Month: November 2013

I came across a blog post  by Vincent Wang, talking about how Snapchat recently rejected a 3 billion dollar buyout from Facebook.

https://blogs.ubc.ca/yixiwang/

In his post, Vincent talked about how Snapchat has emerged as a competitor to Facebook due to its very unique product. Because Snapchat has grown its customer base so fast in just two years, it would be better for Facebook to simply buy the company now before it becomes a threat.

In short, I don’t agree with the fact that Snapchat will be a serious threat to Facebook in the  future. Facebook has integrated itself to become a vital part of society. Snapchat is just a toy that teenagers play with and will eventually out grow. Getting rid of one’s Facebook account would be like cutting off an arm, but no one has the same kind of attachment to Snapchat.

So why would Facebook want to buy Snapchat? It is possible that Facebook feels threatened by Snapchat’s growth, but I think Snapchat would actually be a great asset for Facebook to acquire. Both companies would benefit from each other and share their huge customer base. I would not be surprised if Snapchat was acquired by Facebook in the future, but at the moment the owners of Snapchat are probably feeling a little more ambitious than 3 billion dollars.

Magic the Gathering is a strategic card game that is so popular that there are tournaments with cash prizes every week and a community of professional players exists. Some of these tournaments are played online on Magic the Gathering Online (MTGO).

On November 9, the Magic Online Championship Series was held. This is the most important tournament of the year for online Magic players, with a first place prize of $25,000. After more than 10 hours the server crashed, and all the results of the tournament were lost.

Brian Kibler, a professional magic player who was in the running to win the tournament, wrote about his experience on his blog here.

http://bmkgaming.com/magic-online-championship-series-exist/

The MTGO server has been crashing repeatedly in major events worth thousands of dollars for years now, and the developers haven’t taken action. But because this happened to a well recognized player, a lot of attention was given to this incident.

Wizards, company that makes Magic cards, generates huge revenues and profits every year, yet they’ve been unwilling to allocate the money to fix these issues. As a huge fan and a customer, this is saddening: How a company can be so deep in its riches that they’re blind to the needs of their consumers until its reputation is at stake. And while Magic will continue to remain popular, this incident has opened the door for other games and competitors to take away dissatisfied customers.

As Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo get set to debut their next-gen consoles in the next few weeks, let’s take a look in the past at Sega’s failure in the console industry. While it may be hard to imagine, there was a time when Sega was the dominant force in the video game industry. There were a few points and thoughts that Mr Takezaki, a Sega veteran shared in the article below, but I believe there was more to be discussed.

http://www.polygon.com/2013/8/7/4599588/why-did-the-dreamcast-fail-segas-marketing-veteran-looks-back

Something people may not have thought of was the fact Sega came out with a new console far too often, which made their previous consoles outdated along with games that people bought. In Sega’s mind, consumers wanted the most advanced technology at their fingertips, and so they came out with a new console every 2 or 3 years. This is a relatively short time in comparison to the fact that the PS3 came out almost 7 years ago, and the short development times led to some issues with quality. EA also refused to develop games for Sega consoles anymore, which is a big gap in the customer segment for Sega. 

Based on COMM 101, I think Sega could’ve adopted a more “lean” approach to their ideas. They could’ve gotten feedback from customers who would’ve tested their hardware, rather than making a huge investments based on intuition.

http://ubyssey.ca/news/cus-referendum-fails-123/

The UBC Commerce Undergraduate Society referendum of the decision to spend $200,000 in response to the incidents at Sauder Frosh has failed. Of those who had voted almost 70% were against this allocation of funds, which is a staggering amount.

This is a sensitive issue that has been felt through out the Faculty of Commerce, and so I’m going to try to provide a non-biased, neutral collection of thoughts about this subject.

First of all this incident was only relevant to those who were directly connected with Frosh, so the first years, the frosh leaders, and the organizing committee. Almost all the second, third and fourth years weren’t part of it, which is almost 75% of the undergrads in Sauder. So, in regards to Frosh, for almost three quarters of the undergrad commerce students this wasn’t an issue. So it sort of makes sense that they were against this usage of their tuition.

However, I don’t believe that this is the right decision necessarily because the majority voted on it. These events have tarnished Sauder’s reputation, and if nothing else these programs and money are a step towards salvaging it. Also, these programs can still benefit the whole university at large. Either way, all the students would still pay the same tuition, and if we don’t spend it on this the CUS would just spend it somewhere else.