My two cents on Stardock.............
Friday, July 6, 2007 by CATMANDU21 | Discussion: Animated Wallpapers
In my opinion, Stardock's out of control on the Premium Dream pricing scheme. The real reason this site is hot is because of the free submissions made by aspiring artists who frequent this site like TheMasterBaron, AzDude and others who have really brought Stardock's Dream Site area all of the hype it has and have also saved Microsoft's butts. Stardock's Premium Dreams have had little impact on the overall success of Dreamscene's, if anything Stardock and Microsoft are riding the coattails of all of Stardock's free submitters. Also realize that if the free users stopped submitting, Stardock would be dead in the water on Dreamscenes. Stardock shouldn't have any premium Dreamscenes, they should be free contributions for all the hits and revenue their users produce. They can charge for Object Desktop, Windowsblinds and the rest of their 100+ other products they have for sale on their site. Just to add, my opinion on why Stardock is charging is because Microsoft made things much harder for Stardock with Vista. In the XP days, Stardock brought Vista-like interface changes to the table. In that era, Stardock cornered the market on GUI customization. Today, things aren't so rosy. Vista performs many of Stardock's Object Desktop features natively, leaving Stardock to find new ways to make money. Understand Stardock's days are numbered in the GUI customiztion business. As OS's get prettier with age like Vista and MacOS, Stardock's software can now be considered "bloatware" and a waste of precious RAM and processor time.
Also, isn't Stardock getting any Microsoft kickbacks being that Dreamscenes and Deskscapes/Dreammaker are collaborative efforts as they work into one another, I mean Stardock has bailed Microsoft out on what would have been a pathetic release with only 10+ dreams available from Microsoft when Stardock currently brought over 200 more Dreams to the table? Finally, if you purchase any of these Premium Dreams, you'll have to activate this product, a little overboard for a $10 wallpaper. Even better, if your system should fail and you are reinstalling Windows and you don't take backup images like a friend of mine who purchased one, then chances are your going to have to call/e-mail Stardock to reactivate your Premium Dream as this activation is paying attention to your SID's when activated to prevent piracy so a reinstall or sysprep would force reactivation, yuck! Saddest part, after the paying customer has all these hoops to jump through, I can guarantee crackers have already infiltrated the activation so in the end the guy paying the $10 feels like, um..........
Hopefully, Stardock's work in the GUI business will not be in vain, leading to a buyout or takeover by Microsoft being that your GUI enhancement's have influenced Vista greatly. In the end Stardock could take over the GUI development portion of the next Windows OS after Vista, which would buy Stardock more time in the game. Some may say it's crazy, but look at the Winternals acquisition. Winternals showed Microsoft how to use System Restore and make it work. They also introduced Microsoft as well as BartPE, UBCD and Reatogo to the bootable Windows environment, which changed the face of Vista as alot of Winternals ERCD's features are integrated into Vista's install DVD. Business constantly changes and evolves, eventually Stardock's position in the market will change drastically, hopefully for the better!!
Also, isn't Stardock getting any Microsoft kickbacks being that Dreamscenes and Deskscapes/Dreammaker are collaborative efforts as they work into one another, I mean Stardock has bailed Microsoft out on what would have been a pathetic release with only 10+ dreams available from Microsoft when Stardock currently brought over 200 more Dreams to the table? Finally, if you purchase any of these Premium Dreams, you'll have to activate this product, a little overboard for a $10 wallpaper. Even better, if your system should fail and you are reinstalling Windows and you don't take backup images like a friend of mine who purchased one, then chances are your going to have to call/e-mail Stardock to reactivate your Premium Dream as this activation is paying attention to your SID's when activated to prevent piracy so a reinstall or sysprep would force reactivation, yuck! Saddest part, after the paying customer has all these hoops to jump through, I can guarantee crackers have already infiltrated the activation so in the end the guy paying the $10 feels like, um..........
Hopefully, Stardock's work in the GUI business will not be in vain, leading to a buyout or takeover by Microsoft being that your GUI enhancement's have influenced Vista greatly. In the end Stardock could take over the GUI development portion of the next Windows OS after Vista, which would buy Stardock more time in the game. Some may say it's crazy, but look at the Winternals acquisition. Winternals showed Microsoft how to use System Restore and make it work. They also introduced Microsoft as well as BartPE, UBCD and Reatogo to the bootable Windows environment, which changed the face of Vista as alot of Winternals ERCD's features are integrated into Vista's install DVD. Business constantly changes and evolves, eventually Stardock's position in the market will change drastically, hopefully for the better!!
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Hankers
Reply #103 Tuesday, September 4, 2007 8:08 AM
To add my 2 cents .... very well said.
Reply #103 Tuesday, September 4, 2007 8:08 AM
Nicely put, sprinkleSB ...
To add my 2 cents .... very well said.
MySecret
Reply #104 Tuesday, September 4, 2007 9:09 AM
Ditto sprinkleSB
It's My Secret
Reply #104 Tuesday, September 4, 2007 9:09 AM
Nicely put, sprinkleSB ...
To add my 2 cents .... very well said.
To add my 2 cents .... very well said.
Ditto sprinkleSB
It's My Secret
ArileenDesign
Reply #105 Tuesday, September 4, 2007 9:16 AM
Reply #105 Tuesday, September 4, 2007 9:16 AM
Ditto of Jafo
Ditto of Hankers
Ditto of MySecret
...
Ditto of Hankers
Ditto of MySecret
...
Jeffrey Bombard
Reply #106 Thursday, September 6, 2007 10:01 PM
Reply #106 Thursday, September 6, 2007 10:01 PM
If you are running Vista Ultimate then slowdown is probably coming from all of the Microsoft bloat. My biggest complaint about Stardock is that their good software makes Microsoft even lazier than they already are. As far as I'm concerned Dreams are the only reason to run Vista let alone "Ultimate". If Stardock could come out with a way to play Dreams on XP, there wouldn't be a reason to buy Vista and I think even more people would be interested in Dreams. The reason they don't IMHO is not because it's any more technically difficult than anything else they have done in the past, but simply they don't want to piss off Microsoft. Stardock used to be a great independent company, somewhere along the way they got turned into Microsoft's lapdog.
starkers
Reply #107 Thursday, September 6, 2007 11:26 PM
No, not MS' lapdog....Stardock has explained that Dreams will not be developed for XP because it does not have WDDM technology/accelerated graphics capabilities of Vista.
Stardock still is a great independent company...just because it has done a little business with MS, doesn't mean to say they've climbed into bed together.
Reply #107 Thursday, September 6, 2007 11:26 PM
Stardock used to be a great independent company, somewhere along the way they got turned into Microsoft's lapdog.
No, not MS' lapdog....Stardock has explained that Dreams will not be developed for XP because it does not have WDDM technology/accelerated graphics capabilities of Vista.
Stardock still is a great independent company...just because it has done a little business with MS, doesn't mean to say they've climbed into bed together.
Jeffrey Bombard
Reply #108 Friday, September 7, 2007 12:36 AM
Reply #108 Friday, September 7, 2007 12:36 AM
"Stardock has explained that Dreams will not be developed for XP because it does not have WDDM technology/accelerated graphics capabilities of Vista"
I have heard this too, the difference is that I find it a little hard to believe. I might believe it if they said the cost of development would outweigh any potential profits and thus they will not do it. I wouldn't necessarily agree, but it is more believable. I bet if Stardock developed their own "Dreams" program that ran on XP and Vista it would be lighter, more efficient and feature rich than anything Microsoft could do. WindowBlinds shows that when it comes to graphics the expertise of the engineers at Stardock far exceed Microsoft. To be quite honest I don't personally know that many skinners, however the people I know who use their PCs for things other than skinning do not want to up(down?)grade to Vista. The only way I will ever use Vista if it comes with a PC I buy, and then only maybe. Stardock has history of doing things despite the supposed limitations of the OS, now all of a sudden they can't create a program due to a limitation of the OS... sorry not buying it. Sorry I think it has more to do with keeping up a relationship with MS than any real limitation. It could be a costs vs. profit issue, but IMHO there are still alot more XP users than Vista users and that isn't going to change anytime soon. So it seems unlikely they are worried about potential profits, when XP is still a much bigger market to sell to.
I have heard this too, the difference is that I find it a little hard to believe. I might believe it if they said the cost of development would outweigh any potential profits and thus they will not do it. I wouldn't necessarily agree, but it is more believable. I bet if Stardock developed their own "Dreams" program that ran on XP and Vista it would be lighter, more efficient and feature rich than anything Microsoft could do. WindowBlinds shows that when it comes to graphics the expertise of the engineers at Stardock far exceed Microsoft. To be quite honest I don't personally know that many skinners, however the people I know who use their PCs for things other than skinning do not want to up(down?)grade to Vista. The only way I will ever use Vista if it comes with a PC I buy, and then only maybe. Stardock has history of doing things despite the supposed limitations of the OS, now all of a sudden they can't create a program due to a limitation of the OS... sorry not buying it. Sorry I think it has more to do with keeping up a relationship with MS than any real limitation. It could be a costs vs. profit issue, but IMHO there are still alot more XP users than Vista users and that isn't going to change anytime soon. So it seems unlikely they are worried about potential profits, when XP is still a much bigger market to sell to.
vStyler
Reply #109 Friday, September 7, 2007 12:46 AM
Everything in life is tied into the resources you maintain at that particular moment, Technology will never catch up with itself there will always be newer software \ hardware that can or cannot be run by different groups of Jones'.
Waiting patiently is one solution, not using something your machine isn't fit to run is another.
Reply #109 Friday, September 7, 2007 12:46 AM
If thats all I am doing is reading email and surfing the web... No problems.
Everything in life is tied into the resources you maintain at that particular moment, Technology will never catch up with itself there will always be newer software \ hardware that can or cannot be run by different groups of Jones'.
Waiting patiently is one solution, not using something your machine isn't fit to run is another.
Jafo
Reply #110 Friday, September 7, 2007 7:18 AM
Reply #110 Friday, September 7, 2007 7:18 AM
Stardock has history of doing things despite the supposed limitations of the OS, now all of a sudden they can't create a program due to a limitation of the OS... sorry not buying it. Sorry I think it has more to do with keeping up a relationship with MS than any real limitation.
You may just have to not buy it then. If Stardock's crew say there are specific limitations to the capacity for something such as Dreams being unworkable on XP then I for one WILL buy it.
They [Stardock] have no reason to think/say otherwise.
If, that is, "IF" there is some fool[s] out there who have purchased Vista simply for its capacity to run Dreams then more fool them. The real [true] advantage of Vista is its entirely re-written Kernel. It is a new OS, in the same way XP was/is over Win98.
Back to the original quote...Stardock's developers are continually banging heads against quirks of the MS OS, Vista AND XP [and others prior]. Many issues are circumvented....but not all CAN be...eg 'Dark skins' in Windowblinds....hard-coding of some text makes them difficult to successfully pull off.
That's neither MS's nor SD's fault....just a fact of reality...
Old_Crab
Reply #112 Tuesday, September 11, 2007 12:42 AM
Reply #112 Tuesday, September 11, 2007 12:42 AM
Harumph. Ahem. A computer is a tool. Not a toy. One needs only the farm reports and a basic office package to do ones work. All the fiddly-bits are just a nusiance and a distraction. Moving wallpaper and animations...indeed.
Grand Raspberries to all and to all a good nite.
Grand Raspberries to all and to all a good nite.
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Reply #101 Tuesday, September 4, 2007 4:29 AM
PS. As you can see by my post stardock means a lot more to people like myself than anyone realized. It give some people a reason to get up in the morning and use this site as a place to be in touch with the world they cannot go out in due to mobility issues.