We gamers are a strange lot, and I'll be the first to admit myself into this august company. We back developers and franchises, we champion games and platforms that we don't think got a fair shake and we villify anyone and anything that threatens our past time. For all of that, most of the stances we take are matters of principal.

SO....

What stance have you taken for or against a game/product/service/organization/whatever. It can be anything that is related to our joint hobby or it's peripheries.

I'll go first... My stance is against Apple, and it's not for the reasons that most people think it is. I use Macs at school for photography and I find them annoying due to the way the mouse works, but they do a fantastic job. No, my beef with Apple is because of two reasons, 1) you are not allowed to change the battery on any Apple device except a laptop, and 2) no expansion slots on an iPhone/iPod? Really?

I don't like companies telling me what i can and cannot do with the product that I put my hard earned money toward, and Apple does it and acts like they're doing me a favor. Paying for a battery and then having to pay a guy to change the battery is insulting. forcing me to use iTunes to change music on an MP3 player because no other software is guaranteed to be compatible and they don't have a product that will hold my entire music/audio book library is also insulting. (on a side note; I have to do special operations to the device to support a lossless audio format?)

Until they change these things I will never own an Apple Product. Proprietary hardware can kiss my ass.

Steam and that stupid EULA / ToA thing a month or so back.

Apple, after iTunes conveniently deleted my music library instead of simply removing the entries from its own index of the library. Something like 300-400 ripped CDs that I had to rip all over again. And ditto on the battery thing. Everyone else has a removable back cover. In fairness on that point, many folks don't keep their devices long enough for the battery to die of old age. But still... Dang, I haven't been a real gamer since 1989. ; ) Besides, I'm not buying until it goes on sale. And then I won't buy it because I'm a spiteful SOB.

Back in uni I really, really disliked my Property Law teacher. What a bitch. And the guy who substituted her every once in a while was a dick too.

You MUST play Sacrifice. It's your obligation as a rational human being...

Your entire library, how large is it? Over 160 GB like the Ipod classic? I'm not sure competitors have devices with more storage either. Even if the classic hasn't been advertised in a couple of years, it's still being sold by Apple.

I do believe all Ipods (possibly except shuffle) support ALAC, which is lossless.

I certainly agree on the battery issue, and you can't change the battery on their laptops either since a while ago.

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As for the actual matter of thread... I don't know.

I kind of get what you're saying, but at the same time, I don't know where we'd end up if everything made by all the different companies was interchangeable. If Apple wants to "protect" what they sell, they should. It may limit them in some respects, but I'm sure it has advantages in others.

I have an iPod, so I never really learned much about what other companies have to offer. What else has been successful, and is there one that had no restrictions on compatibility with anything else?

And let's not forget that when you get down to it, Microsoft is just as screwy - "Don't make me do too much or I'll crap out on you!" :-)

DRM is one for me. If a game has limited activation DRM, it's an automatic no-buy, even if it has a revoke tool.

Client based games (i.e. those that require Steam or Origin) are severely devalued in my eyes, so I'll only pay a maximum of $5 for them, with the very rare exception of up to maybe $10. Never higher than that, ever. And, as noted, more than $5 is a rare case.

Sony products: after their secret rootkit on music CDs shenanigans, I swore to never buy a Sony product if I can avoid it.

Well, now you're just making assumptions.

;-P

I have over 160 GB in audio books. I like having my library with me wherever I go. Yes, I know that no one else has a device with such a large storage, but there are many devices that accept SD/Micro SD cards, so spaces is effectively infinite.

I used to have an Apple Laptop and I loved it, but it got too old and the new ones were way too expensive. I didn't know that you couldn't change the battery in the new ones.

Like I said, I consider it a matter of principal. The proprietary issue is why I also boycotted the Packard-Bell, The Acer, and the Tandy back in the day. I think there should be a standard that works for everything, and that companies should conform to the standard, not create their own because they don't like to play with others. And we probably don't even know the half of it. :D

Really hard to argue with this logic. Sacrifice is definitely something every rational human being must experience.

No to Apple, too much control. I would say that at some point control becomes obtrusive enough to discourage me. The iTunes commandeering and rendering an entire library incompatible... aside from ease of use I do not understand why this is acceptable.

Makes sense to me. I have DRM issues myself, mostly because after I've gone through the process of making my computer work the way I like it to, I don't need DRM screwing with my configurations, locking up my machine and trying to take over my system. makes me want to scream.

I don't pay full price (in real money) for a video game. $60 is way too damn much for most games these days. At the same time, I don't pirate them either.

Apple - a bunch of sue-happy dick heads. Over priced luxury products.

Steam - overrated, has DRM, is a pain in the ass.

that is all.

I used to stand for things, then I realized that it'd never change jack shit, so now I do whatever and just bellyache about it occasionally.