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Comment Next move... (Score 1) 148

Few things ...

1. Microsoft has opened up a few Brick and Morter Stores designed for strictly Microsoft Technologies

2. Microsoft is realeasing a new Mobile Phone OS shortly which will allow XBOX Live integration in combination with their "hopefully" intuitive UI and NetFlix video streaming.

3. Microsoft already tried to cut in to the market with the Zune. Why not some other device that they themselves built.

4. Microsoft now has an in with the ARM chipset

5. The XBOX 360 will be hitting the 5 years old mark this November

I guarantee (and by guarantee; I am fairly certain; and by fairly certain, I am completely speculating) that Microsoft is hedging their bets in order to enter the Hardware market in a more agressive fashion. And with their own brick and mortor store, they can guarantee "local" educated and informed support for their newest products.

Comment iPhone, Android, WP7 (Score 2, Interesting) 298

For starters, I am a little biased since I program primarily in C# and Silverlight so take it as you may.

I have always told people about my dislike for Apple products because they were so closed and tight and when the iPhone came out, I was like absoluetly not. I will never get one of those. (and to this day that has held true). However, about 6 months ago, I won a 32gig iTouch and I started to use it. To my surprise it was simple, elegent and worked. it was incredible. I have to admit that was impressed. I still wouldn't buy an Apple computer, but I have always been a PC guy and thats what I understand.

I have never used the Android phone so I can't say for sure one way or another if it is cool as well, however my friends say that they love it so that has to count for something.

Regarding the WP7, I am very excited about it, and not just as a fan boy. I have written apps for my windows mobile 6 phone but there did not seem to be a market for any of them, now with the new Marketpalce they are going to have on the phone, I am extatic to be able to put my games and apps up on the store to sell. What I ultimately would like to do, is make a multiplayer turn based game that is cross platform between the 3 systems so that my family (Who currently mostly have the iPhone) and my friends (Who currently mostly have the Android) can all play together. The big one that they love playing is 'Words with friends' and I must admit, I enjoy it as well with my iTouch.

I believe that Microsoft will get most of it right with this new phone OS because they are mimiking to an extent, Apple's App Store and Apples closed loop of what can be on the phone, i.e. XNA and Silverlight. While I would still like to be able to just write something and put it on my phone without going through the hastle of going through the app store, it might actually work out to be fine, because who knows, maybe one of the 3 games I am writing at this moment, will make me some money instead of it being just a hobby.

Comment Joygasm (Score 2, Insightful) 157

The first time I remember actually caring about the XBOX Achievement system was when a friend of mine started claiming he owned me at Halo 3 because he was 80% completed with his achievements for the game. I had never really paid much attention to it but I started looking into it and saw a whole other game. I successfully got 100% of the achievements ( until they added more) and moved on to CODMW, CODMW2, and many others, but it added a sense of continuation for the game once the campaign was over which prolonged the enjoyment of the game. Now I check the achievements out before starting the game to see the game within the game. Totally worth it in my book.

Comment Re:You don't need to yell into your phone. (Score 4, Funny) 585

I've noticed that people needlessly talk very loud on celphones. People underestimate how well modern cel phones will isolate your voice from medium-noisy background pratter. People automatically compensate for the person not being in the room without even thinking about it.

WHATS THAT HONEY? YOU WANT ME TO PICK UP TAMPONS ON THE WAY HOME?

Comment Re:How to get management to listen (Score 3, Insightful) 633

No way man, not this developer. Unions just give you someone else who is 'in charge' of you. Not only do you have to pay union dues, half the time those union dues are spent on political purposes you don't agree with and have no say over.

I work as one of 6 developers inside a huge 20000+ corporation. To keep it simple, our corporation decided that we were to move from salary to hourly and it turned up a huge stink, clocking in and such, and people began a movement to unionize which thankfully went nowhere.

When my wife and I got married, she was part of a food workers union which went on strike during winter while she was prego. She lost 15 lbs (she started at 108 lbs) and the Doctors forced her to go on leave 5 months before the baby was due for her health. The union received the doctors notice and as unions typically do to protect their members, is decide that they wont pay the hospital bills for the birth because when we turned in the doctors note, we didn't fill out some 3x5 card that was mandatory for them to continue medical coverage. Where is the common sense in this world you piss ants, but thankfully the state picked up the tab. That's my first and last contact with the f-ing unions. They may have been worthwhile at one point in time, but no longer.

And in regards to getting paid by the line of code, that's stupid too. Out of the 6 programmers, I am probably the #2 guy in skill level, and if you looked at my code vs the other's, mine is object oriented while theirs looks like a batch file, scripted into submission. it gets the job done at a much slower and ludicrous pace.

Comment Social marketing? (Score 2, Insightful) 87

I might be in the minority here, but who actually uses facebook to take a look at someones business? definately not me.

I mean my 90 year old Grandma has a facebook account to keep in touch with the family and I'm sure to also build up her Mafia Wars account, but seriously, every time someone sends me a "Hey, join this group or support this company" invitation through there, I just ignore it.

In all honestly, I would love to figure out how to make money by putting a game up there for people to play, but that has nothing to do with actually promoting a company like your local plumber or some big box store.

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