Random Bits for November 2
What follows is a bunch of little things from today that don't justify individual posts or aren't guaranteed to be interesting to anyone but me.I updated to Mac OS X 10.4.3. Spotlight searches are much, much faster on my Mac mini now. The encrypted iChat conversations for .Mac members seem interesting, and apparently you can use the same cert to sign your emails? There's a lot in this update, so I'll have to dig deeper. Safari/WebKit got an update as well, now passing Acid 2.
I heard an electric car pull away from a curb today. At first I thought the thing had stalled because there was no sound, but then it started moving. Impressive! Call me crazy, but I think world peace will come when we reduce noise pollution.
I read that Microsoft's Xbox division has lost $4 billion dollars since 2001. Is this fair competition? I guess they're going up against Sony so it makes sense, but it seems to me that the folks at Nintendo are the only ones that have their heart in it. A lot of the stuff from Sony and practically everything from Microsoft just mirrors what we already see in other media outlets: sports and explosions.
There's an interesting book that Kevin Callahan pointed out called Day of Deceit. It uses documents released via the freedom of information act to suggest that FDR knew about Pearl Harbor in advance. The book review suggests the evidence is anything but weak. Democracy in action!
On a lighter note, the ZFOOTBALL Kansas City tournament took place this past weekend. My favorite team name from this event is "Scoregasm," who won the C division. The ZF crew are on their way to Phoenix for the next event this weekend.
U2 has a new concert DVD coming out, Live from Chicago.
How about a del.icio.us-style site specifically for music?
Random Bits for November 2
Posted Nov 2, 2005 — 5 comments below
Posted Nov 2, 2005 — 5 comments below
Olivier — Nov 02, 05 500
Mr eel — Nov 03, 05 502
Their obvious strategy is to crush the competition by just spending more, and then hopefully recoup the costs when they dominate the market. Personally I think it will fail.
They are offering games that only appeal to the existing market, yet given increasing costs, they need to widen the market or face lower profits or none at all.
Microsoft is a public company. Although they would like essentially buy a market, they have to justify the cost to their shareholders. How many more years will they continue to post billion dollar losses in the Xbox division and how long with shareholders put up with it?
What's really interesting in all this, is that despite the perception that they are losing the console war, Nintendo are actually doing very well. In the last fiscal year they made more money than Sony. That's ALL of Sony, not just the entertainment division responsible for the Playstation.
Scott Stevenson — Nov 03, 05 503
Carl — Nov 03, 05 504
Anyhow, if MS is trying to shut out the competition then jack up prices, then they're on a fool's mission. If they jack up prices for developing on the XBox, then developers will just jump ship to the next console system to come along. Users, in turn, are used to buying new consoles every 4 or 5 years anyway, so it's hard to leverage dominance from one console cycle to the next. The most they can hope for is that the 360 breaks it competitors, they have a healthy profit for two or three years, and then a new console is released by someone and the cycle starts over. It's not really a good strategy.
Mr eel — Nov 03, 05 506
Absolutely. Retro-gaming has built up alot of steam lately, but too few publishers were willing to offer up old releases as downloadables.
Personally, I'm very keen to see the Revolution come out. The thought of downloading the SNES back catalogue is mouth-watering.
I just hope that Nintendo don't try to gouge on the prices too much. I think that would discourage people. After all, folks aren't gonna pay high prices for what they consider old games.