Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Bizmology

Bizmology

Is Nintendo’s 3DS the next big handheld device?

Posted: 18 Jan 2011 02:30 PM PST

As an avid Nintendo fan, I have owned every gaming system they have released, and was very excited to hear about the new 3DS handheld gaming system revealed at the 2010 Electronic Entertainment Expo. The 3DS will have 3D viewing without the need of any special glasses, added controls including an analog button, Wi-Fi capabilities (with the ability to download games), three cameras (one inner and two outer, with 3D capture capabilities), a motion and gyro sensor, and will be about the same size and weight as the DSi. The 3DS will even be able to play the original DS games. The company is also releasing many fan favorite games to go along with the new system including Mario Kart, The Legend of Zelda, Paper Mario, Metal Gear Solid, and Resident Evil.

The 3DS will be released this March. While the price has not been confirmed in US dollars, it is suspected that the 3DS will cost around $300. With many consoles running in the same price range, including Nintendo's own Wii, Sony's PS3, and Microsoft's XBOX 360, competition will be even more fierce than it already is.

The current handheld market is over-saturated with Nintendo devices. It currently has three separate DS versions for sale which all have some improvements on the original DS system. I personally have not upgraded my original DS. The new DS systems have some good perks, but buying another one seems redundant. The 3DS may just change my mind though, along with a lot of other gamers. As soon as I am able to see Mario pop up on my screen in 3D, I'll be hooked. There's also the improvements to game play. According to Shigeru Miyamoto, Nintendo's video game designer,"The additional dimension of depth in 3D makes it easier for players to judge distances while giving developers a new tool to create games and experiences that play with both height and depth."

By developing a completely new viewing capability for games, Nintendo may be able to transform the gaming market. 3D technology seems to be everywhere these days. 3D movies, which used to be few and far between, are now popping up all over the place. You can even take 3D home with you, with the new addition of 3D TVs. And soon 3D games will be a reality.

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Photo by Matt Jerome, used under a Creative Commons license.

Stuart & Sons’ really grand piano. Too many notes?

Posted: 18 Jan 2011 01:14 PM PST

 

In Amadeus, the Oscar-winning movie about the musical genius Mozart, the Emperor Joseph II criticized one of the wunderkind's compositions with the phrase "there are simply too many notes."

Now, thanks to the innovative work of Australian musical instrument maker Stuart & Sons, the Emperor may have a better case for his complaint. The company’s piano designer Wayne Stuart has created The Ultimate Piano with 102 keys, some 14 more than the standard grand piano. Imagine, if you will, hitting those lowest bass notes on a regular piano, going down for about another octave, and then doing the same at the high-end of the piano’s range. It truly challenges the mind, and the ear's sense of what is musically appropriate.

In the Stuart & Sons piano, in addition to the extended keyboard, the makers offer a combination of the use of rare wood, crafted metals, and state-of-the-art technology. The piano has an extra pedal, a dolce pedal that moves the hammers closer to the strings to reduce the intensity of the hammer strike, for a quieter sound. The unique quality of Stuart & Sons pianos' sound is vouched for and scientifically explained by Robert Anderssen, a senior mathematician with Australian national science agency, the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation.

Each Ultimate Piano takes about a year to build. The price tag for this truly amazing instrument — $300,000.

It may be really grand, but that's too many notes, no?

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Picture by Hoder Slanger, used under a CC-Share Alike license.

J. Crew: Still Shopping

Posted: 18 Jan 2011 10:31 AM PST

While the preppy clothing retailer’s months-long “go-shop” period expired on Saturday with no competing offers to challenge the $3-billion deal struck in November between the company and a pair of buyout firms, chairman and CEO Millard “Mickey” Drexler can’t exhale just yet.

The go-shop period has just been extended a month to satisfy numerous merger-related lawsuits brought by shareholders unhappy with what they perceive as cozy deal making between J. Crew Group and TPG Capital and Leonard Green & Partners(collectively known as Chinos Holdings — cute! — for acquisition purposes). The lawsuits have protested the proposed sale price and allege that Drexler may have breached his fiduciary duty to investors. TPG is a former owner of J. Crew and hired Drexler — an ex-Gap CEO widely credited with restoring its preppy luster — in 2003 to run the business. Drexler has faced criticism for negotiating with TPG and Leonard Green for seven weeks before informing the board of the talks. Indeed, at dinner following a regularly scheduled board meeting on September 1, James Coulter (a founding partner of TPG who has served as a director of J. Crew since 1997) raised with Drexler TPG’s potential interest in exploring an acquisition of J. Crew Group. (For a chronology of events read here.)

As part of the settlement, the period to solicit competing offers has been extended until February 15. While Sears Holdings and Urban Outfitters have already browsed J. Crew’s books, neither made a bid by the original deadline to top the one proffered by the buyout firms in November.

Given that go-shop periods often fail to turn up competing offers, will another month make any difference? Certainly, if it results in a richer offer. If not, shareholders may be more likely to vote in favor of the buyout in March if they feel the sale process was open to all comers.

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Photo by Joshin Yamada, used under a Creative Commons license.

More bad news for MySpace

Posted: 18 Jan 2011 07:45 AM PST

To not compete directly with Facebook. That’s just about all MySpace can hope for at this point.

Last week the once-pioneering/now-struggling social media site announced it would send 500 employees walking, nearly half its workforce, as part of a major restructuring effort. The move followed reports late last year that parent News Corp. was mulling a sale, merger or spin-off of the company. Whatever its fate, MySpace faces a long road ahead, and Facebook casts a long shadow.

“My expectation…is that MySpace will be spun off into what the News Corp — or a potential new owner — hopes is an adjacent and as-yet unrealized market, something that does not compete directly with Facebook,” analyst Brad Shimmin of Current Analysis told Computerworld last week.

Calling MySpace damaged goods would be an understatement, and analyst Rob Enderle suspects a fourth option may be in the cards for News Corp.: shutting down the site altogether. That would be an enormous waste, Enderle posits, though he’s hard-pressed to think of a good reason why someone like Google would be interested in investing.

Since 2009, MySpace has seen its social networking market share erode to the likes of Facebook and, to a lesser degree, Twitter. In November 2010 the company rebranded itself and announced a “mashup” with Facebook that enables users to share information across both sites.

It was a concession of major proportions for the once mighty MySpace, bowing at the throne of Zuckerberg, but it may fall short of what this company needs to stay in the highly volatile social media game.
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