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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Roland Delacroix" data-source="post: 493458" data-attributes="member: 1753">John:  Whats your point?  That there is a difference between short-term and long-term market conditions?  I'm sorry, i thought the ST effects of the OGL and D20 were obvious.  Yes, the market is in a state of flux as it adapts to this new paradigm.  No, this isn't anything new, especially right now.  Multiple markets are dealing with a massive shift in how they work.  Books in particular, further de-stabilizing the RPG industry.  They are still working out the kinks.No company will create barriers, i've never heard such a ludicrious proposition.  The barriers EXIST, cost and profit, and others, they just haven't hit this changing market yet.  (maybe i didn't entirely understand what you were trying to say though...)  We are already seeing the results of cutting costs by putting out a bad product.  WotC, the number one seller of d20 material, took a major hit after the debacle of Sword and Fist.  Web sights such as this one will merely add to the tearing away of the d20 chaff.  Publishers can't expect to survive on selling crappy product to early-adopters.  If a company expects to survive it establishes a >long term< plan.  Short term plans, such as the 'crap pumping' you describe, are usefull for fixing ST problems (such as the need for money, recession, etc).  In this particular method of generating ST revenue these companies are shooting themselves in the foot.  I'm sure i'm not the only one to turn away from a company after seeing one bad product.  Companies that have produced a very good product have guaranteed i will buy from them again.  It's only a matter of time until an 'Amazon.com' rises from the other badly managed starter-uppers (to cite a company in a very similar situation a few years ago)Chaotic patterns and timeframes are all luck.  Luck is well-documented as part of the weeding out of new business  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f600.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":D" title="Big grin    :D"  data-smilie="8"data-shortname=":D" />You scenario assumes something common to all markets up until, say, 3 years ago; Imperfect Information.  As you illustrate the concept of consumers having imperfect information was critical to marketing strategy.  The reality is that I.I. is shrinking as the internet solidifies as a shopping aid.  I won't be tempted to buy product 'B' after reading 5 bad reviews here (or elsewhere).  I'll buy product 'A' after reading 15 good reviews.  To claim that imperfect information is anywhere near where it was 5 years ago is utter foolishness.  The sucess of sites such as carsdirect.com, Amazon.com, Cnet.com, and subsequently the products they review well, has also caused a massive shift in how corps will produce goods in the future.  The side effect is that it renders your example invalid.  An interesting side note is that imperfect information still is a powefull market force for product that is bought primarily by adults and the elderly.  People 'less connected'.  RPG's sell primarily to teens, college kids, young adults before they settle in with kids.  The kind of market that knows how to use internet resources when spending the little money they have.Filesharing is almost the complete opposite of the imperfect information corps depend on.  It's hard to sell when a week BEFORE release the mass public knows that your product sucks.  Hows this effects the economic system is good and bad.  Consumers with near-perfect information are virtually guaranteed a supreme deal, a quality product at a good price.  Thats good.  The flip side is that corps that put out a bad product are virtually guaranteed a massive loss.  The instability this puts in the market is mucho bad.  I suspect the correcting factor will be corps focusing alot more on exactly what consumers want BEFORE production instead of fishing, toss stuff out and clone what they bite on.I'm way ramblin too, and its early, but this is really a fascinating time to be living as an economist.  Of course i'm excited  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f61b.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":p" title="Stick out tongue    :p"  data-smilie="7"data-shortname=":p" /></blockquote>

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