[casual_games] Portals: Room for improvement?

[James Baker - WDDG/Inferno]

> Plus, I have to wonder; if the discount is coming out of the 
> channel's revenue share, why don't instead they spend that 
> money on marketing their site and bringing in new customers? 
> Or on implementing *real* ways of differentiating their 
> offering (such as better customer service, the dynamic 
> retailing that we've talked about here, a kick-ass 
> multiplayer platform, better treatment of developers, a 
> vibrant user community, creative promotions, et cetera)? 
> 

Not to be overly cynical - but I think that the main reason for this is
laziness.  To discount titles all you need to do it much around a bit
with the CMS that runs the site.  To do deals, to better advertise and
to create better promotions takes effort that most of the large portals
are avoiding.