The Scott Johnson Blog

So I have been working a bit on trying to figure out what listeners listen to what, and where they crossover, etc. I wanted to do this while ELR’s numbers were still current, given the recent announcement. The result was quite interesting for me. I meant for these to be strictly for me to plan for the year, work out sponsorships, etc etc. But I figured you might find them interesting as well.

Here is how the total listeners over ALL FrogPants shows pan out in terms of percentage.

While it was no shock that The Instance has a huge percentage of total downloads, what took me by surprise a little was how some of the newer stuff has grown in a very short amount of time, particularly, Film Sack, Current Geek, and AppSlappy.

ELR has always been a bit of an acquired taste, so seeing it’s lower turnout still represents a sizable number, but not as compared to everything else. Also, a scrubbing of the IP’s indicates that nearly 90% of those listeners also spread around to the other shows as well.

Diary of a Cartoonist, oddly enough, gives me some of my most frequent email feedback, all while being the lowest on the list. I think ELR and Diary both stand as examples of shows with a smaller overall base of listeners, but a super dedicated base nonetheless.

Anyway, I find stuff like this interesting. Looking at numbers takes all the emotion and assumption out of the equation, and leaves you with the raw truthiness of it all. I hate math, but I love what math tells us.

UPDATE: Some are asking where the Fourcast numbers are…I don’t have access to those. In that particular case, Tom Merritt produces and hosts those files.

I am nearly 100% sure that this notion is nothing new, but I was way too lazy to dig around the web and find out.

The current method of paying to play in MMO games is terrible in my opinion. Most think that playing more than one MMO at a time is a problem simply because it would be an incredible time sink. Certainly this is true to some degree, but I think the larger reason is simply this: people don?t want to pay 100 bucks up front, and 30 bucks a month for two different games, no matter how great the games might be.

A real world example? I?d be happy to still be playing Aion AND WoW at the same time. With Star Trek Online out now, there are now three games I?d like to be playing here and there.

So there?s the problem. Want a solution?

Stay with me…

Do it like cell phone services, with a couple of tweaks. Charge me 15 bucks a month, but only if I?ve used all my time.

For example, lets say they charge my credit card on Monday the 1st of March. That would included unlimited play time up to April 1st, just as it does now. That is roughly .50 cents a day for that month.

Now, lets say I only played 10 days worth of that 30 days paid time. Carry that unused 20 days over to the next month, and don?t charge me again until I use the 20 hours up. A little like carry-over minutes for your cell phone. In effect, I am paying a per our rate, and not being charged for time I am not in the game.

Now, I know there are some holes here. For one, no one plays a total of 720 hours in 30 days time. So there?s no such thing as someone getting 100% of their paid time completed in a month. A huge portion of the player base will end up in the ?casual? bracket, and 15 bucks could potentially last them 6 months or more, thus effectively killing a substantial portion of revenue for the games developer.

Maybe you don?t count hours or days, but rather you are given a ?credit? system that represent time chunks. Say they are 8 hour ?credits?, and you are given 90 ?credits? for the month, and when you use those up, you?ve used your time. That could be adjusted of course.

All that said, my idea is all about getting these games into more hands. 10 million players in WoW seems like a lot, but a plan that made these games less of a financial commitment for players could potentially bring in tens of millions more.

I am well aware that no one is going to change to this system anytime soon, but some of these failing MMO?s might find some new life if they change it up a little, and give us more ways to pay…and then maybe we?ll play.

I’ve been experiencing a strange sensation over the last 15 years or so that time is speeding up. I have a notion that plenty of people are feeling this effect as they get on in life, and much of what I am saying probably feels cliche and old hat, but the idea never really held much sway in my mind until the last few years.

Time is speeding up. For me, anyway. How do I know this? Unfortunately, I don’t have a good way to quantify this phenomenon in any sort of scientific way, and to someone watching casually from their teens or early 20’s, this sounds like bollocks, if I might borrow a term from our British friends.

I know that time is speeding up for me because I have way less of it than I used to, but more importantly than that, my perception of time is nothing like it was when I was younger.

As a kid, an hour seemed like three. Now, an hour seems like 15 minutes. Week long vacations seemed to last for months. Now they feel like a day and a half.

As a teenager, 2 years sounded like a lifetime. Now it sounds like not enough time.

I provided this simple chart (shown above) to sort of help explain my notion of time. The large labeled lines represent major points on my life, and all the little red ones represent various sub-events. As you can, later in the chart, these sub-events start to go up in volume. I think those are the key.

Would love your feedback as to whether or not I am feeling this way on my own, or if others share my plight.

EEEEEEK!

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I hate Vegas. I don?t want to hate Vegas. But I do. I hate it.

I could end this blog post there, but that seems a little unfair. I feel compelled to express precisely why I have a hard time with Vegas, and what I think should be done about it.

I should mention here that all this Vegas talk comes from the fact that I was considering heading down there this week for a peak at CES, and perhaps lunch with Tom and Veronica. Clearer heads have prevailed. CES makes Vegas crazy.

On paper, I should love the place: I love the spectacle of it all. I don?t need to be reminded that there is a damn pyramid, a replica of New York City, and an Eiffel Tower in the middle of that desert.

Which reminds me, I love the desert. I live in Utah, which is largely a desert state, despite the tons of snow we get every year. I love southern Utah, where the rock gets red, and the horizon makes you feel like hopping into your land speeder and shopping at Mos?Eisley for the afternoon.

I also only live about 4 or 5 hours away from Las Vegas, so driving there is really not all that hard or time consuming. We often stay in a town called St. George, about an hour north of Vegas, and I LOVE that place. It?s a strange combination of college town and retirement area, with incredible bike trails, hiking, canyons, etc. Lots of hippies and art and music and cool stuff there. A wonderful place that I would not mind living in permanently, truth be told.

Anyway, as you can see there are lots of things to love about the ?idea? of Las Vegas, Nevada. I?m also a big fan of any movie using Vegas as its setting. It makes for the perfect backdrop to just about any genre I can think of: Comedy, mob movies, post-apocalyptic disaster flicks, etc.

I?ll waste no more of your time, and just tell you where my problems lie. Let?s break down why Vegas exists. I mean REALLY exists. I?m going to treat Vegas like a big cake in this blog post: Pushing all that frosting to the side, and see what this thing is really made of.
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What? Yes…I got hit by a car this morning while jogging. It happened about 7am, in front of an exit point for a bunch of condos near where I live. It was part of a 2 mile route I often take when running. Nothing fancy, just a big loop from my house, out to a main road, along a jogging path I should mention, and back around again.

I was at the half-way point when the hit happened. Here’s how I remember it. I approached the condo exit and noticed that a small grey car was heading out of it, so I slowed down. I noticed that he started slowing down well ahead of the exit, which told me he’d seen me and was ready to let me by. In fact, he came to a near stop, which a jogger can usually take as a green light.

So I sped up, got in front of him, when he suddenly slammed on the gas pedal and lurched forward, whacking me in the right butt-cheek, hurling me into the ice-encrusted snowbank on the other side.

Now comes the part that I can’t really explain. I simply got up, kept running, and listening to “Over The Line”, by The Crystal Method on my iPod, as if nothing had happened…I just kept running. I never looked back, but I heard the driver yell something that sounded like, “Sorry car flinder stern mace!” I can only imagine what he meant by that.

Did he hit gas when he meant to hit the brake? I’ve done that. Did he mean to slam into me? Was his idea of a new years resolution so twisted that I’m simply lucky to be alive?

No idea. Honestly I’m more concerned about why I just kept running. There’s a lesson in this somewhere. I think the lesson is, “Keep running”. Or something.