And it's time for Frustration Friday, a nice, relaxing rant where I look at annoying things in the geekonomy, the fan-to-pro world, and more.
Let's talk the idea of mainstream and geeky things.
It happened.
It's over.
Geekiness WON.
Economics/Geekonomics
A company from spare parts?
Electronic arts cuts staff and onboards an expensively-purchased social media company.
Gamestop goes for DLC and talks about building the company by acquisition.
Mergers, acquisitions, outsourcing has all made me wonder this:
- There is a lot of common technology (databases, Office docs, etc.)
- The internet and these technologies let companies collaborate and combine efforts faster.
- It's a tough economic time.
- Companies want to change and move fast, and building new divisions is hard.
So I've wondered if what we're going to see in the future is an outburst of Frankencompanies, pieced together from the acquired parts of other companies, merged-in studios, and mass-hired consultants.
Fandom, Geeks, Jobs, and the Japanese Economy
On and off I encounter speculation that Japan's economy is going to get worse. I'm sure you've seen much the same news over and over.
I'm not able to speculate in detail, but I can see that Japan has had its trouble since its own economic meltdown, doesn't seem to have solved it's issues, and is having problems with its workforce. In my own opinion as a non-economist, I can at least see why people are concerned.
Geekonomically and fannish-job-wise, I wonder what will happen to the major geeky industries of video games, anime, and manga if Japan's economy does take a serious dive (again).
(This is why following economics is important to any career. Period.)