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Investment of $1 billion+ wouldn't dethrone WoW, exec says
We all know that World of Warcraft is the big daddy on the MMO block. Hell, with the amount of money Blizzard is raking in, World of Warcraft is the big daddy on the gaming block. And what's more, it's still growing. According a report, Activision CEO Bobby Kotick stated in an investor meeting that his company had done extensive research on the MMO category, and came to the conclusion that even a game bolstered by an initial investment of $500 million to $1 billion would still probably have a hell of a time competing in the same space as the Blizzard juggernaut. This likely came as part of their research prior to the massive merger with Vivendi Universal late last year.Kotick points to the relative failures of big companies like Microsoft in trying to develop a competitive product as proof in the pudding. Even companies with decades-long track records of extracting money from lose-lose situations don't stand to gain much from trying to directly compete in the same space. For his part, Kotick believes it's the ingenuity of the guys at Blizzard that is really the deciding factor. Since no amount of money is liable to recreate the success of Blizzard, they simply found the prospect of buying them out more amenable. If you're wondering why it seems like so many MMO development houses are scaling down their products to make them more niche oriented, this is why. Throwing money, even a billion dollars, into a competition with World of Warcraft is only likely to end in tears.
Apple's $18 billion stash
Where's all that cash that Apple made from the iPhone and all those iPods, Macs, and iTunes downloads last year going? Why, right into Apple's mattress. According to the Financial Times, Apple currently has $18 billion sitting on their balance sheet, doing nothing much at all. And they're OK with that -- Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer recently said in the Q1 conference call that they like having that "flexibility." And after all, you never know when you might need to drop $18 billion on something important.All that money doing nothing isn't so great for Apple's investors though, some of whom apparently want a piece of the pie. They might like to see dividends, stock buybacks, or even actual spending come out of that on Apple's part (later in the piece, I'm surprised to see that Apple only spends 3% of their sales on R&D, while Microsoft spends 14%). But no -- Apple is flush with cash from all their big sales numbers, and they want to apparently stay that way.[Via Ars]
Xbox division has $1.9 billion loss, blame red rings
For Microsoft's fiscal year ending June 30 the division which includes the Xbox posted a $1.9 billion loss -- $1.2 billion of that was from the fourth quarter alone when Microsoft owned up to the Red Ring of Death issues. The division actually climbed 28% over the year and may even be profitable soon according to Microsoft entertainment division lead Robbie Bach, who sold millions in stock just as the Red Ring of Death warranty issue broke -- but, that's just a coincidence.Microsoft says it shipped 6.6 million units of the Xbox 360 and now has a base of 11.6 million and manufacturing costs for the Xbox 360 continue to decline. They also say that revenue in games increased 19% to a total of $650 million. They're also expecting a blockbuster holiday with that little game called Halo 3 coming out along with some other highly anticipated titles. If it weren't for the RROD debacle Xbox wouldn't have actually had such a bad year. Now we wait for the price drop.
Researcher dreams up $2.5 trillion "space sunshade"
With all these batteries exploding vehicles running around, we aren't too surprised that researchers at the University of Arizona are getting fired up about stopping global warming, but dropping $2.5 trillion on such a project might just cool the whole idea down a bit. Nevertheless, astronomer Roger Angel thinks that launching a "constellation made of trillions of small, free-flying spacecraft parts a million miles above Earth" could form a long, cylindrical cloud to reflect "about 10 percent" of the sun's rays away from our planet. The lightweight flyers hanging around in the L-1 orbit would be crafted from "transparent film pierced with small holes," utilizing "MEMS" technology mirrors as tiny sails that hold them in line while drifting about. The idea gets even zanier when referring to shooting the "20 million ton structure" into space; it's been suggested that "20 electromagnetic launchers" running on hydroelectricity could launch a stack of flyers "every five minutes for ten years" to complete the project, and while he feels that even the massive sunshade is no substitute for "developing renewable energy," that's still a huge chunk of coin to drop on something so, um, outlandish.[Via Primidi]
NY Times talks to the iTunes Billionth Downloader
The New York Times has a brief article profiling Alex Ostrovsky, the billionth downloader on iTunes. Turns out that he is 16 years old, doesn't buy things fro iTunes all that often (though with his new $10,000 iTunes card that is going to change), and he was in need of a new computer (but now has a 20 inch iMac).
iTunes Billion songs countdown
Apple is counting down to the one billionth download from the iTunes Music Store, and as is the tradition they are having a contest. The person that downloads the one billionth song (or video, sadly only paid songs get you into the contest) gets: 1 20-inch iMac 10 60 gig iPods (5 white and 5 black) 1 $10,000 iTunes Music Card (in US dollars which is good for any kind of download). Not only does the person who downloads the billionth item get some goodies, Apple will be creating a scholarship to a world renowned music school in the name of the person who wins. There is a word for that kind of contest, boys and girls, and that word is sweet!But that's not all, starting at 950,100,000 Apple will be giving away the following for every 100,000th song: a 4 gig black iPod nano $100 iTunes Music Store card No purchase is necessary, you can just fill out a form to enter (limited to 25 a day).Thanks, Aaron.
