Wednesday, November 28, 2007

Open Gaming Platform, a Bad Idea.

BBC News reported a month ago that EA is calling for an open gaming platform. The idea is simple.  EA believes that there should only  be a single set top box instead of the current three being put out by Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo.  In EA's vision Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo would become licensers of technology for manufacturers in order to produce this one open set top box. 

It does sound good from the stand point of the game developers since they would only have to worry about developing for one system.  Also, consumers would no longer have to worry about buying more than one system to play the exclusive games for each console.  So, this seems to be a win, win for all of us right.  But it will probably never happen.  Each console manufacturer seems to have a different priority for why they produce there consoles.  Nintendo is trying to be different, Sony sees there consoles as a vehicle to sell there latest technology and Microsoft sees the console as a stepping stone to get into the living room of peoples homes. 

I personally don't see these companies being able to open up to each other.  And even if they are able to come together.  Just think what would happen if we had one gaming console.  For one,  there would be no incentive to subsidize the cost of the console since there would be no more competition.  Normally,  each company in the gaming industry subsidizes there console and makes their money back on the sale of games and accessories.   But with a monopoly there would be no incentive to subsidize.  And so your next console may cost $900 (which is was a estimated real price of the PS3).  

Then again, as licensers of technology, Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft wouldn't need to produce there own consoles.  And what we could be looking at is a reinvention of the PC market.  Where people take a chipset from one or more of these companies and puts together there own version of this open console.  Which could actually make it harder to produce games for this open console since there wouldn't be any standard configuration that would necessarily exist in this model. 

Also,  if there is only one console and people are making money, by selling consoles.  Then this could mean that the 5 year life cycle that we all came too enjoy, would be over.  The incentive would be to simply pump out new versions of the open console so that they can continue to make money.  Which this all comes down too.

So really the real winners in this open console will be the hardware manufacturers and not the gamers or developers.  Then again, may be I'm wrong and we will all celebrate the day the open console arrives. 

Beware of Paypal

For those that have used it, Paypal has become probably the most convenient and safest way to buy products and services on the web.  But, it appears to have a dark secret.  Well, that of course is what security expert Steve Gibson is saying. 

On the last episode of "Security Now" (which I recommend you listen to), Steve Gibson out lined how PayPal has been causing its users to go through a page set up by a third party (Doubleclick), as users are going around Paypal's site. 

This redirection is particularly concerning, since it is not readily apparent to users of the site and has caused a concern for peoples' privacy.  Depending on how far Paypal and Doubleclick's relationship goes, they may have all of PayPal's user information, which includes all of there banking or credit card information. 

What ever the case is, it doesn't sound good.  So if anyone has a chance, download the last episode of Security Now and comment on what you think it means.

Wednesday, November 14, 2007

Wonder Bra - Cadbury Spoof

It appears that not even the world of advertising exists without spoofs.  A couple of months ago I posted to the blog Cadbury's commercial which featured a Gorilla playing the drums to Phil Collins song "In the Air Tonight". This video went all the way around the Internet and is probably why Wonderbra has decided to spoof the commercial.  The Wonderbra's commercial is pretty much the same as Cadbury's commercial, but with one exception.  In Wonderbra's Commercial,  there is a pretty woman in here bra playing the drums instead of a Gorilla. 

Now to me this seems kind of like "cheap" marketing.  But then again, I'm pretty certain that there are many guys out there that won't mind.  Enjoy.

 

Monday, November 12, 2007

Nintendo Drops the Ball on Marketing Again

In two days, Nintendo will be releasing Super Mario Galaxy, which is probably there biggest game to date to release for the Nintendo Wii.  But where is the advertising?  Has anyone seen a commercial for it?  It wasn't until today that I saw a commercial for this game, even though it releases Wednesday.  There are no bill boards or other types of ads which you would think would accompany the release of one of there top franchises, but there is nothing.  So I have to ask.  What's up with the marketing?

This by the way is not the first time that there was near zero marketing for a Nintendo game.  In August, Nintendo released the game Metroid Prime 3: Corruption with literally zero marketing.  This lead to Matt Casamassina (an editor at IGN) to write an editorial on how Nintendo dropped the ball on marketing that game and yet here we are again, just a few months later, with zero marketing for Super Mario Galaxy. 

Now this to me just doesn't make sense.  And probably never will.  Then again,  maybe I've been hiding under a rock for the last several months and I really don't know what I'm talking about.  So, now that I've finished my rant, I thought I would let you see the ad for the game.  That is of course if you haven't seen it.  Enjoy!

 

Monday, November 5, 2007

Japanese Magician - Burger Trick

If only food was this easy to get.

Sunday, November 4, 2007

Toyota does a World of Warcraft commercial

I saw this video on Marketing Safari's blog recently.  Apparently Toyota has decided to capitalize on the success of World of Warcraft to sell there new Tacoma truck.  Although I like the fact that Toyota is acknowledging this game, I'm not sure that the World of Warcraft crowd is the type of people to be buying pickup trucks.  Then again I could be wrong.