Real sells their servers while Apple gives QT Server away. Real's business model probably has the Linux server income subsidizing most or all of the expense of porting the player.
that comercially mass-marketed consumer-level software, by and large, has yet to really succeed in Linux. Loki Games just recent went belly up, and Quake III for Linux was a giant sucking hole on id's cash flow statement.
Considering that Apple's marketing plan for QT is to give away the base player for free and hope that a small percentage of those users will pay for registration, is there really any hope that they can recover their investment on the Linux side?
I only repeat what the internal feeling was amongst the 1394 community, and I think that feeling is justified. I saw a number of chipsets that were going to have 1394 mysteriously lose that feature around this period.
Not so mysterious, really. Intel had been a long-time backer of FireWire, so the natural assumption was that FireWire would find instant adoption in the PC world. But a year or so before Apple started shipping the first FireWire Macs, Intel started grousing about how FireWire wasn't suitable for the masses and that USB and ATA were. Did it really matter to Intel if motherboards included FireWire? Directly, no, because all of those motherboards would have included USB and ATA, anyway. Where Intel stood to lose ground was in the peripheral market, where most manufacturers might start using FireWire chipsets in quantity instead of Intel chipsets. Intel had a chance to delay/slow this by a few years (maybe even kill it), and they took the shot.
From a business perspective, then, FireWire was only available on a small percentage of PC systems, and it was very questionable as to "when" FireWire would see widespread adoption on PC motherboards. Is there a reason to build for a niche market with a murky future (FireWire) instead of building for the market that 100% of new PC's will support (USB)? Of course most manufacturers/developers were going to build for USB over FireWire.
Basically, they were complete idiots and damn near shot off their foot at the ankle. I think this had a lot to do with the fact that 1394 isn't standard kit on todays PC motherboard chipsets. The royalties alone were close to the cost of the entire chipset.
Are you saying that the entire chipset of a motherboard cost $1? Because that's how much Apple was charging in royalties for FireWire, until a very public backlash forced them to charge.25.
I disagree with your assessment of why FireWire isn't standard on PC mobo's though. I think it has much more to do with Intel pushing Intel-owned standards such as USB and ATA (in spite of the fact that neither one of those is a true replacement). Had Intel embraced FireWire for the mainstream, then yes, we would see FireWire as ubiquitous on PC's as USB. But it was Intel's marketing strategy to position their competitor's product as being for high-end and niche markets, not for mainstream. Very shrewd.
that the PS One is now a portable console, and may be Sony's way of gradually easing into the handheld market. With an LCD screen, a PS One sells for about $150 (still a little pricey). Sony may get another 6-7 years out of the PS One.
While it's true that hands-on experience and proven skills still count for more than degrees and certifications in many circles, a college degree is almost a requirement for getting a job these days. In fact, I'll even go so far as to say that it doesn't matter much *what* your degree is in (provided you have said experience and skills). I know an IT manager whose degree is in pre-seminary work; however, on his resume, he just lists that he has a B.A. and leaves it at that. And doors still open for him.
It bears repeating, so I'll say it again: A college degree is virtually a requirement for landing a decent job these days.
Besides, you may find it an enriching experience that your previous schoolwork doesn't begin to compare to.
IMO (and a lot of other people's, too, from what I've read), the biggest mistake was releasing the movie with such shoddy CG work. I mean, there are such glaring problems in there that even non-3D artists like myself are picking up on. Lighting is off, textures are too smooth, physics are way, waaay off, footfalls are off, and the character motion is incredibly un-lifelike. Every time I was ready to really get into the movie, I kept getting snapped back to reality by the poor 3D animation; I think it kept Spider-Man from being a great movie, rather than just a good movie.
I know why it is the way it is, though. The movie's release schedule got bumped up several months because of business decisions about the optimal time to release it. It makes me shudder to think of what might be awaiting us when The Hulk or the Fantastic Four gets made. Are the studios going to bank on the franchise, and to hell with quality?
I wonder how Sam Raimi feels about this? Is he really satisfied with the crappy CG work in Spider-Man? Considering how much money this film is making, it would be really great if, for the DVD version, he re-animated those scenes to make them more believeable. What's his email address? Maybe someone should start a petition...
Most of the "mistakes" that are being filed are NOT mistakes, just kids inventing mistakes. The owner of the site confesses that he hasn't seen the movie yet (he's in the UK), so he's not really in a position to make any judgement calls on these.
...that Spider-Man will have a significantly larger opening weekend than AOTC, because AOTC is opening on far fewer screens. The only valid comparison will be what their total gross is once they've had their runs.
Incidentally, there is concern in the press that Spider-Man may peak too early because it opened on so many screens; however, I'm sure it was intentional, as they knew they had to make as much money as possible in the two weeks before AOTC opened.
You may remember that, immediately after Sept. 11, a very popular popup making the rounds was for a game called "Yo Mama, Osama". If you clicked the ad and played the game, of course, it installed a spyware app (don't recall which one).
While technically not any different from the way other spyware are distributed, it still tops the list in my book for the sleaziest thing I've yet seen in spyware, i.e., capitalizing on the emotional turmoil for 9/11.
They're the ones who released those phony pics of an Apple branded PDA last year. Whether it was a publicity stunt or they were deceived (my money's on the former), Spymac is NOT a good source for Mac news.
Even if Macromedia was prohibited from selling the Flash authoring tool this would not necessarily have any affect on the browser plugin itself. I don't see what would keep Macromedia from developing a new version of its authoring application with an interface that doesn't employ tabbed palettes.
Who's brilliant idea was it not to broadcast for a day in protest? Internet radio stations are up and down so much that no one is likely to even question why. It's not like a major TV station like CNN going offline for 24 hours. Most people are going to just move on to the next net radio station or pop in a CD.
What they SHOULD have done was to run a continuously looping 30-second spot telling everyone WHY their programming was interrupted and WHAT they wanted the listener to do.
Congrats, you just wasted a day of valuable broadcast time.
What I meant was that I don't want to be nickle-and-dimed at every site I visit (or, more appropriately, five and tenned). If we ever approach that, the internet will cease to be great.
However, the laws of supply and demand are still in effect here. The supply of free game reviews on the internet is fairly large, so it's hard to say that the demand for GameSpot will be enough to generate a lot of subscriptions (I recall reading that another site lost 90% of its traffic by going to a subscription-based model). Besides, $5 a month is an outrageous amount, in my opinion. I visit hundreds of sites in a week, and thousands a month, should I be paying each of them $5 for a month's access? I think GameSpot would be far more reasonable to price their service at $1 a month, an amount I wouldn't mind paying (well, I would, but I'd probably do it anyway, even though I'm only an occasional GameSpot user).
My experience with GameSpot has been that a) reader review scores of a game have been more accurate than the score given by a professional game reviewer, since most of us aren't as hung up on minor details if a game plays well, and b) most all of the salient points of the official reviews are repeated many times in the reader reviews.
I know that *I* won't now or ever be sending any money GameSpot's way. As others have said, the content is available free on a bazillion other sites, so why pay?
Not to mention that this is turning into a general trend on the internet, paying for content that was previously free. Just yesterday it was announced that a game I've been playing for free over the internet for the past couple of years is going back to a subscription model. I won't be paying, because there's just too many other good games out there that are free (and, frankly, more important things I really should be doing with my time, like finishing up my master's degree, not spending untold hours on a game).
Plus, they say the GameSpot cost is only $4.95/month. Slashdot is roughly $5/month. Salon premium, $6/month. On and on. When they say "it's only $5," that doesn't account for every other site that you visit wanting your $5, too. It adds up. I won't be paying for any content, because I believe in the essential "free-ness" of the internet (which I'm already paying $25/month to access). There's too many folks out there who would like to be competition for these sites that are willing to do it at no charge.
Furthermore, if you get stuck anywhere in any game, it's almost certain that someone will have posted a walkthrough, or even just a usenet post (which Deja/Google will do a wonderful job of finding for you) with the solution. Meaning you spent $10 up front for a guide you might or might not need (if you're buying it in case you get stuck) when you could have found the information for free from your fellow gamers.
For the most part that's true; however, I've noticed that fan sites and FAQ's are reluctant to publish tables and charts from the strategy guides. A lot of them say up front that their intention is to supplement the strategy guide, not replace it.
I would love to hear a counter example from someone who buys strategy guides and finds they improve the experience (of an otherwise good game) somehow. Anyone out there?
I found the StarCraft guides somewhat useful, though it tended to stop short of detailed analysis. They came bundled with the game, so I wasn't complaining...
Going way back to a game like X-Com:UFO, the strategy guide was priceless.
I would agree with your advice to seek counsel and treat this as a legal morass, not an IT problem. Push back as hard as you can while you work toward 100% compliance.
However, don't assume that the BSA is afraid of negative PR; quite the opposite. They are in the business of pissing off people and making examples. And the bigger the better. If they can strike a victory on this campus, it'll send shockwaves through other campuses around the country. If you've been to their website, it's filled with press releases of companies that have crumbled before them.
If any of you had bothered to test out the site, instead of taking it at face value...
First of all, the church staff for Mt. Fellowship Baptist Church is featured prominently in the Bio's section. Fine. So why isn't there a street address and phone number for the church on the site? Not even a city or state listed anywhere!
Second, I actually emailed each one of the members on the Bio's page. Of the 10 listed, SEVEN BOUNCED.
TWO OF THE DOMAINS WEREN'T EVEN REGISTERED.
But hey, Slashdot is all about Christian bashing, though, right? Accuse Christians of being ignorant of scientific facts while being ignorant of facts themselves?
Slashdot Mirror
Real sells their servers while Apple gives QT Server away. Real's business model probably has the Linux server income subsidizing most or all of the expense of porting the player.
that comercially mass-marketed consumer-level software, by and large, has yet to really succeed in Linux. Loki Games just recent went belly up, and Quake III for Linux was a giant sucking hole on id's cash flow statement.
Considering that Apple's marketing plan for QT is to give away the base player for free and hope that a small percentage of those users will pay for registration, is there really any hope that they can recover their investment on the Linux side?
I only repeat what the internal feeling was amongst the 1394 community, and I think that feeling is justified. I saw a number of chipsets that were going to have 1394 mysteriously lose that feature around this period.
Not so mysterious, really. Intel had been a long-time backer of FireWire, so the natural assumption was that FireWire would find instant adoption in the PC world. But a year or so before Apple started shipping the first FireWire Macs, Intel started grousing about how FireWire wasn't suitable for the masses and that USB and ATA were. Did it really matter to Intel if motherboards included FireWire? Directly, no, because all of those motherboards would have included USB and ATA, anyway. Where Intel stood to lose ground was in the peripheral market, where most manufacturers might start using FireWire chipsets in quantity instead of Intel chipsets. Intel had a chance to delay/slow this by a few years (maybe even kill it), and they took the shot.
From a business perspective, then, FireWire was only available on a small percentage of PC systems, and it was very questionable as to "when" FireWire would see widespread adoption on PC motherboards. Is there a reason to build for a niche market with a murky future (FireWire) instead of building for the market that 100% of new PC's will support (USB)? Of course most manufacturers/developers were going to build for USB over FireWire.
Basically, they were complete idiots and damn near shot off their foot at the ankle. I think this had a lot to do with the fact that 1394 isn't standard kit on todays PC motherboard chipsets. The royalties alone were close to the cost of the entire chipset.
.25.
Are you saying that the entire chipset of a motherboard cost $1? Because that's how much Apple was charging in royalties for FireWire, until a very public backlash forced them to charge
I disagree with your assessment of why FireWire isn't standard on PC mobo's though. I think it has much more to do with Intel pushing Intel-owned standards such as USB and ATA (in spite of the fact that neither one of those is a true replacement). Had Intel embraced FireWire for the mainstream, then yes, we would see FireWire as ubiquitous on PC's as USB. But it was Intel's marketing strategy to position their competitor's product as being for high-end and niche markets, not for mainstream. Very shrewd.
George Lucas is working on Spider-Man Episode I as we speak. Here's some select quotes:
"Meesa been bitten by a spider!"
"Meesa spidey-sense all tingly! Oh no, issa bombad villain! Meesa got to go find a phone booth!"
Sim Invading Iraq to Keep Approval Ratings High
No president has ever been reelected to office following a war.
I bet the top Bungie folks are buying Maalox by the caseload these days. They've bet heavily on the success of the XBox.
Ah, well. Maybe once the XBox goes tits up, the key Bungie people will bail and form a new game company.
that the PS One is now a portable console, and may be Sony's way of gradually easing into the handheld market. With an LCD screen, a PS One sells for about $150 (still a little pricey). Sony may get another 6-7 years out of the PS One.
While it's true that hands-on experience and proven skills still count for more than degrees and certifications in many circles, a college degree is almost a requirement for getting a job these days. In fact, I'll even go so far as to say that it doesn't matter much *what* your degree is in (provided you have said experience and skills). I know an IT manager whose degree is in pre-seminary work; however, on his resume, he just lists that he has a B.A. and leaves it at that. And doors still open for him.
It bears repeating, so I'll say it again: A college degree is virtually a requirement for landing a decent job these days.
Besides, you may find it an enriching experience that your previous schoolwork doesn't begin to compare to.
Ten Atari 2600 games for $20? Why? They should have put the entire 2600 library in the ROM's and sold it for $20.
I have a hard time seeing ten 2600 games giving me $20 worth of replayability, but maybe that's just me.
IMO (and a lot of other people's, too, from what I've read), the biggest mistake was releasing the movie with such shoddy CG work. I mean, there are such glaring problems in there that even non-3D artists like myself are picking up on. Lighting is off, textures are too smooth, physics are way, waaay off, footfalls are off, and the character motion is incredibly un-lifelike. Every time I was ready to really get into the movie, I kept getting snapped back to reality by the poor 3D animation; I think it kept Spider-Man from being a great movie, rather than just a good movie.
I know why it is the way it is, though. The movie's release schedule got bumped up several months because of business decisions about the optimal time to release it. It makes me shudder to think of what might be awaiting us when The Hulk or the Fantastic Four gets made. Are the studios going to bank on the franchise, and to hell with quality?
I wonder how Sam Raimi feels about this? Is he really satisfied with the crappy CG work in Spider-Man? Considering how much money this film is making, it would be really great if, for the DVD version, he re-animated those scenes to make them more believeable. What's his email address? Maybe someone should start a petition...
Most of the "mistakes" that are being filed are NOT mistakes, just kids inventing mistakes. The owner of the site confesses that he hasn't seen the movie yet (he's in the UK), so he's not really in a position to make any judgement calls on these.
...that Spider-Man will have a significantly larger opening weekend than AOTC, because AOTC is opening on far fewer screens. The only valid comparison will be what their total gross is once they've had their runs.
Incidentally, there is concern in the press that Spider-Man may peak too early because it opened on so many screens; however, I'm sure it was intentional, as they knew they had to make as much money as possible in the two weeks before AOTC opened.
You may remember that, immediately after Sept. 11, a very popular popup making the rounds was for a game called "Yo Mama, Osama". If you clicked the ad and played the game, of course, it installed a spyware app (don't recall which one).
While technically not any different from the way other spyware are distributed, it still tops the list in my book for the sleaziest thing I've yet seen in spyware, i.e., capitalizing on the emotional turmoil for 9/11.
What was he running, Abacus XP?
They're the ones who released those phony pics of an Apple branded PDA last year. Whether it was a publicity stunt or they were deceived (my money's on the former), Spymac is NOT a good source for Mac news.
Try macnn.com instead.
...it can only be about where to hide your body after they've figured out a way to puree you.
Even if Macromedia was prohibited from selling the Flash authoring tool this would not necessarily have any affect on the browser plugin itself. I don't see what would keep Macromedia from developing a new version of its authoring application with an interface that doesn't employ tabbed palettes.
:-D
Oops, they've already done just that
Hmmm... Where have I seen that pallette before? Oh yeah, right here.
Better keep those lawyers around a while longer Macromedia.
Then again, Microsoft is the king of interface ripoff, maybe they'll just be flattered...
Who's brilliant idea was it not to broadcast for a day in protest? Internet radio stations are up and down so much that no one is likely to even question why. It's not like a major TV station like CNN going offline for 24 hours. Most people are going to just move on to the next net radio station or pop in a CD.
What they SHOULD have done was to run a continuously looping 30-second spot telling everyone WHY their programming was interrupted and WHAT they wanted the listener to do.
Congrats, you just wasted a day of valuable broadcast time.
What I meant was that I don't want to be nickle-and-dimed at every site I visit (or, more appropriately, five and tenned). If we ever approach that, the internet will cease to be great.
However, the laws of supply and demand are still in effect here. The supply of free game reviews on the internet is fairly large, so it's hard to say that the demand for GameSpot will be enough to generate a lot of subscriptions (I recall reading that another site lost 90% of its traffic by going to a subscription-based model). Besides, $5 a month is an outrageous amount, in my opinion. I visit hundreds of sites in a week, and thousands a month, should I be paying each of them $5 for a month's access? I think GameSpot would be far more reasonable to price their service at $1 a month, an amount I wouldn't mind paying (well, I would, but I'd probably do it anyway, even though I'm only an occasional GameSpot user).
My experience with GameSpot has been that a) reader review scores of a game have been more accurate than the score given by a professional game reviewer, since most of us aren't as hung up on minor details if a game plays well, and b) most all of the salient points of the official reviews are repeated many times in the reader reviews.
I know that *I* won't now or ever be sending any money GameSpot's way. As others have said, the content is available free on a bazillion other sites, so why pay?
Not to mention that this is turning into a general trend on the internet, paying for content that was previously free. Just yesterday it was announced that a game I've been playing for free over the internet for the past couple of years is going back to a subscription model. I won't be paying, because there's just too many other good games out there that are free (and, frankly, more important things I really should be doing with my time, like finishing up my master's degree, not spending untold hours on a game).
Plus, they say the GameSpot cost is only $4.95/month. Slashdot is roughly $5/month. Salon premium, $6/month. On and on. When they say "it's only $5," that doesn't account for every other site that you visit wanting your $5, too. It adds up. I won't be paying for any content, because I believe in the essential "free-ness" of the internet (which I'm already paying $25/month to access). There's too many folks out there who would like to be competition for these sites that are willing to do it at no charge.
Furthermore, if you get stuck anywhere in any game, it's almost certain that someone will have posted a walkthrough, or even just a usenet post (which Deja/Google will do a wonderful job of finding for you) with the solution. Meaning you spent $10 up front for a guide you might or might not need (if you're buying it in case you get stuck) when you could have found the information for free from your fellow gamers.
For the most part that's true; however, I've noticed that fan sites and FAQ's are reluctant to publish tables and charts from the strategy guides. A lot of them say up front that their intention is to supplement the strategy guide, not replace it.
I would love to hear a counter example from someone who buys strategy guides and finds they improve the experience (of an otherwise good game) somehow. Anyone out there?
I found the StarCraft guides somewhat useful, though it tended to stop short of detailed analysis. They came bundled with the game, so I wasn't complaining...
Going way back to a game like X-Com:UFO, the strategy guide was priceless.
I would agree with your advice to seek counsel and treat this as a legal morass, not an IT problem. Push back as hard as you can while you work toward 100% compliance.
However, don't assume that the BSA is afraid of negative PR; quite the opposite. They are in the business of pissing off people and making examples. And the bigger the better. If they can strike a victory on this campus, it'll send shockwaves through other campuses around the country. If you've been to their website, it's filled with press releases of companies that have crumbled before them.
If any of you had bothered to test out the site, instead of taking it at face value...
First of all, the church staff for Mt. Fellowship Baptist Church is featured prominently in the Bio's section. Fine. So why isn't there a street address and phone number for the church on the site? Not even a city or state listed anywhere!
Second, I actually emailed each one of the members on the Bio's page. Of the 10 listed, SEVEN BOUNCED.
TWO OF THE DOMAINS WEREN'T EVEN REGISTERED.
But hey, Slashdot is all about Christian bashing, though, right? Accuse Christians of being ignorant of scientific facts while being ignorant of facts themselves?
Carry on.
Can you just imagine a cop jumping off one of these things to chase down a criminal?
"Awright, buddy, come back with me to my, uh... Now where did my Segway go?"