f13.net

Smells like desperation to me, wasnt expecting a digital download version so soon after launch. Anyone have any current subscription figures? are they really losing that many customers?

Well it's not like it's free to download (yet) so I don't see that as a sign of desperation. The SOE "tag line" (example here (http://sonyonline.com/corp/press_releases/051005_QFA_announce.html), scroll to bottom) says they have over 800K active accounts among all their games and that number has apparently stayed the same since January (http://www.sonyonline.com/corp/press_releases/01142005_SWG_Added_To_Station_Access.html). Actually now that I'm poking around their press releases (http://sonyonline.com/corp/press.jsp) I see that before the EQ II release (http://www.sonyonline.com/corp/press_releases/102404EQ2_Pricing_and_Ship_Date.html), SOE was saying they had over 750K active accounts so that means that EQ II has given them around 50K new active unique accounts. That's pretty sad.

Much as I enjoy laughing at SoE that would be 50K + enough to cover a massive EQ1 exodus to WoW, which sounds better. However I do notice that many of the EQ2 forums and message boards appear to have become ghost towns (including this one), which is not a very positive indicator.

Yes that's true. They've apparently been in "equilibrium" where the number of subscribers joining equals the number of subscribers cancelling since around January.

Mmmm. EQ2 is $15 at Fry's and the Collector's tin got dropped to $30 at EBGames and recalled. We still have one. I desperately try to sell it.

Apparently the word "Everquest" is a pox on man.

Schild - buy that collectors edition for $30 - the pet dragon and ingame artpiece should fetch you that much in plat when you can use soEbay.

Can I just sell the collector's edition on SOEBay?

Why not sell it on old school ebay in a year or two.

IF the game is still around by then. Having tried the tutorial, I hope that it is not.

I hated the game after 20 minutes ...

Once again. That tutorial island was by far the best part. I mean it really was enjoyable. It was tightly constructed and well paced. After which they obviously got overwhelmed by having a huge world to with it and continued to fuck up what could have been a decent game. *whoops*. Sometimes I have sympathy for these things. Unfortunately here, I do not. I was scolded when I tried to relate the issues of the game to them in the forums and all the fanbois were like "who the fuck are you? this is the best. game. evar." So I left.

Along with everyone else, apparently.

Digital download?  Superfluous verbiage anyone?  Or is there an analog download somewhere?   :roll:

It's 2005, if you don't attach "Digital" to it, it's not hip.  Try to keep up old man!

I'm now going to go watch some Digital On-Demand on my Digital Cable and  turn off my Digital Cell while I try to unlock the secret to creating the Digital Microwave.  I'll make billions!

Broadcast radio.

Back in the "synth versus heavy" war times of the 1980s, some British radio stations would occasionally send Spectrum or C64 programs in the nigth, which the home computer owners could record on a cassette tape and load into their computers.

*blinks*  You're shitting me.

Too cool :)

[derail]

Which brings me to something quite off topic, but something that's been bugging me for a few years now. Has anyone noticed that the Emergency Broadcast System tests now consist of modulated pulses (a la modem tones) instead of the wonderfull and ear splitting sine wave symphony (853Hz and 960Hz combined tones) of the '70's? I can only assume that it was/is an attempt to send a signal that would automatically switch TV's or radios to a specific channel. Or maybe it's just encoded messages meant only for the Illuminati.

Gotta get my tin foil hat and turn on Art Bell!


[/derail]

Nope: They used analog tape for storage back then. Transfer rates were 600 baud for C64 and 1500 baud for the Spectrum - at 1 bit/cycle, that's 600 Hz and 1500 Hz respectively, well within the audible spectrum. You probably needed a very good reception for the radio "distribution" though, and I don't think they did this often or for long anyway.

I had an Oric-1 which could save/load at 1200 bits/s or (if you had a shitty cassette) at 600. So I used to listen to the start of the tape to find out what speed it was recorded at...

Oh, I had a C64 with a tape drive back in the day.  It just never occurred to me that you could broadcast them that way.  I mean, I guess it makes sense, it's just... whoa...

Okay, my smartassery stands corrected.  Analog download.   :-o

That change happened at the time the Emergency Broadcast System (EBS) was ripped out and replaced with the Emergency Alert System (EAS).  The signal was not intended to switch consumer radios, but what it did do better was control the contents (fnord) of the radio station broadcast.

The PCM data stream contains the text of the alert, along with the coded messages (fnord), and also automatically causes the EAS receivers that every radio station must have tuned to other radio stations (and NWS and other EAS sources) to take over the transmitter output, and automatically rebroadcast the EAS alert.  It also prints out the text of the alert, and any DJ on duty can read it after the alert, or the setup can be configured to automatically record the human listenable version from an 'upstream' source and rebroadcast THAT too.  Its really pretty slick.

(fnord)

That makes sence now. Last year we had some really bad thunderstorms move through the area and one of the local AM stations automatically kicked in with the EAS (didn't know that's what it was called then). I do remember the announcer saying that when an alert comes in, it basically takes over the broadcast. Was pretty cool. Sounded a bit like Dr. Sbaitso from the old Soundblaster days :) Thanks for the info.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled thread.

Don't you have some ingots to mine or something?

No.  I've given up on that silly game.  I'm going to buy this one, so I can choose a static character class and then grind for months, so I can poop into a sock while doing a 12 hour raid.  Man, I've seen the light.

Welcome to 1999?