My current computer problems reminded me of a few things I read some time ago. I’m actually quite surprised that I haven’t already written about this, but then again there are a lot of things I never get around to writing about, many of them being on my mind far more than this.
I’m talking about the fact that certain things are becoming too cheap for their own good. Consumers desire cheap goods in order to be able to afford as many as possible and manufacturers desire high profit margins. That means that, in order to be able to make some profit out of selling their products at prices that consumers are willing to pay, manufacturers need to reduce costs as much as possible. Some costs can be reduced without causing problems, and those certainly should be reduced, but most go past that level and the consequences are unpleasant for all involved. On top of the environmental and social problems caused by reducing costs past a certain level, the products in question also lose quality, and this is what this post is about.
Some time ago, I read a post written by a corporate blogger where the author was trying to counter the general idea that products made in China are inherently of poor quality. The main argument was that the Chinese can produce anything that’s required of them and can do it while ensuring one of about ten different quality levels, so the company that chooses to manufacture some of its products in China chooses the desired quality level as well. Then he pointed out the obvious, namely that each quality level comes with a price, the lowest quality being the cheapest and the highest quality being the most expensive. Companies would obviously desire products of the highest quality, but they can’t afford them because they need to keep costs down, otherwise the products ending up being too expensive and consumers no longer buying them. Still, there can be companies that try to stick to certain standards and therefore demand higher quality even if their products are also made in China, so the question is what are the consumers who complain about the quality of those products looking for. If they look for cheap goods, they shouldn’t expect high quality, not even for products that are not made in China. If they look for quality goods, they should expect to find some that meet their criteria even among those made in China.
That’s a very valid point, but the fact remains that the average quality of the goods that hit the market tends to keep dropping. After all, we all know sayings like “they don’t make them like they used to” for a reason… In a way, such a drop in quality (and especially in reliability) can be seen as a strategy the manufacturers employ in order to ensure that people keep buying their goods, as they’ll need to keep replacing those that fail. However, it all changes as soon as you add warranty into the mix, because the manufacturers need to replace the products that fail without the consumers purchasing new ones, meaning that reliability problems create higher costs.
When you buy an item that fails and needs to be repaired or replaced during warranty, the manufacturer spends some money in order to solve your problem. Obviously, they need to earn those money back from somewhere. That can be accomplished by raising prices, which initially hurts consumers and then also ends up hurting the manufacturers when their sales start dropping, by lowering profit margins, which initially hurts the manufacturers but then can also end up hurting consumers when the manufacturers go bankrupt or stop developing new products, or by trying to lower costs even further, which usually ends up hurting everyone because the quality also drops and all the associated problems get even worse.
Either way, it means that people don’t get the products they purchase repaired or replaced for free, but that they pay for these operations in advance when they make their purchase. But, on top of paying for all of this in advance, consumers also lose time, productivity, information or various other things when the products they purchase fail. On the other hand, manufacturers see themselves more or less forced to keep lowering the quality and continue this vicious circle because, while they could perhaps manufacture more reliable products and sell them at similar prices if they wouldn’t need to cover the costs of the repairs and replacements, those costs aren’t going to go away for quite some time due to all the unreliable products that they have already sold. That means that an improvement in quality and reliability usually implies a significant increase in price for quite some time, which tends to drive consumers away from the products in question and toward those that just make this vicious circle even worse, more or less turning an increase in quality and reliability into suicide for the companies that attempt it and making even previously trustworthy brands become less and less so.
The faulty HDD made me remember this issue because it’s quite obvious when you think about computers. The percentage of components that need to be replaced during warranty, or even those that are dead or at least faulty on arrival, seems to keep increasing. I even remember reading several times in WXPNews and the former VistaNews (currently Win7News) that the author and her close friends and family have personally experienced situations where a certain component even had to be replaced three or four times before they received one that at least worked the first time, not to mention that the number of components that fail before the warranty expires seems to keep increasing.
Though I would hope that such situations where repeated replacements are required are still quite rare, I believe that just about everyone’s personal experiences can confirm that things are indeed getting worse and worse. Mine certainly do, at least… So I ask you this: Considering how much cheap products actually end up costing, how cheap is too cheap?
Yet another Seagate HDD decides to trouble me. The exact model is ST3500320NS, though on that page it says it has 16 Mb of cache and mine has 32 Mb, or at least that’s what it says. I really bought it thinking it’d be very reliable, seeing as it’s supposedly built specifically for reliability, but it would appear that I was very wrong. I checked two shops from here, one being the one I bought it from and the other being the one I bought most other components from lately, and there is a flood of negative comments about this specific model, the first one being posted just two weeks after I bought it. People seem to agree that it comes from a bad production lot, or at least it did at some point, and that it will fail no matter what.
The problem is that I had another Seagate HDD fail on me before, two if I add the one from Andra’s old computer, and I noticed some issues with yet another one. That makes it no longer appear to be a problem with a certain production lot or even a specific model, but with their products in general… Or is it just me? I’ll admit that they always recover enough to allow me to save what was on them elsewhere, or at least I could have saved everything if I only knew exactly what to do when Andra’s crashed and if I had enough room when the previous one I had crashed as well. But, while that is a detail of crucial importance, the fact that they keep crashing in the first place is a huge problem!
Meant to write much more about this, but it has already failed once and now it’s making strange noises, so I’d rather not risk it. Managed to get it to work again by disconnecting it, knocking on it a few times, connecting it again and then, well, praying a lot. Then I checked my backup and added pretty much everything I could get to without accessing the partitions where I believe the main problem is located, and now I wait. There’s nothing I won’t be able to get back rather quickly on those partitions anyway, but if it’ll keep working long enough and then also start again after I’ll need to turn off the computer in order to connect another HDD to it, I’ll really save everything since now I have more than enough room available. Once that’s done, I guess I’ll wait for it to be replaced, since I only bought it a year and a half ago.
Since MMORPGs have recently been brought back to my attention and I usually tend to have some sort of plan for a game running through my mind, I went back to trying to find a solution for one of my pet peeves, namely that you can’t play such a game (mostly) by yourself. Sure, many would be quick to point out that they’re not supposed to be played like that and that the whole point is to be in groups, but I deal with gaming just like I deal with the vast majority of other things as well, which is to say that I do it alone or not at all. And since I’m the one thinking about this issue now, it means I’ll try to figure out a solution for this, so people who desire a similar style of playing would find a place for themselves in such games as well, if they’d care to try playing them.
The nice part is that my solution would add another layer of complexity, allowing for far more interesting quests, dungeons and game events. It would also add actual heroes, since currently all those characters who need each other’s help in order to accomplish anything meaningful are reduced to nothing but common soldiers. The bad part is that it would require quite a bit of additional work from game developers and players alike, as such characters would need to be approached quite differently and would require a lot of time and effort to develop successfully. But they’re only meant for a certain kind of players after all, and I imagine the feeling of accomplishment would be quite powerful when you’d finally manage to get it right.
What makes regular character classes require groups is the fact that they’re far too specialized and don’t really have “survival” skills, by which I mean the skills that’d allow them to make it through lengthy battles, whether against one very strong foe or multiple weaker ones. That means that solitary classes should have a greater variety of skills and also a separate skill set which’d make them capable of making it through such long battles by themselves. To even things out, such classes would gain access to powerful skills much later than regular classes, plus that those “survival” skills could perhaps be gained in a more difficult and time-consuming manner, such as through quests. That’d mean that such characters would become extremely powerful at very high levels, but that it’d take a lot of time and effort to get them there and that any strength they might have earlier than that would depend on the player’s ability to effectively combine all their different skills and not on raw power.
I went through various options and eventually settled on one which’d double the level cap for such classes and also offer them that separate skill set I mentioned above, but make it so they could only advance through it by doing quests, with some of those quests giving them the choice of what to train next and others training a certain ability directly, therefore forcing them to be very careful when choosing what quests to accept. That’d mean they’d eventually have much higher stats than regular characters and also a double number of regular skills plus yet another, separate, skill set. The downside would be that they’d also gain access to skills at twice the level that regular classes gain access to them, so they’d advance slowly and constantly need to make full use of all their different skills, including the “survival” ones, because they’d be fighting enemies that have more raw power than they do.
Still, if you also add all the equipment that their much higher level would eventually allow them to use, you’ll realize that such characters would be truly formidable and therefore need to be kept out of groups, because otherwise you’d just end up with groups formed entirely of these characters and everyone would forget all about the regular classes. My solution for that problem is to make them truly be solitary characters, eventually completely unable to join others. They could be able to join very small groups early on, then only be able to join one other character, then only one other character that’s also of a solitary class (to prevent pairings which would combine a regular character’s raw power and a solitary character’s “survival” skills) and eventually, as I said, they’d end up being unable to join others at all. On top of that, while they’re still able to join others, there could be a timer which would have a certain amount added to it at the start of each day and tick down whenever such a character is in a group. Once that timer reaches zero, the solitary character would start suffering severe penalties, which would get worse and worse until eventually they’d automatically leave the group.
Another level of both interest and difficulty could be added by having such characters start the game in remote areas and requiring them to wander all over to receive their quests, and even giving quests to themselves at times by having entries appear in the quest log as if the characters are reminding themselves of things that they have to do or musing about what they could attempt. It’d make perfect sense to keep such characters in remote areas more often than not and rarely send them to cities or other “populated” areas.
The added complexity would come from the fact that such characters would be the actual heroes and therefore, on top of their own specific quests, there’d be tasks tailored specifically for them inside dungeons. That’d mean that both regular and solitary characters would be required for raids, instances, runs or whatever other name such games use for such activities. The regular characters would form a group and fight the regular enemies while advancing through the area, while the solitary characters would carry out specific tasks by themselves, everything needing to be coordinated properly for success to be possible. An “association” system would need to be used in order to allow a solitary character to take part in the same quest a group takes part in, without actually being in the group.
For example, let’s assume one potential group quest requires the capture of a general. That general is inside a fortress that can receive reinforcements from two nearby villages. The fortress is also defended by some ancient force, such as a monster or spirits, that only answers to the general. To complete this quest, you’d need a group of regular characters and three solitary characters, specifically a ranger, a sorcerer and an assassin. The ranger and the sorcerer would need to make their way through the forest, the ranger finding and moving certain markings to ensure that the sorcerer won’t run into patrols on the way back, in order to reach the entrance of the tunnel used by the guards from one village to reach the fortress. Upon reaching it, the sorcerer would remove the magic lock placed on it, allow the ranger in, lock it again in a different way so the reinforcements won’t be able to get in behind the ranger and then get back to the group. At the same time, the assassin would have to sneak to the gate and, either by treachery or by climbing the walls, get inside the towers placed on either side and kill the guards. Then he’d need to keep going further, killing any guards on the way and reaching the exit of the tunnel the ranger’s in before the ranger would reach that point so there won’t be any guards who could trap and kill the ranger as soon as he’d come out. After that location would be secure, the assassin would have to get back to the gate and open it, allowing the group and the sorcerer to storm inside. As soon as they’d be in, he’d get out and place as many traps as possible before the reinforcements from the second village would get close, then he’d need to get back in, close and hold the gate against them until the group would capture the general. On the other side of the fortress, the ranger would have a similar task, holding off the reinforcements from the first village as they’d attempt to climb the treacherous slope, seeing as they couldn’t use the tunnel anymore. Inside the fortress, the sorcerer would make his way down some ancient tunnel or find some way to draw the ancient force to him, constantly keeping it occupied. This would allow the group to advance inside the fortress, battling the soldiers and other lesser creatures currently stationed there, until they’d reach and capture the general, commanding him to order the ancient force to back off and let the players take him away.
There is a “bread fair” nearby this weekend. It was advertised as a place where you’ll see traditional types of bread and pastries and watch demonstrations of traditional methods of baking. So I thought I might as well have a look around, out of curiosity. Thought I might even buy something, but of course there was no chance of me managing that, especially since the area was really crowded. It also turned out to be quite different from what I expected, but my mind drifted off after a while anyway…
What really sent my mind to where it always means to go is that there were a few stands of pottery and other traditional kitchen utensils and two of decorations. That reminded me of the pottery fair Andra dragged me to early on, while I was visiting her, and I realized that the Andra I used to know back then would have liked this, would have dragged me around to see everything, would have bought things to keep us supplied for three weeks and very likely a couple of pottery items and decorations as well, and then would have kept asking me what I wanted until I’d have said something just so we could get back home and that could have resulted in an item or two that I’d treasure afterwards, like the dog statuette and the tiny cup she bought for me back then.
After I got back, I had a little talk with someone about Aion and, after carrying that over into another conversation and finding myself saying that I don’t even know anyone with the same preferences and approach when it comes to gaming who’s also willing to talk to me without me having to struggle to get a few words out of them, I realized that the Andra I got to know when we last talked, nearly two years ago, would have probably been at least somewhat interested in that and we could have exchanged some opinions about it. Also reminded myself of how long it’s been since I last heard anything from or even of her…
And, most of all, I’m realizing all too well that four years ago, just about now, she was leaving…
You might have noticed that another little image showed up on the right. I’m talking about the one advertising Blog Action Day 2009. For the other two that you currently see there I first wrote a post and then added the image, but this time I added the image right after I got the message from them and forgot to post.
Blog Action Day explains itself as “an annual event that unites the world’s bloggers in posting about the same issue on the same day on their own blogs with the aim of sparking discussion around an issue of global importance.” This year’s issue, as you can see, is climate change and it marks a trend I’m quite pleased with, considering that the first issue, in 2007, was the environment. I wrote a post with that occasion and I certainly plan to write one now as well, despite the fact that the issue of climate change itself isn’t one that I particularly try to fight for, seeing as its an effect of all the damage we cause to the environment and therefore it’ll keep getting worse if we keep harming the Earth but it’ll solve itself if we stop harming and start fixing the damage already done.
In case anyone who happens to be reading this has a blog, is interested in environmental issues and has solutions for this problem, or even simply thinks that they can point out its severity, I’d strongly encourage you join your voice to ours and write a post about climate change on October 15th. Thank you.
