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I launched an IPO and all I got was a Lousy T-Shirt!

Tuesday, March 25, 2014

Welly, Well,  Well, Well

http://massively.joystiq.com/2014/03/25/facebook-pays-two-billion-bucks-to-acquire-oculus-rift-company/

Facebook just purchased the current darling, Oculus Rift.  They thank the fools who invested through Kickstarter and saved them money in research and development.  Now they can pick up patents and an almost shelf ready project for peanuts.  Obviously they expect the technology will be worth more than just 2 billion in the future.

This sale goes beyond VR for the masses.  It will spell the end for Kickstarter.  Simply because the "investors" AKA Suckers will now realize that IPO investing requires more than just cheap t-shirts and early access to whatever they funded.  Especially when a company like Oculus used that goodwill money not to allow small investors company ownership via stock options, but to roll it over into a company sale.  This is an ethics free move on Oculus' part and their small investors could rightfully sue for fraud.

Kickstarter is just another get something for nothing that Silicon Valley LOVES.  They want programming for free via open source.  They want workers for free via work clubs (more like online sweatshops).  They want graphics and art for free via social networks like Flickr, Pinterest and Tumblr.  They want content for free via Creative Commons.

Is anyone seeing a pattern here?

The only reason why these companies and owners get mega millions/billions is because they are depending on free work, free content and free money from the customers.  They have no development overhead because all of us are paying for it.  The rest is just gravy.

We, the investors, need to step back and demand more for our money.  We have to make demands and get off the animal farm.  Because that is all we are now to the tech industry, slaughterhouse animals.


It has been awhile...

Monday, March 17, 2014



I just haven't been playing games lately.  After about 2 months break for all games, I just went back to visit TERA Online.  It took some time getting used to my Popori Archer again.

I'm not a great player and the quest text boxes are like tiny walls of text.  So I mistakenly started soloing BAMs (vicious orisks and brutal orisks) and could not figure out why they were taking so long to kill.  I died a few times, finally settling on a system of just running around, dropping traps, during monster pauses shooting off a poisonous DOT and getting some more elaborate shots.  The great thing about the BAMs now is that they seemed to have nerfed the gathering requirements for them, so instead of 10 or more monster kills, you just need 3 to 5.  Because of this, they have also taken off the party needed warnings off the quests.  Which is why I started taking them on, otherwise I would have just ignored them.

Anyway, this was a video linked on the TERA forums.  I think it is a guild recruitment video.  But it is so sweet and inventive. Poporis are the best.

NOT Elins though, Elins just creep me out.