I've been in a similar situation, only for us it was the case where someone wanted to run a course in our IT Suite. They needed specific software for the course and told me this 2 days before the course was due to run, they told me they'd ordered the licenses and were on the way but might not make it until after the course was due to run.
Knowing what these people are like, and having little confidence in their ordering of the licenses I put my foot down and refused to install it until the licenses arrived, I made the point that if this caused a problem for their course that they should perhaps consider not leaving things until the last minute in future. My line manager backed me up in my stance however my boss over-ruled both of us and told us to install it, standing my ground I defied him and refused to do so. Eventually my boss installed the software himself, so the course ran and so forth but at least I hadn't been the one to break the law, the best part? Those licenses never arrived, the whole thing was completely illegal, frankly I fail to believe the licenses were ever really ordered.
You shouldn't worry about losing your job by refusing to do this, they'll most likely back down on any threat to sack you. If they do however follow through then you're looking at an extremely strong court case involving a massive payout for yourself. If you get sacked and know they have gone ahead installing illegal copies, your first stop should be to report them to whatever country deals with anti-piracy raids, when you report it ask that any evidence of infringement they find be made available to your court case, this will make your case pretty much un-loseable. Just bear in mind that you absolutely do not have to do this, you're entirely in the right by refusing to do so and the law will recognise that.
One other thing to note is that if you do follow through, obey your orders and install the software - what happens if someone else reports your company? Can you really be sure they'll take the blame? What are you going to do if they say they had no knowledge of pirate software on your systems and hence the blame gets shifted entirely on you.
I think most people pirate at least some software and home, and so some may say it's hypocritical to say the things I've said here knowing that, but there's a distinction to be made between what you do at home and being professional at work. No one has to know what you get upto at home, and so the risk is more controlled, however at work any number of your users could cash in on that $1000 software piracy report reward or whatever. Furthermore, I'd imagine the penalties for what would probably be commercial copyright infringement would be much more harsh than for home copying also.
I'm not sure to be honest - you could well be right, but it's probably worth noting that MS are part of the HDDVD alliance yet have publicly noted they'll likely release a Bluray solution for the 360 if that were to become the prominent format.
Companies behind the two alliances that aren't part of the manufacturing process seem a lot more willing to sway between formats as the market allows, I'd guess Apple is in the same boat - whilst they may be a Bluray backer, if it did flop I doubt they'd be afraid to jump ship and if they become both just as prominent I doubt they'd just ignore HDDVD.
I could be completely wrong, I don't know Apple's stance but I'd imagine Apple just aren't ready to commit to Bluray yet, they're probably waiting for more mature drives that support both HDDVD and Bluray together or waiting for a more definitive winner in the format wars, right now it's just too early to take sides and I doubt Apple want the headache of producing/supporting systems that have either Bluray or HDDVD and not both in, I can see it now:
Customer: I bought this HD movie and it doesn't work in my drive can you help? Apple: Sir, it's an HDDVD, you have a Bluray drive Customer: But my Bluray drive is for HD isn't it? Apple: Yes, but HDDVD and Bluray are different formats Customer: But I want to be able to play HD movies! Apple: *sigh*
I am willing to buy it and I need ultimate because I make use of both media centre and thinks like IIS locally when testing ASP. However:
OEM version has restrictions on reinstalling it after more than one or two hardware changes, not willing to pay £120 ($240 US) for something I can't use after I upgrade/change my PC.
Retail version is far too expensive at £350 ($700 US), this would allow me to have the pleasure of hardware upgrades (gee what a benefit!) without problem (well, not entirely, I'd still have to deal with activation crap each time) but again, I can't justify that cost.
Upgrade version isn't a bad bet but I have no guarantee the install-from scratch trick will always be reliable. What if a post-system setup patch comes down from MS to disable the system if it can in some way work out I did it this way? Upgrade edition is also rather expensive but of course not as bad as retail.
Now take those two points, consider the fact I have 2 XP desktops and a laptop and I want a common platform amongst them all, multiply the costs by 3 and see the problem.
I'd be willing to pay for 3 OEM licenses if I could use them indefinitely through as many hardware upgrades as I wanted, I am of course not going to pay for one retail license. What it comes down to is that MS have the option to take around £300 off me to kit my systems out - if they don't provide that option, one of two things will happen:
1) I'll find a reliable way to pirate it
2) When the time comes that I really do need to drop XP, if no price drop has occured, I'll move across to Linux (hopefully in the 2/3 years that'll take, distros like Ubuntu will be incredibly mature)
The ball is in MS' court at the end of the day, if they want me to switch to Vista I will and for what imo is a very reasonable price. Most people couldn't even justify as much as the ~£300 I'm willing to pay so as a non-business customer. The alternative is that they push me away as a customer, and hopefully I'm not alone with this entire dilemma, if this is true then maybe they'll realise about the same time they push a whole lot of us away such that XP useage stats decrease without at the same time boosting Vista useage stats as we all move to Linux or whatever. I'll admit right now I'd rather not switch to Linux, but if Vista remains such an unfeasible option indefinitely, and XP gets phased out such that patches aren't issued then I might as well switch to Linux, sure it still probably wont do DirectX 10 ever but at least it'll be supported and updated which eventually XP wont be.
Sometimes it feels like companies just don't want to actually take my money.
He was basing his comment on the number of units sold. The question is of course, whether units sold automatically infers most successful launch ever. If they sold the 800,000 units because they had enough units available to fulfil demand due to them delaying the Euro launch by 5 months then don't sell hardly anymore units over the next few months, whilst the competitor only sells 400,000 at launch as that's all they could produce in time but sells another 1million over the next few months then I'd say their definition of best launch is irrelevant - it's the playing out of the first 6 to 12 months after launch that really matter I'd say.
Certainly if you defined "best launch" by attendees and purchases at launch parties then Sony haven't earnt that title for the PS3, it was a flop in that respect. Whilst Sony has used the first 2 weeks as their measure of time for judging best launch I'd bet that the Wii/360 would claim this title back if you used say, the first 6 hours or perhaps even first few days as the measure of time for judging it instead.
Some people are suggesting the price is fair when comparing it to music prices online.
The problem is, most XBox live users wont and aren't comparing it to that, they're comparing it to other XBox live content. When you can get Geometry Wars or some other 400 points game on XBox live for less than the price of a 3 song pack, the price of the songs becomes a whole lot less fair looking.
The cost of all 9 songs is more than 3x 400 point full games and is only 100 MS points short of 4 full games. It's also not far off (700 points) the cost of the new Oblivion expansion - shivering isles.
I think quite simply, a combination of of digital music still being rather expensive, Red Octane/Harmonix/MS wanting to squeeze as much out of customers for DLS as they can and then some of the 400 point games being reasonably priced is where where these complaints come from.
One final point worth noting is also that $2 per song is reasonable to some people here, but do those people still find it reasonable if only one of the songs out of the 3 are worth having? That essentially makes it $6 per song you want if you're forced to have 2 songs you neither want nor will ever play.
I do think the DLC for Guitar Hero could be handled a whole lot better - I'll admit I'm new to Harmonix/Red Octane games, they seem to have a pretty decent fanbase but as a first time customer to them, I'm not terribly impressed thus far. I received one of the faulty Guitars and have still yet to hear officially from them (via their site or if they bother to respond to my e-mails) as to how I'm meant to get it replaced - couple that with less than impressive DLC thus far and I have to say they have a long way to go to get in my good books.
MS wants to get the new iteration of their 360 hardware out the door that is, the cooler, quieter and cheaper to produce iteration.
Whilst cheaper to produce however, MS will still initially make a loss until they're shipping en-masse. Therefore, I'd say MS is releasing the elite with the new hardware iteration as a method to ship said new hardware without taking as high a monetary loss. Essentially, what this means is that they're using the elite as a tool to bring down cost of production of the new hardware iteration, so that 6months down the line, they can start building the premium version with the new hardware so cheap that they can announce a massive price drop on the core and premium.
Whilst the Elite may indeed look like an idiotic short term decision, if this is their plan then by the end of the year you could see MS shifting the 360 perhaps even as cheap as the Wii is currently. This is something Sony wont be able to compete with any time soon, they've already shafted backwards compatibility in the name of reducing production costs for the European release of the PS3, by xmas 2007 year I'd be suprised if the PS3 had dropped at all, but again, I bet the 360 is selling for current Wii prices. As an aside, I'd guess the Wii will be cheaper again by then, Nintendo is shifting so many units and never made a loss per-unit in the first place so a price cut would be an easy hit for them by xmas 2007.
I don't know US prices off by heart, but my prediction for xmas 2007 console prices in the UK is something like: Wii - £149.99 360 Core - £169.99 (or possibly even written off altogether) 360 Premium - £199.99 PS3 60gb - £399.99
It's all very well that they broke the record for shipping the most units, but this doesn't equate to actually selling the most units, so does anyone really care if they broke the record for most units available, if the units weren't even in demand?
Over the weekend when I was shopping for clothes for work I dragged my girlfriend into the games and electronics shops as usual in trade for having to put up with her clothes shopping and I didn't encounter a single store with less than 10 PS3s in stock, one GAME shop I went to I counted 32 piled up waiting to be shifted, with possibly even more in their store room as the shop floor was too full to fit any more. This seems to be the same story nationwide speaking to friends and from various reports online.
The story also seems to be the same with online retailers, they all have plenty in stock and are already adding in sweeteners to try and shift them (i.e. buy it with a game, get £5 off, 2 games, £10, 3 games £15, 4 games £20 at Amazon).
Only time will tell if the PS3 has been a success in the UK. Number of units shipped does not equate to success, only number of units sold can define that. I'd imagine that if the PS3 really was doing well then Sony would be gloating about the number of PS3s they'd sold over the initial launch weekend and not about how many they managed to ship.
Accounts for all sorts from MMOs to bank accounts to ebay get hacked online, I'd argue however that MS has an even tougher job than usual here as console users are probably often even less security-literate than PC users.
I doubt this is much different from the trojans that target WoW accounts or the organised crime financed hackers that go for people's bank, paypal and ebay accounts.
...Lots of games run, but not an awful lot run without issue. There's a massive amount in that list rated as having problems.
I've said to myself in the past I'll buy a PS3 eventually when the price goes down primarily so I can see what the fuss about the Final Fantasy and Devil May Cry series is all about but with the official news of Devil May Cry 4 coming to the 360 at the same time as the PS3 and so forth my interest is dropping furthermore. That said Sony may well have managed to improve their backwards compatibility list by the time of a price drop at least! It's just a shame that in the meantime Sony's backwards compatibility list for the European release of the console appears on better than the 360's backwards compatibility list, the difference being MS never advertised full compatibility whereas Sony did so unless this list improves fast, full backwards compatibility as promised feels like a big fat lie from Sony - at least with the European console.
"A study concludes that people who play car racing games may be more likely to take risks and drive aggressively when driving in real life."
Well yeah, people who play tennis MAY be more likely to molest small children but that's a pretty big may. Research that needs to resort to "may" often suggests that it's actually rather inconclusive but would like to make itself sound important anyway so that sites like Slashdot post it.
Just to emphasise this, FTA:
"The researchers then studied 68 men and found those who played even one racing game took more risks afterward in traffic situations on a computer simulator than those who played another type of game."
Gee, imagine that, people who play computer games understand that there are no consequences of driving recklessly in a computer simulator (aka just another game).
But does the linked article come with instructions on how to install vista without getting owned by product activation/genuine advantage and with the ability to successfully receive and install automatic updates;) ?
I think you're probably right, and PC game prices seem to reflect this somewhat, the cost of PC games seems to drop when sales figures drop, around 5 years or so ago when the Xbox, PS2, Gamecube etc. came about PC games went back down to around £29.99 after a breif period of being up at £34.99, around 3 years ago they went back up to £34.99 and dropped around a year ago to £29.99 (around the time of the 360 launch), now a lot of PC games are selling for £24.99, since the release of the Wii.
It seems as PC sales decline, so do game prices in an effort to coax more people into buying them I'd guess. Still, if lower PC sales mean lower prices then regardless, it seems great for the consumer.
I have to agree - I find Wii sports more fun and more addictive than any other Wii game, to me Zelda and Red Steel aren't enhanced particularly well by the Wii mote, I could just as well play them on a classic controller but Wii sports really stands out to me as demonstrating what the Wii mote was made for.
The problem I have with it is that it's not even charging for what was free, it's charging for less than what was free - you don't get dedicated servers, game servers are hosted entirely by peers.
When extra content from the marketplace has costs of it's own and games are hosted by the clients I have to ask what I actually get for my subscription other than access to the service? If access is all then £40 a year is an extortionate cost.
Because I grew up, got a job and am now gullable enough to buy any crap the games industry throws out. I suffer from obsessive compulsive computer game purchase.
Oh how I miss the days of being dependant on pocket money where every penny had to be spent so wisely.
If only the UK goverment realised this.
on
DRM Causes Piracy
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· Score: 2, Insightful
Honestly, the response to the recent petition to the UK goverment to ban DRM almost sounded like it was produced for the goverment by the RIAA and Macrovision combined. The response in full:
Digital rights issues have been gaining increasing prominence as innovation accelerates, more and more digital media products and services come onto the market and the consumer wants to get access to digital content over different platforms. Many content providers have been embedding access and management tools to protect their rights and, for example, prevent illegal copying. We believe that they should be able to continue to protect their content in this way. However, DRM does not only act as a policeman through technical protection measures, it also enables content companies to offer the consumer unprecedented choice in terms of how they consume content, and the corresponding price they wish to pay.
It is clear though that the needs and rights of consumers must also be carefully safeguarded. It is reasonable for consumers to be informed what is actually being offered for sale, for example, and how and where the purchaser will be able to use the product, and any restrictions applied. While there is good reason to expect the market to reach a balance as these new markets develop, it is important that consumers' interests are maintained in the meantime.
Apart from the APIG (All Party Internet Group) report on DRM referred to in your petition, Digital Rights issues are an important component in other major HMG review strands on Intellectual Property, New Media and the Creative Economy. In particular, the independent Gowers Review of Intellectual Property commissioned by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, published its report on 6th December 2006 as part of the Chancellor's Pre-Budget Report. Recommendations include introducing a limited private copying exception by 2008 for format shifting for works published after the date that the law comes into effect. There should be no accompanying levies for consumers. Also making it easier for users to file notice of complaints procedures relating to Digital Rights Management tools by providing an accessible web interface on the Patent Office website by 2008 and that DTI should investigate the possibility of providing consumer guidance on DRM systems through a labelling convention without imposing unnecessary regulatory burdens.
The article states the guy bought at least 4 of the units at launch, Microsoft has already made it clear there was a problem with a lot of launch units so is it really any suprise that this has happened? One replacement failed again but it doesn't state if this was one that was replaced earlier on and hence could be prone to the same fault.
Don't get me wrong it does indeed suck for the guy and it is a bit silly of MS to release with these problems (surely they must have known?) but the article sounds like it's trying to make something of an issue that's now largely done and dusted. It's a little like someone claiming they had 8 Wii motes all bought at release and that the straps all broke, perfectly realistic scenario but let's face it, is and issue that's now been and gone.
Sounds logical and it was my original understanding of the issue, but I have to now question whether these stores wouldn't have happened otherwise. The music industry was following an unsustainable business model, if the tech companies really were so anti-DRM then they could surely have waited until the music industry became so desperate that they had to bow down to the non-DRM demands. I'd suggest it's more greed on behalf of the tech companies in not being willing to wait for the music industry to cave that made them choose too go in early and support DRM not a need to get their foot in the door because as I mentioned above - I'm convinced there's other ways to do that, I'm sure Apple could have just as easily signed bands themselves if they had wanted.
I don't even so much have a problem with the tech companies going in early and supporting DRM because from a business standpoint it's a smart move - to get in their and start making money as early as possible. What I do have a problem with however is them now trying to claim the moral high ground when their previous decisions to go in early and support DRM, whilst a good business decision was, imo, a morally wrong decision.
I've never understood why tech companies listened to the music industry in the first place. Perhaps I'm wrong but I was under the impression that the tech companies are far bigger in monetary value and hence far more powerful than the music industry in the first place so don't understand why these companies supported, rather than fought DRM from day one.
If it weren't for this I'd believe these companies coming forward now were coming forward of their own free will and not because they're getting scared at the fact that governments and lawmakers, particularly in the EU are turning against DRM.
Slashdot Mirror
I've been in a similar situation, only for us it was the case where someone wanted to run a course in our IT Suite. They needed specific software for the course and told me this 2 days before the course was due to run, they told me they'd ordered the licenses and were on the way but might not make it until after the course was due to run.
Knowing what these people are like, and having little confidence in their ordering of the licenses I put my foot down and refused to install it until the licenses arrived, I made the point that if this caused a problem for their course that they should perhaps consider not leaving things until the last minute in future. My line manager backed me up in my stance however my boss over-ruled both of us and told us to install it, standing my ground I defied him and refused to do so. Eventually my boss installed the software himself, so the course ran and so forth but at least I hadn't been the one to break the law, the best part? Those licenses never arrived, the whole thing was completely illegal, frankly I fail to believe the licenses were ever really ordered.
You shouldn't worry about losing your job by refusing to do this, they'll most likely back down on any threat to sack you. If they do however follow through then you're looking at an extremely strong court case involving a massive payout for yourself. If you get sacked and know they have gone ahead installing illegal copies, your first stop should be to report them to whatever country deals with anti-piracy raids, when you report it ask that any evidence of infringement they find be made available to your court case, this will make your case pretty much un-loseable. Just bear in mind that you absolutely do not have to do this, you're entirely in the right by refusing to do so and the law will recognise that.
One other thing to note is that if you do follow through, obey your orders and install the software - what happens if someone else reports your company? Can you really be sure they'll take the blame? What are you going to do if they say they had no knowledge of pirate software on your systems and hence the blame gets shifted entirely on you.
I think most people pirate at least some software and home, and so some may say it's hypocritical to say the things I've said here knowing that, but there's a distinction to be made between what you do at home and being professional at work. No one has to know what you get upto at home, and so the risk is more controlled, however at work any number of your users could cash in on that $1000 software piracy report reward or whatever. Furthermore, I'd imagine the penalties for what would probably be commercial copyright infringement would be much more harsh than for home copying also.
Sounds more like Job's admin staff dealt with it than Jobs himself.
"How do you cope with sexual desire among healthy young men and women during a mission years long?"
Celibate space monks!
I'm not sure to be honest - you could well be right, but it's probably worth noting that MS are part of the HDDVD alliance yet have publicly noted they'll likely release a Bluray solution for the 360 if that were to become the prominent format.
Companies behind the two alliances that aren't part of the manufacturing process seem a lot more willing to sway between formats as the market allows, I'd guess Apple is in the same boat - whilst they may be a Bluray backer, if it did flop I doubt they'd be afraid to jump ship and if they become both just as prominent I doubt they'd just ignore HDDVD.
I could be completely wrong, I don't know Apple's stance but I'd imagine Apple just aren't ready to commit to Bluray yet, they're probably waiting for more mature drives that support both HDDVD and Bluray together or waiting for a more definitive winner in the format wars, right now it's just too early to take sides and I doubt Apple want the headache of producing/supporting systems that have either Bluray or HDDVD and not both in, I can see it now:
Customer: I bought this HD movie and it doesn't work in my drive can you help?
Apple: Sir, it's an HDDVD, you have a Bluray drive
Customer: But my Bluray drive is for HD isn't it?
Apple: Yes, but HDDVD and Bluray are different formats
Customer: But I want to be able to play HD movies!
Apple: *sigh*
It's called turning it off, and helping do your little bit to cut CO2 emissions and cutting your electricity bill at the same time!
Doesn't Sony know? Curing cancer is so last century, this century it's all about carbon emissions.
I am willing to buy it and I need ultimate because I make use of both media centre and thinks like IIS locally when testing ASP. However:
OEM version has restrictions on reinstalling it after more than one or two hardware changes, not willing to pay £120 ($240 US) for something I can't use after I upgrade/change my PC.
Retail version is far too expensive at £350 ($700 US), this would allow me to have the pleasure of hardware upgrades (gee what a benefit!) without problem (well, not entirely, I'd still have to deal with activation crap each time) but again, I can't justify that cost.
Upgrade version isn't a bad bet but I have no guarantee the install-from scratch trick will always be reliable. What if a post-system setup patch comes down from MS to disable the system if it can in some way work out I did it this way? Upgrade edition is also rather expensive but of course not as bad as retail.
Now take those two points, consider the fact I have 2 XP desktops and a laptop and I want a common platform amongst them all, multiply the costs by 3 and see the problem.
I'd be willing to pay for 3 OEM licenses if I could use them indefinitely through as many hardware upgrades as I wanted, I am of course not going to pay for one retail license. What it comes down to is that MS have the option to take around £300 off me to kit my systems out - if they don't provide that option, one of two things will happen:
1) I'll find a reliable way to pirate it
2) When the time comes that I really do need to drop XP, if no price drop has occured, I'll move across to Linux (hopefully in the 2/3 years that'll take, distros like Ubuntu will be incredibly mature)
The ball is in MS' court at the end of the day, if they want me to switch to Vista I will and for what imo is a very reasonable price. Most people couldn't even justify as much as the ~£300 I'm willing to pay so as a non-business customer. The alternative is that they push me away as a customer, and hopefully I'm not alone with this entire dilemma, if this is true then maybe they'll realise about the same time they push a whole lot of us away such that XP useage stats decrease without at the same time boosting Vista useage stats as we all move to Linux or whatever. I'll admit right now I'd rather not switch to Linux, but if Vista remains such an unfeasible option indefinitely, and XP gets phased out such that patches aren't issued then I might as well switch to Linux, sure it still probably wont do DirectX 10 ever but at least it'll be supported and updated which eventually XP wont be.
Sometimes it feels like companies just don't want to actually take my money.
He was basing his comment on the number of units sold. The question is of course, whether units sold automatically infers most successful launch ever. If they sold the 800,000 units because they had enough units available to fulfil demand due to them delaying the Euro launch by 5 months then don't sell hardly anymore units over the next few months, whilst the competitor only sells 400,000 at launch as that's all they could produce in time but sells another 1million over the next few months then I'd say their definition of best launch is irrelevant - it's the playing out of the first 6 to 12 months after launch that really matter I'd say.
Certainly if you defined "best launch" by attendees and purchases at launch parties then Sony haven't earnt that title for the PS3, it was a flop in that respect. Whilst Sony has used the first 2 weeks as their measure of time for judging best launch I'd bet that the Wii/360 would claim this title back if you used say, the first 6 hours or perhaps even first few days as the measure of time for judging it instead.
Some people are suggesting the price is fair when comparing it to music prices online.
The problem is, most XBox live users wont and aren't comparing it to that, they're comparing it to other XBox live content. When you can get Geometry Wars or some other 400 points game on XBox live for less than the price of a 3 song pack, the price of the songs becomes a whole lot less fair looking.
The cost of all 9 songs is more than 3x 400 point full games and is only 100 MS points short of 4 full games. It's also not far off (700 points) the cost of the new Oblivion expansion - shivering isles.
I think quite simply, a combination of of digital music still being rather expensive, Red Octane/Harmonix/MS wanting to squeeze as much out of customers for DLS as they can and then some of the 400 point games being reasonably priced is where where these complaints come from.
One final point worth noting is also that $2 per song is reasonable to some people here, but do those people still find it reasonable if only one of the songs out of the 3 are worth having? That essentially makes it $6 per song you want if you're forced to have 2 songs you neither want nor will ever play.
I do think the DLC for Guitar Hero could be handled a whole lot better - I'll admit I'm new to Harmonix/Red Octane games, they seem to have a pretty decent fanbase but as a first time customer to them, I'm not terribly impressed thus far. I received one of the faulty Guitars and have still yet to hear officially from them (via their site or if they bother to respond to my e-mails) as to how I'm meant to get it replaced - couple that with less than impressive DLC thus far and I have to say they have a long way to go to get in my good books.
MS wants to get the new iteration of their 360 hardware out the door that is, the cooler, quieter and cheaper to produce iteration.
Whilst cheaper to produce however, MS will still initially make a loss until they're shipping en-masse. Therefore, I'd say MS is releasing the elite with the new hardware iteration as a method to ship said new hardware without taking as high a monetary loss. Essentially, what this means is that they're using the elite as a tool to bring down cost of production of the new hardware iteration, so that 6months down the line, they can start building the premium version with the new hardware so cheap that they can announce a massive price drop on the core and premium.
Whilst the Elite may indeed look like an idiotic short term decision, if this is their plan then by the end of the year you could see MS shifting the 360 perhaps even as cheap as the Wii is currently. This is something Sony wont be able to compete with any time soon, they've already shafted backwards compatibility in the name of reducing production costs for the European release of the PS3, by xmas 2007 year I'd be suprised if the PS3 had dropped at all, but again, I bet the 360 is selling for current Wii prices. As an aside, I'd guess the Wii will be cheaper again by then, Nintendo is shifting so many units and never made a loss per-unit in the first place so a price cut would be an easy hit for them by xmas 2007.
I don't know US prices off by heart, but my prediction for xmas 2007 console prices in the UK is something like:
Wii - £149.99
360 Core - £169.99 (or possibly even written off altogether)
360 Premium - £199.99
PS3 60gb - £399.99
It's all very well that they broke the record for shipping the most units, but this doesn't equate to actually selling the most units, so does anyone really care if they broke the record for most units available, if the units weren't even in demand?
Over the weekend when I was shopping for clothes for work I dragged my girlfriend into the games and electronics shops as usual in trade for having to put up with her clothes shopping and I didn't encounter a single store with less than 10 PS3s in stock, one GAME shop I went to I counted 32 piled up waiting to be shifted, with possibly even more in their store room as the shop floor was too full to fit any more. This seems to be the same story nationwide speaking to friends and from various reports online.
The story also seems to be the same with online retailers, they all have plenty in stock and are already adding in sweeteners to try and shift them (i.e. buy it with a game, get £5 off, 2 games, £10, 3 games £15, 4 games £20 at Amazon).
Only time will tell if the PS3 has been a success in the UK. Number of units shipped does not equate to success, only number of units sold can define that. I'd imagine that if the PS3 really was doing well then Sony would be gloating about the number of PS3s they'd sold over the initial launch weekend and not about how many they managed to ship.
Accounts for all sorts from MMOs to bank accounts to ebay get hacked online, I'd argue however that MS has an even tougher job than usual here as console users are probably often even less security-literate than PC users.
I doubt this is much different from the trojans that target WoW accounts or the organised crime financed hackers that go for people's bank, paypal and ebay accounts.
...Lots of games run, but not an awful lot run without issue. There's a massive amount in that list rated as having problems.
I've said to myself in the past I'll buy a PS3 eventually when the price goes down primarily so I can see what the fuss about the Final Fantasy and Devil May Cry series is all about but with the official news of Devil May Cry 4 coming to the 360 at the same time as the PS3 and so forth my interest is dropping furthermore. That said Sony may well have managed to improve their backwards compatibility list by the time of a price drop at least! It's just a shame that in the meantime Sony's backwards compatibility list for the European release of the console appears on better than the 360's backwards compatibility list, the difference being MS never advertised full compatibility whereas Sony did so unless this list improves fast, full backwards compatibility as promised feels like a big fat lie from Sony - at least with the European console.
I quote:
"A study concludes that people who play car racing games may be more likely to take risks and drive aggressively when driving in real life."
Well yeah, people who play tennis MAY be more likely to molest small children but that's a pretty big may. Research that needs to resort to "may" often suggests that it's actually rather inconclusive but would like to make itself sound important anyway so that sites like Slashdot post it.
Just to emphasise this, FTA:
"The researchers then studied 68 men and found those who played even one racing game took more risks afterward in traffic situations on a computer simulator than those who played another type of game."
Gee, imagine that, people who play computer games understand that there are no consequences of driving recklessly in a computer simulator (aka just another game).
But does the linked article come with instructions on how to install vista without getting owned by product activation/genuine advantage and with the ability to successfully receive and install automatic updates ;) ?
Sweet, rumble, 1080p and coop play!
;) the summary just made it too easy!
How will Microsoft ever compete against these features!
I know I know it's flamebait, sorry, I just couldn't resist
I think you're probably right, and PC game prices seem to reflect this somewhat, the cost of PC games seems to drop when sales figures drop, around 5 years or so ago when the Xbox, PS2, Gamecube etc. came about PC games went back down to around £29.99 after a breif period of being up at £34.99, around 3 years ago they went back up to £34.99 and dropped around a year ago to £29.99 (around the time of the 360 launch), now a lot of PC games are selling for £24.99, since the release of the Wii.
It seems as PC sales decline, so do game prices in an effort to coax more people into buying them I'd guess. Still, if lower PC sales mean lower prices then regardless, it seems great for the consumer.
I have to agree - I find Wii sports more fun and more addictive than any other Wii game, to me Zelda and Red Steel aren't enhanced particularly well by the Wii mote, I could just as well play them on a classic controller but Wii sports really stands out to me as demonstrating what the Wii mote was made for.
Whilst you're right in that temporary accounts make the total user base figure look less impressive, the original post also states:
"An astonishing 70% of Live users have purchased a title from the Xbox Live arcade."
Which is a figure that to be fair on MS, gets more impressive when dummy accounts are taken into consideration.
The problem I have with it is that it's not even charging for what was free, it's charging for less than what was free - you don't get dedicated servers, game servers are hosted entirely by peers.
When extra content from the marketplace has costs of it's own and games are hosted by the clients I have to ask what I actually get for my subscription other than access to the service? If access is all then £40 a year is an extortionate cost.
Because I grew up, got a job and am now gullable enough to buy any crap the games industry throws out. I suffer from obsessive compulsive computer game purchase.
Oh how I miss the days of being dependant on pocket money where every penny had to be spent so wisely.
Honestly, the response to the recent petition to the UK goverment to ban DRM almost sounded like it was produced for the goverment by the RIAA and Macrovision combined. The response in full:
Digital rights issues have been gaining increasing prominence as innovation accelerates, more and more digital media products and services come onto the market and the consumer wants to get access to digital content over different platforms. Many content providers have been embedding access and management tools to protect their rights and, for example, prevent illegal copying. We believe that they should be able to continue to protect their content in this way. However, DRM does not only act as a policeman through technical protection measures, it also enables content companies to offer the consumer unprecedented choice in terms of how they consume content, and the corresponding price they wish to pay.
It is clear though that the needs and rights of consumers must also be carefully safeguarded. It is reasonable for consumers to be informed what is actually being offered for sale, for example, and how and where the purchaser will be able to use the product, and any restrictions applied. While there is good reason to expect the market to reach a balance as these new markets develop, it is important that consumers' interests are maintained in the meantime.
Apart from the APIG (All Party Internet Group) report on DRM referred to in your petition, Digital Rights issues are an important component in other major HMG review strands on Intellectual Property, New Media and the Creative Economy. In particular, the independent Gowers Review of Intellectual Property commissioned by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, published its report on 6th December 2006 as part of the Chancellor's Pre-Budget Report. Recommendations include introducing a limited private copying exception by 2008 for format shifting for works published after the date that the law comes into effect. There should be no accompanying levies for consumers. Also making it easier for users to file notice of complaints procedures relating to Digital Rights Management tools by providing an accessible web interface on the Patent Office website by 2008 and that DTI should investigate the possibility of providing consumer guidance on DRM systems through a labelling convention without imposing unnecessary regulatory burdens.
The article states the guy bought at least 4 of the units at launch, Microsoft has already made it clear there was a problem with a lot of launch units so is it really any suprise that this has happened? One replacement failed again but it doesn't state if this was one that was replaced earlier on and hence could be prone to the same fault.
Don't get me wrong it does indeed suck for the guy and it is a bit silly of MS to release with these problems (surely they must have known?) but the article sounds like it's trying to make something of an issue that's now largely done and dusted. It's a little like someone claiming they had 8 Wii motes all bought at release and that the straps all broke, perfectly realistic scenario but let's face it, is and issue that's now been and gone.
Sounds logical and it was my original understanding of the issue, but I have to now question whether these stores wouldn't have happened otherwise. The music industry was following an unsustainable business model, if the tech companies really were so anti-DRM then they could surely have waited until the music industry became so desperate that they had to bow down to the non-DRM demands. I'd suggest it's more greed on behalf of the tech companies in not being willing to wait for the music industry to cave that made them choose too go in early and support DRM not a need to get their foot in the door because as I mentioned above - I'm convinced there's other ways to do that, I'm sure Apple could have just as easily signed bands themselves if they had wanted.
I don't even so much have a problem with the tech companies going in early and supporting DRM because from a business standpoint it's a smart move - to get in their and start making money as early as possible. What I do have a problem with however is them now trying to claim the moral high ground when their previous decisions to go in early and support DRM, whilst a good business decision was, imo, a morally wrong decision.
I've never understood why tech companies listened to the music industry in the first place. Perhaps I'm wrong but I was under the impression that the tech companies are far bigger in monetary value and hence far more powerful than the music industry in the first place so don't understand why these companies supported, rather than fought DRM from day one.
If it weren't for this I'd believe these companies coming forward now were coming forward of their own free will and not because they're getting scared at the fact that governments and lawmakers, particularly in the EU are turning against DRM.