2025-05-09 03:00:09
Nintendo's fiscal year just ended on March 31, and their annual results report has some goodies in there I thought were worth shouting out.
First up, the company made a lot less money than in the previous year, with 30% lower revenue and 46% lower profits. As someone who typically follows the financial results of major tech companies that have relatively stable revenue, it's interesting to see another company that is undeniably successful, but has rather large swings from year to year. This drop is, of course, explained by the switch being so deep into its life cycle, and the pain is certainly buffeted by the fact that their 2026 expectations are absolutely through the roof for how well the Switch 2 is going to help them (63% YoY growth).
It's also interesting to see they just lay out plainly how many Nintendo Switch 2s they expect to sell in the coming year, which is 15 million. Based on how it's gone so far, it really sounds like they can manufacture 15 million devices in the next 12 months.
Another thing I found really interesting was that for every full year that the OLED Switch has been on the market, it has been the top-selling model in the lineup. I thought this was notable since pretty recently it also came to my attention that the unit sale numbers of the iPhone are dominated by Pro models as well. For a lot of tech products, the entry-level model often is the top seller, but it is interesting to see in some categories, the most expensive models actually also move the most units.
I'm also always interested in how well physical media is doing compared to digital game sales, and how those numbers may differ from platform to platform. Nintendo reports that about 53% of their software sales are digital. Meanwhile, I don't think Microsoft and Sony report these numbers specifically, but the data we do have from reporters like Mat Piscatella indicates PS5 owners buy 78% of their games digitally, and Xbox owners buy 91% of their games digitally.
Still on the physical versus digital thing. It's expected, but also fun to see that the percentage of software sales that are digital drops significantly in the quarter that includes Christmas. It just feels so much better to give someone a physical game than to give them an envelope with a download code.
The most important thing for me is that Nintendo seems to continue to have a healthy business, which is just great to see. Like any company, I have my beef with them, but I think the world is better having Nintendo in it.
2025-05-08 22:29:23
The gang gets to work defending their Mac login items. Who has the most minimal startup? Who's got the craziest apps? This episode has more new apps mentioned in any episode of Comfort Zone ever!
2025-05-08 08:41:00
My friend and Comfort Zone cohost Niléane recently recommended the series Jet Lag: The Game, and it's become my new obsession recently. I think the show is so fun, and Sam, Adam, and Ben have such a great dynamic. The show is on YouTube, but it's also on Nebula with early episode releases. If you're looking for a good place to start, I highly recommend the latest season, which features one of my favorite internet creators, Tom Scott.
Anyway, this is a long way to say Nebula released their own font today called Nebula Sans and it looks pretty nice and is totally free if you're looking for something new.
2025-05-08 08:05:00
In three minutes, I had that script built with ChatGPT. I could see it, it's this bash thing, it does this thing, and authenticates with the Google, and it's great! The malleability of macOS is now, I think, giving it in the age of these LLMs, giving it like another breadth of like superpower life that iOS and iPadOS simply don't have access to.
This really resonates with me. The web and more open platforms like macOS are where innovation is happening right now, it's not on locked down platforms like iOS and iPadOS. Yes, you can use ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini on an iPad, but you've getting a neutered version of them. These are technically amazing tools, but they're limited to being as powerful as Apple allows them to be. Criag and I have used LLMs to build new tooling for our Macs to make our lives easier, but that's literally impossible on iOS and iPadOS until Apple adds the tooling to make it possible.
As I wrote last year, some platforms are allowed to evolve massively through the innovation of everyone, while other platforms make you hope one company adds the feature you want at their developer conference.
2025-05-08 07:19:58
When is the computer doing too much for you? Has our line for this moved over time?
2025-05-06 21:18:00
I read this excellent post by Niléane: Are Pride Wallpapers and a Watch Band Enough in 2025?…
At a time when some trans people are actively seeking to flee the U.S. to preserve their fundamental right to a healthy, safe, and decent life free from the threat of President Trump’s actions, Apple doesn’t seem to be stepping up to its professed values to the extent that the situation requires.
…and then I just so happened to read this post from Nilay Patel about Jeff Bezos saying that his immense wealth protects him ("my wealth and business interests as a bulwark against intimidation"):
What we have here is one of America’s richest men, insisting that his wealth and principles will protect his newspaper from intimidation while it pursues an advocacy campaign for free markets, all while the White House calling the mere idea that Amazon might display pricing information a “hostile and political act” causes his company to cave. It seems like that same wealth and power might serve to protect Amazon, no? And definitely seems like a man so committed to free markets that he’s willing to burn down his newspaper has no choice but to look the bully in the eye and really put his money where his mouth is.
Do I like that Apple publicly supports Pride and consistently creates products that people can buy to support both visually and financially LGBTQ groups? Absolutely. Do I believe that most people at Apple, up to and including Tim Cook, genuinely want to support LGBTQ people? I do. Do I recognize that Cook is in a challenging spot, politically in the Trump era? I do as well.
But that said, Bezos said that his immense wealth protected him from government pressure to go against his morals, and Tim Cook is in a similar situation. Well gents, this is your time. This is your challenge. Did you amass all this money and power to wilt in the face of an attack on democracy which includes an attack on LGBTQ rights? Given you both have expressed more public support, both verbally and financially, to Trump than any other administration under your tenures, it seems from the outside that you want to hold onto that power more than exercise it to support marginalized people. Here's a question: have you donated more of your personal money to support LGBTQ people in the past year or on a party for the guy who is actively attacking those people's rights and disappearing people without due process?
Again, I appreciate the public support of Pride, and I appreciate that this is a hard situation given the abhorrent executive we have right now, but if you don't stand for what you believe in when things get tough, it's hard for others to think you actually believe those things. For my part, my support of the LGBTQ community is unmoved by the whims of the current administration or public opinion.
Also, for all you small government, free industry folks out there who voted for Trump, consider what it means if your opinion on this is that Cook has no choice but to play the game and voice fealty. Supporting LGBTQ rights isn't an economic thing, so surely Cook could voice opposition to those policies without risking economic punishment from the administration, right? Oh, any public dissent is met with punishment? Great, that's some good small government you've got there.