Xbox One Debuts This November [UPDATE]
- Thread starter Earnest Cavalli
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It's a question of convenience. If you disagree with something online, you don't link to it, because linking to things drives traffic to those things. You wouldn't link to a hate group's website. You wouldn't link to the political blog of someone whose opinions you strongly disagreed with. You might refer to it in passing, but you wouldn't post the link. This is like that.NiPah said:
Spreading a link around gives the link clicks. Clicks drive sales. Therefore, if you post this link, you're sending the message to Mircosoft that they've won, this is totally cool, please take my money. The fact that it wasn't actually *your* money but somebody else's who read your post is beside the point.
I disagree with you on two levels, first the easy one;WarpZone said:
While it is true that linking to Amazon will help sales (not much), it is more important to site your sources and give evidence of what you're talking about. Journalistic integrity is more important then preventing the small number of people who bought the system and would not have if not given said link.
Second disagreement; When the hell did Microsoft become the WBC, the Xbox One is not spreading lies about the Holocaust, it's just a new console with really shitty DRM and some admittedly anti-consumer practices. The Escapist is an online news magazine, it's not in the business of crusading against the evils of DRM and consumer rights, they are in the business of educating consumers so they make more educated choices. Stop this nonsense about Microsoft winning or not winning, the only way to beat practices like invasive DRM is to educate consumers, not by hiding links from them, and certainly not zealotry that attacks a staff member for simply providing a link.
I guess you're right on both counts, with one slight qualification on your second point: Educating consumers just plain doesn't work.NiPah said:
Microsoft only cares about the bottom line. If consumers don't buy the Xbox One, Microsoft may be forced to change their business plan, like when EA recently gave up on Project Ten Dollar. (The $15 million they made from on-disk DLC was apparently a drop in the bucket, and the damage to their PR and the fact that people were just playing their games online less was seen as more important, apparently.)
If consumers DO buy it, ESPECIALLY people with the money to waste on being an Early Adopter, the whales, I.E. the people AAA is desperately trying to appeal to right now, the audience segment they want so badly that they're willing to throw all of us gamers and fans under the bus en masse and DESTROY THE CONCEPT OF PERSONAL PROPERTY... Microsoft will make tons of money and the other console manufacturers will jump on the bandwagon. And once that becomes normal and sane, it'll never go back to being a consumer-friendly industry ever again.
So no, it is not at all silly to describe this in terms of Microsoft "winning." But if Microsoft wins, it won't be Nintendo and Sony that lose. It'll be all of us, all gamers, all consumers. Forever.
(Edited heavily because I was tired and angry and rambling in the first draft and it was an incoherent mess. Sorry about that. Also, full disclosure: Xbox 360 is pretty much the only console I play these days, usually for Borderlands II, though I do own a WII. I game on PC when I'm not productivitying on PC.)
But from that standpoint would you rather this entire news story was never published at all? While I understand what you're saying it would seem more damaging that people are even told about an extra incentive to early adopters? It almost seems the link is not the issue, that you would rather The Escapist ignore entirely the Xbox One and pretend it does not exist, such a stance would hurt certainly hurt sales.
Something about that just doesn't sit right with me, when a news site withholds information they stop being the new site and are simply a tool to spread their own bias. Rather it's a link, or an entire story, a valid news site will offer it all.
Something about that just doesn't sit right with me, when a news site withholds information they stop being the new site and are simply a tool to spread their own bias. Rather it's a link, or an entire story, a valid news site will offer it all.
So you just say that it is on sale without linking to the BUY NOW page. It is a general principle of using the internet that you don't link to stuff that's more popular than you want it to be. Holocaust Deinal is a different type of Bad Thing than a sucky video game console, but I thought the general principle was "it's okay for reporters to talk about a thing without furthering that thing's agenda, especially if they don't like that thing or what it stands for."
Look at it this way: the original draft of this OP contained no link! Just sentences. The link apparently didn't come in until the second edit. When I read the post, I assumed that they wouldn't put the link there unless they wanted the Xbone to succeed. There's no other reason to include a link to a business's BUY NOW page. I thought this was internet common sense. You could just say that they're taking preorders, maybe even say they're taking preorders at Amazon and leave it at that. The story would still be factually true while benefiting the bad guys less.
Can I just point out how AMAZING it is that The Escapist is the kind of place where we can even seriously have a discussion QUESTIONING whether or not the writer of the article is in bed with Microsoft? Anywhere else it would be a given. That's part of why it made me so angry, it struck me as some form of betrayal of the values which are the reason I come here. Yahtzee and Jim Sterling are A Thing That Can Exist here. That's probably about as close to Free Speech as a video game website can get without collapsing in on itself.
Look at it this way: the original draft of this OP contained no link! Just sentences. The link apparently didn't come in until the second edit. When I read the post, I assumed that they wouldn't put the link there unless they wanted the Xbone to succeed. There's no other reason to include a link to a business's BUY NOW page. I thought this was internet common sense. You could just say that they're taking preorders, maybe even say they're taking preorders at Amazon and leave it at that. The story would still be factually true while benefiting the bad guys less.
Can I just point out how AMAZING it is that The Escapist is the kind of place where we can even seriously have a discussion QUESTIONING whether or not the writer of the article is in bed with Microsoft? Anywhere else it would be a given. That's part of why it made me so angry, it struck me as some form of betrayal of the values which are the reason I come here. Yahtzee and Jim Sterling are A Thing That Can Exist here. That's probably about as close to Free Speech as a video game website can get without collapsing in on itself.
Only $500 to be spied on?! What reason don't I have to get this!
Seriously, I'm not mad about the Kinect basically being a spy in my living room, I'm mad about the ownership of games fiasco this thing's going with.
Seriously, I'm not mad about the Kinect basically being a spy in my living room, I'm mad about the ownership of games fiasco this thing's going with.
Hahah..."One". I take it that was the effect you were going for, anyway. Perhaps Sony should now offer a trophy that you get just for buying their new console, regardless of whether you preorder it or not.Zachary Amaranth said:I think I can guess the name of the achievement.search_rip said:
Hmm, now that I think about it, I feel kind of dirty having my 360 avatar as my same here on The Escapist. *shudder*
Pun definitely intended. And continuing the wordplay, perhaps Sony could call theirs "owned."MarsProbe said: