Holding Patterns...

...yep, still waiting for that ore, but it seems that's going to take care of itself one way or the other very soon. We've working on it and I expect I'll be back in space very soon.

In the meantime, while I'm waiting, I decided to check out the first free episode of EvE TV this morning. Very well done...it seems this show gets better and smoother all the time. If it stays free, I doubt I'd ever miss an episode. As it is, Jalipo is just an unjustifiable expense for me right now. No it's really isn't all that much, but right now, it's one of those luxuries that I'm doing without to save money...it's gotta come from somewhere, and the food and gas budget ain't it. Once again, I quietly thank myself for paying for EvE for a full year in advance.

I have no doubt that if EvE TV becomes a free show its viewership will skyrocket. I heard SpiralJunkie say during the show that the Alliance Tournament got about 17 million downloads...not too shabby and more than enough to justify a profitable rate for commercial ad sponsorship. This week's free episode was described as a test, and what I really hope they're testing is if there's really enough people who will watch the show for free to make it worth trying to fund the show through sponsored ads, or perhaps for CCP to fully finance this great big ad for their product themselves.

If I had my choice, I'd much rather it were CCP paying the bills. Not only could players be confident that CCP would take as hands-off an approach to the show as they do with the game itself, but viewers wouldn't have to deal with the ads, making it a much more attractive media offering in general over the long haul. The other reality, as Spiral alluded to on the show, is that a lot of EvE's players and potential viewers of the show are college students who have very little disposable income. It's my guess that many players aren't watching EvE TV, not because they don't want to but because, like me, they just don't have the extra money to shell out for it. I'll be interested to see what happens here. I'm smelling the possibility of something big.

Oh and you may not see a lot of posts here over the next several days. Yeah, it's busy time again. My radio talk show is about to return from hiatus (October 4th, 7pm eastern check my other blog for details...fair warning though: It's not really about EvE, though I do occasionally talk about it on the air.), so I've been focusing a lot of my time on getting ready for that.

Til next time, fly safe.