Monday, September 30, 2013
Weekly Article: Why Verizon Wanted It All
Charlie Rose Show - A discussion about the Federal Reserve with Alan Blinder of Princeton University, David Leonhardt of the New York Times and Gillian Tett of the Financial Times.
I watched the Charlie Rose Show about the Federal Reserve decision of
ending the bond issuing campaign. The analysts on the table were surprise with
the move of the Federal Reserve. They claim that the Fed has made the same mistake
before and that the Fed continues to make the same mistake over and over again;
they claim that the worst mistake of the Fed is being too optimistic with the
growth of the economy. The Fed is running low on weapons to bring the economy up,
what they are doing now is a verbally intervention, which means that what they
say is to bring the confidence back to the population. However, by saying good
things means that they will need to fulfill what they promised otherwise the
move will back fire them. The analysts also state that the unemployed rate does
not tell totally about how well the economy is doing because it does not count
those that quit looking for jobs.
Bloomberg TV
I watched a video on Bloomberg TV called Apple Unseats Coke
as Most Valuable Brand. Apple is valued at U$98 billion, meanwhile Coke that
holds the number 2 spot is valued at U$78 billion, it has been the first time
in 13 years that a company took the number spot form Coke. The analysts in the video
claimed that Apple was the first to change the ecosystem of technology,
resulting on the craziness that the consumers have when they release a new
product. Apple was the first to connect the cellphone with the computer using
the cloud. On the other side, Microsoft missed the change from laptop to
mobile, resulting on a loss of market value and consumers. The analysts also
believe that soon we will no longer need Microsoft Office to work on due to
what the other companies are doing and showing to the market. The same happened
with Kodak when there was a change from printed image to digital image.
Netflix Won an Emmy: Now What? on Bloomberg
The video Netflix Won
an Emmy: Now What? present on Bloomberg's website talks about how successful Netflix is at the moment. The companies
won an Emmy with the TV show House of Cards, which received an U$100 million
investment in 2 season of the shows. Since the success Netflix has been having
the number of subscriber went up
36%. However, Netflix does not own those shows, the companies that produce own
the shows, such as Liongate and 20th Century Fox. Cable networks were the winners in the
Emmy’s, where HBO won the most; meanwhile, CBS did not win an Emmy. Netflix is
aiming to attract more subscribers to their monthly payment plan since consumers are consuming more videos online. Now you can watch
whenever you want to, you do not have a specific time to watch your favorite
show. What is making Netflix popular is that the supply-demand is against the number of shows that are coming and
the time the population have to watch; in simple words, there are too many
shows (supply) to a low number of
people watching all the shows (demand).
That is the reason why few shows become a hit. HBO is ahead of the competition
because they are spending a lot of money in investments, which means that many high quality writers are sending their scripts to HBO studios. One
factor that called the attention of the analyst in the interview was that 17.6
million watch the Emmy’s on CBS, getting a higher rating than NBC’s famous
Sunday Night Football, where the Bears and the Steelers played.
What is the future of Television? Where is this convergence going? What can we envision?
Since its beginning in 1930’s by
the Germans the Television market has grown impressively; a faster growth has
occurred since 2000. Like every market, three big companies, NBC, CBS, and ABC
dominate the Television in the U.S. Those three companies conquered the market
by a horizontal integration method;
buying small companies and making them affiliates, which means that the big
three receive affiliate fees in
order for the small TV companies to broadcast their programs. For instance, a
few year ago ABC had ABC Sports in order to broadcast sports but in an
investment move the company bought the majority of ESPN group.
When the big companies in the TV
market made more investments, many houses changed from having basic cable to a direct broadcast satellite (DBS), some examples are DirecTV and
Dish Network. According to Robert LaRose in The Media “basic cable is the
lowest level of cable service that included local broadcast stations” (The
Media, 216), this means that the one who has this plan in Westchester, NY will
watch news from channel 12 regarding what happens in Westchester; another
person that lives in Long Island will only have news in channel 12 regarding
Long Island, having a community access.
Meanwhile, who has DBS can watch a lot more channels, especially from around
the world since it comes from a satellite connection.
One of the
features that has changed a lot in television since its beginning is the image
that we see. Before the image was in black and white, and nowadays we can see
the image as clear as possible when we watch in a high-definition television (HDTV).
However, in some companies the HD channels are still pay TV, which means that we have to pay extra in order to have
those channels and also another channel that we would like. For instance, who
has Optimum TV will have to pay extra in order to have NFL Network, Tennis
Channel, HBO and other channels.
We can see
major investments in the TV market because many channels are becoming 3D, like
ESPN 3D where you can watch sports in a different way, it is almost like you
were running with the player in the field. The big companies can invest a lot
due to the cost per thousand, how
many people will watch it, that they charge when a company wants to put its
advertising during a show’s commercial break.
The future of the TV is unknown due to what the companies that produce
are doing. Now there is a television that recognized your voice and you can
talk to the TV, similar to when we talk to Siri in our iPhones.
Summarizing Tom Toynton's Presentation
Last week the guest speaker that came to our class in order
to give us more knowledge on the games world was Tom Toynton. Toynton is an
Associate Professor of Creative Art and Technology at Bloomfield College, he
used to work as a director of Creative Technologies at Centurion Brothers, LLC.
Toynton also participated in many games construction projects and design. There
were more than 10 points in his presentation that impressed me with things that
I did not know about games or that caught my attention, however, I will only
summarize the 10 important points.
-
Games are experiences: Toynton started the
presentation with this sentence, and also stating that everybody plays games.
What matters the most in a game is the player experience and how the audience
will interact with the game
-
Board and
Card games design started in Germany: after WWI Germany was devastated after
the war so no games were on warfare since the population was tired of war
-
Euro-Games: most popular type of game. Another player
cannot destroy what you created along the game; they only change your path in
the game. You get to choose what you want to do first, always according to the
game’s rules.
-
American Games: more competitive than
cooperative. These games are random luck since you roll the dices in order to
move. The game itself can change the gamer’s path.
-
Monopoly game – it is a poorly designed game,
however, many people in the U.S play it. In 30 to 45 minutes within the game
you already know the winner. The game usually takes 3-4 hours to finish
-
The Book of Rules – in Germany is normal for the
gamer to read the rules before playing so they know what they have to do. In
the U.S gamers play the game first then they go to the rules in order to know
what to do when a complicated situation in the game arises
-
Theory of Flow – hours go by when you are doing
something pleasant. The flow is when you are challenged to the point that you
know it is difficult but you know you can do it
-
Games are tools for education – they make education
fun, and less boring for the newest generations. Games also help men to
socialize
-
Grading and Pointing System – grading had a
negative reaction because the student starts with an A and the grade is dropped
along the semester according to what you didn’t accomplish or if he didn’t get
100% on a task. Pointing had a positive reaction because you work your way up
earning points according to what you accomplish. You end up trying to get
better every time rather than getting disappointed by your grade
-
The most difficult task for a game developer: in
the end of the presentation I asked Mr. Toyton what was the most difficult task
for a game developer and he told me that the design part is the most difficult
because it takes a lot of time to design a game for the age range that the
company is aiming to sell the game and also make it better than the competition
It was a pleasant and excited experience to have Mr. Toyton
as a guest speaker in our classroom once I enjoy a lot to play games when I
have free time. He also showed us how games work in the players’ mind and make
they think more. Also he showed us the project that he is working on, which
will be in the stores soon for the public.
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