Oh yeah, I want to run right out there and do business with a company that seems to be in the business of suing people over every little thing - like saying their database server products suck... or that you found a way to make money with one of their products they didn't think of... or that you use one of their products in a way they didn't think of themselves and charge you outrageous fees for...
If I had wanted that, I would have bought copious amounts of SCO products to keep Daryl McBride employed. Let me put it more simply to you, for those at Oracle who might care:
I'd rather eat razor sharp ground glass than use your products.
...and the fact that working with Nintendo's console development group is such a nightmare that even seasoned development houses don't put the manpower into creating stuff for them BECAUSE they are so difficult to work with. They lost a ton of franchises because of it - Resident Evil, Final Fantasy, and a ton more won't even -ever- consider it because of the tales they've heard about it.
That works against you getting premium titles for your console when you cull your developers before they even get out of the starting gate. The ones that are left don't sink the manpower into flagship games that could get killed at any point by Nintendo to favor their own titles, release schedules, or even if they just don't like your game concept as it's evolving. Petty shit kills good products, and Nintendo has been stabbing a lot of people in the industry in the back over the years - it's just taken a while to catch up with them.
The problem with your argument is that the Wii is actually a pretty good console - it's just saddled with crappy games because that's all that makes it past Nintendo's vetting process. Cheap and sleezy ports and titles that are just 'phoned in' make up a large bulk of the console's 'shovelware'. If Nintendo didn't require you to be an A tier developer with blockbuster games already in your stable - then they'd have some room for innovative products on the platform. As it is - they have geared their developer's licensing to poach developers from other consoles.
Given the Android platform, this could really open the world of console game development to the independents - those who could never convince Nintendo or Sony to even sell them a development kit - or pay for Microsoft XBOX's QA for deployment on XBOX Live. I've seen some really impressive indie games out there - and this could be their shot at getting in on a console that hasn't already 'cherry-picked' their developer base.
Of course, there is also a lot of $hit indie games as well - but that's kind of to be expected with no vetting process of any kind. Perhaps as the market matures, places like Metacritic and game magazines will review and rate indie titles on such systems as this more frequently - and it will not be such a crap-shoot.
That's got to be a serious contender for the record of fastest funded project on Kickstarter in the category of nearly a million dollars... But anyway, I hope this means we'll get to see what they come up with - a 99 dollar console is just about in the range of 'sure, I'll bite - see what it's like' in terms of risk to the consumer.
...because every time they get a good product into the market, get businesses to adopt it, get the contacts built up to make a major push into the market... corporate pulls the plug on the hardware, pulls the plug on the software, removes all the corporate features - and forgets all the movers and shakers they spent the last decade trying to pull in. Businesses got tired of it after the XServe fiasco - you don't drop significant capital into hardware only for your vendor to say, "Sorry, who are you again? We never made that so-and-so device... Get real, consumer stuff is where we're at - who did you think we are, IBM?"
I'd imagine they'd deal with it like people deal with the inevitability of childbirth here on Earth in the absence of modern medicine. It's gonna happen whether a doctor or midwife is present or not - all you can do is have someone who is moderately trained in the basics of it, bring along medical supplies to deal with common medical issues such as this - and perhaps bring along a little more to deal with this particular medical situation should some of the more common complications arise.
The nature of this kind of exploration would mean that you take the risk that something horribly unforeseen or preventable can happen; and if it does in this case - you face the possibility of having someone die in a pretty unpleasant fashion (I'd imagine death in childbirth to fit this qualification) in close quarters. Hell, people die in childbirth here on Earth, surrounded by the best medical care we, as the human race, can provide in the 21st century. Humans still have babies, and people still have them without a doctor or modern medicine around even.
Of course, the ethics of conceiving and bearing a child into a situation like this would be debatable - especially if it's a death sentence. But in the case where this is a planned expedition with a planned return trip after a period of colonization - then it's a risk some may take.
...but if they rely on the computer to perform real time inventory management, they are practically (if not completely) dead in the water. You can't sell items out of inventory, your pricing would be whatever the tag is (not whatever your instant savings might be), your staff would be bogged down handling inventory control and asset management, and most retailers won't take checks without the ability to electronically verify them. YES - you CAN run a store without computers, but you'd realistically be better off to only do so for your customers in the store, and then shut down until the system came back; you can't hope to run a modern retailer without real-time inventory management and control - at least without serious shrink (both accounting and realized).
Sounds like an awesome idea - that way, you are TOTALLY FSCKED when your internet connection goes down. One thing if your online ordering for a business goes down - just take orders by phone. When it completed hoses your order taking system (offline and online), then your screwed.
Why does this remind me of the spoof commercial I saw somewhere for the 12 blade facial razor, for the ultimate in close shaves? The thing looked like a damn textbook attached to a Bic razor handle. 62 speakers sound like extreme overkill in any environment outside a professional theater.
The Department of Education doesn't seem interested in the solution to this - which would be to standardize the information taught in core curriculum in college-level courses. Accreditation was supposed to convey a certain level of performance and standards - but given the rampant creation of 'accredited bodies' to which every college can make their own and become a member of; it didn't go far enough. To a certain extent, a standard cost break-down of what core courses should cost based on what materials are taught would help people decide if a particular institution represents the value they claim they possess.
While it is true (limitedly) that when you increase financial aid resources, the tuition at institutions see an increase - placing this measure on services would keep unnecessary cost increases under pressure to remain competitive. Another step that would help is a more in-depth information packet being provided to the student - like a prospectus - showing how education dollars are spent, projections for costs during the time they are attending, and how this might impact their financial obligations.
What the WSJ and Bloomberg's talking heads suggest - eliminating or severely curtailing financial aid in all federal subsidized roles - merely cuts people off from access to these educational resources. While private student loans would continue to exist, the ability to attend college would be limited to those of financial means and upbringing, not merit or skill. The people who could obtain these new loans to attend college would be those who have, traditionally, been denied federal financial aid to go to college - the children of the elite and wealthy; people who do not need loans to attend any college of their parent's choosing. Sadly, a bit of this is 'I've got mine, so screw you and yours' that permeates conservative news media sites nowadays. Others are simply content to use this measure to eliminate 'competitors' to their wealth preemptively.
The answer to every problem with a program here or there is *not* simply 'dismantle and destroy it'
Ethiopia is probably on the Human Rights Council of the UN, which means they are the poster children of ethical governance. You know, the seat the United States -used- to occupy that has been open for countries like Myamar, Sudan, and other wretched rat-holes to be elected in.
They need to be able to have FDA testing, certification, independent verification of testing, quality assurance and all the paperwork hell -that- involves. The certification needs certifiers to certify that the certification has certificates on the certifiers to do certifications and so on... There is a MASSIVE paperwork rats-nest involved in making ANYTHING that used in healthcare.
It's why healthcare spending is rapidly outstripping the US economy, to be completely honest.
I'm a troll because ACs respond to me? Amusing, completely strange idea. I don't need to post as AC to agree with my own idea, I tend to have more to do then that.
My statement is based on the summary (I know, didn't read the article - but that's a proud/. tradition...) and it's my feelings on the facts as presented in the summary.
Well, that was a slightly useful tool when it worked... not so much now. Now I will just get a listing of who paid to be there, and who are sure to keep their prices fixed to one another.
Legal judgements *cannot* be discharged in bankruptcy, not even if the judge wanted to. You are legally obligated to pay the judgement, or face contempt charges if you do not. So, yes - it's slavery; this young man's life is over.
Sounds like anyone who avoided their game dodged a serious bullet, and now this is the logical result. Learn the lesson Mr. Shilling - you brought this entirely upon yourself.
...because most people don't have two hundred thousand dollars laying around to just buy a house someday, or thirty thousand dollars extra to purchase a car in cash?
The real secret for cutting down on reselling used games (can't eliminate it entirely) is to provide an incentive for the customer to retain it. New content, re-playability, tie in with future products that open new avenues of gameplay, rewards for brand loyalty, etc. You make a nice single player franchise, have there be some sort of in-game reward for owning other products, having played them, or even still having the original disc and manual.
Oh, and don't shit in your own sandbox when you go werewolf on the series - destroying everything and everyone just because you want it to be 'though provoking' when it all comes crashing down (looking at you Bioware / EA...).
You continue to make another Call of Duty / Battlefield clone with a crappy five hours of single player action to make a quick buck - your game will get resold to Gamestop, that's just a fact. Multiplayer 'passes' prevent resell of a multiplayer game, but it won't do donkey dick to prevent those who are tired of owning your product from selling it off. Just accept that this will happen if you make shitty games.
People are willing to change what they eat because their cell phones plans have steep early termination fees if you drop your level of service - same with your digital television or broadband connection. Temporarily changing your dietary desires is much more simple - not a sign of technology addiction, more a sign of service charge and penalty avoidance.
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Oh yeah, I want to run right out there and do business with a company that seems to be in the business of suing people over every little thing - like saying their database server products suck... or that you found a way to make money with one of their products they didn't think of... or that you use one of their products in a way they didn't think of themselves and charge you outrageous fees for...
If I had wanted that, I would have bought copious amounts of SCO products to keep Daryl McBride employed. Let me put it more simply to you, for those at Oracle who might care:
I'd rather eat razor sharp ground glass than use your products.
It's supposed to be 60,000... some places and people have something against using commas to represent thousand separators.
...like purchasing a thumb drive shaped like the Holy Bible to store all of your quasi-legal pr0nz on?
...and the fact that working with Nintendo's console development group is such a nightmare that even seasoned development houses don't put the manpower into creating stuff for them BECAUSE they are so difficult to work with. They lost a ton of franchises because of it - Resident Evil, Final Fantasy, and a ton more won't even -ever- consider it because of the tales they've heard about it.
That works against you getting premium titles for your console when you cull your developers before they even get out of the starting gate. The ones that are left don't sink the manpower into flagship games that could get killed at any point by Nintendo to favor their own titles, release schedules, or even if they just don't like your game concept as it's evolving. Petty shit kills good products, and Nintendo has been stabbing a lot of people in the industry in the back over the years - it's just taken a while to catch up with them.
The problem with your argument is that the Wii is actually a pretty good console - it's just saddled with crappy games because that's all that makes it past Nintendo's vetting process. Cheap and sleezy ports and titles that are just 'phoned in' make up a large bulk of the console's 'shovelware'. If Nintendo didn't require you to be an A tier developer with blockbuster games already in your stable - then they'd have some room for innovative products on the platform. As it is - they have geared their developer's licensing to poach developers from other consoles.
Given the Android platform, this could really open the world of console game development to the independents - those who could never convince Nintendo or Sony to even sell them a development kit - or pay for Microsoft XBOX's QA for deployment on XBOX Live. I've seen some really impressive indie games out there - and this could be their shot at getting in on a console that hasn't already 'cherry-picked' their developer base.
Of course, there is also a lot of $hit indie games as well - but that's kind of to be expected with no vetting process of any kind. Perhaps as the market matures, places like Metacritic and game magazines will review and rate indie titles on such systems as this more frequently - and it will not be such a crap-shoot.
That's got to be a serious contender for the record of fastest funded project on Kickstarter in the category of nearly a million dollars... But anyway, I hope this means we'll get to see what they come up with - a 99 dollar console is just about in the range of 'sure, I'll bite - see what it's like' in terms of risk to the consumer.
...because every time they get a good product into the market, get businesses to adopt it, get the contacts built up to make a major push into the market... corporate pulls the plug on the hardware, pulls the plug on the software, removes all the corporate features - and forgets all the movers and shakers they spent the last decade trying to pull in. Businesses got tired of it after the XServe fiasco - you don't drop significant capital into hardware only for your vendor to say, "Sorry, who are you again? We never made that so-and-so device... Get real, consumer stuff is where we're at - who did you think we are, IBM?"
...in what way? People have kids, life happens - be prepared.
I'd imagine they'd deal with it like people deal with the inevitability of childbirth here on Earth in the absence of modern medicine. It's gonna happen whether a doctor or midwife is present or not - all you can do is have someone who is moderately trained in the basics of it, bring along medical supplies to deal with common medical issues such as this - and perhaps bring along a little more to deal with this particular medical situation should some of the more common complications arise.
The nature of this kind of exploration would mean that you take the risk that something horribly unforeseen or preventable can happen; and if it does in this case - you face the possibility of having someone die in a pretty unpleasant fashion (I'd imagine death in childbirth to fit this qualification) in close quarters. Hell, people die in childbirth here on Earth, surrounded by the best medical care we, as the human race, can provide in the 21st century. Humans still have babies, and people still have them without a doctor or modern medicine around even.
Of course, the ethics of conceiving and bearing a child into a situation like this would be debatable - especially if it's a death sentence. But in the case where this is a planned expedition with a planned return trip after a period of colonization - then it's a risk some may take.
...but if they rely on the computer to perform real time inventory management, they are practically (if not completely) dead in the water. You can't sell items out of inventory, your pricing would be whatever the tag is (not whatever your instant savings might be), your staff would be bogged down handling inventory control and asset management, and most retailers won't take checks without the ability to electronically verify them. YES - you CAN run a store without computers, but you'd realistically be better off to only do so for your customers in the store, and then shut down until the system came back; you can't hope to run a modern retailer without real-time inventory management and control - at least without serious shrink (both accounting and realized).
Sounds like an awesome idea - that way, you are TOTALLY FSCKED when your internet connection goes down. One thing if your online ordering for a business goes down - just take orders by phone. When it completed hoses your order taking system (offline and online), then your screwed.
Why does this remind me of the spoof commercial I saw somewhere for the 12 blade facial razor, for the ultimate in close shaves? The thing looked like a damn textbook attached to a Bic razor handle. 62 speakers sound like extreme overkill in any environment outside a professional theater.
The Department of Education doesn't seem interested in the solution to this - which would be to standardize the information taught in core curriculum in college-level courses. Accreditation was supposed to convey a certain level of performance and standards - but given the rampant creation of 'accredited bodies' to which every college can make their own and become a member of; it didn't go far enough. To a certain extent, a standard cost break-down of what core courses should cost based on what materials are taught would help people decide if a particular institution represents the value they claim they possess.
While it is true (limitedly) that when you increase financial aid resources, the tuition at institutions see an increase - placing this measure on services would keep unnecessary cost increases under pressure to remain competitive. Another step that would help is a more in-depth information packet being provided to the student - like a prospectus - showing how education dollars are spent, projections for costs during the time they are attending, and how this might impact their financial obligations.
What the WSJ and Bloomberg's talking heads suggest - eliminating or severely curtailing financial aid in all federal subsidized roles - merely cuts people off from access to these educational resources. While private student loans would continue to exist, the ability to attend college would be limited to those of financial means and upbringing, not merit or skill. The people who could obtain these new loans to attend college would be those who have, traditionally, been denied federal financial aid to go to college - the children of the elite and wealthy; people who do not need loans to attend any college of their parent's choosing. Sadly, a bit of this is 'I've got mine, so screw you and yours' that permeates conservative news media sites nowadays. Others are simply content to use this measure to eliminate 'competitors' to their wealth preemptively.
The answer to every problem with a program here or there is *not* simply 'dismantle and destroy it'
Ethiopia is probably on the Human Rights Council of the UN, which means they are the poster children of ethical governance. You know, the seat the United States -used- to occupy that has been open for countries like Myamar, Sudan, and other wretched rat-holes to be elected in.
They need to be able to have FDA testing, certification, independent verification of testing, quality assurance and all the paperwork hell -that- involves. The certification needs certifiers to certify that the certification has certificates on the certifiers to do certifications and so on... There is a MASSIVE paperwork rats-nest involved in making ANYTHING that used in healthcare.
It's why healthcare spending is rapidly outstripping the US economy, to be completely honest.
I'm a troll because ACs respond to me? Amusing, completely strange idea. I don't need to post as AC to agree with my own idea, I tend to have more to do then that.
My statement is based on the summary (I know, didn't read the article - but that's a proud /. tradition...) and it's my feelings on the facts as presented in the summary.
Well, that was a slightly useful tool when it worked... not so much now. Now I will just get a listing of who paid to be there, and who are sure to keep their prices fixed to one another.
It's the only reason to disarm your populace - to make it lethal to fight back against tyrannical regimes.
Legal judgements cannot be discharged in bankruptcy. Ever.
Legal judgements *cannot* be discharged in bankruptcy, not even if the judge wanted to. You are legally obligated to pay the judgement, or face contempt charges if you do not. So, yes - it's slavery; this young man's life is over.
Sounds like anyone who avoided their game dodged a serious bullet, and now this is the logical result. Learn the lesson Mr. Shilling - you brought this entirely upon yourself.
...because most people don't have two hundred thousand dollars laying around to just buy a house someday, or thirty thousand dollars extra to purchase a car in cash?
....this still won't save you from the Oracle software apocalypse.
The real secret for cutting down on reselling used games (can't eliminate it entirely) is to provide an incentive for the customer to retain it. New content, re-playability, tie in with future products that open new avenues of gameplay, rewards for brand loyalty, etc. You make a nice single player franchise, have there be some sort of in-game reward for owning other products, having played them, or even still having the original disc and manual.
Oh, and don't shit in your own sandbox when you go werewolf on the series - destroying everything and everyone just because you want it to be 'though provoking' when it all comes crashing down (looking at you Bioware / EA...).
You continue to make another Call of Duty / Battlefield clone with a crappy five hours of single player action to make a quick buck - your game will get resold to Gamestop, that's just a fact. Multiplayer 'passes' prevent resell of a multiplayer game, but it won't do donkey dick to prevent those who are tired of owning your product from selling it off. Just accept that this will happen if you make shitty games.
People are willing to change what they eat because their cell phones plans have steep early termination fees if you drop your level of service - same with your digital television or broadband connection. Temporarily changing your dietary desires is much more simple - not a sign of technology addiction, more a sign of service charge and penalty avoidance.