*That's interesting. It's the specter of traditional computer gaming being wiped out by digital demonetization. Maybe Jaron Lanier was right, when, in his SXSW speech, he said that the state of music today is the economic endgame for everybody.
http://www.billboard.biz/bbbiz/content_display/industry/e3i8c42c2e07eaa0e32a9c85abe801dd780
"Every single example of these musicians who did really well by giving stuff away... they don't exist," Lanier says. "There are a lot of people who pretend ... and it is fake." (...) "Anyone who is making it now is making it off the little shreds of the old system that is still working," he says.
(((It's always especially interesting when this obsolescence happens to guys who are considered, like, way high-tech. Live by the chip, die by the chip. Those who live closest to the volcano are the first to get scorched.
(((Computer games, being briskly annihilated by zero-cost online freeware... but, really, why not? If news isn't "news" but the free stuff is okay, why not games that aren't "games"?)))
"The 21st century will be a war of attention," Schell said. "We have to choose sides." The world can either be controlled by the designers who only want to make money – the "persuaders," as Schell labeled them – or these games can be controlled by the humanitarians, and the artists, and the fulfillers. The persuaders can be beaten, Schell said, but only "if we wake the hell up." (((Very William Morris of him. As soon as industry discovers its inner artsy-craftsy, you can predict that the steamroller is waiting.)))
"The war is already here," Schell pleaded. "You're fighting in it right now."
For their part, Zynga, Farmville’s developers, didn’t help matters by giving a well-publicized (at least among furious game developers) patronizing pat on the head. (...)
Of course, if you want to know what’s actually happening, follow the money. And that, specifically a panel of venture capitalists – the people who actually fund new game companies - held cold comfort as well for traditional game developers.
"It was easier ten years ago... when you'd just ship a great product and the users pay you up front," [Pacific Crest analyst Evan] Wilson says. "Those days are over."
From there, he raises a controversial question: "How important is game development when you have poor quality free social games generating these kinds of numbers?"
Media companies only care about daily average uniques, Wilson continues. "The industry has been moving in that direction rapidly and it's accelerating and it's scary," he adds. "It is a big, big issue when some of the leading social gaming companies can get over 20 million players on a game in nine days," he adds – even the best AAA titles can't pull those numbers....
(((Later: lots more, and grittier.)))
