Be Excellent To Each Other

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-21021073

I was pretty sure this was going to happen a week or so ago. They have missed the last few affiliate payments to me for commission from sales on SavyGamer (which is exactly what GAME group did when they were entering administration). Then they updated the affiliate agreement to say I'd only get 1% on any transactions including a voucher (instead of the usual 3% for games), and then launched a massive voucher clearance sale, and lied that everything was fine.

They also hired a new CEO in August, former Jessops CEO Trevor Moore. I gather what he did for both Jessops and HMV was to cut costs/sack people as quietly and cheaply as possible to silently prepare for administration.

I think it was probably inevitable. Their preowned games are generally far more expensive than buying games new online, and they don't drop prices for ages and ages and ages. For music/films, we have streaming, download and piracy services that do a far better job than HMV do for the most part.

I'm not too bothered, to be honest. They (whether indirectly or directly) killed off lots of indie records stores, they're entwined with the record industry in questionable ways, and I've had sub-par customer service from them whenever I used them. Let the dinosaurs die.

Obvious standard caveat about it being shit when people lose jobs through no fault of their own. It's a shame that the people to blame at the top will be the ones with the most security.

A trip to HMV used to be a thrilling adventure of impulse bought CDs and lusting over games and t-shirts and posters.

Now it's just depressing. The HMV in Toronto used to be a huge place, occupying one very large building and expanded into two adjacent units. Now just one of those adjacent units (I think it was once the laserdisc section!!) and even the basement is now not for customers - it's the stockroom. Before I lived in the UK, HMV on Oxford Street during a visit was a necessity to marvel at all the awesome on sale.

As the BBC says, they're irrelevant. A CD is now bought to be brought home and shoved into your computer and ripped. Games could be had new or preowned cheaper elsewhere, likewise DVDs. The one advantage - getting the product in your hands immediately - didn't justify the often vastly higher prices.

Harrumph. I announced the announcement in the Economy thread two hoor agoo, but you're right, a dedicated thread's probably best.

Re: prices. Yes, such a pity they had to make us pay VAT. Or that they had corporation tax to pay.

The big chains put the small retailers out of the market. They'd move into a town, undercut the local indies/small chains and put them out of business. Then when they were the only people left, they'd whack up the prices. I know someone who ran a small chain in the 70's and 80's and Our Price moved in and undercut him. They could put pressure on the record companies and place bigger orders to get a lower wholesale price. Eventually he closed down because it was only going one way. Fact is if Our Price were selling records at almost the same money as you were paying wholesale it was only going one way wasn't it?

Perhaps if they'd developed some brand loyalty instead of acting like a supermarket for records? I can't remember the last time I went into HMV. In the days of VHS you might pop in to see what Doctor Who tapes they had in stock but now you can get the entire back catalogue online. MVC had the right idea as they had a much bigger and eclectic stock of DVD's and I was sorry to see them go.

I think there is room for quality record retailers but not for HMV. It's had its day.

My overriding memory of HMV was going into the one in Telford (I think it was) back in 1999, when the Amiga had well and truly died a death.

They were selling Sensible World of Soccer, Cannon Fodder and Gloom (might have been Gloom Deluxe) for £49.99 each.

I went in to HMV to look for a DVD the other week. I know, I know, I'm archaic. I was a little shocked to see how sloppy the place looked, there were tons of DVD title cards on the shelves sans the actual DVD, which made for a really annoying browsing experience. "Oh wow, it's Berlin: Alexandraplatz!" flicks next to card, "Big Momma's House." Gngh. It also looked tremendously understaffed.

Hopefully more people will be going to Spillers in Cardiff now, our lickle indie record shop. And who knows? In the wake of an electro-magnetic pulse or solar flare the High Street may become the hip and happening place again! ("Where you can buy exciting spiked shoulderpads for bottlecaps," - ed.)

Lovingly carresses 'Goodbye Babylon' box set by Dust to Digital.

There is still very much reason for physical products in the music sector. Ironically however these physical products will be releases from bands and small independent labels who want to give their fans something tangible and worth collecting. The internet has done far more for the resurgence of old blues, gospel, folk, spiritual, country and bluegrass music than ever HMV and its ilk did, so I find it hard to mourn them.

Look! Look! You even get the raw cotton in the beautiful cedar box set! http://www.dust-digital.com/goodbye-babylon/

Plus there's vinyl. I'm not a crusty fellow who insists it sounds better, but I do like to see it spinning on my old none-too-shabby 50's Decca portable. Get a nice warm sound from that, even if it is mono. Plus there's the peachy Cambridge DVD player and amp in the front room, so I have to keep that fed too.

I guess one day the writing will be on the wall for most CD's, which is good for the environment, but bad for the music library. Heigh-ho.

HMV haven't been able to restock recently, Pete. I went in this weekend for Sniper Elite 2 though, and it was "now only £35". Over the road in Grainger, £25.

Have never come across this chain. However I do know they are staffed by dwarfs who are somewhat 'refreshed' and will furnish you with free condoms.

http://www.gizmodo.co.uk/2011/10/how-an-unknown-games-retailer-committed-suicide-at-a-gaming-awards-event/

I am. It does.

And not in the 'warm sound and crackle' way, but in the 'it's not as compressed as CD' one.

I've been twice recently to actually buy things. The first time I bought the first season of The Boondocks on DVD, the second time I bought Christmas presents for my friend and there was an employee standing by the line for the cashier just to hand you a candy cane!

The smaller branches now have a large (over a quarter of the store in one shopping centre) memorabilia section. Great if you want Big Bang Theory bobbleheads or an Avengers pint glass set, I suppose.

I'm not certain on that score, as I have classical music on both vinyl and CD and it always sounds a bit clearer and seems to have more depth on CD. When it comes to old recordings, until Dust to Digital came along they definitely sounded better on vinyl than on the thrown together CD releases.

The mastering is a big thing, yes. A lot of classical CDs have a lot of effort put into them. My CD of Ein Deutsches Requiem, for example, sounds much better than wax.

Ok, to be more precise: rock from its inception til about 1994. All decent hip hop. Pretty much all dance music, soul, funk. Better on vinyl.

Agreed sir. *Shakes hand*

Is that the John Elliot Gardiner Ein Deutsches Requiem? I think we've conversed on that one before, on every level its probably the best piece of music I've heard in my life - though come to think of it EMI's Simon Rattle's Vaughan Williams Theme of Fantasia by Thomas Tallis is damn close.

Er, back to HMV. Sorry.

Same as Jessops, too expensive compared with the internet, even when they went on the internet. They should have had a Jersey based VAT free operation years ago.

Shame about the job losses, another empty unit in the shopping centre or high street.

I used to order quite a bit from HMV up until phhh.... two years ago or so. Their Canadian site in particular was good for obscure metal and noise artists and was the most cost effective way to import at one point. I used to order games from them quite often too. Then around the same time as they started taking pre-owned in, they suddenly became too expensive even in their sales. Not quite sure what happened, but that's when they lost my custom.

Also worth saying that Fopp has probably died their second death with this too, given they're owned by the HMV group.

I'm certainly not going to miss them, although I suppose it's nicer to have an HMV on your high street than yet another bookies.

Blockbuster next, reckon.

In the end we're going to end up with one branch of "Buy N Large" in each city if you need to physically visit a shop and the internet for everything else.

I used to pile into HMV when it was "6 dvds for £20" as that was the only time they seemed to have genuine bargains. The "2 for £20" was always laughable as they just put the DVDs that were normally £10 back up to £18-£19.

I think I only ever bought one game from a physical store and maybe 2 from the website.

Nah, we'll be just fine.

If we're going to play "Who's going under next", my money is on Maplin.

Also, I looked back over the SavyGamer archives. I used to see a fair amount of decent deals on HMV's website, but Dimrill's spot on, they don't have good deals any more. In the the last six months there has been a total of 10 deals I considered worth posting on SavyGamer. 2 of those 10 were repeated deals too.

I was trying to think last night, when was the last time I had a good deal from HMV?

I must have done as I've bought stuff from there before but I honestly couldn't remember a time when I've seen something cheaper in HMV than anywhere else.

Do you think? They're still fairly cheap for good-quality components, so bulk orders from large companies will keep them going for a while.

I guess that side of the business might survive (perhaps even do better if it isn't propping up the shops) but as a high street or retail park place I don't see much of a future for it either.

On the highstreet? I seem to remember Resident Evil 4: Wii Edition being cheaper there than anywhere else by a few quid. Edit: on release day, that is.


Possibly. I've poked my head in a few of there stores over the last few months, and they've always been practically empty. A lot of the stuff they sell, I bet no one buys (no one buys PC components from Maplin). I guess it depends on their margins on the stuff they do sell, but at the very least I expect they'll have closed a bunch of stores by the end of the year.

You'd think that no-one buys PC components (I never have), but they're not stupid - they simply wouldn't stock them if people didn't buy them.

I agree that the shops are always quiet, though.

HMV has always been the shop I go in on Christmas Eve, when I remember at the last minute that I forgot to order that CD/DVD/game I was going to get my mum/dad/brother/girlfriend (delete as appropriate) online and the only way I'm going to get it on time now is if I just walk into a physical shop and pay their prices.

That said, I'm genuinely very sad to see yet another casualty of the high street.

I was watching the John Cusack film High Fidelity on Sunday night and it once again made me lament the growing loss of the physical retail sector. I know HMV hardly compares to an awesome indie, but there's no place for either nowadays. Back in around 2003, I was very seriously looking into starting up an indie games store with a friend and we got as far into it as talks with the business advisor at the bank, a look around a few vacant shop units for rent and speaking to a few suppliers - and we gave up when we realised it didn't cost much more for the average Joe to buy games from any number of online retailers than it would for us to buy stock from suppliers.

Physical retail be fucked. I don't see clothes shops and the big supermarkets going anywhere just yet, but who knows long term?

Retired guys in knitwear buy pc components from Maplin.

I've bought PC components from there. Namely wireless network cards, and wireless USB things. Theyw ere under a tenner and I could get them on the day.

Empire Records > High Fidelity

High Fidelity: The book is really good, the film is absolute fucking wank.

In my last job, I worked in a very small IT specialist for the jewellery retail trade and we'd occasionally run to the local Maplin if we needed a component for something right then and there. That was quite rare though. I'd never buy from them myself unless it was an absolute emergency - not only are Ebuyer much cheaper, not only do they stock decent parts rather than the Maplin own-brand tosh, they also offer next-day delivery on items ordered up to 11pm at night. I can only assume they do this by channeling dark and evil powers, sending your items express through dark portals, through the timeless dimensions of hell, conveniently straight to your door. Which is quite a service to offer.

Spillers is still going? I heard about all sorts of issues with that place a few years ago, so it's wonderful to know it's still alive and kicking. I used to love that place when I was at the art college in the 1990s.


Meh. Another store I used to love in Cardiff, but that was back when it used to rely more heavily on being a big mess of components, rather than trying to sell a gold-plated HDMI lead in a massive plastic cocoon for a MILLION POUNDS.

As for HMV, from what I've been reading today, it looks like short-sighted management a decade ago was primarily to blame. Not seeing the writing on the wall regarding supermarkets and the web led to the chain not heavily investing in digital. Had it done so, it could have been a massive internet presence backed by high-street stores. But when said stores refused to price-match with their own website, that doesn't show joined-up corporate thinking at all. All the same, it's another British company gone to the wall while the dominance of Americans who don't pay taxes increases.

Think this was quietly dropped before Christmas. May have been a temporary thing but I haven't been offered it on my last few orders when I have been ordering late at night.

OBJECTION.

It is physically impossible for John Cusack to make a bad film.

Runaway Jury
2012
Con Air

I used to agree with this, really I did. But then I saw Identity.

I really liked Identity.

Really? That's only nudged out of the top 3 movies I've ever considered demanding a refund from the cinema I watched them in because I agreed to go out one night with a friend who'd been having a really rough time, and she insisted on us going to see Paul Blart: Mall Cop.

The things I do for friends.

Incidentally, the other two were Death Becomes Her (I never forgive, never) and Batman And Robin.

I also thought Identity was very good. And Con Air, Runaway Jury and 2012. I can only assume the lack of street dancing caused Mali's dislike.

Con air is pure awesome cheesy nonsense

How does Cyrus end up under the pile driver?

Did you pair wake up this morning and think "You know what I need? I need an injection of stupid today, best do that before lunch."

I just went in to have a look through what was on sale, and was pretty unimpressed. 25% off stuff that's way overpriced doesn't help a great deal. And the stuff that's actually cheap is old stuff that's typically on Netflix anyway.

Not accepting their own gift cards as payment apparently. Bit of a shit, considering I was given a £10 one for Christmas and was about to head into town to spend it on something.

That's not too unexpected. Game did the same if I recall.

Maplin are fairly safe. This lot aren't though. It's the companies in hedge funds that have the largest % of shares out on loan. I have no idea what any of that means but apparently the higher the % the more likely they'll go under:


1. Home Retail Group - 21.4%
2. W H Smith - 15.6%
3. Weir Group - 15.2%
4. Ocado - 13.9%
5. Carpetright - 12.2%
6. JKX Oil & Gas - 11.1%
7. Dixons - 10.2%
8. Thomas Cook - 7.9%
9. Premier Foods - 6.1%
10. Admiral - 6.0%

If WH Smiths go bust I might stand outside and offer then a bar of chocolate for a pound and stuff their bags with FUCKING VOUCHERS.

According to Martin Lewis, HMV are still sending out emails encouraging people to preorder stuff.

Apparently Home Retail Group are Homebase and Argos. Does anyone use Argos anymore? That is surely a business model that has been destroyed by online sales?

Don't Argos do alright from online sales though? They seem to be promoting it a lot and it does seem like it's convenient to the customer.