Xbox360 release title list and sport-title-heavyness... - Sony's DRM is worst than MS DRM "Yeah, they've created plenty of DRM technology, but they aren't trying to stop people from using more reasonable file formats." - talking about how PS2 owners don't buy console add-ons or play online much, implying Xbox owners all play online ( when it's really like 10% that do ) - "Microsoft can do just fine even if the Japanese don't care about the console"
That's it other than this latest "I don't own and Xbox but I'm very excited about the 360!"... yet he knows a *lot* about Xbox games for someone who doesn't own one, doesn't he?
This makes it hard for him to argue he's not just either an MS fanboy or Xbox shill, doesn't it, when your only areas of interest/expertise are protecting the world from Microsoft-bashers and defending the future of the Xbox360 ?? Why even read Slashdot, since you hate it so??
In fairness, maybe he has other interests and this is just the sore spot as of late, but it looks a bit dodgy, eh?
Please tell me you aren't judging the interest based on posters on slashdot.
Dude. I would never do that. Half of these fools thought the iPod would be a total flop. Seriously. To read this forum you'd think the Gamecube was like, totally a great console, but who on earth would buy a console anyway when you can play games under WINE?Why play anything other than Netcraft anyway?
No dude, that's not me, and I *don't* think the 360 is going to tank. I'm just not sure it's going to totally dominate, and I'm not sure it's super-great, and I'm not sure a ton of non-Xbox-owning guys like yourself are going to rush out and buy these before the PS3 comes out.
A lot of people might rush out and buy an Xbox after the PS3 comes out ( maybe the Xbox price drops or is just cheaper or the PS3 is really late or underwhelming or includes lame DRM-type restrictions ), but that remains to be seen. There are plenty of ways for this to go badly for Sony. Maybe they'll be crushed in some sort of unrelated anti-DRM backlash.
Maybe it is the case that more gamers fit the teen "daddy's going to buy me a 360 just like he buys me anything else I ask for" crowd and the "I have nothing better to spend my money/time on" crowd, and the Xbox will get some sort of insane head start that'll make things really, really hard for the PS3. I think it's going to be a lot more balanced; people who are running out to buy a 360 now will also strongly consider a PS3 ( as well ) when it comes out, but people who put off the decision ( like me ) and buy only *one* of the two consoles, those people will crown the 'winner'... and even the 'loser' will come away with a good, solid percentage of the market and a good game-sales market.
All I was saying is that I'm not seeing a ton of guys ( like you ) who have no Xbox and are really excited about the 360. Just one datapoint, and one fairly isolated from the teenage crowd that I believe is the target of 360 marketing... I mentioned that I'm not really willing to draw too wide a conclusion from my viewpoint on this... but I do watch a little G4 and read a little gamer press, and after filtering out a little Xbox fanboyism and product placement, the excitement factor doesn't seem off-the-scale... again, just one data point, I could be wrong...
but tell me... what has you excited about the 360? Is it just better graphics, and are they really that much better?? Are you bored with your current console and game selection, and see something in the current ( or future ) Xbox lineup that's really compelling, or is it just graphics ? Don't tell me you're excited about Xbox Live, or using your 360 to play music or something... are you ? What is so compelling about the 360 that I seem to be missing? Really, I'm curious, because I *am* missing it... I see no reason not to wait until well after the PS3 release to decide what to buy.
Tell you what... I'll boycott Sony's MUSIC and maybe VIDEO products, how does that sound?
Oh, wait, I almost forgot. I boycott ALL "copy-protected" CDs already. If there's a copy-protected CD that I want, I'll purposely avoid buying it and go download it from some gnutella network or something like that... or just live without it. Everyone needs to consistently boycott copy-protected CDs, that's the moral of this story, really.
Honestly, I think that should do the trick. These divisions within Sony are just that- separate corporate divisions. If the music publishing portion were to actually become *unprofitable*, I somehow doubt that money would be siphoned off of the gaming, computer and electronics divisions to prop it up, *especially* not the gaming division just now. If consumers keep punishing the *bad* behaviors of corporations, and rewarding the *good* behaviors, eventually maybe they'll get the message and only the *good* will remain. Or they'll slowly become unprofitable.
In short, I might go for a boycott of Sony Music and maybe even Sony Pictures, but as evil as this is, I'm going to keep buying PS2 games, and I wouldn't let this whole mess stop me from buying a Viao or PSP ( not that I'm about to; I'd sooner buy an iBook and a NDS ).
I've noticed the same thing as you, none of my friends are very excited about the 360. There doesn't seem to be much buzz surrounding it. Personally I think it is because all the games are just sequels, more of the same but with fancier graphics.
Here's my take: people are still pretty satisfied with the consoles and games that they have. This console, while perhaps a bit flashier in the graphics department, isn't a *lot* flashier ( especially depending on which game you're looking at ). There's no "gotta have it" buzz or coolness factor to catch those of us who aren't in the "big fan, going to pre-order it no matter what, it's new, have to be the first on the block to have it" crowd.
There are a good number of people in the gotta-have-it-now-because-it's-new crowd, more than enough to snap up all of this first wave of 360s and give MS some good "we sold out" marketing spin, I guess... but the reality is that a very, very large number of fairly serious gamers are just going to wait... we're going to wait until the PS3 is out, look at the competing game lineups, find demo models ( or friend's consoles ) to sit down and play a few games, and *then* we'll decide which console to get. Maybe next christmas... or even the christmas after that, for those of us who don't have HD sets and have fresh memories of buying consoles at $300+ which later droped to less than $150...
Personally, it'll take me a while to buy and play all of the PS2 games I want; I'm not in a rush to run out and buy a very expensive console which takes only very expensive games.
I'm trying to be cautious not over-generalize based on my view and that of those I know; I'm now into buying older/cheaper games, so maybe I'm not very representative of the target market, but then again... maybe there are more and more players fitting my profile, which could explain the trouble the industry has been having growing sales as of late.
It'll be interesting to see what happens, but it does look a tad troubling for microsoft that those really interested in the 360 already have an Xbox. For this to be the runaway success that they'd like, a bunch of people who currently don't have an Xbox need to be really excited about it... and I'm not seeing that...
That I've been accused of falling prey to religious nuts for merely trying to point the discussion where should be is quite telling, and frankly, annoying.
Then answer the question! Do you have religious motivation to defend I.D., or are you atheist/buddist/FSMist/newAgeist/whatever ???
And that's a *very* cogent point; if you're not backing some religious view, ( actually, a specifically Christian religious view ) you are *not* going to find yourself backing I.D. That's a very, very telling *fact*, and you shouldn't ignore it- you should take it to heart, and at least have the guts to stand up and say "yes, I believe in the story of Genesis as told in the Bible and that's part of why I think I.D. is a valid theory". If you don't have that faith in your convictions and religious beliefs, then I have a hard time respecting you intellectually... because on it's own merits, there's very little to I.D.
Nice straw man with the "eye" example - nobody has seriously used that in quite some time.
Ok, so the eye was a straw man ( I honestly wasn't aware of that... when did the I.D. guys take that as a defeat? I saw it used here less than a month ago )... so, what's the new thing? The eye seemed like a pretty good candidate... and most other things, the heart, limbs, etc... they all seem more straightforward... what's supposed to be irreducibly complex? or, if
all of the supposed counter-examples can be refuted, or are at best inconclusive
then what's the point you're trying to make by bringing that up as the most serious 'scientific' leg of I.D.? It sounds like I.D. is pretty hard to defend scientifically, doesn't it? Why are you trying?
I'm sick of the uninformed masses denouncing an idea they don't even comprehend just because of who supports it. Reject it for the evidence; don't reject it because of its implications.
a) sometimes who supports an idea *is* important, and can tell you a lot about the possible result of adopting the idea.
b) what about the informed masses denouncing an idea they do comprehend ? It's only the I.D. folks who are trying to make the evidence and theories sound *really* complicated... the evidence is pretty hard and easy to demonstrate, and I'm willing to bet that well over 25% of the general public grasp the concepts, which, for science, is a pretty large number. Personally, I've tried really, really, really hard to look for solid evidence behind I.D., and I'm afraid it just doesn't seem to be there, as much as I might like it to be.
C) do you think people would reject an idea just because it proved the existence of some sort of deity?!? Are you kidding? As unsettling as it'd be to find that there is a god that just doesn't seem to mind us starting wars, etc, it'd be one of the most awesome discoveries of all times, and we'd all love it ! Well, most of us would, anyway. It'd be like finding aliens, or perpetual motion, only even cooler...
Unfortunately, the simple fact is that I.D. is just some wealthy religous guys blowing smoke to try to get religious views taught as science in U.S. schools, and nothing more... and that's sad, because if mom and dad want to teach their kid about Genesis, that kid should be going to Sunday School already. And other kids? They don't need that teaching from the state, m'kay?
In the long run, this *is* really all about trying to get religious views are taught in public schools, isn't it?
ID claims to have found irreducably complex systems. (I'm not about to discuss whether they've got the goods or not.) An irreducably complex system is logically inconsistent with everything that has ever been said about materialistic evolution. This is very much a scientific discussion, even if much of the public discourse isn't.
Look, clearly you've bought what the ID folks are selling ( and again I ask, honestly, have you bought into this in part due to your religious views? ), so it's not productive for me to spend much more time arguing this with you, *but*...
this whole "irreducably complex systems" argument? It's totally bullshit, and, no matter what someone with some sort of degree said on TV, *not* 'inconsistent with everything'... 'about evolution'... microevolution, maybe, but not really. The key example the ID gang likes to talk about is the eye. Really, there *are* rudimentary eyes, and slightly more advanced eyes with only 'cones', and really, it's not clear why they think the eye is so 'irreducably complex' that it means, uh, someone must have designed it... that's a hell of a conclusion to reach from "boy, this is a complex organ".
Really, their argument is a little like "all the atoms in this crystal are lined up *exactly* in a matrix formation! That's too weird. It *must* have been arranged that way by an intelligent being!". Which of course ignores the possibility that more basic self-organizing properties of matter are at work...
To summarize: of course they'd say yes, they have proof. Any scrutiny of that 'proof' shows that, really, they have nothing. We all have to determine if they 'have the goods', and after reviewing the evidence, even *they* know they don't have the goods ( check the science journals if you want ), they're just trying to make it look like there's some doubt about evolutionary theory so they can introduce their own religious-based pseudo-pseudoscientific ( I call it that because it tries to be pseudoscience ) ideas taught as "science".
If they weren't all about obviously pushing a religious agenda, it'd be more difficult to figure out what's going on, but let's face it... these I.D. folks? Easy-to-spot religous nuts, funded by and founded by well-known religious nuts. Not scientists. People with an agenda. Not people concerned with your children learning about science. If you're fooled, you wanted to be, or you weren't really paying attention...
Slashdot Mirror
Or not taking risks. I mean, despite the 'revolutionary' nature of the new controller, is Nintendo doing anything crazy and dramatic like spending tons of money developing truly cutting-edge hardware and selling it at a loss? No, they're not. That would be Microsoft and Sony, as you point out. Nintendo is taking the safe position, targeting a market they know well- people who play cute, fun games to have fun, rather than be dazzled by the latest and greatest. Thus the classic games and really-its-a-game-machine-not-a-media-center focus. They'll make money for sure. Not a ton more money, but they're a mature business and they're not going to lose money, even if they lose market share.
Microsoft doesn't see the Xbox as a mature business, probably correctly, they're in near-startup-mode with the thing. Sony is unfortunate to have to compete with them, but they have bigger plans that involve ruling the next generation of HD-enabled video players. Neither of them really see a problem with making only a little money on their respective ventures when counted in terms of pure hardware sales, they both intend to make money 'selling blades', so to speak.
Where the problem is, and what Charlie here is talking about, is in the smaller development shops that can't afford to develop for PS3 and XBox360, and in the larger companies that might mistakenly make the video game equivalent of... I dunno, the DOOM movie...
The only real difference between Charlie and I ( besides that he's getting stories published and I'm just posting on slashdot ) is that I see this as more of a bit of a down cycle in a mature industry, and he sees it as another crash. Either one of us could be right... I think that in terms of pure $$, the market will actually grow towards the end of next year, and continue to grow for a bit. He's sure right that game publishers are going to continue to be under pressure for a few years, though...
Thanks Charlie! That's the info I didn't manage to find in my google search on you... I can see how that'd get burried under your more recent writting gigs !
However, the reason I had looked for your gaming industry job history was to get a feel for why you're so bitter and down on the industry. *Jaguar* dev, of all things, no wonder you're bitter, I would be, too ! Hell, you've *earned* that bitterness, developing a great system to see it go down in flames! That must have sucked!
Sorry Charlie, but read your own article, you do sound bitter. I'm not even saying you're wrong, really... the games market is clearly saturated everywhere with the possible exception of the very high end, and that area is seeing incredible pressure as you note, but still... I could be wrong, but I don't think we're talking about a "bust" for the industry really, so much as a leveling and consolidation period for what is now becoming a mature industry. A down period perhaps, but this is no dot-com-style crash. The games industry is a bit more mature and well-supported than that.
I suppose I should have been more clear about that and less flippant. What I meant to say is that I suspect we're seeing a cycle here where the next year or so will look a little rough, the new consoles will come out, things will pick up a bit, but smaller companies and those that make mistakes ( as you point out ) will be bought up. Then things will pick up again for a few years, then the cycle will repeat. Nothing terribly new, not even in the games industry... of course, I could easily be wrong, predicting the future is like that, but your article makes it sound like the sky is falling, when maybe it's really something a bit less dramatic...
BTW, do they let you put a link to a bio somewhere near your article ? That, or some more concrete facts ( like market sales numbers, etc ) would help keep fools like me from discounting your words to the point where we figure you're about as worthy a read as some random slashdot post...
Of course, who cares what this guy thinks? That's probably why he's so bitter... it's bad enough he's been working his whole life to become a writer, now suddenly his opinion is worth about as much as some dude on blog*.com...
I'll pay attention when more articles like this start originating from developers, project managers, and game industry execs. Oh, and when whole-dollar-sales of video games start to dip. Call me when all of that happens. Until then, can we ignore crackpots ? That'd be nice. Thanks.
That is *definitely* not the case in my house. Truth be told, we probably watch about the same amount of TV we always did, if not more, and we watch for the same reason we always did - it's 'down time'. We're relaxing in the living room after dinner and want a couple of hours of mindless enterainment before bedtime.
The *only* difference with a PVR is that you're watching *exactly* what you want to watch, *exactly* when you want to watch, with the ability to fast-forward, pause, reverse and replay. That's *it*, but it makes a big difference.
I don't 'surf' anymore. I spend a lot less time watching 'most extreme building projects' and ( most regretably, I think ) random nature-shows, but I miss very few episodes of The Daily Show, South Park, The Venture Brothers, and I don't have to stay up late to see The Late Show.
For some people, especially those with limited ( read: over-the-air-broadcast ) TV choices, this may mean they watch less. On the whole, though, you watch exactly as much TV as you want, good or bad, but at least with a PVR, it's shows you *want* to watch, not just whatever happens to be on at the time.
Dude. Thank you. Seriously. You've just justified every thought and every discussion I've ever had about why I'm not rushing out to buy one of these.
Fake shortages happen *all the time*, and in this case, one has been predicted, and makes sense to a *lot* of people. It's fully orchestrated.
I'd give you more links, but I trust you can google "Xbox 360 sell out" and related phrases yourself. Microsoft has themselves stated that they'll have a small initial supply and release *small* shipments. They could have started with a large supply, and could rapidly ramp up production ( as long as they have enough parts, I suppose ), but they've purposely choosen not to follow that route.
Frankly, it's *exactly* what Sony did for the PS2 launch, and Microsoft has taken that winning play from Sony's playbook.
Stuff like this happens all the time, particularly in manufacturing of high-end items, and this is just one more example.
I don't know, maybe it didn't work... has there been an buzz about the Xbox360 today? ;-)
More to the point, they *could* have known, and *should* have known, but the fact seems to be that they just don't *care*.
I mean, if users don't know what rootkits are, why should Sony care if their DRM uses one? That's their opinion, really!
They're interested in cutting down on copying of CDs using computers. First4Internet had a package that would do it. Done deal. How much did Sony Music poke under the hood of the copy-protection package they bought? Probably releasing it on such a limited number of discs was their idea of "testing" it.
The guy using pointers in seriously time-sensitive numerical computation loops should be strung up anyway. My C code can be optimized pretty aggressively as long as I use fix-length data structures, as Fortran is limited to.
. C is banned in some numerical shops because it has earned a reputation for resulting in code that engineers can't maintain.
Is that *really* the reason, not just the justification? These shops obviously haven't seen the poorly written, convoluted, uncommented Fortran routines I've seen... or they're FORTRAN experts looking to protect their turf, most likely...
Don't get me wrong, FORTRAN is fine for many uses, but it's neither portable nor easy to maintain, and it's performance benefits have been way over-hyped, at least in my own personal benchmarking experience. Fill two fixed-length arrays with doubles and multiply them, it's going to be just as fast whichever language you write the routine in, and the I/O is going to be a hell of a lot easier to code ( and friendlier to the user ) using C libraries... if I/O doesn't matter to you, then fine, use FORTRAN, just don't hire me to maintain it...
Well, they have made statements that they were just using third-party software and didn't really *care* or think the consumers would *care* what the software did... and I guess that's sort of the point, if they knew or not, they didn't care...
I'm not saying it was one person acting as a lone wolf... I said it was one person in charge, as it always is, giving general marching orders like "get some sort of strong DRM on our CDs, people are copying them like crazy!" and not wanting, in typical pointy-haired-boss fashion, to be bothered with the details.
I do think it's *possible* that, since we're talking about the music division here, nobody really understood what First4's software actually *did*... I don't think they cared to know. No idea if that's what really happened, and either way, there is *definitely* still an issue here. Apparently, since they're offering to replace the discs, they now are aware of that. All of those lawsuits and all of that bad press probably helped drive the message home.
(pointing) HA HA!
You're not kidding. Heck, my PS2 still has a lot of good game-hours left in it. I'm likely to wait until well *after* the PS3 has been our for a while, check out the offerings and value among the competing next-gen packages, and pick up a system in *2007*, after it's easier to determine where the best games and value can be found.
I can wait...
If initial reports and prices on ebay are any true indicator, people might have to wait anyway if they don't already have an Xbox360 in hand... between a planned sell-out and possibly intentional small supply over the holidays, it's not looking likely that you'll be walking into some mega store and picking one of these up before the new year...
When I checked this auction, with 2 minutes to go, the Xbox360 premium package was bid up to $2550. http://cgi.ebay.com/Microsoft-Xbox-360-Premium-Pac k-Game-console-NEW_W0QQitemZ8234635572QQcategoryZ6 2054QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
I'm in complete and total shock. I would have never pictured myself saying this, but I wish I had pre-ordered an Xbox360... so I could sell it on eBay and more than quadruple my money in one day !
WTF?!? I mean... they're going to make more... you have to pay $2000 extra to have it *now*?!? That doesn't even include a fricking game!!!
It'd be nice if someone in Redmond realized that this whole closed document format thing is costing them too much in ill will, though. That would be smart... funny how we're all skeptical about this here. We'll see...
I'm sure the dev that made the software knew what was going on, but he didn't work for Sony. He worked for First4Internet. So some scumbag marketing guy sold some scumbag music-division head at Sony this magic software that keeps people from copying CDs. Nobody involved in the sale cared if somebody got their machine rooted when they put a CD in it, WTF are you putting a music CD in a computer for anyway, in their opinion...
I'm not excusing Sony here. They're dumbasses, to be *charitable*. Still, it is plausable in this case that the Sony Music boss scumbag was just clueless enough that he didn't call over to Sony Computer and have someone with half a brain check out this third-party product. He's not going to know what a rootkit is and the First4 salesjerk sure as hell isn't going to mention it if he does know.
I mean, the guy who signed the contract with First4 and put the order in to have the discs pressed is a music industry hack, is he going to ask for someone else's opinion? Not bloody likely.
And before you ask Dave, no, I'm not a Sony fanboy, I despise their music strategy and their DRM policies are almost as bad as Microsoft and Intel together...
Wow, testy... nice attitude. You may choose to take the smiley as not making it any less insulting, but it's meant to signify that what was written is a JOKE...
If you decide that said joke is a little too close too home and decide to be a jerk about it, that's your business, and maybe the JOKE *did* just hit a little too close to home...
Other than the ;-), what do you want me to write to more politely ask if maybe you might not be an Xbox fanboy, which MIGHT I ADD, I find *nothing* wrong with... be a fanboy for Apple, Microsoft, Sony, Open Source, whatever you want, just admit it freely when it's the case, and when it's not and you find yourself accused, say "no, I don't think I quite fit the bill, because I think the { iMac, XBox, PS3, Linux, etc } lacks ------".
No need to be a dick, Dave. Really, I just wanted to see if you knew if USB drives could be read on the damn thing, honest...
actually I also wrote out "joke people, not flaimbait !" at which point you proceed to light up your flamethrower...
on the serious side, I ( and apparently a few other folks on this forum ) have never even heard of the video you mentioned, and you seem to know a lot about this Microsoft Connect thing and the Xbox, sooo... it's not a stretch to accuse you of knowing a lot of positive things about the Xbox ( which pretty much yea, makes you a fanboy ), not that it's a bad thing to be, if you are, which sheeesh I guess you aren't... except to look at your post history, you might be after all... you might at least be a Microsoft fanboy if not specifically an Xbox fanboy... and if you want to flame me for that, go ahead, but look at your own frickin' post history before you do, and think about how it looks to someone who doesn't know you.
That explains a lot. This thing goes on forever. I was worried that someone had just way, way, way too much free time.
Of course it's ancient. It talks about FORTRAN... probably the best bit in the whole thing. "Write all your code in FORTRAN."
For what it's worth, as much as this is a joke, it does appear to be what a number of government contractors and research scientists do, if they do it to secure their jobs or not I don't know...
But you do need a PC running Windows XP...
You've seen a video of an Xbox360 connected to an iPod? You went out of your way to download it? You've had your 360 on pre-order for *how* long ? Just sign your posts "love, Xbox fanboy"... ;-) humor, not flamebait, people... there's nothing wrong with liking the Xbox360, it *is* the first HD game system on the market, that *should* count for something, even if the launch titles are a bit weak and not all of them terribly Hi-Def... we've got to *expect* any advanced network interoperablity to be WinXP-only, it *is* after all a Microsoft product...
but, why not actually answer the parent post's critique? Can you just plug a USB hard drive or memory stick containing a bunch of mp3s and mpgs into an XBox and play them, or not?
Precisely. Frankly, I don't see the urgency. Maybe I don't know just *how* behind the times your PC is, but really, maybe it shows my "meh, graphics aren't all that" bias, but... I'm going to happily play PS2 games for the next year and a half, honestly. Will I be a little jealous if I go to a friend's house and they're playing sweet-looking games on a $2000+ PC or an XBox360 or ( later next year ) a PS3 ? Sure I will. Will it kill me? Not even close.
while there isn't one of them which is big enough reason to get the xbox alone, put them together and they are.
Granted. Again, my big point was... folks who are pretty certain to not want to buy both consoles are very, very likely to wait until the PS3 comes out, *unless* there's some killer feature set which makes lots of non-Xbox-owners want to get an Xbox360. I don't think you should really care much what other folks are buying, *unless* you're trying to foolishly predict the future buying habits of millions of individuals... if you're say, trying to figure out what will sell more, PS3s or Xbox360s.
Then, you might want to ask... who is buying an Xbox360 before the PS3 comes out? Will that group also maybe buy a PS3 ?
I want to be able to play console games online.
I'm only vaguely interested in online console gameplay; if a game isn't great without online play, I'm never sure the unevenness of online play will make it fundamentally better... plus, if it costs more monthly/yearly, I'm just not interested.
Better graphics are always a plus.
I agree, but clearly, that's not the real reason you're looking at a new console, is it?
The PS2 makes one crappy DVD player, and my other dvd player broke, so that'll be good too.
Somehow, I'm going to guess that a nice less than $100 player is going to be a better DVD player than an Xbox. Just a guess, really, but still... hardly a reason to get an Xbox360, is it?
I also want to use it to play music files and stream video from my PC to my big screen TV. Why is that suprising?
Because if that was really a big deal to you, you'd already be doing it, since there are products which do that? I've just never heard anyone outside of MS talk about this being a big Xbox feature. How well does that work?
I'm completely sick of PC gaming.
Ok... I came to the same realization and started playing more *PS2* games... not a terribly pro-Xbox360 argument...
I'd take Morrowind, KOTOR, and KOTOR2 over the collection of RPGs available for the PS2. I also like racing games
Personal taste, I guess, don't know those games and not big on RPGs myself, but OK...
I might end up getting the PS3 too.
Ah! Ok, well, now I understand...
HDTV is huge for me. My PS2 just looks sad on my new TV.
Yep. Now I understand completely. What's more, I fully support your decision. If your bank account isn't hurting from buying a nice HDTV, by all means, run out and buy an Xbox360, buy an Xbox Live subscription, buy a few games, and let us all know how it goes. Then, later next year, feel free to pick up a PS3 as well. I salute your ability to just spend, spend, spend on a whim. Good for you.
My point was and is that a *large* percentage of the market lacks the resources to think that way. My PS2 looks better than most signal sources on *my* TV. I'm not about to spend the cash to wire ( or wireless ) my house just so I can play online games from the bedroom or livingroom, and frankly, I'm not going to spend extra cash monthly to play online games, period. Like most people, I barely have time to watch all the crap I Tivo ( or the NetFlix DVDs I get ); the few videos I get off the internet, I'm *fine* watching those on my PC; most of them I can't save to the hard drive easily anyway. I have MP3 players and other solutions for listening to music... I don't see a need for my game machine to do that. Besides, I'm not running WinXP, so I'm sure to be cut out of whatever functionality Microsoft has lined up there anyway.
To me, your list of reasons for wanting an Xbox360 boils down to one thing: you have the cash, so why not ?!? Indeed. I agree. Why not.
But that puts you in the don't-have-anything-better-to-do-with-my-money crowd I mentioned earlier; I don't know if you've noticed, but it's an increasingly smaller crowd these days. My buddies and I are saving our pennies and will ( later ) buy the console that does what we want ( plays fun games, supports HD really well, whatever )... and you, by your own admission, may end up buying both consoles, just because they'll both have good games you'll want to play. Sony can still screw things up for themselves, as most folks probably haven't made a decision and won't until they see both consoles, but I didn't see you list here the reason(s) why everyone should be running out to buy a 360, or the reason why it will dominate the next-gen console market.
Ooooh, good point. I almost feel sorry that I responded to him. For those of you without time to look, it's :
- xbox fanboy rant
- slam on Nintendo Revolution fan
- "OpenDocument in no way benefits me, as I've tried using Open Office and would only use it as a last resort, and I've never had a problem with incompatibility between version of MS Office. " ( direct quote; this topic contains a lot of belittling MS-bashing, defending Word document format lock-in, etc )
- defending shortness of Xbox360 release title list and sport-title-heavyness...
- Sony's DRM is worst than MS DRM "Yeah, they've created plenty of DRM technology, but they aren't trying to stop people from using more reasonable file formats."
- talking about how PS2 owners don't buy console add-ons or play online much, implying Xbox owners all play online ( when it's really like 10% that do )
- "Microsoft can do just fine even if the Japanese don't care about the console"
That's it other than this latest "I don't own and Xbox but I'm very excited about the 360!"... yet he knows a *lot* about Xbox games for someone who doesn't own one, doesn't he?
This makes it hard for him to argue he's not just either an MS fanboy or Xbox shill, doesn't it, when your only areas of interest/expertise are protecting the world from Microsoft-bashers and defending the future of the Xbox360 ?? Why even read Slashdot, since you hate it so??
In fairness, maybe he has other interests and this is just the sore spot as of late, but it looks a bit dodgy, eh?
Dude. I would never do that. Half of these fools thought the iPod would be a total flop. Seriously. To read this forum you'd think the Gamecube was like, totally a great console, but who on earth would buy a console anyway when you can play games under WINE?Why play anything other than Netcraft anyway?
No dude, that's not me, and I *don't* think the 360 is going to tank. I'm just not sure it's going to totally dominate, and I'm not sure it's super-great, and I'm not sure a ton of non-Xbox-owning guys like yourself are going to rush out and buy these before the PS3 comes out.
A lot of people might rush out and buy an Xbox after the PS3 comes out ( maybe the Xbox price drops or is just cheaper or the PS3 is really late or underwhelming or includes lame DRM-type restrictions ), but that remains to be seen. There are plenty of ways for this to go badly for Sony. Maybe they'll be crushed in some sort of unrelated anti-DRM backlash.
Maybe it is the case that more gamers fit the teen "daddy's going to buy me a 360 just like he buys me anything else I ask for" crowd and the "I have nothing better to spend my money/time on" crowd, and the Xbox will get some sort of insane head start that'll make things really, really hard for the PS3. I think it's going to be a lot more balanced; people who are running out to buy a 360 now will also strongly consider a PS3 ( as well ) when it comes out, but people who put off the decision ( like me ) and buy only *one* of the two consoles, those people will crown the 'winner'... and even the 'loser' will come away with a good, solid percentage of the market and a good game-sales market.
All I was saying is that I'm not seeing a ton of guys ( like you ) who have no Xbox and are really excited about the 360. Just one datapoint, and one fairly isolated from the teenage crowd that I believe is the target of 360 marketing... I mentioned that I'm not really willing to draw too wide a conclusion from my viewpoint on this... but I do watch a little G4 and read a little gamer press, and after filtering out a little Xbox fanboyism and product placement, the excitement factor doesn't seem off-the-scale... again, just one data point, I could be wrong...
but tell me... what has you excited about the 360? Is it just better graphics, and are they really that much better?? Are you bored with your current console and game selection, and see something in the current ( or future ) Xbox lineup that's really compelling, or is it just graphics ? Don't tell me you're excited about Xbox Live, or using your 360 to play music or something... are you ? What is so compelling about the 360 that I seem to be missing? Really, I'm curious, because I *am* missing it... I see no reason not to wait until well after the PS3 release to decide what to buy.
Oh, wait, I almost forgot. I boycott ALL "copy-protected" CDs already. If there's a copy-protected CD that I want, I'll purposely avoid buying it and go download it from some gnutella network or something like that... or just live without it. Everyone needs to consistently boycott copy-protected CDs, that's the moral of this story, really.
Honestly, I think that should do the trick. These divisions within Sony are just that- separate corporate divisions. If the music publishing portion were to actually become *unprofitable*, I somehow doubt that money would be siphoned off of the gaming, computer and electronics divisions to prop it up, *especially* not the gaming division just now. If consumers keep punishing the *bad* behaviors of corporations, and rewarding the *good* behaviors, eventually maybe they'll get the message and only the *good* will remain. Or they'll slowly become unprofitable.
In short, I might go for a boycott of Sony Music and maybe even Sony Pictures, but as evil as this is, I'm going to keep buying PS2 games, and I wouldn't let this whole mess stop me from buying a Viao or PSP ( not that I'm about to; I'd sooner buy an iBook and a NDS ).
Here's my take: people are still pretty satisfied with the consoles and games that they have. This console, while perhaps a bit flashier in the graphics department, isn't a *lot* flashier ( especially depending on which game you're looking at ). There's no "gotta have it" buzz or coolness factor to catch those of us who aren't in the "big fan, going to pre-order it no matter what, it's new, have to be the first on the block to have it" crowd.
There are a good number of people in the gotta-have-it-now-because-it's-new crowd, more than enough to snap up all of this first wave of 360s and give MS some good "we sold out" marketing spin, I guess... but the reality is that a very, very large number of fairly serious gamers are just going to wait... we're going to wait until the PS3 is out, look at the competing game lineups, find demo models ( or friend's consoles ) to sit down and play a few games, and *then* we'll decide which console to get. Maybe next christmas... or even the christmas after that, for those of us who don't have HD sets and have fresh memories of buying consoles at $300+ which later droped to less than $150...
Personally, it'll take me a while to buy and play all of the PS2 games I want; I'm not in a rush to run out and buy a very expensive console which takes only very expensive games.
I'm trying to be cautious not over-generalize based on my view and that of those I know; I'm now into buying older/cheaper games, so maybe I'm not very representative of the target market, but then again... maybe there are more and more players fitting my profile, which could explain the trouble the industry has been having growing sales as of late.
It'll be interesting to see what happens, but it does look a tad troubling for microsoft that those really interested in the 360 already have an Xbox. For this to be the runaway success that they'd like, a bunch of people who currently don't have an Xbox need to be really excited about it... and I'm not seeing that...
Then answer the question! Do you have religious motivation to defend I.D., or are you atheist/buddist/FSMist/newAgeist/whatever ???
And that's a *very* cogent point; if you're not backing some religious view, ( actually, a specifically Christian religious view ) you are *not* going to find yourself backing I.D. That's a very, very telling *fact*, and you shouldn't ignore it- you should take it to heart, and at least have the guts to stand up and say "yes, I believe in the story of Genesis as told in the Bible and that's part of why I think I.D. is a valid theory". If you don't have that faith in your convictions and religious beliefs, then I have a hard time respecting you intellectually... because on it's own merits, there's very little to I.D.
Nice straw man with the "eye" example - nobody has seriously used that in quite some time.
Ok, so the eye was a straw man ( I honestly wasn't aware of that... when did the I.D. guys take that as a defeat? I saw it used here less than a month ago )... so, what's the new thing? The eye seemed like a pretty good candidate... and most other things, the heart, limbs, etc... they all seem more straightforward... what's supposed to be irreducibly complex? or, if
all of the supposed counter-examples can be refuted, or are at best inconclusive
then what's the point you're trying to make by bringing that up as the most serious 'scientific' leg of I.D.? It sounds like I.D. is pretty hard to defend scientifically, doesn't it? Why are you trying?
I'm sick of the uninformed masses denouncing an idea they don't even comprehend just because of who supports it. Reject it for the evidence; don't reject it because of its implications.
a) sometimes who supports an idea *is* important, and can tell you a lot about the possible result of adopting the idea.
b) what about the informed masses denouncing an idea they do comprehend ? It's only the I.D. folks who are trying to make the evidence and theories sound *really* complicated... the evidence is pretty hard and easy to demonstrate, and I'm willing to bet that well over 25% of the general public grasp the concepts, which, for science, is a pretty large number. Personally, I've tried really, really, really hard to look for solid evidence behind I.D., and I'm afraid it just doesn't seem to be there, as much as I might like it to be.
C) do you think people would reject an idea just because it proved the existence of some sort of deity?!? Are you kidding? As unsettling as it'd be to find that there is a god that just doesn't seem to mind us starting wars, etc, it'd be one of the most awesome discoveries of all times, and we'd all love it ! Well, most of us would, anyway. It'd be like finding aliens, or perpetual motion, only even cooler...
Unfortunately, the simple fact is that I.D. is just some wealthy religous guys blowing smoke to try to get religious views taught as science in U.S. schools, and nothing more... and that's sad, because if mom and dad want to teach their kid about Genesis, that kid should be going to Sunday School already. And other kids? They don't need that teaching from the state, m'kay?
In the long run, this *is* really all about trying to get religious views are taught in public schools, isn't it?
Look, clearly you've bought what the ID folks are selling ( and again I ask, honestly, have you bought into this in part due to your religious views? ), so it's not productive for me to spend much more time arguing this with you, *but*...
this whole "irreducably complex systems" argument? It's totally bullshit, and, no matter what someone with some sort of degree said on TV, *not* 'inconsistent with everything'... 'about evolution'... microevolution, maybe, but not really. The key example the ID gang likes to talk about is the eye. Really, there *are* rudimentary eyes, and slightly more advanced eyes with only 'cones', and really, it's not clear why they think the eye is so 'irreducably complex' that it means, uh, someone must have designed it... that's a hell of a conclusion to reach from "boy, this is a complex organ".
Really, their argument is a little like "all the atoms in this crystal are lined up *exactly* in a matrix formation! That's too weird. It *must* have been arranged that way by an intelligent being!". Which of course ignores the possibility that more basic self-organizing properties of matter are at work...
To summarize: of course they'd say yes, they have proof. Any scrutiny of that 'proof' shows that, really, they have nothing. We all have to determine if they 'have the goods', and after reviewing the evidence, even *they* know they don't have the goods ( check the science journals if you want ), they're just trying to make it look like there's some doubt about evolutionary theory so they can introduce their own religious-based pseudo-pseudoscientific ( I call it that because it tries to be pseudoscience ) ideas taught as "science".
If they weren't all about obviously pushing a religious agenda, it'd be more difficult to figure out what's going on, but let's face it... these I.D. folks? Easy-to-spot religous nuts, funded by and founded by well-known religious nuts. Not scientists. People with an agenda. Not people concerned with your children learning about science. If you're fooled, you wanted to be, or you weren't really paying attention...