Category: Uncategorized

Call it a one day sales zerg.

Blizzard Entertainment® today announced that World of Warcraft®: The Burning Crusade(TM) has broken the day-one sales record to become the fastest-selling PC game ever in North America and Europe, with a worldwide total of nearly 2.4 million copies sold in the first 24 hours of availability.

..

“In addition to setting a new day-one PC-game sales record at our GameStop and EB Games stores, the expansion garnered more online pre-orders than any other PC game in our company’s history.” – Robert McKenzie, senior vice president of merchandising at GameStop Corp

World of Warcraft is arguably passing out “game” status to cultural touch-point, especially among the technical elites under 30. But MMOs, and games in general, still have a long way to go to rival cultural media points such as Seinfeld or American Idol, who’s audiences dwarf any base of players for a game. However, numbers like the Burning Crusade release are becoming more common and the barriers to being involved in these kinds of virtual worlds are lowering.

How long until a persistant, virtual nation or world is based on simple, approachable, pre-existing technologies? When will the barrier of buying a box disappear? Don’t want to install something? Want to check on your online assests? When the answer is “Fine, fire up a browser” the landscape could change overnight.

Still, it’s impressive to see the impact one game can have. 2.4 million copies at $39.99 USD is around $96 million USD (and no, I will not adjust for non-US sales; it’s a faux stat). In 24-hours. That’s better than most movies do in their lifecycle.

World of Warcraft(R): The Burning Crusade(TM) Shatters Day-1 Sales Record: Financial News – Yahoo! Finance

But some economists and demographers are beginning to wonder whether New Orleans will top out at about half its prestorm population of about 444,000, already in a steep decline from its peak of 627,525 in the 1960 Census. At the moment, the population is well below half, and future gains are likely to be small.

…

The new doubts, surprisingly, are largely not based on the widespread damage caused by the flood. Rather, crippling problems that existed long before Hurricane Katrina are mostly being blamed for the city’s failure to thrive.

A hard, but fair, look at the situation in NOLA 17 months post-Katrina by the New York Times. The basic tennet is the possibility that the current population is within a few percentage points of what the new, normal population of NOLA will be. With pre-Katrina problems such as crime and government corruption now leading the list of issues facing the remaining residents (and those who have yet to return), the culture of NOLA is in peril.

With scholorly work now coming to the mainstream with predictions like this, what is the face of NOLA to become? Is it realistic to expect to preserve every cultural aspects of the city pre-Katrina? Where does the city shrink, either geographically, culturally, or both? Who gets to decide? Who is deciding?

In short, who chooses what to lose in order to save the most?

Hard questions, but questions that need to be asked (and for which I’ll be flamed, I’m sure). Good article, check it out.

New Orleans of Future May Stay Half Its Old Size – New York Times

Beer for dogs!

“Kwispel” is the Dutch word for wagging a tail.

I would have gone for the (more pedestrian) hondbier, but I’m Dutch-American. (“Hond” is Dutch for “dog”.)

Pet shop owner creates beer for dogs

UPDATE: Sweet! There’s an American version; Happy Tail Ale. [via Popgadget]

State officials should consider raising the tax on beer for the first time since the 1960s as part of an effort to ease the state’s budget problems, according to [John Bebow, executive director of The Center for Michigan, a think tank in the Ann Arbor area].

I hereby postulate that Mr. Bebow is a snobby wine drinker and further propose that the tax on wine be increased at a rate three times that of a beer tax. Obviously, he can afford it working in a think tank (cha ching) in the Ann Arbor (CHA ching) area (CHA CHING).

And how, you may ask, did The Center for Michigan come up with this brilliant tax plan? Perhaps they’re playing to their base: check out the steering committee.

Link

We are assembling a community of heathen pet-lovers to care for pets that are “left-behind.” We are coordinating with feed mills and kennels in preparation for your post-apocalyptic pet care needs.

JesusPets [via MeFi]

Seriously, nothing like ending the run of a format before it even gets started. Sony announced today, after days of back and forth, that they will not allow their disc-replicating subsidiary to produce pornographic titles. At all. Sony says they won’t actively try to prevent adult titles on Blu-Ray, but won’t allow their subsidiary to do so. They then turn around and completely contradict that statement with this:

“As far as I understand, Sony has said to the replicators that if you replicate adult, you’ll lose your license.” –  Robby D, a director at popular adult film maker Digital Playground Inc.

Sounds like a pretty active prevention technique. If this scenario sounds familiar, it should.

Many believe that Sony’s Betamax video tape format, while technologically superior to VHS, died because the adult movie industry was barred from using Betamax, noted Jake Richter, an analyst at Jon Peddie Research

This is a layman’s definition of insanity. Nice knowing you Blu-Ray.
Sony says no to porn on Blu-ray Disc

Dear Ann Arbor photographers,

It snowed. We get it.

Thanks,

Everyone Else

Flickr: Photos tagged with annarbor

Here’s a quote from an article on organ donors, plus one important word I read that was not actually published:

The Secretary of State’s office is kicking off a campaign that asks residents who are willing to be organ donors to place a heart sticker on their license plates or state identification cards.

The words “plates” was not actually in the article, but my brain popped it in there for me. I immediately thought “that’s stupid, desperate people will just start running potential donors off the road in hopes of getting their organs.”

I may be a bit too cynical.

Link

Amanda Congdon, former hostess of Rocketboom and attention whore, gets tasered at CES. And no, the irony of my linking to this video is not lost on me.
ABC News: Amanda Congdon Index

YouTube – Editor B on AC 360

[via Garden of Irks and Delights]