Results tagged “economy”

Geek News Roundup for 08/02/09 - Bobbing for Apple News and Frivolous Lawsuits

By Angela Moseley on August 9, 2009 11:59 PM

It should be noted that this isn't really a MacBook Touch, it is just a concept image.

One of the worst economic recessions in recent history has nearly dragged on for a year now. Even if the recession were to end tomorrow job growth and creation would still be a lagging indicator. In others words, job loss would continue for a while even as the economy steadily improved. Many college graduates across many fields have been hit hard as they've left school only to be laid off from a job or are completely unable to find work in their respective field. One New York college graduate was so upset by her jobless situation that she took matters into her own hands by suing her school to recover the $70,000 she spent obtaining her degree. Call me unsympathetic but many of us are unable to find field related work after college and we're not suing our universities-- yet.

In news of a less frivolous nature, Google CEO Eric Schmidt is resigning from Apple's board of directors as the companies increasing find themselves in competition with one another. Unfortunately Schmidt's resignation from Apple comes too late to avoid an FTC inquiry into both companies. Better late than never, FTC? If having the CEO of one major IT company sit on the board of another IT company doesn't raise a few possible anti-trust red flags I'm not sure what does. On the upside for Apple, rumor has it the upcoming Apple tablet tentatively called the "MacBook Touch" could act as a gaming console. I personally feel it's silly to call what is essentially a tablet a gaming console at heart, yet denying the possibility of it also being used for gaming would be foolish. If the upcoming "MacBook Touch" was first and foremost a gaming device rather than a personal computer/multimedia hub, a price point of $800 would be way too high. If viewed as a PC/multimedia hub that also happens to play games a mere $800 is very reasonable.

To be fair I'm certain the upcoming MacBook Touch (or whatever it'll eventually be called) will be used a fair amount of times to check up on Facebook and Twitter. Unless the said popular social networking sites are down due to distributed denial of service attacks. On Thursday that is exactly what happened to both sites to the detriment of heavy users. Unsurprisingly, security experts are not shocked about the DDoS attacks. In a brief world without Facebook and Twitter people can always find other things to do like take the time to learn to play Guitar Hero while solving not one, but two Rubik's cubes.

While I'm on the subject of games, there has been an update in the Activision lawsuit against Double Fine. The lawsuit over Brütal Legend was settled, and thankfully Activision received little to nothing in terms of compensation.

The anime distributor 4Kids Entertainment has put itself up for sale after several years of steady profit loss. Outside of the Pokemon anime the company was not very popular with anime fans, as 4Kids often lived up to its name by editing (or butchering) anime series never intended for kids. And in a case of either "too little too late," or "what the hell took so long?!" 4Kids has begun releasing subtitled episodes of Yu-Gi-Oh! on Youtube. The anime distributor had originally released the first 12 uncut and subtitled episodes on DVD in 2004 and never picked up the project again until recently. Uncut and subtitled Yu-Gi-Oh! episodes are awesome (in my opinion), but having to wait five years for the project to resume is just madness.

Image courtesy of Gizmodo.

Geek News Roundup for 03/29/09 - The never-ending saga comes to an end

By Angela Moseley on April 6, 2009 1:32 PM

The highly anticipated anime adaptation of Guin Saga began airing in Japan yesterday. Despite the fact that Guin Saga has not been licensed for distribution in North America an English dubbed trailer was released a few days ago. It left many to wonder when the show would be licensed and if that process would happen any time soon. Guin Saga is based on an ongoing light novel series of the same name that is currently 124 volumes long. If this is series is intended to be a faithful adaption of the novel it could be something of a never ending saga. Meanwhile Guiding Light, an extremely popular soap opera will end its 72-year run in September. No matter how long an anime series may be it's always nice to be reminded that American soap operas are the real never ending sagas, except for when they finally end.

In a move that almost feels like the renewal of the 1990's handheld wars Sony claimed the DSi is for kids, while the PSP is for winners. Apparently kids can't be winners and winners wouldn't be caught dead with a DSi (or a DS). Sony's time could be better spent supporting the PSP's software lineup (which pales in comparison to the DS's). Of course the executives at Nintendo aren't immune from making statements that could be considered "out there." Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime insisted Nintendo isn't worried about used games and also stated that businesses don't sell used CDs or DVDs. Wait what? I can't even begin to describe how that last statement defies reality.

A recent study revealed that workers who use Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube on the job are generally more productive employees. The seemingly contradictory study found that short breaks help with overall concentration. Now try telling your angry boss that when he or she catches you watching episodes of Naruto on Youtube instead of working.

In more general news jokes about General Motors suddenly becoming "Government Motors," may be near with the ousting of GM's CEO, Rick Wagoner by the Obama adminstration. Whether you love or hate GM we all can agree that the company and its employees have some pretty dark days ahead of them.

Geek News Roundup for 03/23/09 - The Death of the Monthly Anime Magazine

By Angela Moseley on March 30, 2009 12:45 PM

If you're still reeling from the news of Newtype USA's death a year ago here's another possibly devastating blow: Anime Insider is dead. After eight years in publication the lone surviving monthly anime magazine has finally fallen. Given the recent death of Newtype last February and EGM this February the news isn't all that surprising. After all, traditional news media outlets have been struggling for years, and this economy has only made survival all the more difficult. To add insult to injury, Wizard has not given a reason for ceasing publication and laying off the entire staff but the economy is probably a major cause. As of this writing, there is no news on what will be done with remaining subscriptions to the magazine. A best case scenario would be another Wizard publication substitute for the remaining time, but subscribers may be out of luck. The anime magazine business isn't completely dead, bi-monthly publications such as Otaku USA are still around.

A bevy of announcements came from this year's Game Developers Conference. Some of the more interesting announcements came in the form of new types of game consoles. Specifically, those designed not to compete with Microsoft, Nintendo or Sony. The first new contender is the Zeebo which offers cheap downloadable games through 3G wireless networks and launches in Brazil this July. The idea is to bring an affordable console and games to countries where the prices of traditional consoles are highly inflated and as a result piracy is rampant. Honestly, if I had to pay $700 for a Wii and nearly $200 for the games I'd pirate them too. Fortunately, major publishers such as Namco, Capcom and THQ have already promised support to the Zeebo.

The next contender would be OnLive, a "microconsole" and gaming service that aims to stream games online to TVs. If the concept works many PC games such as Crysis could be played through the TV without ever having to buy a physical copy of the game, or needing a high-end gaming computer. The concept is interesting, but there are concerns that the device may ultimately end up as a failure. Still, this innovation could be a smash success if it works. After all, may people doubted the innovation the Wii brought to the table and it has sold 50 million units globally.

This year's GDC also produced lots of love for the iPhone as a gaming device. While it still makes very little sense to directly compare the iPhone to the DS or PSP, Nintendo and Sony aren't taking the issue of downloadable content lightly in regard to their portable devices. It would be a stretch to assume these features were rolled out just to compete with Apple instead of being a natural progression of features already offered on the Wii and PlayStation 3. Still, the success of the iPhone may have accelerated the development and release of these features.

Lastly, the Obama administration has sided with the RIAA's draconian punishment fines for pirated music tracks. It looks like the excessive actions of the RIAA's efforts to combat piracy will continue for the foreseeable future. Suddenly, paying that .69 to .99 cents per song through iTunes just became a little more appealing.

Geek News Roundup for 03/01/09 - Selling Used Games is Serious Business

By Angela Moseley on March 9, 2009 12:15 PM

When GameStop announced that it made $2 billion in revenue from used games, despite the terrible economy, people took notice. It came as no real surprise when both Toys R Us and Amazon.com declared their intentions to move into the used game business. Both retailers plan to accept trade-ins for used games in exchange for credit, or in Amazon's case a gift card. As a result of Amazon's announcement GameStop stock dropped roughly 13 percent. It looks like if anyone can give GameStop a run for its money Amazon can. And if this rumor about the Xbox 360 Elite turns out to be true I wonder what the trade-in values of the console will ultimately be, (if Amazon accepts console trade-ins). Just don't mention that it makes more financial sense to actually sell games and consoles through Amazon's Marketplace to some gamers.

Many gamers may associate Newsweek with N'Gai Croal and for good reason, he's a very well-known games journalist. He announced that he would be leaving his post at Newsweek for a career as a creative consultant to game developers. For the time being Newsweek became just a little less interesting for gamers. Other mainstream media publications are finally embracing some parts of geek culture. The New York Times has actually added manga to its best-sellers lists. Naruto would naturally make the list, being so insanely popular and all.

While we're on the subject of journalism and more importantly blogging, the Pentagon has joined the blogosphere. I wouldn't be surprised if the government and the military set up Facebook and Twitter accounts next-- if they already haven't done so. I'm not sure if I should be glad the government has become tech savvy or afraid. Considering President Obama's pro-net neutrality choice for the head of the FCC a tech savvy government may be actually be beneficial.

Last week the Dow Jones industrial average hit an 11-year low and the unemployment rate hit its highest levels in 25 years. 2008, 2009 and perhaps even 2010 will be years to remember when the economy finally does recover.

Geek News Roundup For 02/22/09 - The humor, it won't stop

By Angela Moseley on March 2, 2009 1:13 PM

A leaked GameStop employee training video has hit the internet. In the video employees are taught how to approach and help female shoppers by the "Director of Womanly Studies, Ima Smartone." Somewhere between my constant groans I've discovered why some overly helpful employees at GameStop store are hard to put up with. Though to be fair it also happens at Game Crazy too, maybe they share training videos. At least the video is so bad it's good, in a very bad sort of way.

Speaking of bad, it would have been very bad if the Japan branch of the Swiss bank, UBS was unable to cancel its order for $31 billion dollars worth of Capcom bonds. The employee had only wanted to place an order for $306,000 dollars worth of bonds. If that doesn't define costly mistake I don't know what does. Several unlicensed Final Fantasy sword replica dealers may have an answer to that rhetorical statement. At least four major retailers found themselves to be the subject of a $600,000 lawsuit by Square Enix. It looks like that replica Buster Sword and Gunblade just became a tiny bit harder to come by.

Remember when Brian Caulfield of Forbes.com argued how the iPhone could kill the DS? Now Nicholas Lovell, a GAMESbrief consultant, argues that the iPhone and the iPod Touch will ultimately kill the PSP. I'm not sure if having the ability to play games on the Touch or iPhone instantly makes it an appealing device for gamers, especially at a starting price of $229. Lovell makes the argument that software ultimately wins the hardware war, and he'd be right-- if must have games were available on the iPhone and Touch. To keep it short, unless all of the major game developers start developing PSP quality games for Apple I doubt the PSP is going to die because of Apple's entry into the gaming market. (Piracy and Sony's own lackluster efforts are a different matter.)

If you are eagerly awaiting the 4th Spider-Man movie in 2011, how about a Broadway musical in 2010 to hold you over? Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark will debut in a little under a year, features music by U2's Bono, and will be directed by Julie Taymor, who also directed The Lion King. If Broadway worked for The Lion King surely it could work for Spider-Man too. By default this musical is bound to be way better than most (or all) of the live action anime movies planned for this year.

Geek News Roundup 02/01/09 - It is Real or Just Really Stupid?

By Angela Moseley on February 9, 2009 9:21 AM

Take a good look at the PlayStation 2 pictured above. Does something seem off about it? If you feel that something is wrong with it, you'd be correct. This PS2 is a wooden replica that was returned to a retailer and actually accepted! Returning a broken PS2 or even a stolen one for the money is one thing, but making one out of wood? I'm not sure what's more incredible, the person who took the time to create this knockoff, or the clerk who accepted it. Perhaps the clerks at various retailers were too busy multitasking and as a result had a shortened attention span. Maybe.

In other news that requires a suspension of belief, viewers of the Superbowl in Tucson, Ariz. were shocked when a pornography broadcast interrupted the last few minutes of the game. Only those viewing the game on Comcast Cable were affected by the incident. Now that really is Comcastic! Just as unbelievable were the events at the Technology Entertainment Design conference, or TED. If you were unlucky to be sitting in the front row during Bill Gates' presentation no doubt you felt the pain of mosquito bites, literally.

At least there's good news for video game addicts living in Texas. On February 3rd the state officially dubbed the day "Video Game Day." It was meant to honor the positive impact of video games on the Texas economy. Now, if only the other 49 states would see video games in such a positive light. Speaking of legislation, a vote was passed in the House of Representatives to delay the DTV transition until June 12th. The bill itself is expected to pass and be signed into Law by the President. Honestly, if those 6.5 million Americans aren't ready for DTV after three years of heavy advertising will four months really make a difference?

The economy continues to get worse, but at least Wall Street executives who accept government money won't get their usual extravagant financial compensation. Fortunately, not all of the economic news is depressing.

Weekly News Roundup for 12/07/08 -- A boiling pot of nerdery and economic turmoil

By Geoffrey Barnes on December 15, 2008 10:48 AM

Just in case you weren't watching Spike TV's Video Game awards show last night, and I don't blame you at all if you didn't, they revealed a bunch of new games at the show. These include: God of War 3, Uncharted 2 (above), Fight Night Round 4, and Dante's Inferno. Also, Brutal Legend has a publisher now: EA.

Also big news last week is that Dragon Quest X was announced for Wii in Japan, even though IX isn't out yet. You can read my thoughts on that if you haven't already.

The economic turmoil is taking its toll on workers around the country, as you've undoubtedly heard about. One of the recent casualties is Sony, who recently announced the layoffs of a whopping 16,000 workers. This is being done to boost earnings. Most of the layoffs are coming from the electronics division, who are responsible for production of their HDTVs and Vaio laptops. It's certainly a way of telling us that the "take a loss now to profit later" strategy isn't a good idea in these times. Take note, Microsoft.

Also not good for Sony: Nintendo's Wii sold over 2 million in November, while Microsoft sold 836,000 360s. The Playstation 3, however, only sold 378,071 consoles. Though it's really no surprise, seeing as how it would cost you at least $400 to purchase a PS3, as opposed to at least $200 and $250 for a 360 and Wii, respectively. The unfortunate part is that a price drop is looking unlikely because of the economy.

In political news, the bailout of the big three didn't go through because of a deal that couldn't be reached between Senate Republicans and the United Auto Workers. If you thought things were unpleasant now, then, oh my...

You knew it was coming, and now it's here. Blackbird, the browser for the African-American community. Is it necessary for that community? Well, no, of course not. But is it silly and humorous? Yes, though unintentionally. While we're on the topic of web browsers: Google's Chrome is no longer in the beta stage. If you bet someone that no creation of Google would ever make it out of beta, I'm afraid you'll have to pay up.

Rumors are circulating saying that UGO is in negotiations to purchase 1up. That's good news for the stability of 1up, though the bad news here is that EGM isn't part of the deal. The days are looking more and more bleak for the magazine, and just when it was starting to become good again.

Weekly News Roundup for 11/30/08 - The Heavily Wired Edition

By Angela Moseley on December 8, 2008 3:14 AM

It seems like everyone is going bankrupt these days. If it wasn't bad enough with the banks, the Big Three automakers are also in need of a bailout from the government. But who's looking out for the video game industry? GameDaily reported that Midway Games is close to filling for bankruptcy and needs $150 million in the next 50 days. Unfortunately, it looks like the game publisher can't blame this one on the entirely on the economy.

Amazon.com became target of pirates when a Firefox browser add-on installed a "Download 4 Free" link on the retailer's merchandise pages. The link took users to the site The Pirate Bay, where they could download torrents of the pirated merchandise. Amazon.com immediately targeted the creators of the add-on, Pirates of the Amazon, forcing them to take the site down. Later the Netherlands based creators revealed that the add-on was a parody, and part of a experiment for the Media Design course at the Piet Zwart Institute. If only more college class experiments could be so interesting.

A college experiment parody is one thing when it fools many people, but how about the suckers who fall for advertising puffery? Such was the case in San Diego, where 70-year-old William Gillis filed a lawsuit against Apple, claiming that the company lied about the performance of its newest iPhone model. Apple responded by stating, "...no reasonable person in Plaintiff's position could have reasonably relied on or misunderstood Apple's statements as claims of fact." In short, don't believe the hype spewed out by Apple commercials. Oddly enough, no one seems to be holding AT&T responsible for its 3G network performance where much of the problem seems to lie.

You might be familiar with Michael Vick and certainly O.J. Simpson. For both are football players caught, charged and convicted of doing very illegal acts to others (including animals). But you might not be familiar with New York Giants wide receiver, Plaxico Burress. He accidentally shot himself with a handgun in a New York nightclub, and in adding insult to injury has been charged with possession of a loaded handgun without a permit. Leaving that gun at home (or at least getting a permit for it) may have saved him from a mandatory three-and-a-half jail term under New York law, and possibly the loss of his career with the NFL. Talk about a glaringly stupid way to end up on the wrong side of the law.

And who needs science fiction in TV drama when you can have science fact? According to Wired.com factually accurate science is boosting ratings for some of network TV's hottest drama shows. In short, who needs Star Trek and Stargate SG-1, when you can have CSI and Numb3rs?

Image Courtesy of Gamespot.

Weekly News Roundup for 11/09/08

By Angela Moseley on November 17, 2008 1:33 AM

Hey everyone, I'm back to doing the Weekly News Roundups! A huge thanks goes out to Geoff for taking care of them while I wasn't able to for depressing reasons.

This week's roundup starts off with lots of anime news. Are you a fan of Gundam and mech series in general? The announcement that the newest Gundam series, Mobile Suit Gundam 00, will air in the United States on November 24th should be welcome news. Tune into the Sci Fi Channel's Ani-Monday to catch this new series. The best news of all, Adult Swim didn't pick up this show. Which leaves me thankful, considering their erratic behavior regarding anime series as of lately.

As of December Fox's Saturday morning programing, Foxbox, will be no more. 4Kids has ended their contract with the network in order to pursue a more lucrative deal with the CW network. It leaves people to wonder what Fox will replace their Saturday morning lineup with. As long as it isn't something like Cops reruns, all should be well. Then again, has network TV been worth getting up for on Saturday mornings in recent years? Methinks not.

What could be better than neutered (or just plain crappy) anime aimed at younger audiences? Live-action adaptations of anime! Most notably the live-action movie adaptation of Dragonball now has an April 9th, 2009 North American release date. What better way to kick off Easter celebrations than by watching Dragonball on the big screen? Or could you could attend church first, celebrate the resurrection, and sneak in a prayer or two that the adaption won't suck. Hey, it couldn't hurt, right? Right.

Unfortunately, it looked like the major retailer, Circuit City didn't have much of a prayer. Last week it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy citing falling consumer and vendor spending. Considering Circuit City's business blunders in recent years some doubt that the retailer will survive. It is interesting to note that the nearest competitor, Best Buy, is still profitable. And with rough economic times upon us the practice of price-fixing is still alive and well. Case in point? You may have paid too much for your LCD monitor if you bought from LG, Sharp and Chunghwa. Apple, Dell and Motorola are three U.S. firms that certainly did.

Finally, have you ever dreamed of creating a Mario or Sonic-like level in Sony's LittleBigPlanet and sharing them online? Well don't. Sony has cracked down on levels with questionable content, leaving some gamers to cry foul. Sony isn't hearing any of it. The moral? Always read the fine print, aka the EULA.

Image Courtesy of 13th Anime Street

Weekly News Roundup for 10/19/08

By Geoffrey Barnes on October 27, 2008 9:42 AM

Well, it turns out Sarah Palin doesn't like Katie Couric. Who knew? Undoubtedly it was all of those gotcha questions from that pesky liberal media. Even bigger news is that she's apparently been having numerous disagreements with her fellow campaign members, many of them referring to her as a "diva" or a "rogue." Infighting is not something you want to have happen to a campaign nearly a week from the election. On that note: yes, we are only eight days from the election. No more commercials or withstanding attacks from the Republican Fear Mongering Machine (TM).

One of the biggest announcements in the gaming world was the unveiling of the Star Wars MMO that had been rumored for who knows how long. They're calling it Star Wars: The Old Republic, and it will be set, storywise, 3,000 years before the questionable prequels came into play. No release date has been announced as of yet.

As every sports station has been saying for about a week (or longer) now: How about those Phillies? At this point, they only need to win one more game before they can be declared Major League champions. That's great! You know, if you're a Phillies fan and all.

Chances are that if you drive a car, you probably like the fact that gas prices have taken the biggest drop in history. Of course, I couldn't possibly imagine anyone who didn't like this, unless you're the type that makes it your itinerary throw money into the fireplace because you're just that inherently diabolical.

If you were keeping up with the DOW, it took another big drop last week in tumbling 514. It's going to be a long road to repair for the stock market.

That's it for this belated edition this week. Just hang in there, we only have eight days for this election.

Weekly News Roundup for 10/05/08

By Angela Moseley on October 12, 2008 3:38 PM

Even with all of the bad news regarding the economy and definite recessions, there was plenty of other news to go around this week. As the adage says, "life does go on." Just take Sega for example, despite getting out of the hardware business years ago, it seems that the company is ready to try again with the Vision. The handheld, due to launch sometime next year in the UK first, will play games, music, movies,sports a built-in camera,TV-Tuner and more. Lets just hope that it will be more portable than its Game Gear and Nomad predecessors.

At the Tokyo Game Show Sony announced that all of its future first-party games will be available for purchase and download via Wi-Fi directly to the PSP, starting on October 15th. No announcements were made regarding the US and European markets, but considering the upcoming Nintendo DSi's Wi-Fi store it's doubtful that Sony will be outdone. It'll be interesting to see if downloadable PSP titles will be region free like their UMD counterparts. You know who we're slyly referring to.

Were you one of the many people looking forward to being able to legally rip your DVDs with RealNetwork's RealDVD program? Unfortunately for you, legal action taken by six major movie studios forced RealNetwork to cease selling copies of the software. While the program promised to make pirating movies next to impossible, movie studios were still unhappy. As for the issue of real piracy, the major industries may have the last word if a new bill becomes law. Congress passed a new intellectual property bill, which appears to make it easier to add hefty fines to people in violation of copyright laws, among other things. But there is no certainty that the bill will be signed into law as of yet. Come on Mr. President, side with the consumers for once!

Weekly Roundup for 09/21/08

By Angela Moseley on September 28, 2008 11:38 AM

This week in news was quite interesting to say the least. Somewhere between the first round of presidential debates and the nightmare on Wall Street, Political Machine Express '08 might be the perfect escapist game. Why bother with who said what, when you play as campaign manager to either McCain or Obama for free?

For those of you who want to know more beyond the headlines, the BBC has a report on many of the people who were made homeless by the housing market crash. And long time journalist, Jeff Jarvis, reflects on better ways to spend $700 billion dollars.

Microsoft announced that its new operating system, Windows 7 will debut in October. Hopefully this new release won't become a fiasco, like many of the problems that plagued Vista.

Finally, who said that "free online streaming video", "full episodes", "anime", and "legal" couldn't be uttered in the same sentence? Surely not Hulu.com and its recent partnership with Viz Media, Funimation and Gong which offers free videos of popular shows. Happy watching!

Results tagged “economy”

Geek News Roundup for 08/02/09 - Bobbing for Apple News and Frivolous Lawsuits

Geek News Roundup for 03/29/09 - The never-ending saga comes to an end

Geek News Roundup for 03/23/09 - The Death of the Monthly Anime Magazine

Geek News Roundup for 03/01/09 - Selling Used Games is Serious Business

Geek News Roundup For 02/22/09 - The humor, it won't stop

Geek News Roundup 02/01/09 - It is Real or Just Really Stupid?

Weekly News Roundup for 12/07/08 -- A boiling pot of nerdery and economic turmoil

Weekly News Roundup for 11/30/08 - The Heavily Wired Edition

Weekly News Roundup for 11/09/08

Weekly News Roundup for 10/19/08

Weekly News Roundup for 10/05/08

Weekly Roundup for 09/21/08

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