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And the latest in news of Youtube DMCA and how it sometimes doesn’t quite work as intended…
Microsoft have admitted that a bunch of videos that were recently hit by DMCA notices and taken down were in fact not infringing at all. The videos in questions came from bloggers FrugalTech host Bruce Naylor, and LockerGnome founder Chris Pirillo, who took to Twitter using the hashtag #Microstopped to protest the notices. The notices were filed against the videos purely because people in the comments of the videos were posting product keys for the game. Really.
Microsoft have at least apologised for the gaffe and are now taking “steps to reinstate legitimate video content and are working towards a better solution to targeting stolen IP while respecting legitimate content”. So credit where it’s due, at least they have admitted they made an error and are trying their best to fix it and have it not happen again.
However, it once again highlights the issue with automatic takedown where there’s little to no checking for the infringing content. Of course, it’s not possible to check so many videos by human either. It’s unfortunately a system left open to exploitation and a lack of penalties in place for those who wrongfully and sometimes maliciously take down content doesn’t help matters; but possibly this is the ‘best’ solution at the moment.
The Nielsen Ratings are pretty important media-wise. For those unaware, its the name given to the ratings that determine how popular a television series is by how many people are watching. It could mean the difference between another series of a show or its cancellation.
Nowadays though, more and more people are taking to the Internet to watch their entertainment and not all of it comes from the big media companies anymore. Sites such as Youtube have made it easier than ever for anyone to make their own media to broadcast around the world, so where does a TV ratings company fit into this new order?
Well Nielswn have teamed up with Adobe in a joint venture to attempt to find out where the attention online is really going; to the news websites, the funny videos, the social media or the blogs. The system is estimated to go live sometime in 2015, with Sony, ESPN and Viacom all saying they’ll be signing up already.
Planetary Annihilation, the successor of Supreme Commander and Total Annihilation, was a massive draw on Kickstarter, as you can see above…
But THEN, they released it on STEAM, for… wait for it… £40 ($60) on Early Access, After making $2,229,344 on Kickstarter. Hell, it was £20 for Kickstarter backers, so they actually paid for the game TWICE!
All this and two years down the line, PA is STILL not complete, its only just gotten its offline mode and the game is atrocious
“Today, we busted out a new Kickstarter for a new strategy game called Human Resources. Built on the same engine that you helped us create for Planetary Annihilation, Human Resources expands on the scale and destruction you’ve come to love in exciting and different ways. We realize that some of you might take this news as concerning, so we wanted to come out and say this: work on Planetary Annihilation will not stop if Human Resources funds; both games will have a team dedicated to these separate projects”
So, Human Resources was a second team?
Ok, lets quickly look at the now cancelled Kickstarter for it
Now, I admit, the game looks cool (actually, its looks like the Planetary Annihilation we wanted and mainly thats because it uses the game engine made for it)
But there are two reasons Human Resources failed. GREED and GREED
The loyal fans that would have backed this in a heartbeat didn’t, because of the unfinished game Planetary Annihilation.
The fans with more money than sense though, even most of them saw through the kickstarter rewards this time:
They start off fairly reasonably (ok, I backed it too)
Then it ramps up
Then it starts to get a little crazy…
$125 pledge to get a tshirt and soundtrack? Oh and team colours…
The mini figures and USB stick look fun, but that’s a LOT of money
Ok, this is getting silly now…
Umm… No!
Ok, this is getting stupid
I’ve heard a lot of Indie devs talking about the demise of Kickstarter, even on our own Indie Game Show on a Sunday. And Uber Entertainment prove why this is happening. They aren’t being realistic!
They made $2.2mil just from the KICKSTARTER for Planetary Annihilation. Thats MORE than enough to release a game of the quality PA should have been. But this is hurting the smaller developers more than anything, as backers are starting to lose faith in Kickstarter and what its actually for. Helping small companies bring us good new games and getting going. Its not just Uber Entertainment, 22Cans did the same with Godus last year and there are many others.
So while I am a little disappointed that another potentially good RTS has died, I am laying the blame squarely on the developers this time.
343 Industries boss Frank O’Connor has apologised for a 20GB day-one download for Halo: The Master Chief Collection, but said it was the only way.
Speaking via Neogaf to those critical of the day one patch, O’Conner said, “The game is designed to run as a single, unified product, digital is seamless obviously, but we also wanted disc users to have the same experience, without swapping discs.
“Since the bulk of it is MP or MP related, the logic is sound. There will ALSO be a TU in there, but that in itself is a tiny fraction of the content.”
The 20GB is mainly related to multiplayer portion which is obviously important to most, so the developer hopes people will understand.
“For some folks it will be straight up annoying and I both apologize unreservedly for the irritance, and hope that the package and the way it works more than makes up for it
Do I understand the inconvenience and annoyance for some users? Of course. I’m not going to blow smoke or ignore it.
I’ve been playing the whole enchilada for a week now and the ability to sample, jump from aspect to aspect, customize with skulls and playlists has been absolutely addictive and mesmerizing.
I think I would have enjoyed a box set with the same fidelity, but the way it all connects has for me at least, made it more than the sum of its parts.”
Are you looking forward to the Halo: Master Chief Collection?
Valve’s Steam Machine and their Linux-based OS SteamOS might have been delayed, but that hasn’t stopped other manufacturers developing their own PC-based consoles. Already custom PC builds are popular amongst gamers and computer enthusiasts so much that most PC sites contain the option to build your own custom builds, and recently Alienware has been showing off their Alienware Alpha, which works off a Windows OS rather than a Linux-based one.
Now ASUS have announced their own effort – a console about the size of a Wii called the GR8 Console PC. It comes with a range of parts that mostly cannot be removed and upgraded, except for for the amount of RAM which can go up to 16GB and the amount of storage it has. So it’s probably not for the gamer who wishes to upgrade their machine as they go.
Memory & storage: 1600MHz DDR3L memory (up to 16GB) 2 x SO-DIMM. SATA 6Gb/s; 1 x 2.5″ 1TB 7200rpm HDD, or 2.5″ 256G SSD, 1 x 2.5” extension bay for HDD/SSD, Free 100GB of ASUS WebStorage for 12 months
Connectivity: Front 1 x Headphone, 1 x MIC-in, 2 x USB 2.0 (1 with USB Charger)
Rear 3 x Audio jacks (LINE_IN/LINE_OUT/MIC), 1 x S/PDIF optical out, 1 x HDMI (support Ultra HD 4K), 1 x DisplayPort (support Ultra HD 4K), 1 x LAN(RJ45), 4 x USB 3.0, 1 x 19V DC-in, 1 x Kensington lock
Power consumption: 19V DC, 6.32A, 120W Power Adapter, 0.4W when off, 13W at idle, 70 to 77W at full 3D loads
ROG-exclusive features: SupremeFX Audio, Sonic SoundStage, Sonic SenseAmp, Sonic Studio, Sonic Radar II, GameFirst III, Miracast Receiver
Bundled software: Kaspersky Anti-Virus (1-year full license), AiSuite III, ASUS HomeCloud with Wi-Fi GO!/Media Streamer, DTS Connect
Power cord, User Manual, Quick Start Guide, Warranty Card
Size: Max. 238 x 245 x 60 mm (2.5-liter chassis)
Weight: 1.284kg
The price is estimated to be set at $999 too so it seems to be aiming for a middle market between console gamers and PC gamers. I only hope there’s enough people there to be interested in ASUS’ efforts.
