Forcing 99.9% of your potentially paying customers to:
1. read an annoying message about some technology they don't care about
2. clicking a download button
3. wait for 15MB to download (with 10kb/s, yeah, not everybody has broadband)
4. installing the darn thing (or forgetting it)
5. restarting the browser (oh, and then people forgot your domainname, so you lost them!)
... is commercial suicide.
So until then, we can only add a link with a flashy image in the corner of the page:
Problems? Click here!
which installs u10 which is hosted locally, so people don't have to wade through java.com's horrific i18n.
I'd almost forget it is illegal to host a JRE download file, you must embed it in an app... bugger
Sorry...and, yes, I know it's not the most popular position here, but "commercial suicide"? That's a load of crap.
So, let's take it one point at a time:
1. read an annoying message about some technology they don't care about
It's filler, so what? I can say the same exact thing about commercials on TV yet people still put up with them. Big deal. No one complains that to upgrade Flash, you actually get ejected to Adobe's site that is a big ad for Flash and Adobe technologies.
2. clicking a download button
To an auto installer (mostly). People are willing to go through an AWFUL lot to get to the things they want to do.
3. wait for 15MB to download (with 10kb/s, yeah, not everybody has broadband)
Again, 15MB? Really? So, correct, not everyone has broadband, but the numbers are growing rapidly:
Worldwide consumer broadband connections will grow from 323 million connections in 2007 to 499 million in 2012, according to Gartner, Inc. Worldwide consumer broadband connections penetrated 18 percent of households in 2007, and by 2012, households with a broadband connection will reach 25 percent.
Five countries exceeded 60 percent broadband penetration into the home in 2007; and, this is expected to grow to 17 countries by 2012. The five countries with broadband penetration into the home above 60 percent are Canada, Netherlands, Switzerland, South Korea and Hong Kong (see Table 1).
http://www.gartner.com/it/page.jsp?id=729907
Again, it all depends on the kind of gamer you are targeting. Also, after you have, at least 1.4 installed (and 1.4/5 shipping on well over 80% of all new PCs worldwide) the downloads are not 15MB+ and are incremental.
4. installing the darn thing (or forgetting it)
Again, auto install for a majority of folks and the issue of "Where did it go" seems to be less and less of an issue.
5. restarting the browser (oh, and then people forgot your domainname, so you lost them!)
Oh, you mean, like Flash? Or Shockwave? Come on....
So, here's a perfect example of what people will go through. In our house, we did that silly Elf Yourself app with the kids to send to their grandparents. After getting the damn thing to work, not break connections, understand that I didn't want to drag the photo around anymore, etc. (BTW, Flash application!) we finished our little video and e-mailed the link to the grandparents. We proceeded to spend 45 min on the phone with them trying to get a new version of Flash installed on their WinXP machine so they could see the animation of the grandkids. We suggested that they just wait until they came over to the house during the weekend to see it but they didn't want to wait. After, in total, almost 1 hour, they were able to see the 1 min long clip of the kids.
Point is, if people want a piece of content badly enough, they will jump through hoops. Not an excuse by ANY stretch and we need to constantly improve the experience, so don't misunderstand me. I am not an apologist for the things that should work better, but "commercial suicide"? That is WAAAYYY overreaching.
