Conversely, your job is likely more secure as well as having better benefits. I work in non-profit, and the management is less crazed and there's actual sick and vacation days (and a lot, at that, and they don't go away). Regular wage increases and increases from reclassification of jobs affect everyone, not just new/old people, and I feel more secure in my future here.
I could probably make more money out in the for-profit world of corporations, but I'm much happier here. And my sanity and free time is definitely worth something to me.
Well, I *did* buy an Xbox... once it had enough games that I wanted to play. I picked it up when Halo 2 dropped, not because of 1 game, but because it had about a half dozen older games that I really wanted to play. That, and the costs were mostly upfront -- I really liked not having to dish out any extra money for memory cards;D
But no, I'm not saying that I'll never buy an Xbox 360, or that it's MS's doom. Just that if the games aren't there, why rush the console out? I'm a firm believer that the reason the original Xbox performed so well was because it launched with Halo, which sustained it for its first year plus. The GameCube had some solid launch titles, but they were all short with little replay. I'm historically a fan of Nintendo, but I still didn't rush out to buy a DS -- I waited over a year, and now have about 10 games for it that I bought almost all right away, because I knew that I would have a solid run of entertainment for the forseeable future with the system.
And due to my disagreement with many of Sony's business practices, I haven't owned and probably won't own a PS2, despite many games I would really like to play. But that's my own choice.
But you do have a point -- if it weren't for a good chunk of early adopters, the prices and games may never get to a point where they're attractive to the later adopters like myself. They pay the higher prices and live through the gaming droughts so I don't have to.
I think it's like most systems, where the companies push to get the system out the door with a few "launch games," and then the system sits while the rest of the publishers hurry up. If you look at the GC, all of the games when it first came out that were decent were really short -- indicative of a reduced production cycle. Similarly, the PS2 had a year head start -- which really just meant it could start getting good games when the other systems launched. the 1st year was still pretty sad.
So really, it's just the dev times are different for hardware vs the software. Most developers only get kits about a year out from the time the system launches, and often the kits aren't finalized. Given that it takes, on average, about 2 years for a solid game to be made in the current generation of consoles, it's no surprise that the 1st year is typically slow with few worthwhile games. It seems even more ironic given that the first year(s) are when the system costs the most, and is the hardest to find.
So, you spent $400 (assuming you bought the "full" console) to play games easily playable for free or for $10 on any computer made in the past 5 years, easily?
I don't mean that as a troll, but that's an awful lot of money. Sure, the controller does make a difference, and there's something to be said for hanging out on the couch, but if you're playing the equivalent of 80's arcade games, it seems kind of silly that you're so focused on the cheap 'bonus' games.
I have a friend who is seriously interested in Oblivion which, for him, would require a major update of his PC, so the 360 is tempting him. But when I ask him about other games, he only lists games that he's sure are going to be out sometime in the future. Well, it's poor planning to bank on future games -- why not wait until those games are actually released, so you can actually play them?
I mean, more power to you for having fun with the 360. It just seems like the biggest draw to the system uses really none of the "big, new technology" that commands such a high price tag.
Sailing was fine. It was just that there was way too much of it in the early game. If they had shrunk the ocean so that the little teeny islands were closer together, it wouldn't've changed the game at all, but it would have meant less time holding one direction on the joystick for 5 minutes.
Even reducing the ocean by 15-20% would've made the game less tedious.
I personally really enjoyed the game, but I have no problem wishing that they had added the dungeons and gotten rid of the triforce hunt and reduced the vast, vast ocean.
You raise a really interesting point, because Animal Crossing also consists of "mini win conditions." Paying off your house to Tom Nook is one, finishing up museums, or visiting friends to get different fruit trees, or collecting the various sets, or making lots of money on the stalk market... They're all ways to "win" in the game.
I suppose the one major difference is that it's a lot easier to see how to "lose" in an MMORPG. You can die, have your stuff stolen, and be in a situation where it's more work than fun to progress. In Animal Crossing, your ability to progress is based on how much time you put into the game -- there's no way to die, and it's quite hard to lose money.
What in my comment mentioned Apple, beyond the iPod? In fact, I recall talking directly about the Xbox 360 and how it supported the iPod?
Apple isn't selling a video game device, nor is it setting up an online hub for a monthly fee. It already controls over 70% of the portable MP3 player market. It doesn't make TVs with memory stick ports, nor does it create its own Cameras, Camcorders, DVD players, and so on.
But if a company is going to sell me a product, it better try its hardest to at least make other stuff work. When I plug my Archos AV420 into my mac, it shows up in iTunes -- it's recognized. Sure I can't do funky playlist stuff with it, but I can copy music to it. iTunes supports MP3 the same as it does its own AAC format (and music purchased from the iTMS).
All that completely disregards the fact that Apple has had its iPod out for years prior to the iTMS coming out, proving that the iTMS was created to supplement the iPod. Sony's portable offerings have been laughable, and performed poorly in the market, yet they keep pushing proprietary formats and stores on people. And this shows that they're taking the same approach for their PS3.
Movies and music... that only work on your Sony device. We are already familiar with the tiff Sony had with Apple regarding iTunes in Australia, and we know how loathe they are to open up their own formats.
So you can potentially buy movies and music, and apparently the thing also plays video games (which we haven't heard much about). The Xbox360 lets you plug your iPod in at least (and apparently does a pretty good job of handling it). Yet Sony wants people to not only pay a monthly fee, but also use their service to buy movies and music electronically, encumbered and weighed down with DRM, and which will almost assuredly work only with Sony devices.
The problem then is that the parties exist entirely as a block, so there's no oversight. Look at the problem we're in right now -- republicans have no interest in exploring any infractions by the Bush administration, because he basically controls the purse strings of the party. The only people who have any hope of getting money to be re-elected are those who either conform completely to what the Bush Administration says, or who have enough of their own money to run their own campaigns.
So I'd go one step further than you. Let there be NO party control of campaign finances. All contributions should go towards a federal election committee who gives equal amounts to both candidates. All money spent towards campaigning should come from that fund -- if an incumbent spends party money or his own money for election purposes, he's booted out of office immediately, no questions asked.
As it is, we've got Karl Rove threatening to blacklist any senator who votes against Bush on the NSA spying illegality issue. How is that justice?
The G5 was an amazing chip when it came out. But the speeds stagnated, the heat production was incredible, and they could never design a laptop chip.
How is this chip different?
And what would it cost?
With Intel, Apple gets a low-cost chip that they can use NOW, in their laptops and desktops. They get low-power consumption today, and low-heat today. Not in 2009, when the POWER6 chip has been tamed... Or hell, maybe never, AGAIN.
So yes, this seems like a good chip. But it doesn't really affect the reasons that Apple changed. It doesn't say it's a good chip for laptops, and they would still need to change the architecture of their systems. AND they'd have to stick with a company that was creating lower yields.
Plus, this writeup makes it sound like IBM didn't tell Apple that they were about to make POWER6 chips. I'm sure they knew, and I'm sure they realized the advantages and disadvantages.
Would it be possible to simply have their server limit the amount of connections to ensure that everyone who has a connection keeps a solid stream going? It seems like that would be a more immediate option that would allow them to scale up bandwidth according to their budget.
After all, even if they scale up with colocation and distributing their webcast to other servers, if they can handle [x] users but only get [x/2], with a burst of x+2 once every 6 months, it seems like they should focus more on what they can do to reasonably control dropouts among users who are already connected, vs the rare scaleup to accomodate a large number of users for a short period of time.
Of course, it might also prove out that by having more solid streams, they'll have more users, and will inherently get more users, which would lead to an escalation of costs. Might be screwed either way.
I totally agree. The catch as I see it is that most of the time the game isn't $20. It's $45.
So to many people, they see an opened game with a scuffed up cover, no manual, and the possibility of a scratched disk. Compared to the new copy for $5 more.
It's little wonder why "used" is a dirty word in the gaming industry. Most people's experience with it relates to being gouged by hobby stores, and seeing little discount on used titles compared to new.
I'm not that surprised. People bought the system for games, and they end up buying the movies because there's really no games.
Ultimately I think Sony may have achieved what it wanted, although more by dropping the ball on game development compared to actual effort. They said they wanted to create more of a multimedia device, rather than pure games. In some regards, they've succeeded -- many PSP owners don't use the device for games all that much. They use it to watch UMDs, or hack it.
The catch, as I see it, is that the hacking market tends to be early adopters -- geeks if you will. They're the ones who snatch up gadgets and like to explore it. Sustained sales, though, those are more mass market appeal. Hacking a system, no matter how simple, is not something that appeals to most people. Similarly, you can't buy roms -- they don't sell MAME emulators in Best Buy.
So who is going to buy these millions of PSPs in the future? I know a LOT of people bought them once the emulators hit, but, well, that doesn't turn a profit -- game sales do. Outside of the puzzle game Lumines (which, while popular, isn't exactly a system seller), there's GTA. And a few racing games. Sony seems to not care about the future of the system for games; it just gets a few UMDs.
But I don't see the system focusing on movies hurting the sales of the DS, which focuses entirely on games, and has been selling very well.
I'm sure analysts also thought Google stock wouldn't go up in value, and that Ford would be king of the car industry for decades to come. And Apple will never use an Intel chip; they might as well dissolve the company since no Apple product will ever be popular.
All I see in the future are a handful of PS2 ports for the PSP, and a veritable boatload of original games for the DS. I suppose the PSP is popular if you really like GTA and watching movies...
If analysts really think that a trickle of overpriced UMD movies can propel the PSP to a drastic lead, well... I'd like what they're smoking.
Wouldn't matter. Pirates wouldn't have a revenue source because regular people would be buying them all, making everyone both a pirate and a consumer;D
After all, you only need one. Then the replicator can replicate itself. You can only sell them until someone decides to give them away, or sell for cheaper, at which point a drastic "race to the bottom" occurs, netting everyone a replicator.
I agree, although I think it's a much finer line to walk. Ensuring equal rights is one thing; demanding priviledge based on past inequality is another.
As I'm sure most people have encountered in their lives, it's very easy for a very vocal minority to overwhelm a majority. Look at how many non-Americans believe that the United States is full of evangelical, "fire and brimstone" Christians. They're obviously a majority, but vocal and active enough as to appear to be a majority. They're not the only group in history who as acted as such, either.
But anyway, majorities are historically awarded rights before minorities, and, due to their majority status, are often reluctant to give up any priviledges which they perceive as rights. It can be rude and backwards, such as the perceived right of not having to hear other languages or introduced to other cultures, or it can be the idea that a company always run by black people should continue to be run by black people. True equality is exceedingly difficult to attain, as that majority you mention is usually the most reluctant to give up their priviledge.
I'm a male, and that argument's a non-starter. Of course it should all stay down. That's the "closed" state. Similar to many other household objects, the natural rest state is closed. Doors, windows, etc. They're opened when used; otherwise they wouldn't exist.
Most males encounter toilet seats that are "down," and have to lift them. Even ones without a proper lid. Why they should assume that leaving them in a state unlike they were found, well, that's just slobbish.
Congrats Freesound! I personally have always thought that sound and samples were one of the most underrepresented forms of media on the internet. They're hard to catalog, hard to search for, and generally take up a lot of space without necessarily being that useful to a lot of people. Can't take screencaps of a soundfile, after all!
But I know I'll often hear from people who just want to find a particular sound, whether it's for music, presentations, or whatever. Not just cheesy stuff, either, but actually worthwhile purposes. It's great to see that there's a group out there trying to provide a worthwhile sound catalog for everyone. After all, it's not like everyone has access to foley experts!
Yeah really. Still, it's pretty telling how successful a sneaky popup can be, given how many people still have the original XP style. Not to mention how many install and help documents for XP use the "original" styling for all of their screenshots.
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I could probably make more money out in the for-profit world of corporations, but I'm much happier here. And my sanity and free time is definitely worth something to me.
But no, I'm not saying that I'll never buy an Xbox 360, or that it's MS's doom. Just that if the games aren't there, why rush the console out? I'm a firm believer that the reason the original Xbox performed so well was because it launched with Halo, which sustained it for its first year plus. The GameCube had some solid launch titles, but they were all short with little replay. I'm historically a fan of Nintendo, but I still didn't rush out to buy a DS -- I waited over a year, and now have about 10 games for it that I bought almost all right away, because I knew that I would have a solid run of entertainment for the forseeable future with the system.
And due to my disagreement with many of Sony's business practices, I haven't owned and probably won't own a PS2, despite many games I would really like to play. But that's my own choice.
But you do have a point -- if it weren't for a good chunk of early adopters, the prices and games may never get to a point where they're attractive to the later adopters like myself. They pay the higher prices and live through the gaming droughts so I don't have to.
So really, it's just the dev times are different for hardware vs the software. Most developers only get kits about a year out from the time the system launches, and often the kits aren't finalized. Given that it takes, on average, about 2 years for a solid game to be made in the current generation of consoles, it's no surprise that the 1st year is typically slow with few worthwhile games. It seems even more ironic given that the first year(s) are when the system costs the most, and is the hardest to find.
I don't mean that as a troll, but that's an awful lot of money. Sure, the controller does make a difference, and there's something to be said for hanging out on the couch, but if you're playing the equivalent of 80's arcade games, it seems kind of silly that you're so focused on the cheap 'bonus' games.
I have a friend who is seriously interested in Oblivion which, for him, would require a major update of his PC, so the 360 is tempting him. But when I ask him about other games, he only lists games that he's sure are going to be out sometime in the future. Well, it's poor planning to bank on future games -- why not wait until those games are actually released, so you can actually play them?
I mean, more power to you for having fun with the 360. It just seems like the biggest draw to the system uses really none of the "big, new technology" that commands such a high price tag.
Even reducing the ocean by 15-20% would've made the game less tedious.
I personally really enjoyed the game, but I have no problem wishing that they had added the dungeons and gotten rid of the triforce hunt and reduced the vast, vast ocean.
I suppose the one major difference is that it's a lot easier to see how to "lose" in an MMORPG. You can die, have your stuff stolen, and be in a situation where it's more work than fun to progress. In Animal Crossing, your ability to progress is based on how much time you put into the game -- there's no way to die, and it's quite hard to lose money.
Apple isn't selling a video game device, nor is it setting up an online hub for a monthly fee. It already controls over 70% of the portable MP3 player market. It doesn't make TVs with memory stick ports, nor does it create its own Cameras, Camcorders, DVD players, and so on.
But if a company is going to sell me a product, it better try its hardest to at least make other stuff work. When I plug my Archos AV420 into my mac, it shows up in iTunes -- it's recognized. Sure I can't do funky playlist stuff with it, but I can copy music to it. iTunes supports MP3 the same as it does its own AAC format (and music purchased from the iTMS).
All that completely disregards the fact that Apple has had its iPod out for years prior to the iTMS coming out, proving that the iTMS was created to supplement the iPod. Sony's portable offerings have been laughable, and performed poorly in the market, yet they keep pushing proprietary formats and stores on people. And this shows that they're taking the same approach for their PS3.
So you can potentially buy movies and music, and apparently the thing also plays video games (which we haven't heard much about). The Xbox360 lets you plug your iPod in at least (and apparently does a pretty good job of handling it). Yet Sony wants people to not only pay a monthly fee, but also use their service to buy movies and music electronically, encumbered and weighed down with DRM, and which will almost assuredly work only with Sony devices.
"But it'll have Blu-Ray!" Yeah, big deal.
So I'd go one step further than you. Let there be NO party control of campaign finances. All contributions should go towards a federal election committee who gives equal amounts to both candidates. All money spent towards campaigning should come from that fund -- if an incumbent spends party money or his own money for election purposes, he's booted out of office immediately, no questions asked.
As it is, we've got Karl Rove threatening to blacklist any senator who votes against Bush on the NSA spying illegality issue. How is that justice?
How is this chip different?
And what would it cost?
With Intel, Apple gets a low-cost chip that they can use NOW, in their laptops and desktops. They get low-power consumption today, and low-heat today. Not in 2009, when the POWER6 chip has been tamed... Or hell, maybe never, AGAIN.
So yes, this seems like a good chip. But it doesn't really affect the reasons that Apple changed. It doesn't say it's a good chip for laptops, and they would still need to change the architecture of their systems. AND they'd have to stick with a company that was creating lower yields.
Plus, this writeup makes it sound like IBM didn't tell Apple that they were about to make POWER6 chips. I'm sure they knew, and I'm sure they realized the advantages and disadvantages.
After all, even if they scale up with colocation and distributing their webcast to other servers, if they can handle [x] users but only get [x/2], with a burst of x+2 once every 6 months, it seems like they should focus more on what they can do to reasonably control dropouts among users who are already connected, vs the rare scaleup to accomodate a large number of users for a short period of time.
Of course, it might also prove out that by having more solid streams, they'll have more users, and will inherently get more users, which would lead to an escalation of costs. Might be screwed either way.
So to many people, they see an opened game with a scuffed up cover, no manual, and the possibility of a scratched disk. Compared to the new copy for $5 more.
It's little wonder why "used" is a dirty word in the gaming industry. Most people's experience with it relates to being gouged by hobby stores, and seeing little discount on used titles compared to new.
I thought Microsoft patches only fixed problems? To get new features, you have to buy the next version...
Ultimately I think Sony may have achieved what it wanted, although more by dropping the ball on game development compared to actual effort. They said they wanted to create more of a multimedia device, rather than pure games. In some regards, they've succeeded -- many PSP owners don't use the device for games all that much. They use it to watch UMDs, or hack it.
The catch, as I see it, is that the hacking market tends to be early adopters -- geeks if you will. They're the ones who snatch up gadgets and like to explore it. Sustained sales, though, those are more mass market appeal. Hacking a system, no matter how simple, is not something that appeals to most people. Similarly, you can't buy roms -- they don't sell MAME emulators in Best Buy.
So who is going to buy these millions of PSPs in the future? I know a LOT of people bought them once the emulators hit, but, well, that doesn't turn a profit -- game sales do. Outside of the puzzle game Lumines (which, while popular, isn't exactly a system seller), there's GTA. And a few racing games. Sony seems to not care about the future of the system for games; it just gets a few UMDs.
But I don't see the system focusing on movies hurting the sales of the DS, which focuses entirely on games, and has been selling very well.
All I see in the future are a handful of PS2 ports for the PSP, and a veritable boatload of original games for the DS. I suppose the PSP is popular if you really like GTA and watching movies...
If analysts really think that a trickle of overpriced UMD movies can propel the PSP to a drastic lead, well... I'd like what they're smoking.
Wouldn't matter. Pirates wouldn't have a revenue source because regular people would be buying them all, making everyone both a pirate and a consumer ;D
After all, you only need one. Then the replicator can replicate itself. You can only sell them until someone decides to give them away, or sell for cheaper, at which point a drastic "race to the bottom" occurs, netting everyone a replicator.
As I'm sure most people have encountered in their lives, it's very easy for a very vocal minority to overwhelm a majority. Look at how many non-Americans believe that the United States is full of evangelical, "fire and brimstone" Christians. They're obviously a majority, but vocal and active enough as to appear to be a majority. They're not the only group in history who as acted as such, either.
But anyway, majorities are historically awarded rights before minorities, and, due to their majority status, are often reluctant to give up any priviledges which they perceive as rights. It can be rude and backwards, such as the perceived right of not having to hear other languages or introduced to other cultures, or it can be the idea that a company always run by black people should continue to be run by black people. True equality is exceedingly difficult to attain, as that majority you mention is usually the most reluctant to give up their priviledge.
Most males encounter toilet seats that are "down," and have to lift them. Even ones without a proper lid. Why they should assume that leaving them in a state unlike they were found, well, that's just slobbish.
But is your new iPod any snappier?
Blu-Ray may sound better, but it doesn't mean anything to the vast majority of people.
If they cancel the show, tell the fans... Hello.
A quick jaunt over to iTunes would also show this. Anyway, it's the one with Steve Carrell.
But I know I'll often hear from people who just want to find a particular sound, whether it's for music, presentations, or whatever. Not just cheesy stuff, either, but actually worthwhile purposes. It's great to see that there's a group out there trying to provide a worthwhile sound catalog for everyone. After all, it's not like everyone has access to foley experts!
Try boiling the Xbox 360 for 30 seconds.
Yeah really. Still, it's pretty telling how successful a sneaky popup can be, given how many people still have the original XP style. Not to mention how many install and help documents for XP use the "original" styling for all of their screenshots.