nVidia GeForce Partner Program: Well Intention Marketing or Anti-Competitive

[Derangel]

On 3/12/2018 at 4:49 PM, Razor01 said:

 

 

Please do if its allowed, he banned me, I have been following his stuff for over 10 years now, 12 years, and this is the first time I saw him post things just to make others change their view points about, in particular my posts.

 

No axe to grind with him man. I have the utmost respect for him.  I just stated the facts of how lawsuits work, and since half the community there thinks I don't know what I was talking about, actually asked attorneys in this specific field how things are done.  They stated the same things I did.  If there were any legal avenues for AMD, AIB's OEM's to go towards right now, AMD wouldn't shop around for journalists. 

 

So Kyle's view of things are only for one thing sensationalism.  Currently there is no merit to his article.  This is why no other website or press member picked up the story, its all smoke and mirrors.

 

Kyle got angry I pointed out he made mistakes.  I have seen him ban others for doing the same thing.  I kinda knew he was going to do it with me too.  I really didn't care because someone had to tell him, and it was something I have experience with.  Too bad for him. 

 

Only a person that starts to threaten and censor others for speaking the truth gets hurt at the end.  [H] should get sued or hurt over that type of behavior.  Too bad for them.

He didn't ban you for pointing out mistakes. He warned you, multiple times, to stop basically reiterating the same thing ad nasuem. You didn't stop. He told people to take the legal debate to another thread, you didn't. You also completely ignored what he had said to you regarding lawsuits and decided to say you don't believe anything he has to say in the article anyway. You've been around [H] a few years longer than me, you should know by now that when Kyle tells you to knock something off or to calm down, you do so. Its not like it was the first time he got after you for doing the same thing. I like a lot of the stuff you post over there, especially when you start to dive deep into GPU stuff, but you do have a habit of not letting go when you get your teeth around something. You're passionate about a lot of the stuff I've seen you talk about, but that does lead to you not letting go easily. It was bound to bite you in the ass eventually.

[Derangel]

4 minutes ago, mr moose said:

So basically just more claims and accusations form the same source. 

 

Sorry, I'll wait until there's actually something to read before I make any judgments.

*Shrugs* Have it your way, but Kyle has earned his reputation (both the good and bad parts of it). I'm more inclined to believe him when it comes to stuff like that. [H] has a history of pointing out problems, or potential problems, regardless of how much it pisses off companies. They were one of the first/few to rip into NForce 4 (or 3, one of those two) back in the day and call it for being trash. They were the only people to dig into the Phantom counsel years back and tear that big scam a new one, even defending themselves in court when the company sued them over the article. Kyle was the ONLY person to break the Intel-AMD agreement. People acted the same way to that news as they are now.

 

I wouldn't put it past Nvidia, or AMD really, to pull tactics like that to bury bad news.

[mr moose]

1 minute ago, Derangel said:

*Shrugs* Have it your way, but Kyle has earned his reputation (both the good and bad parts of it). I'm more inclined to believe him when it comes to stuff like that. [H] has a history of pointing out problems, or potential problems, regardless of how much it pisses off companies. They were one of the first/few to rip into NForce 4 (or 3, one of those two) back in the day and call it for being trash. They were the only people to dig into the Phantom counsel years back and tear that big scam a new one, even defending themselves in court when the company sued them over the article. Kyle was the ONLY person to break the Intel-AMD agreement. People acted the same way to that news as they are now.

 

I wouldn't put it past Nvidia, or AMD really, to pull tactics like that to bury bad news.

I treat everyone with the same cold hard approach, until evidence is made available it is just an accusation.  Being right in the past is no guarantee of being right in the future.  This is why people think I am an MS fanboy, I don't ascribe to the claim they collect more data than they admit to because there is no actual evidence.

[Derangel]

4 minutes ago, mr moose said:

I treat everyone with the same cold hard approach, until evidence is made available it is just an accusation.  Being right in the past is no guarantee of being right in the future.  This is why people think I am an MS fanboy, I don't ascribe to the claim they collect more data than they admit to because there is no actual evidence.

That is fair, but you have to admit that the possibility of Nvidia doing that does cast doubt on articles praising GPP or that seem to exist solely to discredit Kyle's article. Kyle could be wrong about the legality of what Nvidia is trying to do, at lot of that would come down to arguments made in a court room and how the judge interprets the various laws being talked about, as for the rest I'm willing to give Kyle the benefit of the doubt, for now. Nvidia's acts could be something not intentionally malicious, it could be their PR department being stupid (again) and overreacting. Nvidia being silent about the whole thing, or just releasing a public statement laying out more details and the like would go a long way towards quieting things down. Hell, if they played it all off as using this as a way to get more cards into the hands of gamers it would probably get a lot of people on their side, especially if that ended up being the case. However, the potential that they went the extreme cover-up route casts a lot of doubt. Unfortunately, a lot of sites rely on not being blacklisted by companies like Nvidia so that means they don't want to rock the boat too much.

 

If Nvidia keeps pushing forward with their current GPP plans there will be one big thing to prove or disprove Kyle's information: He has stated that there are plans for a lawsuit or multiple lawsuits should Nvidia not change their plans. So if that comes to fruition it will lend validity to Kyle's statements. If Nvidia backs down and drops or changes GPP that would also lend validity. If we start seeing AIBs pull AMD cards for their gaming brands that will be pretty big proof. If the opposite of that stuff happens then I guess that will prove him wrong and, honestly, it would probably kill the site. Kyle is basically staking everything he has built up over the last nearly two decades on articles like this.

[mr moose]

1 minute ago, Derangel said:

That is fair, but you have to admit that the possibility of Nvidia doing that does cast doubt on articles praising GPP or that seem to exist solely to discredit Kyle's article. Kyle could be wrong about the legality of what Nvidia is trying to do, at lot of that would come down to arguments made in a court room and how the judge interprets the various laws being talked about, as for the rest I'm willing to give Kyle the benefit of the doubt, for now. Nvidia's acts could be something not intentionally malicious, it could be their PR department being stupid (again) and overreacting. Nvidia being silent about the whole thing, or just releasing a public statement laying out more details and the like would go a long way towards quieting things down. Hell, if they played it all off as using this as a way to get more cards into the hands of gamers it would probably get a lot of people on their side, especially if that ended up being the case. However, the potential that they went the extreme cover-up route casts a lot of doubt. Unfortunately, a lot of sites rely on not being blacklisted by companies like Nvidia so that means they don't want to rock the boat too much.

 

If Nvidia keeps pushing forward with their current GPP plans there will be one big thing to prove or disprove Kyle's information: He has stated that there are plans for a lawsuit or multiple lawsuits should Nvidia not change their plans. So if that comes to fruition it will lend validity to Kyle's statements. If Nvidia backs down and drops or changes GPP that would also lend validity. If we start seeing AIBs pull AMD cards for their gaming brands that will be pretty big proof. If the opposite of that stuff happens then I guess that will prove him wrong and, honestly, it would probably kill the site. Kyle is basically staking everything he has built up over the last nearly two decades on articles like this.

 

In my eyes it is a massive claim and one that I highly doubt Nvidia will be able to bury if true.  Such things are not easy to keep under wraps (not even Intel with their position and money could keep it under wraps). As such things will surface and for that reason I highly doubt Nvidias legal team signed off on such a deal.   I also think the AIB partners will slowly leak info if they feel they are being unfairly blackmailed.   Asus tried to throw Intel under the bus with the CL 1151 deal even though nothing has come of it. Either they felt it was hurting their bottom line or they just wanted to cash in on some easy limelight.    3 things in all this that people may have not thought about,  1, if it's true and nvidia are doing it but have enough power to stop people talking about it then we will no longer see any ROG AMD cards. Just like AMD laptops and pre-builts were almost impossible to find when Intel played their game.  2. if it slips quitely into the night and nothing changes on the consumer choice front, then it probably never happened.  and 3. Didn't Kyle claim there were lawsuits in the process? if so once they start you can't hide them, so a filing will have to be made somewhere.  Until one of these 3 things happen all we have is Kyle's words.

 

I haven't read any real positive articles on GPP except form Nvidia themselves (I'll take that as I take anything direct from a company).  Nor have I read any articles disparaging HardOCP.  They  might be out there, but as I said, if it isn't evidence then it's just hearsay and that is nothing to me.

[Blademaster91]

1 hour ago, Derangel said:

He didn't ban you for pointing out mistakes. He warned you, multiple times, to stop basically reiterating the same thing ad nasuem. You didn't stop. He told people to take the legal debate to another thread, you didn't. You also completely ignored what he had said to you regarding lawsuits and decided to say you don't believe anything he has to say in the article anyway. You've been around [H] a few years longer than me, you should know by now that when Kyle tells you to knock something off or to calm down, you do so. Its not like it was the first time he got after you for doing the same thing. I like a lot of the stuff you post over there, especially when you start to dive deep into GPU stuff, but you do have a habit of not letting go when you get your teeth around something. You're passionate about a lot of the stuff I've seen you talk about, but that does lead to you not letting go easily. It was bound to bite you in the ass eventually.

No, Kyle threatened or banned other users as well from what I looked through, the thread seems to be a circle jerk echo chamber of people just blindly agreeing with him. 

He lets feelings get in the way and hands out threats and bans to long time users? Too entitled for their own good and really unprofessional,IMO. If every thread is like that with him around, I'm glad i didn't sign up for HardOCP,they must be a niche forum for a good reason also since they apparently need Patreon to stick around.

Kyle seems just fine discussing contracts and such,but flips his sh*t at the mention of any legal discussion,which i'm sure they're afraid of after publishing something that seems more like fearmongering sensationalism when there isn't any proof to back up his claims. Yet people are so quick to to treat assumptions as fact because Nvidia might be up to something,most of the tech media picking up on these accusations before waiting for any facts is even worse.

 

[Derangel]

Just now, Blademaster91 said:

No, Kyle threatened other users as well from what I looked through, the thread seems to be a circle jerk echo chamber of people just blindly agreeing with him. 

He lets feelings get in the way and hands out threats and bans to long time users? Too entitled for their own good and really unprofessional,IMO. If every thread is like that with him around, I'm glad i didn't sign up for HardOCP,they must be a niche forum for a good reason also since they apparently need Patreon to stick around.

Kyle seems just fine discussing contracts and such,but flips his sh*t at the mention of any legal discussion,which i'm sure they're afraid of after publishing something that seems more like fearmongering sensationalism when there isn't any proof to back up his claims.

 

Other user, singular. Sith'ari. If he's the person I'm thinking of, he's had similar issues in the past as well.

 

No, they don't need Patreon to stick around. People have been asking Kyle to do a Patreon since Patreon was a thing. If you look at the Patreon it has exactly one post and the part where people put stuff to "sell" the Patreon says "HardOCP and HardForum users have been asking for a way to help offset our revenue losses due to ad blocking and many have specifically asked for us to set up a Patreon account, so here it is!" And they have exactly one pre-set funding level: $1. With a funding reward of "No reward, I just want to support HardOCP.com & HardForum.com". No funding goals, nothing.

 

Kyle tends to "flip his shit" most times one of his topics starting getting dragged off into random tangents for several pages thanks to one or two people posting the same thing over and over again. The forum, especially the news section, really isn't a place for random multi-page tangents. Kyle's a hard ass about stuff, but no he doesn't ban people for disagreeing with him. I would have been banned years ago if he did. So would over half the forum. There's a difference between disagreeing and taking over a topic because you're not willing to just stop for a moment and let an argument end when it reaches a natural end point. I can sympathize with razor's passion on things and not wanting to stop when you feel you are right and totally justified, but sometimes it is important to take a step back and go "Okay, I've drug this one for several pages now maybe its time to stop".

[Derangel]

51 minutes ago, mr moose said:

 

In my eyes it is a massive claim and one that I highly doubt Nvidia will be able to bury if true.  Such things are not easy to keep under wraps (not even Intel with their position and money could keep it under wraps). As such things will surface and for that reason I highly doubt Nvidias legal team signed off on such a deal.   I also think the AIB partners will slowly leak info if they feel they are being unfairly blackmailed.   Asus tried to throw Intel under the bus with the CL 1151 deal even though nothing has come of it. Either they felt it was hurting their bottom line or they just wanted to cash in on some easy limelight.    3 things in all this that people may have not thought about,  1, if it's true and nvidia are doing it but have enough power to stop people talking about it then we will no longer see any ROG AMD cards. Just like AMD laptops and pre-builts were almost impossible to find when Intel played their game.  2. if it slips quitely into the night and nothing changes on the consumer choice front, then it probably never happened.  and 3. Didn't Kyle claim there were lawsuits in the process? if so once they start you can't hide them, so a filing will have to be made somewhere.  Until one of these 3 things happen all we have is Kyle's words.

 

I haven't read any real positive articles on GPP except form Nvidia themselves (I'll take that as I take anything direct from a company).  Nor have I read any articles disparaging HardOCP.  They  might be out there, but as I said, if it isn't evidence then it's just hearsay and that is nothing to me.

Saw something on Twitter earlier talking about it and now I can't find the tweet. I thought it referenced Digitimes, but I don't see anything there. And none of the people I follow on Twitter have glossed over it. I actually really liked Paul and (Bitwit) Kyle's take on it. Regardless, it is good people are talking about this right now. Either it will turn out to be nothing or something big will come from it. I hope Gamer's Nexus or someone else with solid contacts and no absolutely no care about being blacklisted will be able to get some off-the-record information to share because its pretty unlikely that anyone will give on-the-record things right now, or ever.

[MetEishYa]

Quote

In order to have access to the GPP program, its partners must have its "Gaming Brand Aligned Exclusively With GeForce."

If this is true this is extremely bad.

If i read this right this is not exclusive to Graphics cards. Which means that if some on like Asus does a ROG/Strix Geforce Card not only can they not do a ROG/Strix AMD card but they cannot do ROG/Strix Intel or AMD Motherboards, ROG/Strix peripherals, non-gysnc ROG screens etc since ROG/Strix must be exclusive with Geforce. Same for Gigabyte and the aorus line. MSI and there gaming line and all AIBs.

This would also mean OEMs like dell (alienware), lenovo (legion), hp (omen) etc cannot have AMD Gpus.

 

 

 

[Razor01]

13 hours ago, Derangel said:

He didn't ban you for pointing out mistakes. He warned you, multiple times, to stop basically reiterating the same thing ad nasuem. You didn't stop. He told people to take the legal debate to another thread, you didn't. You also completely ignored what he had said to you regarding lawsuits and decided to say you don't believe anything he has to say in the article anyway. You've been around [H] a few years longer than me, you should know by now that when Kyle tells you to knock something off or to calm down, you do so. Its not like it was the first time he got after you for doing the same thing. I like a lot of the stuff you post over there, especially when you start to dive deep into GPU stuff, but you do have a habit of not letting go when you get your teeth around something. You're passionate about a lot of the stuff I've seen you talk about, but that does lead to you not letting go easily. It was bound to bite you in the ass eventually.

 

 

He did, I pmed him prior to posting that up, he was fully aware what I was going to do.  He said go ahead and do it, he would appreciate it.

 

Not only that I have seen him numerous times do this to others, he once banned a person for taking a stance against him, he banned him because his SIGNATURE was too long! But he was pissed off the person showed him up.

 

At this point I didn't care because I know how Kyle thinks and how he reacts, he was going to do it anyways.  He would have found another reason that was moot to ban me.  Kyle behaves like a kid when he gets shoved up against a wall.  Look at this, about 12 years ago, when Kyle was doing his whole "new" benchmark procedures about best playable settings, I argued with him, having both highest playable settings and equal settings is the best way to go because they give different data to the end users to compare and contrast, he almost banned me for that, probably would have gotten banned if I didn't have a vacation for a week.  He doesn't understand not everyone needs to like what he does 100%, people are in their right to criticize his works based on the knowledge they have.  Oddly enough he doesn't know law doesn't change, procedures in law never change, unless the precedent is changed, which is not easy to do, it must come from the public to change the precedent and public is slow to change.  Even though he was sued once before.  How could he not know a cease and desist order which he would have received when he got sued for writing supposed wrong in the past, was due to an injunction.  He doesn't even know things that he has 1st hand experience in.  That tells me a lot about him.

 

Kyle doesn't like it when he gets shown up.  He made a huge mistake Derangel, and if that comment of exclusive gaming brand is read wrong or interpreted wrong.  Kyle is kinda screwed.  He didn't even know advertising was protected by the 1st amendment and why foreign companies selling in the US kinda need to know what they can and cannot do when it comes to branding or co branding or sub branding.  I'm sorry but Kyle's experience in the tech world, stinks when it comes to the laws and procedures of advertising, and I can definitely state he doesn't know shit about tort law.  Come  on a guy that goes out and think law suits happen with out the procedure I suggested which all attorneys know companies should never go to the public to plead their case. Those were just the basic stuff I was talking about, there are ways AMD could crush nV on this if they had that contract in hand and it is exactly how Kyle states.  If Kyle has that contract in hand you bet AMD has it too.  If AMD has them they wouldn't need to go to Kyle or even go to the press as it seriously weakens their position in court.  So which is it they have enough in to get the injunctions or go to trial?  If they had those contracts in hand, where are the injunctions?  Those are public records, I haven't seen any in Cali, or Texas, where they will be filled.....  By even filling we can see it on the supreme court website.   As I stated I think AMD has the contracts, since Kyle was able to get his hands on them, so if AMD has then, they read them and there is nothing they can do about them.

 

Sorry Kyle's assumptions about impending lawsuits, are so far unjustifiably. Kitguru also asked nV about this, and they were pointed to an article that states that nV only wants separate gaming lines for AMD and nV products.  The problem with this is if that's the case, Kyle took out the context of what the line he showed us was, there must be bullet points or definitions that weren't shown.  If Kyle didn't know how to read the contract properly it would throw everything he stated out the window.  Contract speak looks straight forward at times but there could be stipulations stated before and after that change meaning of something that is written.

 

Ah he stated in the video, AGREED GAMING BRAND, when skimming through the contract lol. See that changes the meaning of exclusive gaming brand.  We don't know what agreed gaming brand is now! Because there is no context on that.

 

Now THIS IS COMPLETELY LEGAL, I gave an example of Air Jordan and Nike here.  It is completely legal for Mj to pull Air Jordan from Nike if he feels he doesn't like what Nike is doing, guess what that is why Nike gave Air Jordan to MJ......  Does Nike want to loose 8% of their total sales just because they have a fight with their most powerful brand owner?  Its only 8% right?  Not much, we aren't talking about 8% here, we are talking 70% or more.

 

Yeah OEM's and AIB's are shit scared because nV can pull their cards from them, they have the market power to do just that.  All the other hoopla and drama of AMD leaking this story to Kyle and other websites, so far is baseless BS.  I can pretty much say my conjecture of AMD not taking this to court and getting an ex parte injunction ( nV wouldn't even know about it till its too late), would take the time it to go in front of a judge, this type of injunction survives till information is found to be real or fraudulent that means nV would not be able to use the GPP till that injunction is lifted.  They don't need to go to trial, if the injunction is found to have relevant damages then they go to trial.  That is what takes a butt load of time, not the injunction.

 

This means, A) either AMD doesn't have the contract or B) they have the contract and there is nothing they can do about it. We know the AIB's have the contract right lol.

 

Did you notice Kyle didn't answer my logic question.  Do you know that question is given to first year law students lol, its also repeated in specialization of contract law.  Its a simple math problem.  But there are significant meaning behind it when talking about law.  He hates it when people get the upper hand on him and points out flaws in his articles.  First off he knows who the hell he is talking to.  I don't back down and if people keep repeating the wrong things for too long, they become the truth.  That is how our society works, that is why I don't back down.  We have a mass of idiots online today, that would not have a word or public opinion without the internet.  We have superstars that think the world is flat and say it on national TV lol.  Come on we let people like that keep sayings things over and over, more idiots will start believing other idiots.

 

This is what Kyle didn't know about me and I doubt anyone on [H], I don't have a law degree, but most people in my position as Sr. Producer are lawyers!  I had to take courses in law to keep up with these guys.  I needed to know contract law and legalese.  I work with these things on a daily basis.  Kyle thinks I know too much about too many things, guess what, as a producer I need to know what the hell everyone in my project is doing (artwork, music, technology, you name it I have to know about it, and know the impacts of changing any part will hurt or help a project, from legal side of things and from day to day work because there could be time, resources, money implications which all go back to the client and the contract).  I also will kick the client in the ass if I have to, because I'm the one that helps write up the contracts with our in house attorneys with the client's attorneys, that is why I know so many things about everything.  When CTO or CFO comes to my boss about budgets, and what not about my projects, shit I better know everything, because its my ass on the line if I don't know.

 

Keep this in mind, I supported Kyle with this AMD article last time the same way I did with this one, and told any member of his forum that stated otherwise he did make very good points, some points were incorrect as in the licensing part I thought probably wasn't the way he wrote it. He actually tried to pick a fight with me on that one until I explained to him, I knew there as a huge shake up internal with Intel and how their graphics division operated.  There were many people leaving that division to go to other companies too a few months prior to his write up.  He didn't ban me for repeatedly stating those things to other forum members did he?  Nope he gave me lots of likes for those things I stated lol.  Its quite the opposite when it comes to his own thinking.  Small minds think petty man.  If I didn't respect Kyle, I could have told him how stupid he sounds lol, that is the way I say things normally, I tend to be blunt with people that really are idiots.  You saw how he supported others saying those type of things about me right?  I didn't go down that path with Kyle.  Guess what because Kyle doesn't respect his own forum members that go against, him, its his site, its his forum, that is the excuse he gives, and yeah it is, when you are a totalitarian and don't give a shit about anything other than hits.

[Jito463]

On 3/12/2018 at 6:32 PM, Razor01 said:

Look at independent fast food joints, many of them can't have Coke and Pepsi, its one or the other.  I have a friend who is a VP of marketing at Pepsi, she told me that this is the case. 

That's not actually accurate.  It's only forced exclusivity when they get the soda fountain equipment from Pepsi or Coke.  If they purchase that equipment themselves, then they're free to use whomever they wish, including having both options.

 

If the case made at HardOCP is correct, then a more appropriate analogy would be in regards to companies which make the soda fountains.  This would be like Pepsi (as an example) stating that if they want to be a part of their program, then they can only provide Pepsi on machines labeled as Soda Fountains.  If they want to distribute Coke or 7-Up through their machines, they can't be branded as a Soda Fountain.

 

I know, the analogy isn't perfect, but what analogy is?

22 hours ago, mr moose said:

why a smaller company will be more dodgy with their practice

I don't find that to be the case.  I've had more issues with big, nationwide companies than I have with small businesses.  It's why I generally prefer to deal with smaller companies, when given the choice.

 

[Razor01]

12 minutes ago, Jito463 said:

That's not actually accurate.  It's only forced exclusivity when they get the soda fountain equipment from Pepsi or Coke.  If they purchase that equipment themselves, then they're free to use whomever they wish, including having both options.

 

If the case made at HardOCP is correct, then a more appropriate analogy would be in regards to companies which make the soda fountains.  This would be like Pepsi (as an example) stating that if they want to be a part of their program, then they can only provide Pepsi on machines labeled as Soda Fountains.  If they want to distribute Coke or 7-Up through their machines, they can't be branded as a Soda Fountain.

 

I know, the analogy isn't perfect, but what analogy is?

I don't find that to be the case.  I've had more issues with big, nationwide companies than I have with small businesses.  It's why I generally prefer to deal with smaller companies, when given the choice.

 

 

 

They get other benefits when doing that though the price of the product is less too. So there are benefits to the exclusivity.

 

This is the same with GPP, what nV wants is a separate brand for their products.  Without the context of what Gaming branded aligned is, we can not make a determination on what Kyle stated.  He stated that was the CRUX of the problem.  Guess what in the video where he talks with full nerd he muttered something else while skimming the contract that gives more insight to that. 

[mr moose]

13 hours ago, Derangel said:

Saw something on Twitter earlier talking about it and now I can't find the tweet. I thought it referenced Digitimes, but I don't see anything there. And none of the people I follow on Twitter have glossed over it. I actually really liked Paul and (Bitwit) Kyle's take on it. Regardless, it is good people are talking about this right now. Either it will turn out to be nothing or something big will come from it. I hope Gamer's Nexus or someone else with solid contacts and no absolutely no care about being blacklisted will be able to get some off-the-record information to share because its pretty unlikely that anyone will give on-the-record things right now, or ever.

GN couldn't get anything either. 

 

 

 

Steve basically addressed the article and what the article claimed and then said they could not add anything to  the discussion as their contacts would not "open dialogue" with them. 

[Razor01]

28 minutes ago, mr moose said:

GN couldn't get anything either. 

 

 

 

Steve basically addressed the article and what the article claimed and then said they could not add anything to  the discussion as their contacts would not "open dialogue" with them. 

 

 

My problem with the GPP is the MDF, that is where nV can do many thing if they wanted to, just like Intel did, but most likely those benefits or anti competitive requirements are not even spelled out in the GPP contract, because there is no need to have them there.  The possibility for nV in the future to do the things that Kyle thinks can happen, yeah I see it and totally agree with it.  Outside of that, his view is basically BS.  He took AMD's hook line and sinker on this one.  Until nV crosses that line with MDF, there is no such thing as going after them, so his assumption lawsuits are pending is utter crap. 

[Derangel]

32 minutes ago, Razor01 said:

 

 

My problem with the GPP is the MDF, that is where nV can do many thing if they wanted to, just like Intel did, but most likely those benefits or anti competitive requirements are not even spelled out in the GPP contract, because there is no need to have them there.  The possibility for nV in the future to do the things that Kyle thinks can happen, yeah I see it and totally agree with it.  Outside of that, his view is basically BS.  He took AMD's hook line and sinker on this one.  Until nV crosses that line with MDF, there is no such thing as going after them, so his assumption lawsuits are pending is utter crap. 

 

Yeah, MDF could be a big problem. If the terms mean AIBs are not allowed to market AMD cards as "gaming" it could also cause some potential legal issues. Hard to say though. That could be a real tricky situation. If its just segregating the brands to create more clear differences between AMD and Nvidia cards then I don't think it would cause too much legal trouble, at least nothing Nvidia couldn't win. Most of the rest of GPP is kind of shitty and immoral, but that's par for the course for everyone in the tech industry. Intel, Nvidia, AMD, ASUS, etc, etc, etc, no one cares about the morality of their decisions as long as it brings them money.

 

Jay put up a video talking about his perspective on GPP: 

 

Fairly balanced take on everything and he does a good job going over all of it and his thoughts on things. Like Gamer's Nexus he couldn't get anything out of AIBs. Its all radio silence since Kyle's article.

[Razor01]

Just now, Derangel said:

 

Yeah, MDF could be a big problem. If the terms mean AIBs are not allowed to market AMD cards as "gaming" it could also cause some potential legal issues. Hard to say though. That could be a real tricky situation. If its just segregating the brands to create more clear differences between AMD and Nvidia cards then I don't think it would cause too much legal trouble, at least nothing Nvidia couldn't win. Most of the rest of GPP is kind of shitty and immoral, but that's par for the course for everyone in the tech industry. Intel, Nvidia, AMD, ASUS, etc, etc, etc, no one cares about the morality of their decisions as long as it brings them money.

 

Jay put up a video talking about his perspective on GPP: 

 

Fairly balanced take on everything and he does a good job going over all of it and his thoughts on things. Like Gamer's Nexus he couldn't get anything out of AIBs. Its all radio silence since Kyle's article.

 

 

The MDF isn't talked about in the contract that Kyle has the ins and outs of it, so there isn't a way to really talk about that here.  Which sucks lol.

 

The branding that is spelled out in the contact, and Kyle didn't tell us what it was.   Exclusive gaming brand could have been used as an annotated definition with its definition being different than what we are assuming it is. I don't think he read it right, or is taking something way out of context, nV is pointing other sites as they want an exclusive brand for nV products, let be ROG, Strix, or what ever, it can be called anything doesn't mean the current gaming brand. 

[AlTech]

 

It seems Nvidia is fighting back.

[Razor01]

I think they are going to sue [H]

 

The reason they don't want any other site reporting on it other than to point to H's findings, is because suing multiple defendants always makes the case a bit more tricky, because, each defendant has their our attorney, so for everything being done in court, there will be x times the amount of things done for the amount of defendants there are.

[Notional]

3 hours ago, AluminiumTech said:

 

It seems Nvidia is fighting back.

When a company threatens sites like that, you know something scummy is up. Especially when put together with the propaganda language of using "transparent" over and over again in the official announcement. There is nothing transparent about this program. On the contrary, NVidia is actively trying to silence both vendors and journalists. Too bad the latter won't do their jobs out of fear.

[Razor01]

29 minutes ago, Notional said:

When a company threatens sites like that, you know something scummy is up. Especially when put together with the propaganda language of using "transparent" over and over again in the official announcement. There is nothing transparent about this program. On the contrary, NVidia is actively trying to silence both vendors and journalists. Too bad the latter won't do their jobs out of fear.

 

I think its quite the contrary, they want other sites to link to and point to [H], they want people to see what Kyle wrote lol and of course they want the other sites to back nV, gives them more firepower.  They are playing a game of chess and trying to get an upper hand for their next step.

 

If something makes them look bad in our eyes or press's eyes, and the press doesn't have enough info by themselves to do any further damages, all they can really do is enumerate what Kyle has written so far, the press will continue to do that with our without commentary.

 

Things like this, we have to look at what each party would gain from possible outcomes.  Why would nV sitting around and asking other press to bad mouth Kyle and point to his article while doing so?   nV has no control of the story when doing so.  It damages their cause.  Those other press don't need to listen to nV at all.

 

Either way its a big bad corporation vs the innocent journalists right?  That is how the courts take it.  Doesn't matter what nV acts like, they are always at the short end of the stick when it comes to court cases such as these. 

 

My theory is they are actively trying to separate Kyle and [H] from the other journalists.

 

We have seen it in the past before, when one journalist is attacked many journalists come together. nV doesn't want this as explained above it makes the case much more complicated.

[Notional]

13 minutes ago, Razor01 said:

Snip

 

I don't get any of your points at all. If Kyle is completely off the rails, NVidia could simply go out publicly and state that he is wrong. Not only has Nvidia not done so (despite their claims of complete transparency), but they are indirectly threatening other sites to not write negatively or questioning about this program. What? Furthermore, the vendors are threatened to the point, where no other site can even get off the record statements from them. Not even what is publicly available. 

 

If this was a non issue, a lie from Kyle, then it would be simple and easy to put it to rest. Nvidia has not done so. That speaks volumes. As others have stated, this cartel behaviour might be outright illegal. That is what NVidia has to gain by silencing this.

[Razor01]

1 hour ago, Notional said:

I don't get any of your points at all. If Kyle is completely off the rails, NVidia could simply go out publicly and state that he is wrong. Not only has Nvidia not done so (despite their claims of complete transparency), but they are indirectly threatening other sites to not write negatively or questioning about this program. What? Furthermore, the vendors are threatened to the point, where no other site can even get off the record statements from them. Not even what is publicly available. 

 

If this was a non issue, a lie from Kyle, then it would be simple and easy to put it to rest. Nvidia has not done so. That speaks volumes. As others have stated, this cartel behaviour might be outright illegal. That is what NVidia has to gain by silencing this.

Business contracts are never for public consumption.  Sorry there is no such thing as transparency for contracts like this.  Kyle even took that out of context.  Transparency of GPP is not transparency of the business dealings, its transparency of the hardware being sold to the consumer.

 

When a company talks about transparency to the general public when releasing a product, they don't talk about how many seals it might kill because of where chemicals where dumped or region it made in lol.

 

Vendors are shit scared of nV, explained above, nV has total market dominance right now and they are asking AIB's well more like telling them, get in line with GPP or else.  They don't have a choice.  They don't do it they get screwed by the other AIB's that do do it.  If no multi branded AIB does it they are all screwed, because EVGA which is nV's biggest AIB, then PNY second largest, both are exclusive to nV take home the bacon.  It doesn't matter if those multi vendor AIB's are there or not for nV. 

 

In a court of law its not if something is correct or right its who can weave the better story and sway the jury.  The corporation is always starting off at a low point with cases like this.  Its always assumed the Journalist is correct to begin with because he is a "seeker of truth"

[WMGroomAK]

I'm just going to toss this out here as some of my thoughts but I see impacts to OEMs as just as big, if not potentially bigger than AIB impacts...  If an OEM needs to have the gaming brand aligned with nVidia, this would be a fairly significant impact as most OEMs maintain only a single established gaming brand.  In addition, if we assume or it is proven that these kind of partnership agreements are legal for dGPUs, then it may not take much more for Intel to pursue a similar path for CPUs.  I could see Intel wanting to form 'partnership' agreements with OEMs that basically say that they must align their Gaming brands with Core i Series processors and workstations with Xeon processors.  

[Razor01]

Yeah its potential will impact OEM's too.

 

Intel can ask for the same too, but with their history of abuse it might not go well for them and most likely won't.

[MegaTechPC]

Seems pretty anti-competitive to me if true.  I mean, basically Nvidia is trying to force Asus (for example) to ONLY sell their ROG-branded video cards with GeForce GPU's in them by denying them the typical perks they've always gotten from Nvidia before unless they sign up to GPP.  Asus can still sell AMD cards but NOT under the ROG brand, which is their most popular gaming brand.  This would be the same with MSI or Gigabyte or whoever.  The really sinister thing about it is that Nvidia knows that, due to their market share position, the AIB's can't afford to jeopardize their GeForce cards and will ditch AMD in a heartbeat if Nvidia makes it more of a financial burden for them not to do so.

 

I personally always buy the high-end AIB specialty cards like the ROG Strix or the MSI Lightning and it would be a real shame if Nvidia got their way so that the only AIB AMD cards you could buy were vanilla reference ones.  Not really sure how anybody can defend this sort of leveraging of AIB partners, if the story is accurate (which of course is not a certainty).