Archive for April, 2008


A site I used to like sends me weekly email about the new downloadable games. Over the last few months it’s dwindled from 3 games (2 mac) to 4 games (1 mac) to.. another version of Bejeweled every 2 months.

Today’s email listed 2 games “Available for PC” and one other game “Not available for Mac”…

So I wrote them…


I have decided to terminate my subscription to (Your Company). I have removed my email from the automatic newsletter mailings. I’m writing this to explain why.

When I first discovered GameHouse you were releasing some very enjoyable games on both the Mac as well as the PC. I am (possibly obvious by my ordering) a Mac user.

Over the last year the selections on the site have become grimmer and frankly insulting to a Mac user. For a while you had to dig through the list to find the “Mac Game”… Now they are pretty much entirely eliminated. I use the term insulting because your feature games now list, “Available for the PC” several times and then often add one that is specifically, “Not available for the Mac.”

In short terms. It’s obvious to an end user you’re no longer giving serious support to the platform, but have not taken the time to admit it. And to an educated end user… this is not going to be taken well.

I’m writing in the (perceivably vain) attempt to say that I feel badly. Because I did like the games that (you) sold. I bought them regularly.

Even as the Mac platform grows in market share, it is obvious that some companies no longer desire to invest in the platform. I will issue the same warning that I do to all companies in this situation. This is a bad business decision.

When a company turns its back on Mac users. They leave and they don’t come back. Even when the company shows interest again.

I welcome a response to this email. But sadly, having worked in the computer industry for over 20 years… I sadly do not expect a response.

Regards,
Andrei Freeman
-Former (your company) Customer.
P.S. My attempts to format this email are thwarted by your web posting page.

The post script is because all attempts to use the spacing above failed. It sent looking like one large run on paragraph.

All of my pictures are on my cell phone which makes it a pain to get them off quickly or conveniently.

I have a tonne of pictures showing the snow.

Until I get this posted, I am permitted to show a picture that jackal_child took at her place. She lives about 1/2 a mile up the road from me.

You can see her picture on her space at deviantart.com

The picture can be made larger by clicking on it.

I’m not kidding when I say, “After April 15th in Washington. And about an inch and a half of snow.”

Whee

You play with your hair.

Boys and girls… let this be a lesson:

Comb overs are bad!
picture beyond cut

Well, the April Sniffles seem to have hit the social circle.

This past weekend, walking around GreenLake…um lake I had Aiden on my shoulders. He would routinely sneeze into my hair.

Of course all around me the dominoes were beginning to fall: 1_wolfsong had it Friday on… shimmeringjemmy started showing it Sunday. faerievixen2 and I started showing on Tuesday.

And here I am… down for the count.

On the upside… my brain has had it’s moments of functionality. I made a great stride in a personal project at about 2am this morning (while neither sleeping nor TMI’ing in the bathroom)

I can now (mostly) convert ANSEL files to UTF-8. Mostly because I need to add the last 24 combining marks to the hash table. But the code works.

Amusingly, Unless you’ve heard me talk about this in person… it’s damned unlikely you have any idea what I’m talking about or why I’d want to do that. Granted… if you’re curious you could always lookup ANSEL.