Apple has the right idea. Develop the products with backward capability.
What customers have previously spent their money on will not be lost if you
upgrade the equipment. Also, for the most part, the new will work on the
old. Increase the market by not stopping support for established customers.
Don't leave anyone in the dust of new technology, but, rather, include them.
--
If guns kill people, writing implements cause grammatical and spelling
errors!
----- Original Message -----
From: "Draconis" <i...@dracoent.com>
To: "Gamers Discussion list" <gamers@audyssey.org>
Sent: Tuesday, April 30, 2013 1:44 PM
Subject: Re: [Audyssey] challenge for developers, post xp windows
Hi Tom and all,
Just adding to what Tom is saying here. This is a little long, so I hope
you will all stick with me.
This is also why I am a proponent of Apple's model. Apple iterates
existing products along a trajectory that eliminates the perceived
obsolescence technique. They only update the physical or user interface
designs of their products infrequently, and there software upgrades are
designed to improve the experience, rather than change it. The iPhone is a
prime example. While Apple has added new features and capabilities to it,
the system looks and works very much the same as it did when they first
introduced it in 2007. This year, they are planning a UI overhaul, but
even that has more to do with aesthetics, and the actual layout and
functionality is expected to stay exactly the same.
Since Apple does this, they keep older products on the market, steadily
dropping their price as the cost of the older components goes down, but
they still make a point to update the older products with software
updates. For example, iOS 6, the current version of the software for the
iPhone, still runs on the iPhone 3GS with most features working, even
though the 3GS went on sale four years ago. This is quite remarkable in
this industry.
Macs are handled in much the same way. I used the same MacBook as my
primary machine for 6 years, and it ran perfectly fine with the latest OS
up until the day I replaced it. And boy, let me tell you, that thing took
a beating.
Taking this further, Draconis could have thrown some new sounds into
ChangeReaction 2 and called it a new game, with basically all the same
features and play of the original game, and tried to get users to upgrade
that way. Instead, we wanted to give them something to make upgrading
worth the cost, such as essentially two new games in addition to the
original, a built-in tutorial system, etc. We're taking our model from
Apple's lead which, despite Dark's protestations, is actually designed to
benefit the users first and foremost. Apple's main philosophy is that, if
you put the users and their experience first, customers will come to you.
So far, it is working very well for them, and it is the philosophy we are
employing as well.
On Apr 30, 2013, at 2:13 PM, Thomas Ward <thomasward1...@gmail.com> wrote:
Hi Charles,
that's close enough. However, I don't believe anyone said it was right
or particularly. fair. That's just the way business generally works.
For example, when I took a marketing class in college we studied a
marketing technique called perceived obsolescence. The way it works is
you take an existing product and you find a way to repackage and
resell it to the customer without having to spend much on developing a
new product to replace it.
So let's say you purchased a brand new computer from Del with an
almond colored case, keyboard, mouse, and flat screen display. Six
months later Del has parts left over from that run so they put them in
a brand new case that is smaller, painted black, and has a matching
USB keyboard, wireless mouse, and flat screen monitor. The
motherboard, hard drive, sound card, etc inside the computer is
exactly the same as you purchased but because of the nice new case,
keyboard and mouse you might think you are getting something new when
it is the same product in a slightly different form.
A lot of what Microsoft does is for the same reasons. I don't know too
many people who likes the ribbons in Microsoft Office and File
Explorer etc but it looks different. I figure the primary reason they
do it is because of perceived obsolescence. They can take a product
like Wordpad, which has been around for years, and make it new just by
taking out the menu bars, replacing them with ribbons, changing a few
other user interface elements and packing it on their new OS as an
updated version of the software when in reality the software hasn't
changed. There isn't anything new we didn't have before like a spell
checker, grammar checker, thesaurus, whatever, but it looks new and is
marketed as such.
Cheers!
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