Lurker > WingsOfGood

The US consumer electronics industry died in the late 1980s, destroyed through a calculated effort by Japan's electronics industry, particularly Matsushita (and their brands Panasonic, National, and Technics) who colluded with other large manufacturers there, principally Victor (JVC/Nivico), Toshiba, Nippon Electric (NEC) and Hitachi. The effort began in the late 1950s. These companies artificially raised prices in their home market and then used those extra profits to dump cheap electronics in the US, undercutting American brands' prices.
The US government was lackadaisical about enforcing the existing (weak) anti-dumping legislation and just handed out slaps on the wrist for decades. Finally congress passed tougher legislation but by that time the writing was already on the wall: Americans would buy cheap Japanese electronics over American produced products priced slightly higher. The death blow was the Nixon administration agreeing not to prosecute dumping in exchange for a military base on Japanese soil (it's more complex than this, but the two things were tied together).
That agreement was made in 1969, and within 20 years, an entire industry was gone:
Admiral (Chicago, IL) --> sold to Rockwell in 1964, shuttered. Lived to fight another day*.
Curtis Mathes (Texas) --> brand name sold off in 1988.
General Electric --> brand name sold to Thomson (France) 1987. Factory shuttered.
Magnavox --> Brand sold to Philips (Netherlands) 1975.
Motorola (Quasar) --> Sold to Matsushita (Japan) in 1974. Factory closed 1997.
Philco --> Brand sold to Ford Motor Co. 1966, then to GTE in 1974. Sold to Philips in 1975. Factory shuttered.
RCA --> Sold to GE in 1986, then to Thomson along with GE in 1987.
Sylvania --> Sold to GTE in 1959, then to Philips in 1981. Factory shuttered.
Zenith --> Sold to LG in 1995, Factory shuttered. They were the last American-owned TV manufacturer.
Here is an excellent documentary produced by PBS in 1992 documenting the decimation and death of the industry from inside. It's heartbreaking to watch interviews with employees at the Zenith and Motorola/Quasar plants as they try to stay positive but know what's coming.

I keep getting older people who tell me the 1970s and 80s were worse because their mortgage interest was 15-20%.

Gamefaqs hates everything

In my opinion, yes!

Friends,

First off I am 60.
In high school or before My first per hour job, I made like 1.35 an hour.

In high school I had 3000 dollars in the bank. I told my daughter last night. she
makes like 35, Dollars an hour as a nurse, and is LIVING AT him, and we bought her car
and pay the car insurance, I think she pays no rent.

I told her she should have 30,000 in the bank, if I can do 3000 at 1.35, she
can do 30,000 at $35.

well she has like NOTHING.

you guys with out houses, never seem to take into account all the money you have to PUT into a house in 20 years. a new roof, 15K, a new heater, and AC, 10K. there is a million other
expenses. a new shed in the back yard, 5K.

My dad had a million dollars in the bank, do you know how he made that money. the HARD WAY

he SAVED IT!!!!

What does the quote have to do with Diablo 4?

The quote is correct but it is a dangerous mindset.

People who play videogames want "new content literally almost every single day", according to Blizzard president Mike Ybarra - indeed, "they want new stuff every day, every hour". I do not want new stuff every day, every hour, Mike. Frankly, the idea makes me want to burn my possessions and go spend the rest of my life under a pine tree.
Ybarra's pseudo-apocalyptic observations came during a chat with the Verge about all things Blizzy under new owner Microsoft. Asked about Blizzard's current approach to live service gaming, Ybarra noted that "players have no patience. They want new stuff every day, every hour. We're trying to react that way while holding the Blizzard quality bar high."

One obvious question is how to keep up that avalanche of New Stuff without making Bad New Stuff. Ybarra's answer, as may be deduced from Blizzard's current operations: set up vast teams increasingly fuelled by the power of in-game monetisation, with a lot of effort dedicated to ensuring that buying things in a Blizzard game feels enjoyable.
"We know players want new content literally almost every single day," Ybarra went on. "At the same time, it takes large teams to be able to deliver that. So you have to monetize it in the right ways. At the same time, I always tell the teams, 'When someone spends one dollar or a penny with Blizzard, I want them to feel good after they do that. How do we get to a world where we know that's always going to be the basis of what we're doing?'
"We want to serve players with more content in our universes," he added. "At the same time, we want to make sure we're responsible and meet their expectations. I think we're still fine-tuning a lot of those things as we go forward. But it's something top of mind for me as we go forward."
Blizzard's execs do remain "open" to proposals that aren't live services, Ybarra commented, be it "a four-hour experience or a 400-hour experience". Nor are they "afraid to create new IPs" or "turn models upside down." Still, the publisher's current portfolio suggests that the majority of chips are on service gaming for the moment.

It's interesting/harrowing to think about how live service games both react to and actively cultivate player behaviour. Ybarra doesn't discuss the role publishers and developers have played in teaching players to expect and demand New Stuff every day, via such habit-forming mechanisms as sign-in XP and events with exclusive rewards on top of compulsive design loops and feedback such as the jingly noises you get when you open a lootbox. A lot of this kind of thinking comes from the world of mobile gaming, which Ybarra described elsewhere in the chat as "a hyper growth area for us". Ybarra also doesn't talk about the sustainability implications of this expectation of constant New Stuff - for instance, the risk of mass layoffs when those big-team service games don't perform as well as shareholders wish.
I know, I sound like a scold. But looking at it from a more dispassionate armchair-designer point of view I'd love to hear more about live service projects that try to limit the player expectation of novelty and discourage daily engagement, with a view to creating something that isn't the equivalent of an artificial black hole remorselessly devouring the energies of all concerned. One of the most enjoyable live service games I've played lately is Might & Delight's Book of Travels, a "tiny MMO" with a far-from-Diablo-esque update cadence, in which you spend lots of time ambling from teahouse to teahouse. I sign into the game regularly just to have a nice stroll through the game's painterly countryside. Perhaps there's a tree I can live under there.

Please list any other browsers and programs that are still blocking ads

Cause I put OP on the back burner for now.

What did your dad say when you showed him this?

Of course there's no topic. The other poster that used to make the new OP topics stopped posting for some reason.

There's a user or two here who argue for no minimum wage. "Let the market decide", bullshit. I'm serious.

My first couple of jobs out of high school in 2013 were minimum wage ($7.14).

My first job in 2000 paid $7.00 per hour.

Yeah that was good money in 1978. I was making like $5.50 at Walmart decades after that.

WTF did he do out of high school to be making a living wage

They meant to say double income. Many wives stayed at home when your Boomer parents were starting families.

Now you need to be married

I dunno why boomers act like they have no idea what inflation is. Are they not living right now?