Wii Opens Up a Bit, We All Gain

Game consoles are notorious for being tightly-controlled, closed platforms. So this news, delivered en passant, is a rather significant vote for openness:

On Wednesday morning, Nintendo will officially announce to the general public its plans for WiiWare, downloadable games for the wildly popular Wii videogame console.

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while Nintendo, as the retailer, would itself determine the appropriate pricing for each game on a per-title bases, the games themselves would not be vetted by Nintendo. Instead, Nintendo would only check the games for bugs and compatibility

Clearly, the company has recognised that the loss of control is more than outweighed by the benefit of establishing a flourishing ecosystem around the Wii.