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Welcome to the No Prisoners, No Mercy Suburban Home Companion

 

Yes, I know there are those of you National Public Radio fans out there that may be used to homes out on the prairie, pithy sayings, and grandma’s wit.  Those of you who know us here at NPNM (not to ever be mistaken with NPR, or NDA, but occasionally with BS) know I occasionally quote my grandmother – that tough old bird that doffed her overalls to come to the land of Hondas and Overhead Camshafts.  Yes this is the land where the deer and the buffalo no longer play, having been replaced with bishops, disciples and kings (in this land of gangs, none of which are names of clergy or royalty, but all are still spoken of in hushed whispers).

Back in the era of the great depression, long before anyone ever even heard of National Public radio and Garrison Keillor wasn’t…period…my grandmother came to the land of the stinking onion (Chicago) looking for work.  The name Marshall Fields still graced State Street, and Mrs. Fields hadn’t even sent out her famous cookies yet.  There was a job opening for a cashier at the time, and the line of applicants stretched around the block, with my grandmother at the back.  As my grandmother waited, a store manager walked along the line, like a military commander reviewing the troops.  Suddenly he approached my grandmother, grabbed her out of the back of the line and said “You’re hired.”  When grandmother was done marveling at her good fortune, she managed to ask the manager “Why?”  His reply was, “I’m looking for someone who is honest and you look like a corn row jumper from way back.”

Oh if he only knew.

 

Not only was grandma a tougher bird than a stainless steel turkey, she was one tough customer.  And like grandma, I too can be a tough customer – especially when someone whose works I normally admire decides to dump some sour grapes on my doorstep.  Here is a quote from a recent article in the Chicago Tribune by Garrison Keillor:

“And if you want to write, you just write and publish yourself. No need to ask permission, just open a Web site. And If you want to write a book, you just write it, send it to Lulu.com or BookSurge at Amazon or PubIt or ExLibris and you’ve got yourself and e-book. No problem. And that is the future of publishing: 18 million authors in America, each with an average of 14 readers, eight of whom are blood relatives. Average annual earnings: $1.75” – Garrison Keillor, Chicago Tribune, Coming to the end of an era in publishing, Wednesday, May 26, 2010

 

Mr. Keillor launches into the rest of his diatribe with a phrase almost as trite as the famed line of Chicago politicians “I don’t think you understand all the issues here.”

He continues with “Back in the day…”

While Garrison is busy telling us all how he used to walk to school up hill, both ways, over broken glass and hot lava he forgot one thing.  He mentions in the quote above “no need to ask permission”.  He is of course, quite right – including his.  Whether he changes with the times or no (and we here at NPNM could care less which) he seems intent not to at least “step out of the way”.  So as I politely step around Mr. Keillor and go about the business of writing I will quote you the words that were asked of me when we first discussed this article:

“Who’s Garrison Keillor?”

Of course I explained about National Public Radio and the Prairie Home Companion, and was met with quizzical looks.  Then I simply answered, “He’s the guy on the last page of the Tribune.”  My answer?

“Oh him.”

See you online,

Julie Whitefeather

*sound of telephone ringing, which is eventually answered after 48 rings*

 

Julie: Hi I have a problem with my…

Voice on Telephone (interrupting):  This is the subscription office of the Daily Journal (pause)

Julie: That’s great. You people are just who I need to talk to. I have a problem with my…

Voice on Telephone: (interrupting):  Our offices are closed during at the moment. Please call back during normal business hours which are May 29 from 1:00 pm until 1:01 pm, June 30 from 2:00 pm until 2:03 pm and all day on Febrary 29^th.

Julie: Oh crap.

Voice on Telephone: If you’d like to speak to a computer instead of a live person, please press 0…

Julie: (impatiently presses zero several times)

Voice on Telephone:  …followed by the pound sign. Press zero twice to hang up….goodbye.

(Julie angrily redials the same telephone number. After 15 busy signals, 8 disconnects and 57 rings the telephone is answered again)

Voice on Telephone: This is the subscription office of the daily journal….

Julie: (interrupting) ya, ya – get to it already.

Voice on telephone: …followed by the pound sign.

(Julie carefully presses zero and then the pound sign)

Voice on Telephone: Welcome to Daily Journal subscriptions services. If you are having problems with your newspaper delivery, please press 1. If you would like to speak to someone about payment of your account or to cancel your account, please press 2. If you would like to speak to a live operator please press 3 now.

(Julie carefully presses 3)

Voice on Telephone: Hi and welcome to the Daily Journal subscription services department. Our office is closed right now. Please call back during normal business ours. Goodbye.

Julie: (slamming telephone receiver)  YOU  SON OF A ….I’M GONNA….

(silence followed by the telephone being dialed again.  283 rings later the  telephone is answered).

Voice on Telephone:  Our offices are closed during at the moment. Please call back during normal business hours which are….

Julie: Yada, yada, yada…come on get on with it.

Voice on Telephone:  …followed by the pound sign.

Julie: (carefully presses the zero followed by the pound sign)

Voice on Telephone: … If you are having problems with your newspaper delivery, please press 1. If you would like to speak to someone about payment of your account or to cancel your account, please press 2.

Julie: (carefully presses 1)

Voice on Telephone: If you are not receiving your newspaper please press 1 now. If you have any other complaint about you newspaper service please press 2 now.

Julie: (carefully presses 1)

Voice on telephone: I’m sorry our offices are closed at the moment. Please call back during normal business ours. Goodbye.

Julie: YOU MOTHER GRABBING SON OF A…I’M GONNA FIND YOU REACH DOWN YOUR THROAT, GRAB YOUR ASS AND TURN YOU INSIDE OUT.

(The noise of a telephone being slammed repeatedly is heard.)

Julie: Oh crap.

(An hour later, after a visit to the local wireless store, Julie returns with a new telephone. She dials the telephone. After waiting to hear it start ringing she goes to have a cup of coffee and returns half an hour later to find the telephone still ringing.)

Julie: Crap

(Julie redials the telephone. It is answered on the 40^th ring)

Voice on telephone: This is the subscription office of the Daily Journal…

Julie: (presses zero followed by the pound sign)

Voice on telephone: … If you are having problems with your newspaper delivery, please press 1.

Julie: (dials 1)

Voice on telephone: …If you have any other complaint about you newspaper service please press 2 now.

Julie: (dialing 2) Have I EVER got another complaint.

Voice on telephone:  If you are not receiving your newspaper and are hopping mad about it please press 1 now.  If you are receiving your newspaper but feel the quality of our movie reviews could easily be increased by a staff of a thousand monkeys randomly pounding on keyboards press 2 now.  If you are unhappy with your subscription and would like to change it to $42.99 for three papers a week on months with 5 Sundays or $35.88 for four papers a week on leap years on months with five Sundays, or $26.99 for five papers a week on alternate weeks in leap years with a republican administration please press 3 now.  If you would like to tell us to kiss your ass please press 4 now.  If you would like to tell us to go to hell and make us like it please press 5 now. If you would like to kick our ass so hard that we can fart through our ears please press 6 now. If you would like to beat us senseless with a large wet mackerel until we beg for mercy please press 7 now.

Julie: (dialing) 7777777777777777777777777777777

p.s. We never did get the newspaper

 

rat n. (rat)

1. Any of various long-tailed rodents resembling mice but larger, especially one of the genus Rattus.

2. Any of various animals similar to one of these long-tailed rodents.

Slang

3. A despicable person, especially one who betrays or informs upon associates.

4. A scab laborer.

 Eve Online

5. The name given to NPC pirates who roam the asteroid belts of the Eve Online world, placed there by game developers entirely to keep the game lively enough so asteroid miners will not slip into a coma.

One of the more irritating (or exciting I guess depending on your viewpoint) game mechanics in Eve Online is the Corporate War.  When one corporation (read “guild” for all you World of Warcraft players out there) declares “war” on another then players from both sides are open season – and no where in the game is safe from PvP (even the normally secure 1.0 space).   Upon my return to the Eve Online Universe, I soon found myself in a corporation which was part of a much larger alliance; and that alliance now finds itself in a corporate war.

In this particular case its a corporation of griefers who declare war on a random corporations they feel they can win against, and move on at the end of the week.   Oh yes, I am sure they all told themselves that a primarily industrial alliance (ok, ok, I admit it, we have a pvp arm) would be an easy target.  There is, however, one factor they did not count on…

Patience.

If there is one thing a group of miners have that is patience.  Patience is what we do.  As one member of the corporation put it, “all miners do is sit in astroid belts, shuffle ore from one place to the next and hope the rats show up soon.”  It appears that the organization of griefers are hoping to sit outside space stations in Eve  hoping to either a.) out wait us all, or b.) hope those players with jump clones are too stupid to use them.  The whole event reminds me of the moment in the recent movie League of Extraordinary Gentleman where Sean Connery, as Allan Quartermain, exclaims “And that makes you sweat?…This  is Africa, sweating is what we do!”

So, message to corp that war dec’d us: Try not to grow too old trying to out wait us.

And with that, I present you with a recent, and very funny exchange, between corporate members as one explains to us all how to “insta-undock” over chat, and suddenly encounters NPC pirates mid-conversation.  It is a little something we call “shit - rats”.

Julie > Is there any way I am not aware of to undock while cloaked?

Al> Can’t.  Best bet is make a fast undoc spot from your station.

Julie> whats that?

Dawn > explain that, that is good lesson

Al > just a sec

Dawn > in fact we should practice it

Julie > too long…no more secs

Al> Ok.  Leave your station, touch nothing…don’t steer.  Let ship get out about 200k and make a bookmark called fast undock.

Julie>

Al> To use, undock, and as soon as…shit, rats

Dawn > lol

Starky > ok, wait, I undock, then I shit rats?

Julie> then shit rats?

Dawn > roflmao

Dawn > nice one Al

Starky > and that keeps me from getting podded?

Julie > a brick I can see but rats?

Starky > so, the rats fly out through space and confuse the missle guidance?

Dawn > it does because the hunter thinks your a nut job

Starky> like chaff?

Yes for all you adoring fans out there who can’t wait to get your hands (or ears) on the next release of No Prisoners, No Mercy show 58 is live!

Join Sr. Fran (as Huckleberry Hound), and Sr. Julie (as Tom Waits) as they talk to Tipa from West Karana and Saylah from Mystic Worlds about net neutrality (that’s the internet not fishing in Switzerland),  Zynga, developers circling facebook, Eve Online, and a certain socialogist who thinks that WoW will one day be the afterlife…and you thought WE were crazy!!??? Join us for the fun!

You can find it on Itunes here or on our Podbean site here.  You can read about the article involving WoW and the afterlife here.

We hope you enjoy the show as much as we did producing it. Tune in next week for an hour with Shannon Posniewski, executive producer of Champions Online.

Fran and Julie

For those of you who may not have noticed yet, one of our favorite websites, Lorewriter.com, has gone permanently dark – the owner of the site having gone on to bigger and better things.  Even though I appreciated it while it was there, too often we don’t appreciate something until it’s gone. There are those in artistic circles that claim the best way to become famous is to die…die young (in this case the website not it’s owner) leave a beautiful corpse and your work will certainly appreciate in value.  While the absence of a favorite web site is hardly the same as an absent friend it has given me pause to  consider one of the subjects we discussed at the end of show 58 (out soon) with Tipa from West Karana.  Here is an exchange between Samantha Murphy and the author of World of Warcraft predicts the future, William Bainbridge:

In the book you say: “WoW may have the potential to become the first real afterlife.” How?

Every movement a player makes in WoW is recorded, even their interactions with others. The avatar captures their social self. To what extent the avatar is its controller is a philosophical question, but the avatar can outlive its creator and continue functioning in WoW as a non-player character (NPC). Research is under way that will make NPCs behave more like specific people.”

As I said on the show, author Bainbridge may be a wonderful person. After all I don’t know him, not even by reputation. Still, whether one considers the concept outlandish (I do) or not, it is far from being the first concept that is “out there” of which we have received notice in our email.  Indeed, a few of the emails we have received are still floating somewhere around the outer stratosphere.

What also brought this particular subject to the forefront was the fact that our own Sister Fran has returned to World of Warcraft (WoW) after taking a break from it, and indeed all gaming, for the last 49 days.  It was easy for me to take a break from Warcraft for that long of course.  No, it was no challenge at all.  In fact, when she asked me if I wanted to run a few instances with her I replied that I would rather go to the dentist for her instead of Azeroth; the former being a bit more enjoyable for my tastes.  All this worked together to consider what it would be like if Wow was indeed a “post-religious future” as author Bainbridge suggests.  This conjured up mental image of the First Church of Pardo of perpetual subscriptions. Such would be one of my concepts of hell – stuck in Dalaran for eternity.

Leave the money and get out

Groucho Marx once said that he would never a join a club that would have him as a member. The more I think about those words, the more they ring true.  As we discussed last week, there are many aspects of the gaming industry that leaves me feeling like a commodity instead of a customer.  People like Zahn Ye, of Game Vision, on the other hand, don’t make me feel like a commodity…his concepts of free-to-play game design make me feel like he should leave a 50 on the dresser and get out.  This is far from being limited to the industry that creates one of my favorite pass times.

Some of you may remember the commercial that actor John Houseman made years ago, for investment firm Smith Barney, where he touted “We make money the old fashioned way – we earn it.” Now granted, as anyone you know who may have lived through the Great Depression in the United States can tell you, the arts tend to do well in bad economic times; it is simply a matter of a need for escapism. Still, there seems to be an inverse relationship to economic downturns that my Economics professor back in grad school never considered; lately, the worse times get, the more creative ways business finds to wheedle money out of you. Take a look at a utility bill some time and go down the list of itemized “fees”. Other business’ connected with our hobby seem to be taking a page from this notebook as well.  The FCC has been stymied in their attempts to prevent Comcast from throttling the internet to the point where playing your favorite mmo may one day be like trying to push an elephant through the neck of a beer bottle.  In some circles Zyngas game Farmville has become known as “Scamville” . Mythic Entertainment at least, is now offering to make good additional fees their customers may have encountered as the result of the recent overbilling. While it was nice to see a change in attitude, offering sincere apologies after the blogging community pointed out that what happened was hardly an “inconvenience” is a bit like asking a member of the clergy to sell you an indulgence. It felt a lot like our mothers had to tell them to apologize. Between this and people like Zhan Ye, it leaves me with a bit of a bitter taste in my mouth – kind of like someone urinated in my morning coffee.

It left me feeling that John Houseman (or someone like him) should be making a new commercial that says “we make money the old fashioned way…we steal it.” 

See you online,

Julie Whitefeather

(posted for Julie Whitefeather by The Webmaster)

It’s the lure of easy money, with a very strong appeal

Perhaps you’d understand it better

Mining in my shoes

It’s the ultimate enticement,

It’s the asteroid miner’s blues.

You see it in the help channel, you hear it every day

Pilots say they’re gonna stop it but it doesn’t go away

They move it trough Jita, some mine it while away

No matter how boring it is, Asteroid mining’s here to say

(Vaguely based on Smuggler’s Blues by Glenn Frey)

It has been some time since I have played Eve Online in earnest. Like many I have spent a good deal of time paying a monthly fee that, as Paul Barnett pointed out when he was a guest on the show,  amounted to little more than a “parking fee” – like many I was paying to sit in a station and train my character.

On the face of it there may be some that feel the whole spiel with Hulkageddon and the 25 million isk reward that some reader or other put on my character’s virtual head (never collected by the way) had something to do with it.  Nothing, of course, could be further from the truth….

In fact I was in a null security corp for awhile as a larger corp war dec’ed us and laid siege to our system (only two ways out or in).  The last time I saw corporate warfare was when someone in the small corporation I was part of for some time decided to go back with a big, bad ship and blast away at some one who flipped his jet can while he was mining in Amarr space – only to find out that said “can flipper” was an alt of someone in a large pvp corp with a very bad attitude.  Still, none of that is what drove me out, nor was I lured out by other games.  In fact, as my primary activity was in mining I was for practical purposes bored out (as the title of the last article I wrote on the subject entitled “In space no one can hear you yawn” will tell our readers).

The last time I was actively involved in Eve Online the game we call Star trek Online (STO) was something only promised, Jump Gate Evolution was a promise that appeared a lot more likely to be kept, and no one had yet thought to combine the words Hulk and Armageddon.  Now that Star Trek Online is out, as Joe Blancato, marketing specialist for Cryptic pointed out when he was on the show, Star Trek Online and Eve Online aren’t aimed at the same target market.  Player versus Player (pvp) in STO is simply a matter of evenly matched players (or relatively so) shooting it out and re-spawning upon character death, until one side gets enough points.  The outcome of pvp in Eve Online (especially one on one), as any Eve Player knows, is usually decided before the match even starts and is a matter of who can bring a gun to the knife fight – whether it is a matter of a bigger ship, more ships, more training points or all three. 

There is little doubt that the last factor, who has the most points trained, will always assure that there will be a well populated niche for Eve Online’s target market.  The wild west, winner take all, and very real possibility of losing everything in a moment nature of the game will likely never change; it is truly a game where just about anything goes, short of actually hacking CCP’s software.  In fact many players will tell you that is exactly the reason for Eve Online’s popularity…the possibility of emergent game play that is unparalleled in most other games.

An interesting note is that while I occasionally see Star Trek Online replacing   the choice for “competing game to be denigrated” in Eve Online, I don’t think I have even seen it mentioned once while playing Star Trek Online.

So why come back to Eve Online at all?  Is it that I simply miss the hum of the mining lasers and the columns of light playing back and forth across my keyboard?  Perhaps, but only in the same sense of the word as “hey you missed the target, reload the shot gun and shoot at it again” meaning of the word “miss”. Still, in a game where veteran pvp players measure their points in the tens of millions, it is possible to be flying a top of the line mining ship, with top of the line mining skills in 6 million points or so. And if you can stand the mind numbing boredom it is still a great way to make a fast 800,000 isk per trip mining Veldspar.

On a previous show, Saylah  from Mystic Worlds pointed out that crafting in Eve Online isn’t really crafting at all.  She is, of course, correct in the sense that you don’t see your character actually crafting (as Eve players know you don’t see your character at all except for a portrait).  All you really do is schedule factory time.  Still with the mind numbing boredom of mining, and high end ships that are out of reach for the average single player who doesn’t buy and sell plex (read 30 days of game time for in game currency, which is legal in Eve Online) there is one thing that ccp has that does not have its equivalent in any other game…industry.   While it may be several lifetimes before I can buy a freighter without selling game time, it is well within abilities of even the average player to manufacture and sell spaceships, and their parts. And what other market in any other game bears study by someone with a graduate degree in economics?

So why come back to the game Eve Online and play it actively?

Perhaps I am simply a closet masochist.

See you online,

Julie Whitefeather

Yes Fans, the early release of show 57 is live as I type this, and the itunes release will follow shortly on it’s heals (it is set on 360 minutes to live).

This week Julie is the first to crawl out of the sick bed and into the production chair, finishing up show 57.  Thanks to Fran for fighting her illness long enough to take the show live. 

And on to business…

This week we have the great pleasure of welcoming Mr. Joe Blancato to the show.   Joe is a marketing specialist for cryptic and offers listeners with an inside insight into Star Trek Online.   Mr. Blancato has promised to come back with even more of the Cryptic team to talk about Champions online.  We hope you have as good a time listening to the show as we did producing it.

See you online,

Julie and Fran

Where in the world is the No Prisoners, No Mercy Team?

Opening Scene:

It is early twilight.   In the corner of a room is a bed, lit only by the light of a nearby computer monitor.  On the bed, a mound of quilts stirs. The shape underneath, roughly human in shape, spasms briefly, accompanied by what sounds eerily like a seal barking.  Silence.  Then the shape stirs again, moans and slowly drags itself over to the source of the light…and begins typing this post.

Some few of you may have noticed the peculiar absence of articles for the last five days.  A few of you, not knowing we did an early release of our show before it was posted to Virgin Worlds, had assumed we podfaded and said so.  Those of you who did know about the early release of our show (see the link at right to Podbean) can thank listeners such as Token who threatened to launch a revolt if we did not release shows early. Another enjoinder to action was Saylah from Mystic Worlds who said she was a “sad panda” when a week passes without a release of a show.

The reason for the lack of articles  is, in a word (ok four words),  that the No Prisoners, No Mercy team has been sicker than a dog for the last five days – a turn of phrase I am sure our dogs would take exception to, especially our guard dog who is particularly healthy. All the same, when a member of the team comes down with a respiratory infection, and once queried on the subject of contagion, responds that she is “more contagious than a bad attitude” it is best to take her seriously.  Instead, however, Sister Frances threw caution (and her health) to the wind, and the rest, as the old adage goes, “is history”.

The Rest of the Story…

With a small salute to Paul Harvey who’s works always ended with the above phrase, some of you have written to us and noticed a second No Prisoners, No Mercy feed on Itunes.  So time to answer a few questions on the matter:

1.) Yes, we know there are two Itunes feeds – working as intended.

2.) No, the new Itunes feed isn’t a pretender, that’s us as well.

3.) Yes we are still part of the Virgin Worlds Collective, and proudly so…read on.

Many of you may have noticed the increased presence of professionals from the game development industry on our show of late – this is to facilitate the one of the main purposes of the show, other than entertainment (one “No Prize” to anyone who can guess what that is). That is, to say the least, not an easy task, and certainly due in no small part to our “guy who knows a guy” (You know who you are and a big “thank you” as well as a heaping helping of good karma goes out to you for all that you do).  As wonderful as this is, it creates a condition where some of the information is very time sensitive.   This condition is exacerbated by the fact that our shows often have an lead in time. Alot of time goes in to editing believe you me.  Now this lead in time could, of course, be cut down to a tiny sliver if we were willing to compromise the audio quality of the shows.  We did, in fact, consider that. However, upon consulting with our “guy who knows a guy” it was recommended that we keep up the audio quality of the show…and when our “guy who knows a guy” speaks, we listen (he didn’t get to be where he is because he is in any way uninformed). The upshot of all this is that we felt we needed an itunes account for our podcast of which we had full control. This will enable us to get shows out to you quicker.  The show thread with the graphic at right is ours, the other belongs to Virgin Worlds -  basically we think of it like syndication.  Make no mistake, we love being part of the Virgin Worlds collective, we just wanted to have full control over all of our content so gaming industry professionals know they can count on us to get the information they share with us out in a timely manner. The link to Itunes we control is here  - updates coming when the entire team is able to crawl out of their respective sick beds.

Yes but…

Yes, I know I have left one question a few of you (a very few) have asked about and that is the musical segues.  Those of you who are astute listeners will have noted that the segues are never just taken directly from a song. They are taken from beginning, middle, and end. The order is then changed and sometimes (especially with show intros) a “mash-up” is done.  Our shows do tend to have segues that run in themes, and the latest, of course, is singers in the genre of people like Joe Cocker, Tom Waits with a bit of Janis Joplin.  Yes we know that some of you may not like the works of “scat master” Waits (our title not his).  On the other hand, there are those of you who didn’t like our hip-hop phase. So if you don’t like the segues, think of them like the weather…wait long enough and it will change.

See you online,

Julie Whitefeather

Fran and Julie Welcome Saylah and Tipa for a hen party! Topics discussed include: free to play games, draconic…er digital rights management, gods and heroes, and more! Best show yet!  You can find the show link at right or by clicking here.

Julie and Fran

“No man’s Kwedit is ever as good as his money.” – Edgar Watson Howe

“It is amazing what can be accomplished when nobody cares about who gets the Kwedit.” -Robert Yates (this may close to actual kwedit results)

“Be vewy, vewy quiet – I’m hunting on Kwedit” – Elmer Fudd

It is one of life’s eternal problems, and one that every game publisher will have to face at some point in their corporate existence…

How do you take the “free” out of free to play.

As we all know (and will be discussed on show 56 out later today) free to play games work because they are:

A.) Designed to make the game unplayable without enduring enough anguish, angst and general anger that it would kill a bull moose.

B.) Designed to be so grindy that given the option, Sisyphus would rather continue pushing his boulder up a hill for eternity rather than play the game.

And most importantly…

C.) Fifteen million players all play a game that is actually supported through the spending of a 13 year old in his mother’s basement who doesn’t know her child has her credit card yet.

The solution to all these woes is found in the developer’s cash shop. For those one or two of you out there who are scratching there head when the terms “cash shop” and “free to play” are mentioned…well Google it, you probably aren’t gamers, developers or game publishers anyway.

The interesting thing about the problems with free to play game design noted under “A” and “B” is that they instantly go away if you solve “C”. Now there is a company with a product it is calling “Kwedit” that believes it has indeed found the solution for all that is ill with the free to play game business model.

The system has been written about at length by Paul Hyman over at Gamasutra in an article entitled “Free To Play Games, Meet The Virtual IOU” (You can read the article here ). Here is an excerpt from the article that explains how the system works:

Here’s how Kwedit works: On websites that accept Kwedit Promises, gamers get to buy virtual items now by promising to pay up in a week or two. At that time, they can hand over cash at a store, like 7-Eleven, that takes Kwedit payments or they can “snail mail” cash in a pre-paid Kwedit envelope that can be printed right off the web.

The amount they can “promise” in the future grows — as previous promises are paid up. This increases their Kwedit score, a virtual version of a FICO credit score. The initial Kwedit limit is determined by the game publisher and might typically be just a few dollars.

Unlike using a “real world” credit card, there are no serious repercussions if a gamer reneges on their promise other than the fact that their Kwedit score falls — which may adversely impact their ability to use the system in the future.

“It’s a completely virtual simulation of credit,” says Shader, “in a completely safe environment.”

 

At first glance it seems like a “win-win” system right? The system caters to the impulse buyer that will grab the item and pay for it later…and there aren’t any thugs waiting in dark alleys to break your knee caps if you fail to pay. The upside for the consumer is, of course, also the downside for the publisher, as the system has no way to force the player to “pay up” if they choose not to do so – other than, of course, eventually not allowing them to buy on “Kwedit” again. One look at the picture that comes with product (see blow) reminded me of the old “Joe Cool” adds for camel cigarettes of a few decades ago, purposefully aimed at younger generations.

At least as far as western cultures are concerned, from the individual all the way up through the federal government, what has caused so many problems for so long is the whole “buying it on the never-never” attitude. Kwedit’s CEO claims the product gives parents an “incredible teaching moment”. While it may indeed provide a safe environment for buying the pile of pixels without using a credit card, there seems to be more of indoctrination than convenience inherent in the system. Kwedit will very probably teach the younger members of the target that “credit”, as Charles Dickens put it, “is a system whereby a person who can’t pay gets another person who can’t pay to guarantee that he can pay.” Or as a college friend, who attended Brigham Young university put it of his alma matter: “Brigham Young but Bring ‘em any way you can”.

See you online,

Julie Whitefeather