I seem to be missing the point on the online CB

[falcarrion]

The secret of web-apps - you don't need to build your display technology with much long-term viability in mind. Your database, storage, and server architectures? Yes. But the end display tech? Not so much. You can swap it out at any time. That's a large part of the point of delivering software services through a browser!



In the first half of 2010, smartphones were only 20% of the cell phones shipped, and Apple's OS was only about 14% of the smartphone market in Q2. That makes iPhones about 3% of the total phone market? I'd not call that ubiquitous.

Even if you imagine that they're two or three times more popular among gamers than on average, that's like 10% of the market. You don't usually go too far out of your way for 10%.

According to the latest figures from Nielsen, 28 percent of U.S. mobile phone owners own smartphones, as of the Q3 2010.
The strong growth was attributed mainly to an explosion in iPhone and Android device sales.

While all data firms release different numbers for the same data, the consensus is clear. RIM still leads the market, with Apple a close second. Android, seeing incredible growth, continues to take share.

For the quarter, RIM controlled 30 percent of the U.S. market for smartphones, followed by the iPhone at 28 percent. Android has moved to 19 percent share.

Getting into interesting demographics, RIM had the most users over the age of 45, while Apple had the most under 45. Over 50 percent of Android users were under 35 years of age.

Over the past six months, 41 percent of all new phone buyers are choosing to purchase smartphones, a six percent increase from the six month period before it.

 

[falcarrion]

The iPad - the overwhelming champion of the tablet market in the third quarter - enjoyed the market dominance its chief executive officer predicted last month.

Apple ( AAPL ) commanded 95 percent of tablet sales in July, August and September, according to a Strategy Analytics report and Forbes.com . Of the 4.4 tablets sold in the third quarter, 4.19 million were iPads. During the second quarter, 3.5 million tablets sold.

Both Hewlett-Packard ( HPQ ) and Research in Motion ( RIMM ) are devising and manufacturing competitors to Apple's iPad, but those machines have yet to see the market.

The chief executives of Research in Motion and Apple verbally sparred late last month over the iPad's dominance and Research in Motion's PlayBook. Steve Jobs of Apple said during a conference call that the status of his company's machine as customers' heavy favorite was unshakable. In response, Jim Balsillie of Research in Motion admonished Jobs for imposing on customers' thought processes.

Sales of Dell ( DELL ) and Motorola ( MOT ) tablets, which run on the Android manufactured by Google ( GOOG ), accounted for 2.3 percent of sales during the third quarter, which plunged from 2.9 percent in the second quarter.

The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of The NASDAQ OMX Group, Inc.



Read more: Apple's iPad commands Q3 tablet sales - NASDAQ.com

 

[Solvarn]

Value point

I don't really feel that the offerings for DDI currently justify the cost. That will probably change in the future.

They should offer a free month to new subscribers and credit existing subscribers one month. This would allow people to get hooked on it.

I cancelled my subscription because I use one of my friend's downloads. The digital offerings (Dungeon, Dragon, etc.) have been crap of late. Don't see a reason to re-up to be honest. Can't blame them for making the change though, always thought it was a stupid business plan.

 

[Pseudonym]

Not Silverlight, per se: Moonlight - Mono

As an Ubuntu user, this makes me wonder how close the development cycle would need to match Silverlight's revisions. I tried to use Mono to emulate .NET to get the CB working, but Mono lagged behind .NET so that it couldn't emulate version 3.5 and the CB wouldn't run. I had to create a VM with XP just to run it.

Assuming Moonlight matches Silverlight enough that I can run it no issues, that would be great, but I don't want something that is a version or two behind what I need to run this new thing. If it'll run in Chrome no hassles, that would be fine.

I didn't read the entire Q&A, but my first question is what happens if the server goes down. No characters? Worse, what if something happens and they have to restore from a backup? We all have to rebuild. I'm thinking of ever issue I ever had with characters in a MMORPG manifesting in this new CB. I guess we'll all have to wait and see,

Last night I came expecting to play my envoker mage, but we were missing some folks so I made an Essentials knight in all of five minutes with a pencil and the book. Granted a much simpler set of options, but I realized how spoiled I've gotten,

 

[Ryujin]

As an Ubuntu user, this makes me wonder how close the development cycle would need to match Silverlight's revisions. I tried to use Mono to emulate .NET to get the CB working, but Mono lagged behind .NET so that it couldn't emulate version 3.5 and the CB wouldn't run. I had to create a VM with XP just to run it.

Assuming Moonlight matches Silverlight enough that I can run it no issues, that would be great, but I don't want something that is a version or two behind what I need to run this new thing. If it'll run in Chrome no hassles, that would be fine.

I didn't read the entire Q&A, but my first question is what happens if the server goes down. No characters? Worse, what if something happens and they have to restore from a backup? We all have to rebuild. I'm thinking of ever issue I ever had with characters in a MMORPG manifesting in this new CB. I guess we'll all have to wait and see,

Last night I came expecting to play my envoker mage, but we were missing some folks so I made an Essentials knight in all of five minutes with a pencil and the book. Granted a much simpler set of options, but I realized how spoiled I've gotten,

Lost data is unlikely, given even basic redundancies. I think that more realistic fears, based on past performance, would involve server inaccessibility and server overloading.

 

[surfarcher]

Don't hold your breath expecting WotC to ensure it's Moonlight compatable.

Yeah you heard me. Expect them to give you a violent surprise sodomization too

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Yeah you heard me. Expect them to give you a violent surprise sodomization too

I understand they're paying Brett Favre a buttload of money to do that for 'em, too.

 

[Ryujin]

The iPad - the overwhelming champion of the tablet market in the third quarter - enjoyed the market dominance its chief executive officer predicted last month.

Apple ( AAPL ) commanded 95 percent of tablet sales in July, August and September, according to a Strategy Analytics report and Forbes.com . Of the 4.4 tablets sold in the third quarter, 4.19 million were iPads. During the second quarter, 3.5 million tablets sold.

Both Hewlett-Packard ( HPQ ) and Research in Motion ( RIMM ) are devising and manufacturing competitors to Apple's iPad, but those machines have yet to see the market.

The chief executives of Research in Motion and Apple verbally sparred late last month over the iPad's dominance and Research in Motion's PlayBook. Steve Jobs of Apple said during a conference call that the status of his company's machine as customers' heavy favorite was unshakable. In response, Jim Balsillie of Research in Motion admonished Jobs for imposing on customers' thought processes.

Sales of Dell ( DELL ) and Motorola ( MOT ) tablets, which run on the Android manufactured by Google ( GOOG ), accounted for 2.3 percent of sales during the third quarter, which plunged from 2.9 percent in the second quarter.

The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of The NASDAQ OMX Group, Inc.



Read more: Apple's iPad commands Q3 tablet sales - NASDAQ.com

Dell's tablet PC isn't really what I would call a tablet, having had to support them in limited numbers. It's more of a laptop with tablet function, that is flaky and fairly unreliable for daily use. I can understand why their market share is so low, as my experiences with this product have been rather bad. OTOH I'm a big proponent of Dell's true laptop products.

The new devices, that various companies will soon be releasing, are actual tablets.

 

[Votan]

I don't know any other game with as much errata as D&D 4e.

Star Fleet Battles.

Pre-internet the errata had to be hunted down in monthly magazines resulting in a fair degree of difficulty in making sure everyone had all of the errata.

 

[Votan]

Which was rather odd given the "coincidence" that the ideal number of characters in the game was 5, which matched the number of monthly updates available.

I more suspect five was picked so that Customer Service would not have to deal with people who had some trouble with an operating system (and wanted it on their laptop as well). A couple of bad installs could hit a lower cap rather easily; more than five stretches credibility for OS installation issues.