Black Moves Next, originally uploaded by jasonrr.
Taken at the Watson Research Facility this weekend in Hawthorne, NY. The building has an all-glass facade that just wants to be photographed. I was kind of surprised I didn’t get hassled by security.
Buttermilk Falls - Gorge Trail, originally uploaded by jasonrr.
The lighting along the Gorge Trail was just awesome. Nature literally conspired with me to allow for some cool photos. I love how the light here falls on the lower falls, giving your eye a place to go. The rock formations along the gorge were also really cool, and you can get a glimpse of them here.
Purple and Green, originally uploaded by jasonrr.
Since the world is waking up and turning all kinds of green, I thought it would be fun to start a Green and… series. Taken in Bryant Park again around 10am. The rest of the set will hang out here.
More Cherry Blossoms, originally uploaded by jasonrr.
On my way out of school I spotted this cherry tree in full bloom. The picture didn’t do it justice. What a beautiful day today turned out to be.
Tulips, originally uploaded by jasonrr.
This was taken around 6:30pm in Bryant Park this week. At that time the light in the park is reflected sunset from the surrounding buildings. This shot is appearing a bit desaturated, and I am still working on why that might be.
Update: The problem is my post process embedding Adobe RGB instead of sRGB. I haven’t fixed all of these yet, but you can see more shots from that day here.
While this isn’t wholly surprising, it was disappointing to have it confirmed. In a recent interview, David Cross, a program manager responsible for UAC made some seemingly tongue-in-cheek comments about the rationale behind UAC and its current impact on the average Vista user.
The reason we put UAC into the platform was to annoy users. I’m serious…UAC is not a perfect security boundary, but it [has helped us] move from ‘zero click’ exploits to ‘one click’ defense, said Cross.
Essentially, his position is that having a UAC prompt has made users aware of the dangers that they face in a connected world. In addition, those users have a better defense against exploits. This position was based, at least in part, on internal research that claimed that the vast majority of Vista users have UAC enabled and don’t receive prompts on a regular basis.
I wonder how much actual in-home observation time was included in that research. It has been my experience that UAC leaves non-technical consumers, think about your Mom, in essentially the same position they were in before. A UAC prompt basically gives the user a choice between allowing or disallowing an action which they don’t completely understand and almost certainly believe is happing at their request. In my limited observations, most people click “Allow” without carefully reading the prompt. Same risk as before, just more inane clicking around. It is the usability equivalent of your car asking you if you would like the engine to burn several chemical compounds, that you certainly don’t recognize, as they might be harmful to your car.
Mr. Cross would have us believe that the solution to Windows’ vulnerable code base is to force users to act as police for their computer’s activities. Isn’t this what software is supposed to be really good at? While I agree that there is no perfect solution yet, I think turning the human behind the keyboard into a filter for the “bad” things that are likely to happen on their computer sorely misses the mark. At the very least, more work on tightening down the core Windows code that is consistently exploited would be a good start.
Stream @ Breakneck Lake Trail, originally uploaded by jasonrr.
Jillian and I hiked a very familiar trail today in an effort to get us back into shape for the hiking season. This particular shot was taken along the Red trail on the Cold Spring side of Breakneck ridge. I can’t wait until school is over so that we can take some extended hikes through this area.
Arden Point Bridge, originally uploaded by jasonrr.
I took this photo last week on a hike to Arden Point in Garrison. The trail leaves from the Garrison train station, and follows the tracks This is the first photo I have posted from my 50mm f/1.8 lens.
Over the past decade, the popularity of Massively Multiplayer Online Games (MMOGs) has led to an incredible amount of development by major game producers. With revenues in the billions of dollars each year, over $1.7B for Blizzard/Vivendi’s World of Warcraft alone (Boyer), this industry has grown to include hundreds of titles. These numbers have game producers hurrying to figure out the best way to capitalize on this fast growing source of revenue. As with other high growth markets, secondary markets have developed to satisfy the needs of customers in the primary market that either can’t or won’t be met by primary market makers. Not surprisingly, a market this large, approximately $1B (Brightman), has attracted the attention of entrepreneurs looking for opportunities to support or supplement the primary activities in these markets with products and services that enhance the gamers’ experience.
There are many different forms of secondary markets in the gaming world, some legitimate and legal, and others which have been deemed by game developers to be illegitimate, or even illegal. An example of legitimate secondary market is the host of gaming magazines and websites that offer strategies, content guides, and communities where gamers exchange ideas. An illegitimate market is generally defined as one where people exchange real world currency for characters (avatars), items, or in game currency in ways that violate the Terms of Service defined by the game developers. I will examine how the nature, and implicit goals of a game, affects its interactions with secondary markets. Further, I will argue that the “illegitimate” markets have had a direct impact on primary innovation, shaping current and future game design very quickly to account for these markets’ impact on the value of in-game assets.
I will focus primarily on Vivendi’s The World of Warcraft (WoW) and use Linden Research’s Second Life (SL) as an example of a vastly different approach. In order to effectively explain the impact, and resulting strategies of the game developers, I will detail how value is created and measured in MMOGs , a brief history of secondary markets in MMOGs, their current revenue models and legal concerns, the vastly different responses from Vivendi and Linden Research, the role and impact of secondary markets on design innovations WoW and SL and , finally, my prediction of the impact these markets will have on future game development.
Continue reading ‘The Effects of Secondary Markets on Primary Innovation in MMOGs’
Well, shortly after my last post this happened:
Yes, that is me, and yes I am that lucky [sic]. It was a lot of fun to have my friends and family around for this, and the location was really amazing. If you are at all interested, you can see more of the photos here. In addition, I am one semester through my Masters degree. My next series of posts will focus on some of the work that I have been doing for those classes, including a term paper that I wrote on the impact of secondary markets on massively multiplayer online games.