The New-Age Nickel & Diming @ Techgage
There is an interesting editorial over at Techgage that tackles the issue of modern day "nickel and dime(ing)" For those of you that don't know "Nickel and Dime" is an old saying that described how some products end up costing you more than the original price with various add-ons or fees along the way.
A good example is buying a new car. Say the sticker price is $20,000, when you go in to buy the car the salesman says, "With this car you should also get our special fabric spray for $300, and a set of floor mats for $50, and the upgraded spare tire for $150". By themselves these sound like a deal, and a great way to protect your investment, but also raises the price of the car up to $20,500.
Over the course of the past couple of years, there's been a growing trend that's both frustrating and expensive to consumers. It also shows no sign of slowing down, and ironically, many of us contribute to it. As the title of this editorial suggests, this trend amounts to what I like to call new-age nickel and diming.
The Editorial covers downloadable game content, playability of games, micropayments and the hardware unlocks offered on Intel processors. I can't say I agree with everything in the editorial, especially since the current trends are a direct result of a thrifty public. These are the same people that not only has extremely short attention spans, but is unwilling (or unable) to pay the asking price for anything. These people often turn to piracy (for games and movies) or wait until the price comes down to what they understand to be a reasonable level, basically forcing publishers and manufactures to become creative in their pricing structure.
Micropayments and downloadable content (for games) is one way for game developers to re-coop their costs. Think about it, which sounds better? Spending $60 on something, or $10 on something? $10 is usually accepted, so they lower the base price by $10 and offer an upgrade later.
Related Web URL: http://techgage.com/article/the_new-age_nickel_dim...
