I would disagree and that the real point is for them to make their money up front on the token exchange. When you change $5 for tokens they don't care whether you spend them on games or use them as pogs, they have already made their $5 just as if you had pumped it all into the machines. If they change your $5 for just quarters there is no guarantee you will pump those into the machines, you might instead use them to buy a pack of gum or something and they never see that money. You can walk out with a pocket full of quarters and it will still be useful, this allows you to stop when you feel satisfied and they lose out on that money, a pocket full of tokens gains you nothing, might as well use them all up and then maybe you will want to keep going and convert a few more dollars. Very smart.
Beyond that many also use it as a way to introduce inflation and take a cut right off the top so instead of $1 getting your 4 tokens they can say make it so $1 only gets you 3 tokens and most people don't even notice. Now when you start pumping tokens in the machines in your mind you still feel like you're spending 25 cents when in reality you're spending 33 cents. Instant markup for increased profit.
No, dependency breeds contempt. If he values the relationship he needs to remain independent, i.e. have his own mission in life and not just live for his partner.
I'm curious, if we had the power to just snap our fingers and irradiate all mosquitoes, do we have consensus to do so? I worry about unforeseeable consequences.
One confirmation on average is approximately 10 minutes. Most small value payments are acceptable with zero confirmation once the payment has been broadcast to the majority of nodes which only takes a few seconds.
I am one of the Co-founders of Disco Melee (https://beta.discomelee.com/hub). We are a live streaming social network designed around the needs of gamers. You could think of us like if Twitch and Facebook had a baby who liked to party and was eyeing up Reddit for a future fling.
The gamers that find us tend to rave about our overall vision, low latency and other base features like IM system, streamer storefronts, and free donate/sub buttons for all. The problem however is that (except for our hardcore believers) they don't seem stick around very long due to the pull of network effects from the established players. What strategies could you recommend for overcoming network effects to the point where we can start generating our own? Thanks!
My daughter just had a birthday and we got a "Frozen" themed waffle maker. It's tiny, cheap, ugly and we already have a waffle maker. Now I have to figure out what to do with it because it's brand new in the box. Unfortunately every day that passes increases the likelihood that it just ends up in the garbage =P
I have been a starcraft player for almost 2 decades now and I never really cared about the story or background to it. What I cared about is that it combines elements of some of my favorite strategy games into a single medium. I often say that it has elements of chess, poker and reaction based games like first person shooters.
It is like chess in that it is a game of strategy and board control, army movement, identifying what your opponent is planning and actively countering it, identifying weaknesses and exploiting them.
It is like poker in that is a game of imperfect information. Unlike chess I cannot ever see the entire board in starcraft, only the pieces I have scouted and as soon as my scout leaves that information is now outdated and assumptions have to be made about the actions of the opponent since I last had accurate information. Poker is similar in that you can never have 100% certainty of what your opponent may be holding, there is always that knowledge gap and great players can exploit it.
It is like first person shooters in that is it reaction based, the person who is able to more efficiently process the information they are receiving and make correct decisions about their course of action can execute faster and have an exponential return in terms of tipping the scales in their favor. This applies to many things such as base building, army building and micro mechanics during army engagement.
I've been a fan for so long precicely because these fine strategy details and forced decision making make an excellent filter between the good and the great, the great and the elite. Watching the elite play is comparable in my mind to watching chess grandmasters battle only in real time and not turn based where their perceived life is on the line and one slip up can cause instant death. It's that great adrenaline high, not the background story, that has kept me so engaged for so long.
Disco Melee was founded by gamers, for gamers, to deal with with the lack of social features in other gaming-centric sites, and to reinvent the concept of social streaming. Basically we are "making gaming social again". We're in beta now with plans for public launch soon!
The frontend is built in Clojurescript and Om, the backend in Clojure on a PostgreSQL database. While we do require some degree of prior experience with these technologies, we also greatly value an ability to learn, take ownership, be proactive, and communicate well with others.