This is how it's done Darq's developer shows the right way to handle Epic's brand toxicity

In my last post, I laid out a seven-point strategy for how to announce your Epic exclusivity deal. That post ran long (and, really, which of my posts don't?) but if there's a single big point that I wanted people in the video game industry, and in the media that cover the industry, to take away, it is this:

When dealing with a subject that you know to be sensitive, be sensitive to the people who are going to hear your message.

Learn to read the room. Comedy is hard; making jokes about subjects which you know other people not only take seriously, but are likely to get angry about, is a high-wire act best left to professionals. Don't open discussions with sarcasm when you want to elevate the overall level of the discourse. Just be straight with people, and be transparent with people, and those people will reward your straightforward honesty with respect.

And now, right on schedule, we have a case study in how to handle the touchy subject of Epic exclusivity the right way. We have Darq.

PR Communications 101: Sarcasm = Mockeryor, Glumberland and Ooblets: A case study in how not to do any of this

Anybody who's been watching the F5 internet shitstorm that is Ooblets ill-considered EGS exclusivity announcement should be familiar with the framing that's been emerging in the last day and a half or so, one which paints the Ooblets developers as essentially blameless victims who are receiving an utterly undeserved tidal wave of inchoate rage and hate from "entitled" gamers whose fragile egos simply can't withstand a simple joke.

However, much as I hate to engage in anything that even resembles victim-blaming, I feel compelled to point out the flaw in this framing of the story: Ooblets' developers are not blameless victims here. Whether knowingly or not, Glumberland picked this fight.

No, they should not be receiving death threats. The people who are forging Discord chat logs and faking videos of Discord chat sessions that never happened, deliberately and for no other reason than to discredit the husband and wife duo that basically are Glumberland, have indeed gone beyond the pale. The level of vitriol on display is wildly disproportionate to both the Glumberlanders' initial offense, and to the Epic Game Store in general. But make no mistake: what Cordingley and Wasser initially did really was offensive, and it's very hard to believe that they weren't aware of that.

Devolver Digital was actually the best thing about E3 2019

Once again, Devolver Digital has scored a big win (with me, at least) with their third-in-a-row, batshit-insane, totally satirical takedown of all things E3, disguised as an E3 presser.

If you've never watched one of Devolver's "Big Fancy Press Conferences" before, I highly recommend that you watch all of them, immediately.

2017:

2018:

2019:

Devolver Digital wins E3... again. A+

Keanu Reeves wins E3 Everyone else was just.. meh

I know that we weren't expecting much from this year's E3, what with Sony not being there at all, and with EA doing several single-game announcements rather than a press conference, but even I was expecting more than this.

Cinelinx looks to be first off the blocks with their list of winners and losers, but the consensus of opinion seems to be that the only real winner was Keanu Reeves... and even he was only OK, with a stilted, obviously unrehearsed presentation that Reeves basically overcame through sheer charm. The double reveal that a) Reeves had actually done mo-cap and voice work for am NPC in CD Projekt Red's Cyberpunk 2077, and b) that he was not only appearing in the game, but at E3 to announce when the game would be coming out, was probably the most scene-stealing moment of Microsoft's conference.

The second most scene-stealing moment of E3 was probably Ikumi Nakamura's instantly meme-worthy appearance as she announced her game, Ghostwire Tokyo, during Bethesda's presser. Nakamura was sincerely enthusiastic, and charmingly goofy, and has become something of an overnight sensation on social media as a result; her game looks pretty decent, too.

We got confirmation that George R. R. Martin really has teamed up with the makers of Dark Souls, Bloodborne, and Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice to make a video game; Elden Ring has a terribly generic name, and a meaningless, moody cinematic trailer that hints at an epic scope and dark tone (very much on-brand for both GRRM and From Software), but told us basically nothing about the game itself. Oh, and Forza is getting Lego content added to it, which actually looks surprisingly fun. 

And that... was basically it for genuinely memorable E3 moments, this year. Oh, sure, some stuff happened at E3. It's just that most of it wasn't all that memorable or noteworthy.

Google Stadia is an even worse deal than I thought

It looks like I may have one crucial detail of the Google Stadia package completely wrong.

Like many people, I was thinking that Stadia was basically "Netflix for Games," but if the team at Techlinked are correct, then Stadia may closer kin to XBox Game Pass, with a monthly fee that only gives access to a few free games, with major AAA titles being something you'll need to purchase separately in order to secure access outside of that free period.

This means that the US$1090 over 8 years cost of Stadia that I had calculated as being comparable to the average 8-year cost of console ownership is wrong. The Stadia actually costs US$1690 ($1090 for the service, plus $600 for the games), which amortizes over 8 years to US$211.25 per year, compared to the US$112.50 annual cost of console ownership over the same period. With the added disadvantage, for Stadia, that you own nothing at the end of those 8 years, compared to the console experience which leaves you with a console and 10 games that you own.

Much of Stadia's marketing is still deliberately vague, so clarification on these details could still emerge and magically make the whole thing suddenly awesome, but I doubt it. If this is indeed how Stadia will work, then Stadia... sucks. Even the free version won't actually be a new gaming paradigm; it'll just be a new digital distribution channel. Which nobody wanted. Mazel tov!

Google Stadia is a bad deal for the average consumer, and you should avoid it

Like many people, I was immediately skeptical when Google first announced their Stadia video game streaming service. Details were sparse, and questions abounded, from the technical (several previous efforts at video game streaming had failed because of latency issues), to the basic economics of it all. How much would it cost? Would it be worth its asked-for price?

Well, as of today, we have a few more details, and while the technical issues are still awaiting some hands-on "in the wild" experience to be adequately assessed, we can certainly assess the economics of it all. So here's my ake:

Google Stadia is a rent-to-own scheme, with the added disadvantage that you never actually end up owning anything, and the average gamer should stay far, far away from it all... at least for now, while the "Founder's Pack" is the only version of this thing available.

This isn't based on any subjective aspect of the Stadia "experience," either, even if Google clearly wants consumers to make decisions based on exactly this sort of nebulous, emotional criteria. No, my objection pretty much comes down to simple math. For consumers, the Stadia numbers simply don't add up.

RIP, UWP We hardly knew ye, and never cared.

Way back in 2017, I wrote a post that I titled, "UWP is a failure, and Microsoft knows it."

Nearly two years after releasing Windows 10 and UWP into the world with dreams of marketplace dominance dancing in their heads, Microsoft themselves are only now bringing their 2nd-biggest software product [i.e. Office] to their own store. And it isn't a native UWP version of the program, either; it's a port, brought over via the Project Centennial Desktop App Bridge (henceforth referred to as PCDAB).

That's right: Windows 10 and UWP have flopped so hard that Microsoft themselves can't be bothered to develop natively for the platform.

If Microsoft can't be bothered to develop natively for UWP, then nobody else is going to, either, ever, and that means that UWP is effectively dead on arrival. The only programs that Microsoft will see on its storefront from here on out will be PCDAB ports, none of which will perform as well as Win32 executable versions of those same programs, and even that assumes that developers bother to do that much; with the Windows 10 store being such a shit-show, and the added costs involved in maintaining a 2nd version of their software, all in service of lining Microsoft's pockets, I suspect that most developers simply won't bother to port their programs over in the first place.

Worse yet, a dearth of quality UWP apps means that Windows 10 users are spending this crucial time in the platform's life-cycle locking software-buying habits that exclude the Windows store almost entirely. That's not reversible; if even Windows 10 users are thoroughly trained to buy their software elsewhere, then developers have even less reason to develop for UWP, and that is self-reinforcing. It's a vicious cycle, with the lack of adopters resulting in a lack of apps, which ensures not only a slower rate of adoption, but also ensures that new adopters of Windows 10 don't adopt the storefront along with the OS, resulting in ever fewer apps...

At this point, Microsoft would probably love to be faced with a simple chicken-and-egg problem, rather than this rapidly increasing inertia [...] It seems to be that only one question remains: is this vicious cycle now so well-established that Microsoft is simply unable turn it around?

That was then; this is now. And here in the now, we have the answer to this 100% rhetorical question, as reported by The Verge:

Microsoft had a dream with Windows 8 that involved universal Windows apps that would span across phones, tablets, PCs, and even Xbox consoles. The plan was that app developers could write a single app for all of these devices, and it would magically span across them all. This dream really started to fall apart after Windows Phone failed, but it’s well and truly over now.

Microsoft has spent years pushing developers to create special apps for the company’s Universal Windows Platform (UWP), and today, it’s putting the final nail in the UWP coffin. Microsoft is finally allowing game developers to bring full native Win32 games to the Microsoft Store, meaning the many games that developers publish on popular stores like Steam don’t have to be rebuilt for UWP.

“We recognize that Win32 is the app format that game developers love to use and gamers love to play, so we are excited to share that we will be enabling full support for native Win32 games to the Microsoft Store on Windows,” explains Microsoft’s gaming chief Phil Spencer. “This will unlock more options for developers and gamers alike, allowing for the customization and control they’ve come to expect from the open Windows gaming ecosystem.”

That's right; UWP is definitely dead, and I fucking called it, two years ago.

Who's the man? I am.

The truth about nuclear power and carbon emission reduction

[Reposted from my other blog.]

It turns out that there are better ways to reduce carbon emissions than risking meltdowns, or managing and securing tonnes of weaponizable radioactive material for decades. Who'd have thought?

These totally obvious insights come courtesy of Gregory Jaczko, who once served on the United States' Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and who had previously been a big believer in nuclear power's necessity when it came to combatting global climate change. It took him a while, but he's since come to exactly the opposite conclusion, as he writes in this length article on CommonDreams:

For years, my concerns about nuclear energy’s cost and safety were always tempered by a growing fear of climate catastrophe. But Fukushima provided a good test of just how important nuclear power was to slowing climate change: In the months after the accident, all nuclear reactors in Japan were shuttered indefinitely, eliminating production of almost all of the country’s carbon-free electricity and about 30 percent of its total electricity production. Naturally, carbon emissions rose, and future emissions-reduction targets were slashed.

Would shutting down plants all over the world lead to similar results? Eight years after Fukushima, that question has been answered. Fewer than 10 of Japan’s 50 reactors have resumed operations, yet the country’s carbon emissions have dropped below their levels before the accident. How? Japan has made significant gains in energy efficiency and solar power. It turns out that relying on nuclear energy is actually a bad strategy for combating climate change: One accident wiped out Japan’s carbon gains. Only a turn to renewables and conservation brought the country back on target.

What about the United States? Nuclear accounts for about 19 percent of U.S. electricity production and most of our carbon-free electricity. Could reactors be phased out here without increasing carbon emissions? If it were completely up to the free market, the answer would be yes, because nuclear is more expensive than almost any other source of electricity today. Renewables such as solar, wind and hydroelectric power generate electricity for less than the nuclear plants under construction in Georgia, and in most places, they produce cheaper electricity than existing nuclear plants that have paid off all their construction costs.

In 2016, observing these trends, I launched a company devoted to building offshore wind turbines. My journey, from admiring nuclear power to fearing it, was complete: This tech is no longer a viable strategy for dealing with climate change, nor is it a competitive source of power. It is hazardous, expensive and unreliable, and abandoning it wouldn’t bring on climate doom.

The real choice now is between saving the planet or saving the dying nuclear industry. I vote for the planet.

[Emphasis added, by me.]

The entire piece is much, much longer than this excerpt, and definitely worth a read -- the details of Jaczko's journey towards this conclusion are quite compelling. It shouldn't surprise anybody, though, that he finally reached this conclusion after analyzing the available evidence, since almost everybody who wasn't already inside the dying American nuclear industry had already done exactly that, years ago.


I understand why the United States, in particular, are still clinging to the nuclear illusion. America ushered in the atomic age, and can still look nostalgically backwards to a time when an atomic-powered version of 1950's America looked like it might be the future. But it really wasn't the future; it was, and is, nothing but an expensive dead end. And it's high time for the last adherents of the nuclear delusion to admit that those rosy 1950's visions of an atomic future should be relegated firmly to the past, where they belong.


Nothing says "the past" quite as strongly as something that once screamed "the future." Maybe one day, we'll get fusion power, clean and plentiful energy based in nuclear physics that doesn't come with the costs, dangers, and long-term waste management problems of fission technology. But that day is not today, so for now, let's just all put down the Vault-Tec, shall we?

Steam continues to confound

If there's one thing about the OS market share numbers which has remained reliable from one month to the next, it's that Steam's numbers almost always move in the opposite direction from the OS market over all, and last month was no different. That's right -- Windows lost overall market share among Steam users, with MacOS and Linux both posting gains, all of which is backwards when compared to the broader OS marketplace.

As expected, Windows 10 continued to gain while other Windows versions lost ground, pretty much as one would expect given that gamers are the one group that continues to buy new PCs, all of which come with Win10 installed. I wasn't expecting MacOS and Linux to be gaining in popularity among Steam users, though; one can't help but wonder if Steam Play/Proton isn't playing a role there.

But I'll be honest: I have no real idea what this might mean, if anything. I'll keep watching, though, in the hope that some sort of clarity emerges from the statistical soup.

Watch this space...

Victory! Microsoft surrenders and PC users win

File under, "It's about fucking time," I guess.

As reported in Forbes:

Microsoft has a major announcement today: Windows 10 will no longer automatically install those big feature updates every six months. Home users can pause smaller updates, too. In fact, Windows will even let you pause updates after checking for them!

This is huge. It’s Microsoft’s biggest change in Windows strategy since the company released Windows 10. Microsoft is giving up on “Windows as a service” that is automatically updated outside of your control.

[...]

Microsoft is giving us—and PC users—a lot of what we asked for here! We said Windows wasn’t a service and Microsoft should give PC users more choice. We called for Microsoft to test updates more thoroughly than the botched October 2018 Update, which deleted some people’s files and had other bugs. We warned people not to click “Check for Updates”because Microsoft would treat you as a “seeker” and force updates on your PC before they had gone through testing. We said Home users should get more control over updates, including the ability to pause updates when desired.

Microsoft's insistence on treating Windows 10 Home users like guinea pigs was one of the most contentious issues that still plagued the OS, and was a big part of the reason that I decided to switch to Linux instead. I'm still switching to Linux instead, of course; Microsoft's belated move in the direction of what they should always have done with the OS is just too little, too late, at least for me. But for the millions of Windows 10 users who felt like they had no choice but to adopt Microsoft's new OS, or who were switched after repeatedly refusing the "upgrade," this is definitely good news.

A new normal?

It's the first of a new month, which means that NetMarketShare's new OS market share numbers are out, and the predictable drumbeat of the coverage is all about how Windows 10 is gaining at Windows 7's expense.... even though Windows 10 gained more than Windows 7 lost last month. Never underestimate the extent of tech media's devotion to the pre-established narrative, I guess.

The reality of the current numbers, however, looks a little different to me. To me, it looks like Windows 7 is holding on remarkably well for an OS that's due to officially exit support in only 9 more months, continuing to be the OS of choice on 36.5% of the planets personal computers. That's not 36.5% of Windows PCs, mind, but of PCs overall, a remarkable feat considering that its successor's successor OS was released nearly four years ago, and was free for three and half of those years. To me, the fact that Windows 10 is still only 43.6% of the OS market looks more like a sign foretelling a long, Windows XP-like life for the older OS.

Let's be real, though; "Ten-year-old OS loses market share to four-year-old OS" is basically a dog bites man story. It's expected, and would be dead boring if not for the fact that it's happening a lot more slowly than expected... which is also boring. The more interesting story of the past year has been the movements in the overall OS market.

This week in Facebook

Do you remember when I said that Facebook's ongoing and ever-deepening scandals were going to end with someone from the firm doing jail time? That outcome just became a lot more likely.

As reported by CNN Business:

Federal prosecutors are conducting a criminal investigation into Facebook's data sharing deals with a number of large technology companies, according to a new report in the New York Times.

As part of the investigation, a New York grand jury has subpoenaed two well-known smartphone makers for records related to the investigation, according to the report.

[...]

The grand jury inquiry was on behalf of the US attorney's office for the Eastern District of New York. When contacted by CNN Business, the Eastern District did not have a comment on the case.

Add this to Facebook's big outage of yesterday, and their incredibly stupid decision to block the campaign ad of Democratic Presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren, apparently because it talked bluntly about the need to break up companies like Facebook (way to prove her case, Zuck), and you end up with a week that a New York Times op-ed describes as "biblically bad."