EverQuest Starting Points – Butcherblock and Kaladim
11 hours ago
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Monday, June 14, 2010
Lord of Ultima
I like the game Lord of Ultima. It’s a free game, but you can buy gems to help speed up game play. I'm rated in the top 600 on server 3 US, which isn't too bad. I’m a prince, and no I don't like purple or sing. I have 10 cities, 6 producers, and 4 military types. The military ones can be a bit harder to figure out; since you may want to make attack type troops or simply defenders that you can send to ally’s cities. My alliance has about 80 some players and we are doing pretty well over all.
The one thing about this game is it will take years, in my opinion, to crown the one true Lord of Ultima. One of the reasons is it takes forever to kill a player. Now I haven’t attacked anyone, but from guild chat it seems like you have to coordinate a huge attack to knock off a player. This is not a solo game per say. If you just like building cities and what not it’s okay for a month or so, but I think it will get boring fast. If your part of an alliance you can support your guild mates or decide to build a castle which will allow you to be attacked or attack other castled players. If you don't make a castle others can only plunder you, which means, they get some resources. Big whoop. Once you get your cities rolling your swimming in the resources. It’s a RTS that isn't fast paced like Starcraft or Warcraft.
I'm starting to get the itch to go back to WOW. But I have done everything a non-raider can do, minus achievements, which I think are a waste of time. I wish the new x-pac was out, but I think it will be a few more months. Oh well.
Saturday, June 12, 2010
Doctor Who Doctor Who Hey!
The one show I look forward to each week is Doctor Who from the BBC. It’s in its fifth season of the newly imagined Doctor Who; great stuff, and always a laugh.
The new doctor is played by Matt Smith. His side kick or companion is Amy Pond played by Karen Gillan. I must say she is the cutest of the bunch. She is clever, and quick witted. She’s not as cranky as Donna or as smart as Martha Jones, but she has a certain something that makes me like her. Perhaps it’s her accent and red hair.
You can find the Doctor on ITunes, Amazon, BBC America, or other ways. It’s well worth the look
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
Free to Play games
Turbine announced that Lord of the Rings Online would go free to play this fall, check it out here http://www.lotro.com/. I think it is a great idea. The best things online games can do are attract more players. Nothing kills a game faster than an empty world. Even if you don't want to play with other people it’s nice to see them running around. It makes the world feel alive. I like playing MMo's because they make me feel like I'm not alone. Single player games look great, but they are lonely. No one to chat with, or read silly comments, or party with; I think this will help them in the long run.
I'm playing Lords of Ultima right now. It is a free RTS MMO. The object of the game is to build up cities, eventually building a castle city and laying waste to your neighbors. You can take over other people’s cities. The last one standing is the Lord of Ultima. I have ten cities currently and it can be a bear managing them. Soon I will castle two of my cities and start rampaging through the continent I'm on. I belong to the alliance of The Swarm. I'm on server 3 Us. Come visit us at http://www.lordofultima.com/en.
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
Nielsen Ratings Website
From the Nielsen's website: http://en-us.nielsen.com/home
Sweeping changes in the media industry are disrupting the way you do business. Consumers are devouring more content than ever and are also demanding more control over what they view and when and where they view it.
You know the territory is wide open for you to grow viewership, get more value out of your content and optimize your ad sales yield, but there are few roadmaps, real successes and insights on which to anchor your assumptions and strategies. On what do you base your decisions?
What if you could measure your audience as consumers? Or establish and justify value for all of your platforms?
Nielsen knows your audience completely and holistically. We understand the behavior of the increasingly connected consumer. Our decades of experience in understanding consumers - their media consumption, their reactions to advertisers, and how media influences their brand preferences as well as what they buy - equips us to help you move forward in a changing landscape.
Look to the established leader
The Nielsen Media Practice builds upon our industry-standard TV audience measurement business as well as our leading Internet, mobile and out-of-home measurement research. It brings forward a truly breakthrough capability in revealing consumers’ engagement with advertising, as well as our leadership in understanding their buying behaviors. Only Nielsen can link cross-platform media data with an unparalleled breadth and depth of consumer data, to allow you to optimize ad schedules and illustrate impact against the marketing targets an advertiser cares most about reaching. Finally, our innovative research and methods are not only designed to help you understand what’s happened, but what’s emerging.
What we seek is a deeper understanding as well as the assurance that you’re better positioned to adapt and even help define the new media industry. We invite you to contact us to find out more.
Sweeping changes in the media industry are disrupting the way you do business. Consumers are devouring more content than ever and are also demanding more control over what they view and when and where they view it.
You know the territory is wide open for you to grow viewership, get more value out of your content and optimize your ad sales yield, but there are few roadmaps, real successes and insights on which to anchor your assumptions and strategies. On what do you base your decisions?
What if you could measure your audience as consumers? Or establish and justify value for all of your platforms?
Nielsen knows your audience completely and holistically. We understand the behavior of the increasingly connected consumer. Our decades of experience in understanding consumers - their media consumption, their reactions to advertisers, and how media influences their brand preferences as well as what they buy - equips us to help you move forward in a changing landscape.
Look to the established leader
The Nielsen Media Practice builds upon our industry-standard TV audience measurement business as well as our leading Internet, mobile and out-of-home measurement research. It brings forward a truly breakthrough capability in revealing consumers’ engagement with advertising, as well as our leadership in understanding their buying behaviors. Only Nielsen can link cross-platform media data with an unparalleled breadth and depth of consumer data, to allow you to optimize ad schedules and illustrate impact against the marketing targets an advertiser cares most about reaching. Finally, our innovative research and methods are not only designed to help you understand what’s happened, but what’s emerging.
What we seek is a deeper understanding as well as the assurance that you’re better positioned to adapt and even help define the new media industry. We invite you to contact us to find out more.
Audience Participation
The TV networks need to remember they make shows for regular people. These viewers become invested in the programming they watch. They make fan sites, they read and write blogs, they read forums, go to conventions, gossip to family and friends about their favorite shows, buy magazines, DVD’s, collectibles, and more. What they don’t do is sit raptly at the boob tube watching commercials. I don’t care what the Nielsen ratings say. If they don’t get the show from some other source or DVR it, they use commercial time for anything but watching the commercials. The Networks, show producers, and anyone that sells advertisement for the expressed purpose of funding TV programming will have to get the audiences more involved. They need to get a larger percentage of fans to take an active interest in the life of the TV program. If they can, they will sell far more advertisement than they currently do. Also, this will have the affect of allowing shows with lower ratings the ability to compete with the high scoring, low cost, reality TV shows.
Monday, June 7, 2010
TV by the Numbers
I found this FAQ at TV by the Numbers,http://tvbythenumbers.com/. It does a lot to explain why some shows are renewed and others cancelled.
This is just really a frequently asked questions (FAQ) list aimed at responding to many regularly occurring questions and sentiments. This will no doubt change over time. This iteration was written January 21, 2009.
We regularly hear the same sorts of things so it seemed easier to have something to point to rather than write the same responses over and over.
1. Everyone knows Nielsen is an antiquated system that doesn’t truly measure viewing. It doesn’t count Internet streaming and downloads, or even measure out of home viewing (sports bars, for example). They should use set-top box data. My “what’s hot” screen on DirecTV looks very different than the Nielsen ratings!!
Whatever Nielsen’s flaws may be (and we’re sure there are some flaws) both the advertisers and the television networks rely on it. Nielsen’s panel attempts to statistically represent the demographic makeup of the United States. Set-top box data and DirecTV do not measure the larger population, are limited samples, and also do not offer much insight into *who* was watching (wife, husband, son, daughter, etc). Advertisers, want, need and demand specific demographic data that Nielsen provides.
For now it seems like the set-top box data is just used as a method to validate the Nielsen data, which we mostly presume that it does, otherwise we figure we’d constantly hear pot-shots from those selling the set-top box data. But we never do. The Nielsen data is the data that drives television advertising sales, and we see nothing coming down the pike soon to change that.
There are many ways to measure online viewing, the networks can get good data on this themselves from their own web servers, and Nielsen, comScore, Hitwise and others offer measurement services for Internet usage.
The real problem here is that as of this writing, the networks haven’t figured out how to make much money on online viewing. iTunes downloads of specific episodes are much lower than many think. 30,000 downloads of an episode over a week, can, and more often than not does, catapult a show into the top downloads list.
When it comes to streaming, far, far more people do this than download shows on iTunes, but the networks haven’t really figured out how to make money with that yet either. It’s a challenged model when you consider that a one hour show on TV winds up with less than 1/4th the advertising in terms of commercial spots when it is viewed online. Basically, they’d need to charge 4x as much money per viewer to break even with television. Advertisers don’t want to pay 4x (surprise!) and adding more commercial spots to online streams risks alienating viewers.
Another problem is measuring who’s watching. The Nielsen system for television reports very thoroughly on that. Determining the demographic makeup of Internet usage isn’t always easy to do via web logs. Nielsen and comScore can provide such information, but then you’re right back to a panel based system that does not measure everybody.
We can all probably agree that business models are being turned on their heads and that new models must emerge, but right now, as far as what they will be, you should consult your Magic 8 Ball.
As long as the buyers and sellers of advertising rely on the data to make the buy/sell transaction, the Nielsen data will be important.
2. DVR Viewing. This show will have a lot more viewers when a week’s worth of DVR viewing is factored in!
That is true for dozens of shows. Many shows that have already been cancelled had more than a million viewers of the show via DVR. We find the DVR trends very interesting, and it’s another factor that is turning business models on their heads. But, we’re pretty sure of a few things with DVR viewing. If it’s good PR for the network, the networks will use it, but mostly it doesn’t seem to wind up meaning much.
There are three types of viewing Nielsen regularly measures and reports. Live viewing, live plus same day DVR viewing (these are the most commonly reported numbers) and live viewing plus seven days of DVR viewing. Almost all of our overnight and weekly data uses the live plus same day measurement. But we do also report some live plus seven data.
But the advertising is bought and sold based on Nielsen data we almost never see, commonly referred to as C3 or C+3 which stands for live viewing of commercials plus three days worth of commercial viewing on DVRs. That’s right, they actually measure how many are watching the commercials.
So far as we can tell DVR viewing doesn’t meaningfully add to a networks ability to make money, and more people watching shows via DVR isn’t good news for the networks.
As you might expect, most people using DVRs usually avoid commercials. As of this writing our experience has been that the C3 data doesn’t differ significantly from the live viewing, and that the relative performance of shows using the live plus same day DVR viewing is a good proxy for predicting success or failure. Particularly, the data for viewers aged 18 to 49, which brings us to-cringes…
3. Why all this focus on 18-34 and 18-49 year olds! It’s the people over 50 who have all the money. Why be ageist?
I know it is counterintuitive for some people, but the focus on the younger age demographics isn’t a function of spending power or ageism, it’s a function of relative availability. It’s much, much easier to reach a 60 year old than a 25 year old via television advertising because on average a higher percentage of 60 year olds watch a higher percentage of television than 25 year olds.
Relatively speaking, the 60 year old is easy to reach and the 25 year old far more scarce. It is the relative scarcity of younger viewers which drives the advertising focus and premiums paid for younger viewers.
Whether this is good, bad, right or wrong, I can’t really say. I can say, at least for now, that’s the way it is.
It’s really not about how old you are or how much money you have to spend. It’s about how easy it is to reach you. The easier it is to reach you, the less advertisers are willing to pay for you, the harder it is to reach you, the more they are willing to pay.
4. How do networks decide which shows to cancel and which shows to keep? Networks always sabotage the shows I like and wind up cancelling them. Why do they cancel good television in order to put on more reality crap!?!?
Bill Gorman developed a relatively simple and straightforward measure for determining the likelihood of a show being renewed or canceled, and while there are definitely some exceptions, thus far it has been highly accurate and a very good tool for predicting. How does it work? Generally speaking, it’s pretty straightforward:
•For each network we look at overall prime-time season-to-date averages among 18-49 year old viewers
•We then look at the season-to-date average among 18-49 year old viewers for the particular shows and compare them to the network’s average
•Shows that perform way above average are kept
•Shows that perform way below average are cancelled or not renewed
•Shows that are average are kept
•Shows that are a bit less than average but not way less than average are the interesting “on the bubble” shows. Some are kept, some are cancelled. It could go either way! It’s those shows that are a bit less than average that are the hardest to predict and seem to wind up drawing the most attention
There is no doubt that viewers often take how networks handle their favorite shows personally. But we do not believe that networks are out to sabotage particular shows. Networks love shows they can make a lot of money on, like shows they can make good money on, and don’t like shows they can’t make much money on.
Relative performance among 18-49 year old viewers makes for a pretty good proxy about a show’s ability to make money. This matters more than overall viewership. That may not seem right to you, or fair to you, but it definitely seems to be the way it has been in the past and continues to be as of early 2009.
This is just really a frequently asked questions (FAQ) list aimed at responding to many regularly occurring questions and sentiments. This will no doubt change over time. This iteration was written January 21, 2009.
We regularly hear the same sorts of things so it seemed easier to have something to point to rather than write the same responses over and over.
1. Everyone knows Nielsen is an antiquated system that doesn’t truly measure viewing. It doesn’t count Internet streaming and downloads, or even measure out of home viewing (sports bars, for example). They should use set-top box data. My “what’s hot” screen on DirecTV looks very different than the Nielsen ratings!!
Whatever Nielsen’s flaws may be (and we’re sure there are some flaws) both the advertisers and the television networks rely on it. Nielsen’s panel attempts to statistically represent the demographic makeup of the United States. Set-top box data and DirecTV do not measure the larger population, are limited samples, and also do not offer much insight into *who* was watching (wife, husband, son, daughter, etc). Advertisers, want, need and demand specific demographic data that Nielsen provides.
For now it seems like the set-top box data is just used as a method to validate the Nielsen data, which we mostly presume that it does, otherwise we figure we’d constantly hear pot-shots from those selling the set-top box data. But we never do. The Nielsen data is the data that drives television advertising sales, and we see nothing coming down the pike soon to change that.
There are many ways to measure online viewing, the networks can get good data on this themselves from their own web servers, and Nielsen, comScore, Hitwise and others offer measurement services for Internet usage.
The real problem here is that as of this writing, the networks haven’t figured out how to make much money on online viewing. iTunes downloads of specific episodes are much lower than many think. 30,000 downloads of an episode over a week, can, and more often than not does, catapult a show into the top downloads list.
When it comes to streaming, far, far more people do this than download shows on iTunes, but the networks haven’t really figured out how to make money with that yet either. It’s a challenged model when you consider that a one hour show on TV winds up with less than 1/4th the advertising in terms of commercial spots when it is viewed online. Basically, they’d need to charge 4x as much money per viewer to break even with television. Advertisers don’t want to pay 4x (surprise!) and adding more commercial spots to online streams risks alienating viewers.
Another problem is measuring who’s watching. The Nielsen system for television reports very thoroughly on that. Determining the demographic makeup of Internet usage isn’t always easy to do via web logs. Nielsen and comScore can provide such information, but then you’re right back to a panel based system that does not measure everybody.
We can all probably agree that business models are being turned on their heads and that new models must emerge, but right now, as far as what they will be, you should consult your Magic 8 Ball.
As long as the buyers and sellers of advertising rely on the data to make the buy/sell transaction, the Nielsen data will be important.
2. DVR Viewing. This show will have a lot more viewers when a week’s worth of DVR viewing is factored in!
That is true for dozens of shows. Many shows that have already been cancelled had more than a million viewers of the show via DVR. We find the DVR trends very interesting, and it’s another factor that is turning business models on their heads. But, we’re pretty sure of a few things with DVR viewing. If it’s good PR for the network, the networks will use it, but mostly it doesn’t seem to wind up meaning much.
There are three types of viewing Nielsen regularly measures and reports. Live viewing, live plus same day DVR viewing (these are the most commonly reported numbers) and live viewing plus seven days of DVR viewing. Almost all of our overnight and weekly data uses the live plus same day measurement. But we do also report some live plus seven data.
But the advertising is bought and sold based on Nielsen data we almost never see, commonly referred to as C3 or C+3 which stands for live viewing of commercials plus three days worth of commercial viewing on DVRs. That’s right, they actually measure how many are watching the commercials.
So far as we can tell DVR viewing doesn’t meaningfully add to a networks ability to make money, and more people watching shows via DVR isn’t good news for the networks.
As you might expect, most people using DVRs usually avoid commercials. As of this writing our experience has been that the C3 data doesn’t differ significantly from the live viewing, and that the relative performance of shows using the live plus same day DVR viewing is a good proxy for predicting success or failure. Particularly, the data for viewers aged 18 to 49, which brings us to-cringes…
3. Why all this focus on 18-34 and 18-49 year olds! It’s the people over 50 who have all the money. Why be ageist?
I know it is counterintuitive for some people, but the focus on the younger age demographics isn’t a function of spending power or ageism, it’s a function of relative availability. It’s much, much easier to reach a 60 year old than a 25 year old via television advertising because on average a higher percentage of 60 year olds watch a higher percentage of television than 25 year olds.
Relatively speaking, the 60 year old is easy to reach and the 25 year old far more scarce. It is the relative scarcity of younger viewers which drives the advertising focus and premiums paid for younger viewers.
Whether this is good, bad, right or wrong, I can’t really say. I can say, at least for now, that’s the way it is.
It’s really not about how old you are or how much money you have to spend. It’s about how easy it is to reach you. The easier it is to reach you, the less advertisers are willing to pay for you, the harder it is to reach you, the more they are willing to pay.
4. How do networks decide which shows to cancel and which shows to keep? Networks always sabotage the shows I like and wind up cancelling them. Why do they cancel good television in order to put on more reality crap!?!?
Bill Gorman developed a relatively simple and straightforward measure for determining the likelihood of a show being renewed or canceled, and while there are definitely some exceptions, thus far it has been highly accurate and a very good tool for predicting. How does it work? Generally speaking, it’s pretty straightforward:
•For each network we look at overall prime-time season-to-date averages among 18-49 year old viewers
•We then look at the season-to-date average among 18-49 year old viewers for the particular shows and compare them to the network’s average
•Shows that perform way above average are kept
•Shows that perform way below average are cancelled or not renewed
•Shows that are average are kept
•Shows that are a bit less than average but not way less than average are the interesting “on the bubble” shows. Some are kept, some are cancelled. It could go either way! It’s those shows that are a bit less than average that are the hardest to predict and seem to wind up drawing the most attention
There is no doubt that viewers often take how networks handle their favorite shows personally. But we do not believe that networks are out to sabotage particular shows. Networks love shows they can make a lot of money on, like shows they can make good money on, and don’t like shows they can’t make much money on.
Relative performance among 18-49 year old viewers makes for a pretty good proxy about a show’s ability to make money. This matters more than overall viewership. That may not seem right to you, or fair to you, but it definitely seems to be the way it has been in the past and continues to be as of early 2009.
New Idea for TV advertisers
The age of the Internet has changed the way people work, purchase products, socialize, and consume media. The Net will have an even greater impact on the way consumers watch TV. According to World Internet usage.com, 76% of the North American population uses the Internet, and this number is growing every year. The Internet could, if implemented properly, make traditional TV advertisement obsolete.
Selling commercials to fund programming has been the standard since TV programming came into existence. This model presumes a percentage of the viewers seeing these commercials will purchase the advertised products. The more eyes on the program, the more chances the advertiser has of selling products. Excellent programming is canceled if it doesn’t reach an arbitrary number of viewers. Consumers dislike commercials because they interrupt their favorite shows, they use the time during advertisements to use the restroom, make food, or anything but what the advertiser wants, which is: watching the commercials. With the prevalence of DVR’s, bit torrent sites, ITunes, and other sources, viewers are not watching commercials. This way of advertisement is old and inefficient. One may ask what the solution is. The answer: a new form of advertisement needs to be implemented.
The Networks should develop special websites dedicated to each of their shows. For the most part, these websites are in place currently. One click on a program name would take the viewer to a list of sponsors for that TV show. Clicking any of these sponsors would prompt the viewer to submit their e-mail address, which the advertiser would e-mail coupons to. These coupons would cost nothing to produce, as the user would incur the cost of printing. Each coupon would have a code for the particular show the viewer wanted to support. The advertisers would obtain a definite metric regarding the success of a specific show. Eyes on their shows would equate to a provable revenue stream; unlike the model in place now. Fans of various programs would be directly responsible for the continuation of their favorite shows. If they were not buying the products from the sponsors then the shows would be canceled. Networks and viewers would be in sink. The days of fan favorite canceled shows would be over. This system would take time to implement, but the Internet is here to stay and growing larger every year. Using this system, a show that has a million viewers could be as profitable as one that has ten million viewers in the old system.
This new form of advertisement would need to be promoted by the Networks. The show actors and actresses would make 20 second, or shorter, spots detailing what the viewer needed to do to support their favorite program. This commercial would be part of the show, and not something that could be removed unlike normal commercials. Traditional commercials of the 10 or 20 second variety would still be used to market to those viewers that did not have access to the Internet. Viewers would be responsible for the continuation of their favorite shows not the whim of TV executives.
Bit torrent sites would no longer be a thorn in the networks side. Those people that want to support their favorite shows would regardless of how they saw the show. More money would flow into the Network coffers making it possible for more quality programming. This solution could work if given a chance. Even if it is implemented slowly at first, to gauge the response of the audience, something needs to be done.
TV shows are paid for by advertisers buying commercial time from networks. The old model is not working as intended. A new way must be implemented before viewers completely abandon network TV. Consumers supporting their favorite shows by purchasing products using special coupons could be one way of fixing this problem. The networks have nothing to lose and much to gain. If you think this idea has merit please pass it around. E-mail comments, suggestions, or criticisms to: mark@fomarcreations.com.
Selling commercials to fund programming has been the standard since TV programming came into existence. This model presumes a percentage of the viewers seeing these commercials will purchase the advertised products. The more eyes on the program, the more chances the advertiser has of selling products. Excellent programming is canceled if it doesn’t reach an arbitrary number of viewers. Consumers dislike commercials because they interrupt their favorite shows, they use the time during advertisements to use the restroom, make food, or anything but what the advertiser wants, which is: watching the commercials. With the prevalence of DVR’s, bit torrent sites, ITunes, and other sources, viewers are not watching commercials. This way of advertisement is old and inefficient. One may ask what the solution is. The answer: a new form of advertisement needs to be implemented.
The Networks should develop special websites dedicated to each of their shows. For the most part, these websites are in place currently. One click on a program name would take the viewer to a list of sponsors for that TV show. Clicking any of these sponsors would prompt the viewer to submit their e-mail address, which the advertiser would e-mail coupons to. These coupons would cost nothing to produce, as the user would incur the cost of printing. Each coupon would have a code for the particular show the viewer wanted to support. The advertisers would obtain a definite metric regarding the success of a specific show. Eyes on their shows would equate to a provable revenue stream; unlike the model in place now. Fans of various programs would be directly responsible for the continuation of their favorite shows. If they were not buying the products from the sponsors then the shows would be canceled. Networks and viewers would be in sink. The days of fan favorite canceled shows would be over. This system would take time to implement, but the Internet is here to stay and growing larger every year. Using this system, a show that has a million viewers could be as profitable as one that has ten million viewers in the old system.
This new form of advertisement would need to be promoted by the Networks. The show actors and actresses would make 20 second, or shorter, spots detailing what the viewer needed to do to support their favorite program. This commercial would be part of the show, and not something that could be removed unlike normal commercials. Traditional commercials of the 10 or 20 second variety would still be used to market to those viewers that did not have access to the Internet. Viewers would be responsible for the continuation of their favorite shows not the whim of TV executives.
Bit torrent sites would no longer be a thorn in the networks side. Those people that want to support their favorite shows would regardless of how they saw the show. More money would flow into the Network coffers making it possible for more quality programming. This solution could work if given a chance. Even if it is implemented slowly at first, to gauge the response of the audience, something needs to be done.
TV shows are paid for by advertisers buying commercial time from networks. The old model is not working as intended. A new way must be implemented before viewers completely abandon network TV. Consumers supporting their favorite shows by purchasing products using special coupons could be one way of fixing this problem. The networks have nothing to lose and much to gain. If you think this idea has merit please pass it around. E-mail comments, suggestions, or criticisms to: mark@fomarcreations.com.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
