It sounds like you don't live in the US, or you're just completely fucking oblivious. Healthcare in the US is not socialized for all people. If more companies "helped" their employees register for Medicaid, Medicaid would either go bankrupt or be forced to raise taxes that would be paid for by the working population, not the corporations running from their responsibility.
The International Labour Organization defines "forced labor" as "all work or service which is extracted from any person under the menace of any penalty and for which the said person has not offered himself voluntarily". I assume you've never traveled anywhere where Wal-Mart is a major part of the economy. In all these communities, peoples' work is extracted under the menace of not being able to find another job. Also, these people do not work at Wal-Mart voluntarily, but under the menace of starving, they have no choice.
Also, if you don't consider the factory conditions of Wal-Mart's holdings in China "slave labor", you might as well just give up your humanity card right now. If you truly believe these factories are fair, I do not see how anyone could consider you human.
If anything, WalMart is doing game companies a favor by working with them during the development stage to let them know what titles they may or may not be interested in carrying.
BZZT, wrong, thanks for playing. Wal-Mart's role here is more like the mob, going to developers and saying "That's a nice game you've got there. It would be a shame if the largest retailer of video games in the US refused to carry it...".
You're an idiot. Just because some company sells products under a nameplate does not make them seperate companies. Also, you miss the point. The OP wanted to know of companies that don't deal with Wal-Mart. Since the Dewalt name is owned by a company that deals with Wal-Mart, they should be avoided if you don't want to support the beast from Bentonville.
If Wal-Mart has what I want at a good price, then I'll buy it there.
Sorry, but I refuse to support a corporation that relies on slave labor to produce its goods. I refuse to support a corporation that tells its own employees to apply for Medicare because they won't provide affordable health care. I refuse to support a corporation that directs its own employees to the food stamps office. I refuse to support a corporation that lies to communities and bribes their elected officials.
Wal-Mart is on top of this game for a reason.
You are correct, but it is because of the reasons I have listed, not because of some bullshit free-market ideal that you imply.
Surely the only reason they have a monopoly is because people were going to Walmart rather than smaller shops?
People generally don't "decide" to shop at Wal-Mart. In the US, most of the wealth is held by a few people. The large majority of people have to live paycheck to paycheck and watch their budget. Any opportunity to save a few dollars is gladly taken.
Of course, saving 20 cents on a screwdriver seems like a good idea, until you look at the aggregate picture, which is that of smaller hardware stores going out of business, and this creates less competition. This repeats itself in nearly every sector Wal-Mart deals in.
Also, your concept of democracy is complete bullshit. The aim of democracy is to prevent one person or group from gaining too much power. Wal-Mart and the Walton clan definitely have too much power.
Exactly. This article is like comparing November and December sales to January and February and saying "OMG game sales r teh d00med!!1". If they were comparing March '06 to other years that were "in-between" consoles, then I'd perhaps listen.
I think a lot of hardcore gamers are more concerned about the performance then the flashy looks.
And here we reach a distinction. True hardcore gamers don't care as much about "pimp my case" type stuff as some others do. I'll call these other guys "pseudo-hardcore" gamers. These are the same people Microsoft is preaching to with the Xbox/360. They're also a lot more profitable than the hardcore set, as the pseudo-hardcore generally will spend far more than what something is worth.
Is this an article on art, law, science, and/or film? No. It's on software and business. Graham started a software business. I think he's qualified. Your comment is completely off-topic, and flamebait to boot.
Have you ever worked in a business? Companies have contracts with each other where one calls the other to order something and the account is debited. Places like bars and gas stations have "house accounts" and other ways of keeping records for customers.
In a country where megacorporations cannot lobby or pressure the government to make certain choices
China joined the WTO. Because of this, non-Chinese companies now have a lot more power than they used to (regarding doing business in China). And don't believe for a second that corps like Wal-Mart have no say in Chinese government policy.
I am almost absolutely certain that whichever vector your data travels through, you'll be locked into one provider. Do you think the Brother Bells will let you make calls over Skype when you're connected at Starbucks? I certainly don't.
We are given some rather improbable conspiracy theory around the ODF affair
Um, not really. MS funding attack dogs against ODF or whatever is pretty plausible, mostly because it's true. There are also somearticles that point out some neat ties between everybody's favorite monopoly and some influential people in a place called DC.
The English language is a beautiful one and not everything is about efficiency, speed and clarity. If it were, we'd all read dictionaries for fun and teach our children Lojban.
Okay, so maybe they don't actually make chips, but that's not very far from the truth. This article is pure speculation, parroting estimates made by idiots and containing no real data. I'm not an expert on business finance, but when you compare employee and global sales data between Sony and Microsoft, the idiocy of asserting this kind of sale becomes obvious.
Also, never mind the fact that Sony is a Japanese company, and I'm pretty sure that there would be all kinds of business "agreements" and legal wranglings (both business and government) that would prevent MS from ever pulling this off, even if they had the money. Think about it this way: would the US government allow MS to be bought by a foreign company? Then take into consideration that the Japanese are at least as racist and xenophobic as Americans.
I realize my arguments here aren't very rigorous, but anyone with half a brain should be able to see that this article is pure BS.
I'm surprised that when this is brought up, most people don't think of the inevitable Microsoft reaction to Apple releasing Cocoa or whatever for Windows. The reaction would most definitely be various "upgrades" from Windows Update that would mysteriously cause the Cocoa layer to break in unpleasant ways.
I don't think I've seen this mentioned so far, but people seem to forget that Apple licensed its OS out before. And they quickly put an end to it, becuase the clones were going to put them out of business.
I mean, Windows drivers are often a lottery, and that's when they have 95% share of the market
And then you have the Free Unixes with a combined total of something like 2% of the desktop PC market. But wait, the hardware these guys support is generally supported very well. What gives?
Slashdot Mirror
The International Labour Organization defines "forced labor" as "all work or service which is extracted from any person under the menace of any penalty and for which the said person has not offered himself voluntarily". I assume you've never traveled anywhere where Wal-Mart is a major part of the economy. In all these communities, peoples' work is extracted under the menace of not being able to find another job. Also, these people do not work at Wal-Mart voluntarily, but under the menace of starving, they have no choice.
Also, if you don't consider the factory conditions of Wal-Mart's holdings in China "slave labor", you might as well just give up your humanity card right now. If you truly believe these factories are fair, I do not see how anyone could consider you human.
BZZT, wrong, thanks for playing. Wal-Mart's role here is more like the mob, going to developers and saying "That's a nice game you've got there. It would be a shame if the largest retailer of video games in the US refused to carry it...".
You're an idiot. Just because some company sells products under a nameplate does not make them seperate companies. Also, you miss the point. The OP wanted to know of companies that don't deal with Wal-Mart. Since the Dewalt name is owned by a company that deals with Wal-Mart, they should be avoided if you don't want to support the beast from Bentonville.
Sorry, but I refuse to support a corporation that relies on slave labor to produce its goods. I refuse to support a corporation that tells its own employees to apply for Medicare because they won't provide affordable health care. I refuse to support a corporation that directs its own employees to the food stamps office. I refuse to support a corporation that lies to communities and bribes their elected officials.
Wal-Mart is on top of this game for a reason.
You are correct, but it is because of the reasons I have listed, not because of some bullshit free-market ideal that you imply.
People generally don't "decide" to shop at Wal-Mart. In the US, most of the wealth is held by a few people. The large majority of people have to live paycheck to paycheck and watch their budget. Any opportunity to save a few dollars is gladly taken.
Of course, saving 20 cents on a screwdriver seems like a good idea, until you look at the aggregate picture, which is that of smaller hardware stores going out of business, and this creates less competition. This repeats itself in nearly every sector Wal-Mart deals in.
Also, your concept of democracy is complete bullshit. The aim of democracy is to prevent one person or group from gaining too much power. Wal-Mart and the Walton clan definitely have too much power.
Also, Stallman has a pretty relevant little article.
Exactly. This article is like comparing November and December sales to January and February and saying "OMG game sales r teh d00med!!1". If they were comparing March '06 to other years that were "in-between" consoles, then I'd perhaps listen.
OK, so "the MMO effect" is basically you speculating that WoW is eating up game revenues in general? Let's see some evidence, please.
And here we reach a distinction. True hardcore gamers don't care as much about "pimp my case" type stuff as some others do. I'll call these other guys "pseudo-hardcore" gamers. These are the same people Microsoft is preaching to with the Xbox/360. They're also a lot more profitable than the hardcore set, as the pseudo-hardcore generally will spend far more than what something is worth.
Is this an article on art, law, science, and/or film? No. It's on software and business. Graham started a software business. I think he's qualified. Your comment is completely off-topic, and flamebait to boot.
Have you ever worked in a business? Companies have contracts with each other where one calls the other to order something and the account is debited. Places like bars and gas stations have "house accounts" and other ways of keeping records for customers.
China joined the WTO. Because of this, non-Chinese companies now have a lot more power than they used to (regarding doing business in China). And don't believe for a second that corps like Wal-Mart have no say in Chinese government policy.
I'd do it only if it's possible to play Quake.
I am almost absolutely certain that whichever vector your data travels through, you'll be locked into one provider. Do you think the Brother Bells will let you make calls over Skype when you're connected at Starbucks? I certainly don't.
This is going on my wall or something.
Um, not really. MS funding attack dogs against ODF or whatever is pretty plausible, mostly because it's true. There are also some articles that point out some neat ties between everybody's favorite monopoly and some influential people in a place called DC.
Ever heard of the "meta" tag?
Yeah, except for the fact that my laptop doesn't have all the standard keys, and the nav key setup is much worse than an iBook.
The English language is a beautiful one and not everything is about efficiency, speed and clarity. If it were, we'd all read dictionaries for fun and teach our children Lojban.
There has to be a Perl joke here somewhere.
Rather than being a snarky douche, perhaps you could be helpful and prove that all "PC" laptops contain full keyboards?
Okay, so maybe they don't actually make chips, but that's not very far from the truth. This article is pure speculation, parroting estimates made by idiots and containing no real data. I'm not an expert on business finance, but when you compare employee and global sales data between Sony and Microsoft, the idiocy of asserting this kind of sale becomes obvious.
Also, never mind the fact that Sony is a Japanese company, and I'm pretty sure that there would be all kinds of business "agreements" and legal wranglings (both business and government) that would prevent MS from ever pulling this off, even if they had the money. Think about it this way: would the US government allow MS to be bought by a foreign company? Then take into consideration that the Japanese are at least as racist and xenophobic as Americans.
I realize my arguments here aren't very rigorous, but anyone with half a brain should be able to see that this article is pure BS.
My $40 Discman plays VBR MP3s encoded with LAME just fine.
I'm surprised that when this is brought up, most people don't think of the inevitable Microsoft reaction to Apple releasing Cocoa or whatever for Windows. The reaction would most definitely be various "upgrades" from Windows Update that would mysteriously cause the Cocoa layer to break in unpleasant ways.
I don't think I've seen this mentioned so far, but people seem to forget that Apple licensed its OS out before. And they quickly put an end to it, becuase the clones were going to put them out of business.
And then you have the Free Unixes with a combined total of something like 2% of the desktop PC market. But wait, the hardware these guys support is generally supported very well. What gives?