Jimquisition: Friends

[twesterm]

I've heard people ***** and moan about this before and while I agree it's just an arbitrary number, how many people even actually notice this problem?

Your friends list isn't some PR social network thing you can use like Twitter, it's your friends list. To anyone that has actually filled up their 100 friends on Xbox, WiiU, or the PS3, can you actually look at every person and say "yeah, I know exactly who this person is."

The answer is very likely no. The 90% of the people on that list that you don't have a clue who they are are people you randomly met in a game and never talked to again, random people who friended you from MiiVerse, people that got your name because you posted it on a friend list forum thread, and any other random thing.

I'm sure there are the people that will yell "oh I have 500 friends on Steam and I know and play with them all fuhuh" and to that, I say good for you, you're an edge case.

 

[geizr]

[...]
Of course, the ultimate question, as several have voiced, is whether there is a real technical reason that the "friend's" list has to be of finite extent. If there is a technical reason, such as storage requirements, then it is reasonable that there should be a fixed size; however, the limit should be in proper proportion to the capacity of current technology, not technology of 10-15 years ago when a limit of 100 made more sense for reasons of technical limitations.

The limit is there because that enables them to cut cost and to predict and scale the hardware needed for the friends
service.

But is a limit of 100 still reasonable given the costs and capacity of today's technology and customer usage patterns, or is it overly constraining for no valid reason? This was my point in that paragraph, that the specific 100 friends limit may no longer be a valid restriction from a technology and customer-service view point, even though a finite limit may still be necessary. The same cost control and scaling of hardware could potentially be attained with a higher limit, say 1000 or even 10000, on modern hardware and software. What I gather that Jim is implying, and I have to agree with him, is that this is 2012, not 1995. The limit should be reexamined for the potential to extend to the customer the benefits of advancing technology, rather than hamper them with continuing restrictions based upon, likely, anachronistic constraints.

 

[SAMAS]

Slow news day, Jim?

But is a limit of 100 still reasonable given the costs and capacity of today's technology and customer usage patterns, or is it overly constraining for no valid reason? This was my point in that paragraph, that the specific 100 friends limit may no longer be a valid restriction from a technology and customer-service view point, even though a finite limit may still be necessary. The same cost control and scaling of hardware could potentially be attained with a higher limit, say 1000 or even 10000, on modern hardware and software. What I gather that Jim is implying, and I have to agree with him, is that this is 2012, not 1995. The limit should be reexamined for the potential to extend to the customer the benefits of advancing technology, rather than hamper them with continuing restrictions based upon, likely, anachronistic constraints.

I think the question is not so much a reasonable restraint but whether or not lifting it is a reasonable action. Let's be honest: How many people on this thread, this forum, are at or close to a hundred friends? Compared to everybody else? How many of them do you actually keep track of? How many complaints do you think they actually get about it? I mean, let's be honest, the only reason the Wii U can support two pads today is because people complained about it since it was first announced. If this was actually an issue, it would have been brought up years ago, during the original Xbox's time.

 

[Strazdas]

And what if i do provide a better alternative? will you split my throat too?

Seriuosly, consoles had 100 friends limit? didnt knew that, havent seen such limits on PC for like 5 years.

How many people on this thread, this forum, are at or close to a hundred friends?

after removing my inactives during summer i have 4 friendlists over 100 people. sure, i know COD does claim "you have no friends" when you start up the game, but that doesnt mean noone does.

 

[GrimHeaper]

To all the people who complain that you can't add more then 100 people to your friends list, I gotta ask:

Do you play with even half of them regularly? A third of them?

Baring any far extreme examples, I'm going to say, most decidedly no. You do not. So weed out the ones who haven't been online in a few weeks/months, because really, its quite an idiotic thing to complain about.

Treasure each relationship.
You are looking at the problem with having only 100 right now. You hardly played with half of them regularly.

Ok I have to ask, if you could have 10,000 friends how many of those would you actually keep up with? I mean really? Like maybe 10. 20 at most. I'm surprised if you keep up with all 100 that you've got. Having more "friends" is mostly for bragging rights, it's not as though you keep in touch with all of them or even most of them.

If you have that many friends, maybe you're popular enough that the 10,000 would like to keep up with YOU. In my case, maybe I won't have a close relationship with everyone on my list, but I still feel bad that I can't add them all. It's not nice having to reject requests, and I think anybody who ends up joining big communities online will feel the same way.

So you want live services to act like another twitter or facebook? Aren't these already on consoles? Your request seems very journalism-centric. The live services were designed to replace the sitting in a room and playing together and they are rounded enough to support larger events like tournments and simulate LAN parties. The common man's needs are already being fulfilled, and as there plenty of platforms from bloggers and their fanbases already available, I don't see the need to appropriate another system that was never designed for it in the first place.

It's the *platform holders* that want their services to rival things like Twitter and Facebook. Microsoft's E3 performance revealed it wants the Xbox to be *the* center of our entertainment and networking, but the Xbox division is woefully unequipped to do that at this current stage. The 100 friend limit is simply the tip of the iceberg.

1000 friends sounds about right to me.
100 friends realistically isn't nearly enough, more often than not they tend to be busy/different hours/playing something else/ they are playing the same game, but are busy. So maybe you will get 3 of them, maybe. Have to think about this digitally more than in a actual friend kind of way. Though you can make friends with them, I felt that was kind of the point. But I ramble.

 

[whycantibelinus]

I'm curious to know what (and if there is) a technical reason why it was coded that way originally. Considering how hard all three companies are fighting for market space I think it's weird they wouldn't jump at the opportunity to add a new feature, so I'm sure their engineers had to have had some say in keeping the limit.

I'd guess that if someone were to have 10,000 friends it would probably take up a shit load of bandwidth just to keep transmitting the goddamned notifications. kerplock, kerplock, kerplock, kerplock...thats all that you'd hear when playing and I know you can turn off the notifications but it would more than likely slow your system down by constantly rearranging your friends list to online/offline status of friends.