Category Archives: Culture

The Obvious Reason for Piracy

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Before I begin, I’d like to point out that I have absolutely no data whatsoever that might justify anything I’m saying. I’ve not done any research, nor have I undertaken any surveys to determine whether anything written below is justified. What I do have though is common sense, which seems to be lacking from a great many people (though especially those with all the money).

I’d like to talk about the price of digital downloads. I’d especially like to talk about the price of digital downloads on iTunes and how a change in the price would, I reckon, make a much better alternative to illegally downloading whatever you want.

Although this is something I’ve been considering for some time, a recent TED talk I saw on the subject of “Copyright Math” made me consider again just how insanely priced the media we consume is.

Let’s, for a second, take a look at the price of Buffy the Vampire Slayer on iTunes. Perhaps a random choice, but it was a show I used to enjoy and I fancied watching it again. So I popped on over to iTunes to see if the price matched my expectations. It did. But, not in a good way. Each series of this fifteen year-old show was priced at £24.99 (excluding the short first season, which was £19.99). This meant that if I’d wanted to buy all of the shows, it was going to cost me £169.93. That figure is absolutely ludicrous, when you consider that the DVD boxset can be purchased for just £37.97 on Amazon.

This is a show that, unlike new releases, cannot possibly be generating the kinds of revenue which would justify keeping it at such a high price. The draw of a show which is clearly outdated by modern standards cannot be so high that large numbers of people are downloading from iTunes at such wildly inflated prices.

So what possible reason can the distributors have for charging so much? Apple obviously take their cut, but that’s a percentage and not a fixed fee which the distributor would need to meet. And they’re saving huge amounts of cash on the manufacture and distribution of physical discs. All they have to do is simply upload their shows on to iTunes and leave it at that. They no longer have to touch them or even think about having to stop reproduction due to manufacturing limitations. These are shows which can sit permanently on Apple’s servers without anyone worrying about them, and constantly generating funds from sales when the next person moves into the digital world.

As I said earlier, I have no figures. But to my mind, there’s a case for charge the least amount possible for these shows. I would be more than willing to pay £20 to download every season, for example. And I’m quite sure there would be a great many more people willing to pay the same price to download every single episode.

Just as copyright lawyers seemingly do, I’m going to pluck a figure out of the air now. I’m going to suggest that for every one person willing to pay £170 for all of these seasons, there are going to be at least twenty more people willing to pay £20 for them all. I reckon I’m underestimating that too. And given that there is absolutely no effort involved in changing the price to something more reasonable, nor any extra manufacturing costs to consider, I don’t quite understand why it’s not something they’ve introduced.

Perhaps this is distributors trying to save their own skin before it’s too late. After all, who will need to use a distributor when a moviemaker could simply add their own productions straight to iTunes (or their own online presence) and cut out the middle man? Once cinemas go 100% digital, what’s to stop them downloading the movies straight from the producers too? Distributors are now facing a losing battle. Although there is a current market for physical items, this cannot possibly last forever. Especially if the prices of digital downloads were sorted out to make them more reasonable. Eventually, owning a physical item will be something for hardcore devotes only, which is something distributors clearly must be aware of.

So, distributors have to face up to the facts. It is their outdated business models which are leading to an increase in piracy. For every one person willing to pay £170 for all of these seasons, there are twenty more willing to download them illegally. Twenty people who could be persuaded to pay a small fee to own a show which is otherwise sat on Apple’s servers, only generating a profit whenever someone with more money than sense comes along.

Perhaps I am underestimating the business. Perhaps there are hidden issues which I’ve not considered because I’m not aware of them. But from my limited understanding, looking at this issue with what little common sense I have, there are surely better ways for money to be made by the movie industry, which (as a rather fortunate byproduct) would also lead to a rise in consumer satisfaction?

Triple Town

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It’s a good long while since I wrote anything on the blog, let alone an app. But Triple Town by Spry Fox has got me hooked.

On the face of it, the game doesn’t look much. In fact, its cartoon graphics and cutesy imagery put off at least two people I introduced the game to. Thankfully, after much persuasion they did have a quick go and now they’re just as hooked as I am.

Triple Town in action.

Looking at the graphics alone, one suspects you’re letting yourself in for the sort of game that Zynga are poisoning the web with. The bears which jump about the screen are indicative of a title which would encourage intermittent gameplay and the emptying of your wallet. Once you dive in though, you soon discover how wrong you’ve been. It’s a puzzler in the best traditions of Tetris; simple at heart, but with enough depth and originality to keep you glued to your phone and your battery running on empty.

The idea is so simple, a reality TV star could figure it out. You place pieces on a board, one at a time. Once you put three similar pieces next to each other, they “level-up” into a different piece. Match three of these pieces and they also level-up, and so it goes on with increasing difficulty. Add a couple of special pieces to speed up the levelling process or remove unwanted pieces from the board and the game becomes an instant winner with me.

It doesn’t soon like much, but for the cost of giving it a go (absolutely nothing), you have nothing to lose. Unfortunately the number of turns you can make in the free game is limited and it’ll cost you £1.99 to enable unlimited play, but that’s a small price to pay for the amount of enjoyment you’re going to get from this. Download it now from the App Store for the iPhone and iPad, and give it a whirl.

Becoming an Author

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I’ve always fancied being an author. A novelist in particular. I love the idea of my work being read by others, though I never get around to finishing anything I start. In fact, it barely ever gets off the ground. I come up with half-arsed ideas which don’t lead anywhere and I seem to lack the concentration it takes to get to grips with such a large undertaking. I need focus.

I often go out and buy new notebooks with the intention of filling them with ideas; passages I’ve written which could make it into a larger work; character profiles; ideas for locations. But they never get filled. I carry them around with me for a while, before they start to be used for other, less artistic works. Such as the shopping list.

I bought one the other day. It’s a Moleskin clone from Ryman’s. It feels just as nice to the touch, but less than half the price. But that’s by-the-by. I’m not here to talk about the price of paper. I’m here because I want to write. I need to learn to concentrate and not imagine there are a million-and-one other things I could do instead. When it comes to fictional writing, I am the world’s greatest procrastinator. There is always washing up to be done, or clothes to be dried, or cushions to be straightened, or cats to be stroked. It’s the little things which continually distract me from doing what I really want to do. And by the time I’m distracted, it’s already too late; my mind has wandered. There’ll be no writing on those days.

Eventually, a few days will go by and I’ll never return to the story I’d started. Perhaps I need to give myself more opportunities to write. But I doubt a publisher is going to give me an advance to enable me to quit work and write full-time, especially given that I don’t yet have anything to show them. I know I can do it if I put my mind to it. I just need to beat my mind into submission first.

Although I’m fully aware that this blog isn’t read by a huge number of people, if anyone out there has any hints and tips for writing, I’d be very glad to read them.

Derby Velodrome

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Those who know me will be fully aware that I’m not a very sporty person. Obviously, there is the cycling I did last year and I do try and get to the gym (sometimes), but I’m not one to watch a sporting event. I can’t really think of anything else I’d rather not do. But one thing I am excited about is the proposal to build a velodrome and Olympic-sized swimming pool in Derby.

Derby is a city that’s had a fair amount of investment in the last few years. There was the construction of the Westfield shopping centre, the redevelopment of the old railway sidings into Pride Park, the improved railway station, the fancy bus station (with it’s hotels and casino) and all of the many other bits and pieces which are still ongoing, but too many to mention. There is a website you can visit to take a look.

It would seem that the plans for the velodrome have been in the works for a while, but they have only just come across my radar (a link I saw on Twitter). It has been designed by Mace, who have recently designed the velodrome for the London 2012 Olympics and it seems that a little bit of the glamour has rubbed off on this.

The proposed Derby Velodrome design. It's a fantastic-looking wave-shaped building with a budget of £20m.

Obviously there have been naysayers (see the comments), who claim that the money should be spent on health care, or creating jobs, or improving the other delapidated facilities which already exist. There are also arguments to suggest that the designers should stick to a tried and tested design; i.e. a concrete box. To those who believe the money could be more wisely spent in other areas, surely they understand that the only way to compete and improve the local economy is to promote ventures such as this? Derby (and every other city) is in constant need of attracting people and outside investment, and this would help to put Derby on the sporting map (an ensure a lasting legacy). Sure, a new or updated leisure pool would attract a few families to the city for a day out, but an Olympic-sized pool and velodrome would help attract investment and future expansion.

I also obviously agree that other services need constant investment, but if you pump all of your money into health care you end up with a healthy population living in a continually dreary place. Investing in sporting facilities and improving Derby’s sporting image will help to develop an all-round healthier place in the long-term.

The trouble is, unless money is being spent on something that makes an immediate impact in people’s pockets, the public are going to get annoyed. No matter what the council were to invest in, there would always be someone telling them they’re doing the wrong thing. There’s no way to win, except to get on with it and improve people’s lives whether they like it or not.

The Velodrome will be built next to Pride Park Stadium

And that’s what these developments will do. Some people don’t think so right now because they don’t have the vision to see beyond today.

As I said earlier, I really don’t like sports. I can’t swim and in all honestly, the thought of watching people cycle in a velodrome sends me to sleep. But the council will recoup the money spent on this in no time at all; it will bring new people and investment into the city; it will make Derby a centre of excellence for cycling; and it will leave more of a mark than just upgrading the run-down leisure pool facilities currently on offer. You never know; it may well bring in enough money to sport and leisure in the city that the council have enough to upgrade those as well.

As to the design, I personally hope the final design ends up as innovative and unique as the current proposal. Anyone can build a square; just look at the top of the Westfield shopping centre in the middle of the city. But let’s have something different and funky that leaves its mark, rather than a bland slab that will fade into the background. A unique design will attract greater investment. A concrete square will not.

The Despicable Rise of Freemium Gaming

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Ever played a freemium game before? You know, they’re those titles on iOS (and I’m sure on Android too) which let you download for free, but then hold off with some of the better features until you’ve given them some cash. Or those titles where you progress to a certain level with the expectation that you’re going to be able to continue, but then you run out of coins or something, and you’re forced to hand over real cash in order to go any further.

In my day, those games were called demos. You got a small chunk for free and then you had to pop off to Game if you wanted to get the full thing. And that was absolutely fine. There’s always room for a demo or two. I also believe there is a place in this world for games which only give you a certain number of features before you hand the developer some money. But what I don’t believe is right is the abundance of games which charge an extraordinary amount of money for so very little.

My Country loves your money.

Take, for example, My Country on iOS. It’s a pretty basic city-building game, which is actually quite fun to play when you have a couple of minutes, though it doesn’t really have much of what you’d call longevity. You place buildings, hire employees and continue on until you’ve filled your screen and earned a shed-load of in-world cash. However, the difficulties start pretty soon after you begin the game. In order to hire certain employees, you must collect certain objects whenever you place, upgrade or collect profit from a building. But some of these objects are so few and far between (and placed randomly) that you’re forced to spend real money in order to purchase more in-game currency, allowing you to skip the process of random item dropping and get on with hiring employees. The same goes for expanding into certain territories; mostly you’re fine with the in-game cash, but often the only way to expand is to spend insane amounts of real money.

And let me tell you how insane these amounts get. In order to purchase various amounts of “CountryBucks” which lets you do various things, you’re looking at:

  • £1.49 for 20
  • £4.99 for 70
  • £13.99 for 200
  • £34.99 for 500
  • £69.99 for 1,000

I can’t be the only one who finds this all a little bit excessive, can I? I mean, Modern Warfare 3 is currently less than just £30, so how can a game as tedious and disengaging as My Country possibly warrant charging almost £70 for absolutely nothing?

Worst of all though, is that proper, established game studios have started jumping on the bandwagon. Yes EA, I’m looking at you. EA have recently come out with a spate of titles for absolutely nothing, but which then rely on the freemium strategy of raking in the cash. I’m pleased to say that people aren’t willing to take this lying down when it comes to EA. Smaller companies can get away with it as it’s really become an expectation that their games are funding in this manner. But I think EA have gone off on a tangeant that they really should have steered clear of.

Take, for example, Theme Park. Theme Park is an absolute classic game and I was rather pleased to see it in the App Store. I was also pleased to see that they weren’t going to charge anything for the game. Result! But, of course, there’s always more to it than that and I was extremely disappointed to find it was freemium. As were many other people, which has resulted in the game receiving (at present) 1,897 1* reviews. Lack of freedom of play – and the fact that to do anything at all you have to hand cash over for in-game tickets – have meant a backlash against this title in particular, although it’s by no means alone.

How to destroy a classic.

There’s also Tetris. Now, how could you take Tetris and screw it up? Tetris is the greatest puzzle game there has ever been, it’s also one of the most addictive and it’s the reason why there is still an original GameBoy sat somewhere in a drawer in my parents’ house. But what did EA do to it? They went and offered a subscription service for £20.99 per annum, which gives you in-games coins to boost your score. Which effectively means, if you have the money, you can cheat the game. Where is the fun in that?

You know what I want? I want to spend £5 on a game like My Country. Or Theme Park. Or Tetris. I want to spend £5 and then play the game whenever I want to, without having to fork out extra for it. A game should be fun. It should be relaxing. It shouldn’t mean the stress of having to work extra hours in order to pay for additional content. Which, let’s face it, means absolutely nothing at the end of the day. It shouldn’t mean giving kids a game and then charging their parents a fortune for extra bits, or making them go out to buy an iTunes voucher with their pocket money. There needs to be an end to this disgraceful act of money-grabbing on the part of all developers, but especially the larger studios. We all know you need to make money, but there are alternative methods. Charging people for the game in the first place is the obvious one, but what about in-game advertising. There are options here which don’t involve ripping people off. Developers, please choose them.