I suppose this looks like a great idea on the face of it. U2 is suddenly on millions of devices. However, wouldn't this mean that they've essentially made it impossible to make it onto the music charts which are based off sales?
I don't think U2 gives an awful lot about music charts (any more).
Personally I always liked U2 (grew up in the 80's, so...) but I also think this is an awkward move and maybe more importantly, unnecessary. It just feels out of place.
Having never liked U2, I now have this thing in my music list I either have to figure out how to either or scroll around forever. It may only be an inconvenience, but so was junkware that carriers would preload up. Bono is apparently the carrier that Apple can't resist.
there are many retailers who the publisher has to make amends to for this stunt. Some have rules where they will not sell physical copies for albums released digitally first.
so I have read there will be exclusive tracks to make up for it. As for it being on phones and such, not mine or those devices I gave my parents.
It was presented to me in iTunes on my iMac but the interface was so horrid it really came off bad. Use the cover flow mechanism that shows artists and such I saw the U2 banner and it being free, when clicking on that the normal purchase button was there but inoperative. Instead you had to click else where in iTunes to get the music, I think it was on your previously purchased items page which is not clear! The should have adopted the purchase button to take you there automatically, instead it was a work flow CF
The issue is you're paying money to a third party for mojang's work, more precisely something which you have already paid for by purchasing the game. If you ignore the game itself and look at it from a purely technical view, what people are essentially doing is running code on their own servers (Which is allowed) but then charging people for bits of the code written by mojang (Which is not allowed).
For most private servers you see, they will have a list of "donation" amounts and a "reward" for each, however this is quite clearly a sale since you are exchanging a commodity for money. To be classed as a donation, you would need to donate money without the requirement of something in return.
I think Mojang are clearly right here, but not to the advantage of the minecraft community.
What's wrong with charging to expose functionality on a server you own, just because that functionality involves code written by somebody else?
For example, let's say I run Mac OS X server on a computer somewhere and charge for user accounts on it. I'm charging people for the bits of code written by Apple, right? But surely this is completely reasonable of me, and Apple has no place to tell me that I can't charge money for this.
Taking it further, maybe I allow free accounts which only have access to a few shell commands, and then you can pay more to unlock other commands. Again, I see nothing wrong with that, even though I didn't make those other commands.
> you're paying money to a third party for mojang's work
Most servers are run using Bukkit [1] which is licensed under GPL [2]. The client and the protocols are Mojang's but the server's code is free to modify without such restrictions.
> ...paying money to a third party for mojang's work
Is this really the case though? Aren't these people paying for a specific economy type created in game? they could go play any number of free servers or run their own, but they choose to play a P2W server. The server ops are really charging money for the service of the in game economy being micromanaged.
The players did pay mojang already to have access to everything, it's not like someone is required to play on a private server. I don't see how it's an issue if the players are choosing to pay a server operator for offering a specific service
People seem to assume that the Hoogle glass is going to be stapled to people's heads. Obviously they are not going to be suitable in every situation, would I wear it while driving? No. Would I wear it if I was having a conversation with someone? No. However I wouldn't have my phone out while doing these things either. I can see Google glass filling a function. I'd love to be able to watch Youtube while I'm stuck in a waiting room or record business meetings for later review. I have no idea if it will do end up doing what I hope, however I'm not going to jump to a conclusion like this article without even touching one.
I can see their viewpoint, however I don't agree. If I were to rent a computer to do my work on, should the rental company seek a portion of any profit I make using that machine?
A bigger issue would be where would you stop the charges. They would be quite happy to charge the big names such as google and facebook for when people connect to them, but what about small websites? Where would the distinction lie?
You're not missing much. Author bought an out-dated phone, loaded it with terrible apps then proceeds to complain. The entire article is of no real interest.
