Skip to main content

Home/ ThoughtVectors2014/ Group items tagged amazon

Rss Feed Group items tagged

Filter: All | Bookmarks | Topics Simple Middle
George Neff

Even Non-Nerds Should Care That Netflix Broke Up With Developers - Megan Garber - The A... - 0 views

www.theatlantic.com/...372926

#ThoughtVectors netflix developers

shared by George Neff on 25 Jun 14 - No Cached
  • Big, though, because the closure makes Netflix the latest of the big tech companies and services to have restricted their APIs. Twitter has done it. So has Amazon. So has Google.
  • APIs are enablers of remix culture, essentially. And what they mix is structured data.
  • Because of all that, APIs have been seen, traditionally, as symbolic and practical.
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • Netflix, according to its blog post on the API closure, is incorporating the products it likes into its service. It's abandoning the others.
  • That may be because Netflix deals with licensed content, as opposed to user-generated information.
perezmv

How Pandora Avoided the Junkyard, and Found Success - NYTimes.com - 0 views

www.nytimes.com/...08pandora.html

technology Pandora success music stations

shared by perezmv on 18 Jul 14 - No Cached
  • Pandora’s 48 million users tune in an average 11.6 hours a month. That could increase as Pandora strikes deals with the makers of cars, televisions and stereos
  • At the end of 2009, Pandora reported its first profitable quarter and $50 million in annual revenue — mostly from ads and the rest from subscriptions and payments from iTunes and Amazon.com when people buy music.
  • Its library now has 700,000 songs, each categorized by an employee based on 400 musical attributes, like whether the voice is breathy, like Charlotte Gainsbourg, or gravelly like Tom Waits.
  • ...4 more annotations...
  • Some music lovers dislike Pandora’s approach to choosing music based on its characteristics rather than cultural associations.
  • “It’s not just that this has an 80-beat-a-minute guitar riff,” he said. “It’s that this band toured with Eddie Vedder.”
  • For Pandora and its listeners, it was a revelation. Internet radio was not just for the computer. People could listen to their phone on the treadmill or plug it into their car or living room speakers.
  • In January, Pandora announced a deal with Ford to include Pandora in its voice-activated Sync system, so drivers will be able to say, “Launch my Lady Gaga station”
mcandersonaj

Dragon's Crown review: heavy metal - 0 views

www.polygon.com/...agons-crown-review-heavy-metal

dragon crown gaming

shared by mcandersonaj on 26 Jun 14 - No Cached
  • The same can't be said for the female NPCs that fill Dragon's Crown's dungeons and other environments. Most of the women in the game are barely clothed, with heaving chests, backs twisted into suggestive positions, some with their legs spread almost as wide as the screen. They're presented as helpless objects, usually in need of rescue. It's obvious, one-sided and gross.
    • mcandersonaj
      mcandersonaj on 26 Jun 14
       
      The game has at least one of these scenes every level but they don't tell you that even some of the males in the game are sexualized as well. Granted not nearly as many are
  • Two player characters — the Amazon and the Sorceress — are explicitly sexualized, with breasts literally bigger than their heads with rear ends to match
    • mcandersonaj
      mcandersonaj on 26 Jun 14
       
      While the game does over-sexualize these two characters they at least do get powerful skills to match and the game tries to make up for their bodies by making them strong characters in game. 
  • Dragon's Crown was reviewed using code provided by Atlus. You can read more about Polygon's ethics policy here.
    • mcandersonaj
      mcandersonaj on 26 Jun 14
       
      Ultimately the game score was low but the fact that the website felt the need to post their ethics policy after the article really shocked me. 
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • But I found its over-exaggerated art style alienating and gross in its depiction of women
    • mcandersonaj
      mcandersonaj on 26 Jun 14
       
      The game's review was looked at through a pretty harsh lens in my opinion. While I don't agree with the character designs I feel like the author had a grudge out against the game for the reason above and makes me wonder if other games got reviewed in the same way. 
    • mcandersonaj
      mcandersonaj on 26 Jun 14
       
      this article shows how the over-sexualization of characters can hurt a game. 
  • mcandersonaj on 26 Jun 14
     
    This is a gaming review for a game known as Dragon's Crown
  • mcandersonaj on 26 Jun 14
     
    This is a gaming review for a game known as Dragon's Crown
wstrahan

Streaming revenues turn the tide against digital pirates - FT.com - 0 views

www.ft.com/...6f-11e3-b519-00144feabdc0.html

streaming music video pirates netflix spotify

shared by wstrahan on 11 Jul 14 - No Cached
  • Spotify, the subscription streaming service, has more than 6m subscribers. In video, Netflix, boosted by original productions such as House of Cards , has more than 36m subscribers. Amazon, Google and now Apple, with iTunes Radio, are bringing streaming to a much wider audience
  • This is – at last – translating into meaningful income. The Recording Industry Association of America calculates that revenues from services including Spotify, Pandora and YouTube went from 3 per cent of industry revenues in 2007 to 15 per cent, or more than $1bn, in 2012.
  • Apple’s strategy has pleased some music companies because its streaming service also encourages downloads. But many content owners still believe that streaming cannibalises download and DVD revenues
  • ...6 more annotations...
  • What is lost from many calculations is the fact that the urge to own may be weaker in the age of streaming, but so is the urge to steal
  • Traffic to peer-to-peer file-sharing and torrent sites is declining where legal alternatives are offered
  • . Netflix’s Ted Sarandos said in May: “When we launch in a territory, the BitTorrent traffic drops as the Netflix traffic grows.”
  • In an analysis of the Dutch market, Will Page, an economist working for Spotify, found that releases by Rihanna and Taylor Swift that were held off Spotify sold just one legal copy for each BitTorrent download, while hits from One Direction and Robbie Williams that were instantly available for streaming sold four copies. “The legitimate market is beginning to outshine the illegitimate market,” says Cary Sherman, the RIAA’s chairman.
  • High rates of piracy for hits such as Game of Thrones in markets such as Australia show that consumers still look to illegal sources if content is not available legally in all parts of the world the minute that US consumers get it.
  • No one is ready to declare victory against the pirates, but the tide is starting to turn against them. The Napster generation is growing up – and behind it is an iTunes, Netflix or Spotify generation that has higher expectations of online content, but is more willing to pay.
1 - 7 of 7
Showing 20▼ items per page