A simple thank you

[deccan]

Saxon said:
As such, I have been exploring downloading games. From my somewhat arbitrary survey, based upon my tastes, I have found that this is an area which is not terribly well developed on a commercial basis and problems arise fairly often. Good, secures systems may exist, we handle our payroll Online after all, but they are not common. I find downloading to be about as problematic as my regular losses to the Kenyan Postal Service.

I worked in Gabon for about two years and I've been working for four years in the Solomon Islands. One of the problems with downloading games (or any other kind of digital content) is the often poor quality and unreliability of internet connections in these countries.

[Saxon]

deccan,

We have direct satellite link (VSAT), so our connection is pretty stable. At least since the admin guys got the genarator fixed...

The government here recently broke up the government monopoly on internet and we are starting to see some really positive changes. Privatization is good. Free trade is good. Those of you who do not believe it should come visit and see where trade protectionism costs lives, not jobs. Sermon finished.

I hope things pick up for your link, it is frustrating to have such a poor connection.

[deccan]

Saxon said:
Privatization is good. Free trade is good. Those of you who do not believe it should come visit and see where trade protectionism costs lives, not jobs.

Aye to that!

[Murph]

Well, that worked better than I thought it would. Back on track and everything, which is good, because this is an interesting thread.

As to publicity and marketing, I know exactly the difficulties being described with niche markets. I'm helping a friend develop a board game for Columbia Games based on the Peloponnesian War (Pre-Roman Athens vs Sparta - but I'm sure most everyone on this forum does NOT need me to tell them that). Board wargaming is as niche as niche markets get, so the way we're doing it is developing the game, setting up options for pre-sales and printing and shipping dependant upon the amount of interest as shown by pre-sales numbers.

Of course, we both have other jobs... But the niche problem is the same. Actually, sometimes the thing to do is really burrow into your specific niche - for example, this game is going to be: 3 hours long, 2-player, at least 2 scenarios, using the core block rules - everything else is up in the air, but with boardgames, you almost have to pick a niche and go with it.

It's not exactly the same with computer games of course, there are notable cross-genre (and what's a genre but a pretty big niche, really) successes - sweet Rome: Total War, my copies in the mail.. But by-en-large, cross-genre is more of a risk than simply doing something within established fields. Hence all the Diablo, or Warcraft or FPS clones out there.

So yes, how do you do niche marketing? Word of mouth is best, really, although making your product available in demo form is a good way to get people (like me) interested. I absolutely agree that a full-page ad in PCG is not the way to go for Dom2, but similarly, neither is investing all the money in server architecture and software development so that a few people can buy and download the game Online. I mean, the point of any business is to figure out the way that works best for you - that is effective both in terms of cost and time and customer happiness. If Shrapnel feels that they found there solid ground on this, wicked, because it means that we can get the benefits of great developers work, AND that they can get the benefits of our cash money.

Oh, and Saxon and deccan, I've been to south america where free trade and privatization, enforced by the World Bank and the WTO have allowed multi-national corporations to gain control of water supplies and other essentials of life. I'm all for limited free trade and privatization, but I have grave concerns about "free" trade that the WTO enforces, which does not allow countries to stop selling products or resources once they start.

I live in an area with vast water and energy resources, and as the water and envery shortages get worse in the next 20 years, I fully expect to see armed US soldiers on the dams and rivers that flow past my door, and free trade will justify their being there. But that's a whole other can of worms.

[deccan]

Murph said:
I'm all for limited free trade and privatization, but I have grave concerns about "free" trade that the WTO enforces, which does not allow countries to stop selling products or resources once they start.

I'm not sure what that means. How can countries be forced to sell things they no longer want to sell?

Murph said:
I live in an area with vast water and energy resources, and as the water and envery shortages get worse in the next 20 years, I fully expect to see armed US soldiers on the dams and rivers that flow past my door, and free trade will justify their being there. But that's a whole other can of worms.

Water and energy resources issues are normally subject to specific (and sometimes very old) treaties that fix prices and supplied quantities between countries, hence creating huge distortions, and not directly through free trade (i.e. varying prices and quantities traded according to supply and demand).

But this is really a whole other can of worms.

Start an OT post on this subject and I'll happily jump in.

[atul]

deccan said:

I'm not sure what that means. How can countries be forced to sell things they no longer want to sell?

Perhaps because they're obliged to do so by treaties they've had to sign in exchange of loans and such?

The book's obviously biased, but nevertheless I found Michel Chossudovsky's book "Globalization of Poverty" a good read. If nothing else, at least it gives several case studies on subject of How Can I Totally Mess Up Weaker Economies. Such education is always good for aspiring rulers of the world.

[Murph]

I'm not sure I want to get into a full-on OT thread on the subject of neoliberal trade policies, but basically with GATT (general agreement on trade and tariffs) and the WTO, if country A starts selling, say, water to country B, and then is running short on water and wants to stop, GATT obliges Country A to pay Country B for basically "lost profits", which means that if Country A can afford whatever Billion (depends on the size of the treaty, but we're talking fat, fat cash in any case) then they can stop, unless of course the WTO rules that what Country A is doing is an "unfair barrier to trade", and then they can FORCE Country A to keep selling water - even if they are experienceing drought or something. And in the Last decade, %80 of rulings on matters in this regard have gone towards Country B. Sweet, sweet water.

So anyway, it's pretty easy to mess w/less wealthy and powerful countries in the present world trade market. I think I'll glance over the Globalization of Poverty, and if anyone wants a different (and admittedly biased, but at least they admit it) view of the benefits of globalization, check out the New Internationalist Magazine.