| mrstickball said: I never said they were intentionally attempting to screw consumers over. Just that they are better at it than other companies. Better doesn't have to correlate with being meaner, and more abusive with their stance. I apologize if I worded it incorrectly. I'm not trying to say Nintendo is an evil gaming company, just that the things they've done have been ruthlessly efficient in the gaming market. When companies try to stay in the black, Nintendo is looking to earn even greater profits. In some situations, I think it's hurt the consumer (especially with hardware pricing). But again, it may be a nessicary evil on their behalf - Afterall, if they didn't have these profits, they would cease to be a game manufacturer, and we'd never enjoy their forthcoming great games. The same argument could apply to Apple, as they seem to have a very similar model of ruthless vertical integration. In some cases, it's been fantastic as they've done things that no other company has, yet some may view it as being harmful in other ways. |
"Screwing over" implies intent, which in this context (and especially in the context which Maelstrom is describing, which I believe is the topic of the discussion at hand) means that a company would be attempting to place out value propositions which run counter to what consumers want and then trying to force them down consumers' throats by tying them to experiences that consumers already want. Nintendo has not tried to move people toward a buying model that they don't want, they do not try to take away software rights, and they are not one of the many companies who are trying to do anything mroe than make fun games and a platform to play them on. At heeart, Nintendo is still serving the consumer.
Making profits is not "screwing the consumer". It can't be. They make a value proposition, and are prepaed to change the proposition when the consumer rejects it.
You thinking that the Wii is overpriced does not mean that its price is hurting the consumer.
