NVIDIA Pulling Plug on GPP

Essentially a large number of you don't like GPP and think it's unethical. That's fine. Not liking something because it doesn't align with your inner sense of morality is not the same as claiming it's objectively illegal.

There are no parallels to be made with the Intel OEM fiasco. Many don't like this the same way many despise gameworks. You're free to hate it all you want, but the moment you start talking crap about 'gimping' and entire underwater worlds engineered specifically to cripple AMD you stumble into fact territory and then it's no longer your opinion but a claim that can and will be argued for/against.

I don't see what precisely is the anti-competitive practice here, there doesn't seem to be one, which appears to upset some people.

If you're unhappy with the legislation governing this then this really isn't the place to voice your discontent, and certainly making a bunch of masturbatory posts attributing various events to your crusade is delusional, people.
 
Essentially a large number of you don't like GPP and think it's unethical. That's fine. Not liking something because it doesn't align with your inner sense of morality is not the same as claiming it's objectively illegal.

There are no parallels to be made with the Intel OEM fiasco. Many don't like this the same way many despise gameworks. You're free to hate it all you want, but the moment you start talking crap about 'gimping' and entire underwater worlds engineered specifically to cripple AMD you stumble into fact territory and then it's no longer your opinion but a claim that can and will be argued for/against.

I don't see what precisely is the anti-competitive practice here, there doesn't seem to be one, which appears to upset some people.

If you're unhappy with the legislation governing this then this really isn't the place to voice your discontent, and certainly making a bunch of masturbatory posts attributing various events to your crusade is delusional, people.
Gameworks has been far more hated and negatively reported on, but was never pulled. Why do you think they pulled GPP? Not because partners and competitors could seek legal action against them? Because of their altruism?
 
Gameworks has been far more hated and negatively reported on, but was never pulled.

Gameworks is a standards-compliant technology that runs on DX and probably Vulcan in the future. Like Intel's underhandedness, the comparison to the GPP is so superficial as to not be of any real utility.
 
Essentially a large number of you don't like GPP and think it's unethical. That's fine. Not liking something because it doesn't align with your inner sense of morality is not the same as claiming it's objectively illegal.

This isn't a moral question. The primary issue at hand was whether or not GPP was anti competitive and anti consumer. And it was destined to become a legal matter because nVidia was probably going to get sued.
 
Essentially a large number of you don't like GPP and think it's unethical. That's fine. Not liking something because it doesn't align with your inner sense of morality is not the same as claiming it's objectively illegal.

There are no parallels to be made with the Intel OEM fiasco. Many don't like this the same way many despise gameworks. You're free to hate it all you want, but the moment you start talking crap about 'gimping' and entire underwater worlds engineered specifically to cripple AMD you stumble into fact territory and then it's no longer your opinion but a claim that can and will be argued for/against.

I don't see what precisely is the anti-competitive practice here, there doesn't seem to be one, which appears to upset some people.

If you're unhappy with the legislation governing this then this really isn't the place to voice your discontent, and certainly making a bunch of masturbatory posts attributing various events to your crusade is delusional, people.

So, this is this first post you make after you come off you vacay? I will take Scott Herkelman and Kyle Bennett's point of views as being far more in the know than anything you could ever provide. I am grateful that it was exposed for exactly what it was.
 
I will take Scott Herkelman and Kyle Bennett's point of views as being far more in the know than anything you could ever provide. I am grateful that it was exposed for exactly what it was.

GPP was an attempt for nVidia to control its partners up and down the chain. From supply to retail packaging. There's no way that kind of power from one company was good for anyone but that one company.
 
Gameworks is a standards-compliant technology that runs on DX and probably Vulcan in the future. Like Intel's underhandedness, the comparison to the GPP is so superficial as to not be of any real utility.
Exactly! It's much more hated and receives way more backlash from the consumers, yet it's still here because it's not in the same league of being anticompetitive and potentially illegal. Hence, the reasons for GPP's cancellation are far more serious that the stated PR crap that some are going by here.
 
Exactly! It's much more hated and receives way more backlash from the consumers, yet it's still here because it's not in the same league of being anticompetitive and potentially illegal. Hence, the reasons for GPP's cancellation are far more serious that the stated PR crap that some are going by here.
likely due to how they slapped their logo over every single game that has it?
 
The reason for the cancellation was the backlash, earned and otherwise.

Maybe some of the backlash wasn't earned but nVidia did itself no favors in completely failing to communicate publicly on what GPP was and how it was supposed to help consumers. For a program that was supposedly about transparency, the lack of communication from nVidia was a clear red flag that they simply didn't want to talk about it and just wanted partners to fall in line. The notion that there is some profound confusion among consumers over what they are buying is nonsense. The biggest confusion in the GPU market comes from nVidia and also AMD with constant rebranding of existing parts.

If the problem that nVidia stated was really a problem, OEMs and AIBs would have long ago done something because this kind of confusion would have cause a return issue for nVidia's partners. nVidia's partners wouldn't have been eating high return rate costs over brand confusion and not worked out some kind of solution well before now.

GPP failed scrutiny at every level. nVidia was nearly silent about it. The problem nVidia was trying to solve never existed. nVidia's partners apparently hated the thing across the board. And what were supposed to be the benefits to consumers?
 
Your assessment of GPP doesn't even align with what actually happened. An AMD gaming card was introduced by Asus, a GPP partner.

You don't know about any other anti-competitive policies because no-one is bothering to report on them, not because they don't exist. Many people you claim are justifying GPP are the same people telling you unequivocally that it occurs in most business, a fact you conviently ignore.

The fact that AMD was still "allowed" to sell GPUs to AIBs doesn't make the GPP legal.

I think this thread has been over this a few times... Intel comes up as a direct comparison. Because it is a direct comparison. Intel likewise never contractually obligated anyone to not sell AMD parts. The contracts Intel was fined over 2 billion in total over offered their partners support, preferred shipments, and cash in the form of Marketing dollars. Not to keep AMD out completely but to provide Intel with exclusive access to the premium brands. Its why back in the 90s even though all us Geeks knew if you wanted the fastest machine you bought AMD... average consumers still couldn't go to a store and buy a Premium AMD machine. They could go and buy a ton of cheapo AMD Duron(I had to go look that name up lol) and Athlons attached to low end skus with otherwise pretty cheap parts.

That was ruled to be highly illegal.. which is why Intel got fined. (eventually again its been covered here but it took years of legal wrangling)

In this case Nv would seem to be guilty of the exact same thing. Crafting contracts that don't say don't sell anyone else. However we demand Nvidia be your sole High end part supplier. The Gaming brands are clearly the premium lines. If you sign on we will give you preferred access to stock, enhanced engineering support, oh and MONEY in the form of marketing funds. This all sounds very very much like the illegal Intel contracts.

The type of contracts people bring up with Coke/Pepsi ect where exclusive contracts are allowed within reason are not even close to the same thing. Those don't involve outside branding. Coke suppliers are not spending millions building their own brand.... they are simply selling Coke or Pepsi and the brand they built directly. In the case of the tech market there is the NV / AMD / Intel brands and there are also the AIB brands like ROG. Companies like Asus are not simply filling a shelf with NV or AMDs brand, they are putting those parts into a finished product which uses a brand they built. They invested in, they designed, they marketed (with co funds from ALL the players including AMD believe it or not).

It has also been said at this point... but If Nvidia was honest and they simply wanted transparency. They could have PAID the AIBs to create new Nvidia only brands. That is 100% legal. They could say don't market anything but us under this new brand. That isn't of course what they did... because the truth is creating a new brand from nothing is expensive and time consuming.

That is why using a superior market position to demand another companies established brand is no doubt going to be ruled illegal if it ends up in court. Nvidias actions would have cost their competition directly in terms of $. Exact figures of marketing spend could easily be brought into court. AIBs would be deposed for years about how much money they had spent to build new brands... how much marketing funds they had taken from say AMD prior to booting them from those product lines. Ect ect ect.

Another long post but the main points to make here.
1) in this market their are 2 levels of branding going on. (unlike say the coke example) The part suppliers and the end product suppliers.
2) the closest to end user branding of the AIBs is not owned by their suppliers, and over the years those brands have been directly marketed with co-funded marketing $ from EVERYONE... not just NV.
3) a contract can be illegal even if it doesn't say DO NOT SELL the competitions part. A contract that demands premium position can be illegal.
4) Intentions matter more then words in these types of things... which is why Nvidias AIBs would end up being deposed for years. Emails would be demanded ect ect. As they where in the Intel case... the reason that happens. Is because the lawyers are looking for INTENT. It doesn't matter if Nvidia says X or Y and their contract doesn't spell something out exactly... if say a AMD or Intel legal team was to uncover one email sent by one mid level Nvidia person to a AIB that makes clear intent beyond the wording of the contract. A judge can rule based on that. (I have used this example before but people I think seem to understand it... consider the Trump travel restrictions and all the legal trouble there, its not the wording that matters its the intent that matters to a court)
 
Pretty sure the actual illegal part that Intel was fined for was actually preventing AMD CPUs from shipping in Dells.

Which is quite obviously not what Nvidia was doing here.

Dell was one of many companies deposed and part of the ruling. Dell choose to not sell AMD. Intels defence was always.... "we never said don't, we never wrote down don't". However they structured their rebates based on % of overall shipped Intel parts. Yes that is a bit worse then simple marketing funds. Having said that other OEMs they dealt with such as HP did ship AMD parts, and in those cases Intel did pay for premium brand placement via marketing funds. In general if you give a large company a choice of a rebate or a marketing program they will choose the marketing funds... they can use marketing funds to licence their own brands from subsidiaries they incorporate off shore in elaborate tax evasion schemes. Its why most companies don't actually own things like their logos, they tend to ensure logos, slogans and the like are owned by X company international incorporated in the isle of man ect.
 
I can bet you a pretty penny if AMD pulled shit like GPP, Kyle would be all over it and it wont go silently
That could never happen because AMD informed Kyle about Nvidias GPP. But now since Nvidia is no longer talking to Kyle there would be no one to rat out AMD if they started their own RedGPUsMatter secret campaign.;)
 
Dell was one of many companies deposed and part of the ruling. Dell choose to not sell AMD. Intels defence was always.... "we never said don't, we never wrote down don't". However they structured their rebates based on % of overall shipped Intel parts. Yes that is a bit worse then simple marketing funds. Having said that other OEMs they dealt with such as HP did ship AMD parts, and in those cases Intel did pay for premium brand placement via marketing funds. In general if you give a large company a choice of a rebate or a marketing program they will choose the marketing funds... they can use marketing funds to licence their own brands from subsidiaries they incorporate off shore in elaborate tax evasion schemes. Its why most companies don't actually own things like their logos, they tend to ensure logos, slogans and the like are owned by X company international incorporated in the isle of man ect.

So you understand how this isn't anything like the GPP then, good!
 
13 pages of boiler room barristers and counting.

There where rooms full of practicing barristers out there licking their chops at the thought of all the billable hours they where going to get out of AMD Intel and NV as well if the GPP hadn't been shelved. No doubt. lol
 
So you understand how this isn't anything like the GPP then, good!

Identical in fact. Marketing funds for premium placement. Identical. The Intel case didn't revolve around Dell and Dell alone. Dell was run by morons who took rebates over marketing funds, the companies that took the marketing payments where the actual evil companies. They are the ones that have all those years of profits off shore... as they licensed their own brands from their international arms, and used Intels marketing program funds to more easily do it.
 
Only if you completely ignore reality, including what you posted further above :ROFLMAO:

How much did Intel have to pay out to AMD over this? Perhaps GPP was going done this road but it never came close to that kind of outcome. So by the definition of reality, not the same.
 
How much did Intel have to pay out to AMD over this? Perhaps GPP was going done this road but it never came close to that kind of outcome. So by the definition of reality, not the same.

If the terms and conditions of the GPP are similar or the same as Intel's, then by the definition of reality... That's stupid, so by the definition of literally, it would be the same. As none of us have seen the document, it's all moot and just a bunch of nerds arguing on the internet. Again, lots of boiler room barristers here.
 
Again, lots of boiler room barristers here.

The Intel case went to court. GPP didn't. It's reasonable to say that the two practices were similar but in no way shape or form the same because one went through litigation and the other didn't, or at least hasn't.

GPP was horrible from what I've gathered. But it simply doesn't approach the issue of the Intel case because GPP didn't go to court. And as much as Kyle did on this, litigation from the likes Dell and HP is probably the thing nVidia feared the most. With possibly AMD jumping in.
 
Essentially a large number of you don't like GPP and think it's unethical. That's fine. Not liking something because it doesn't align with your inner sense of morality is not the same as claiming it's objectively illegal.

There are no parallels to be made with the Intel OEM fiasco. Many don't like this the same way many despise gameworks. You're free to hate it all you want, but the moment you start talking crap about 'gimping' and entire underwater worlds engineered specifically to cripple AMD you stumble into fact territory and then it's no longer your opinion but a claim that can and will be argued for/against.

I don't see what precisely is the anti-competitive practice here, there doesn't seem to be one, which appears to upset some people.

If you're unhappy with the legislation governing this then this really isn't the place to voice your discontent, and certainly making a bunch of masturbatory posts attributing various events to your crusade is delusional, people.

Man I have no idea why you defend nvidia like you are their personal lawyer. May be you are. It is anti competitive. If it wasn't nvidia wouldn't have shut it down. Period! There is more to the story. I do firmly believe when major OEMs like Dell and HP gave nvidia the middle finger and told them to F off. That might have been the end of it.

You don't see any problem here? Its not all about people's feeling. Nvidia wants OEMs and AIBs to align their gaming brand to only nvidia gpus. Meaning anything AMD in it can not be considered their gaming brand. That was what was wrong with Nvidia. That is definition of Anti competitive behavior. Gigabyte was already saying they are changing AMD branding becuase they don't consider them their gaming brand. So hey if you want something for gaming its Nvidia only if you got AMD we won't call it gaming.

ASUS, MSI, Gigabyte probably didn't have enough pull and I think when Major OEMs gave nvidia the no, it went down from there. No this has nothing to do with gameworks, its not even remotely same. Just to make this about morality is purely taking sides. We need less fanboyism and more realism.

Nvidia pulled it before they had to go to court over it. Its as simple as that. Good move on their part. I think they were facing major opposition from big OEMs.
 
That could never happen because AMD informed Kyle about Nvidias GPP. But now since Nvidia is no longer talking to Kyle there would be no one to rat out AMD if they started their own RedGPUsMatter secret campaign.;)

I think kyle looked in to it. I highly doubt AMD was the sources kyle was talking about. They were likely AIB partners. When kyle broke out Raja/Intel, Intel using AMD GPUs onboard. Also how polaris was a mess, I highly doubt it was Nvidia feeding the. So I dont think Kyle needs Nvidia to feed him anything about AMD. He has enough sources within AMD I think lol.
 
The Intel case went to court. GPP didn't. It's reasonable to say that the two practices were similar but in no way shape or form the same because one went through litigation and the other didn't, or at least hasn't.

GPP was horrible from what I've gathered. But it simply doesn't approach the issue of the Intel case because GPP didn't go to court. And as much as Kyle did on this, litigation from the likes Dell and HP is probably the thing nVidia feared the most. With possibly AMD jumping in.

Court is moot, nVidia pulled the plug prior to getting to court, and may still end up their.

Why is court moot? Because the underlying document, the contract, is what is relevant. Lack of legal challenge could be nothing more than Nvidia pulling the plug, making legal challenge less economically viable.
 
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We had AMD cards from GPP partners very clearly marked as 'gaming', so this is false.

Nvidia clearly states their gaming brand will be aligned with nvidia cards. Gigabyte rep said they were changing the the branding because AMD cards are not considered their gaming brand.

Nvidia clearly wanted their gaming brands aligned to their cards. So No AIBs could claim otherwise regardless of what the box says. Gaming Brand exclusively aligned with Nvidia was the main sticking point of GPP.

This is an exceedingly poor argument. We can't really ever know why Nvidia shut it down, just that they did.

Okay I get it, but to say oh nvidia never got in to legal trouble for it because they shut it down is equally wrong. You or I don't know why. If people taking nvidia's side can make that claim, I can make the claim from the other side. Sorry can't have one way and not the other.
 
Court is moot, nVidia pulled the plug prior to getting to court, and may still end up their.

At this point GPP is nothing more than a failed something. Losing in court is very public and very humiliating and expensive if you loose.

I agree that there may be some legal issues over this. But nVidia saw the writing on the wall and backed down. Intel didn't. That's way comparing these two situations and saying they are the same makes no sense.
 
Okay I get it, but to say oh nvidia never got in to legal trouble for it because they shut it down is equally wrong.

They shut it down at least in part to AVOID legal trouble. No doubt nVidia considered the Intel case and they took a much different approach when confronted than Intel. I'm not giving nVidia points on this but that makes the two situation much different.

Everyone here is assuming that nVidia would have lost a court battle over GPP and I agree. But that could have possibly won. And boy that's fucking scary. But they didn't chance it. Again, big difference in these two specific cases.
 
At this point GPP is nothing more than a failed something. Losing in court is very public and very humiliating and expensive if you loose.

I agree that there may be some legal issues over this. But nVidia saw the writing on the wall and backed down. Intel didn't. That's way comparing these two situations and saying they are the same makes no sense.

Your agreement is not needed, what is the underlying contract, that is all that legally matters.
 
They shut it down at least in part to AVOID legal trouble. No doubt nVidia considered the Intel case and they took a much different approach when confronted than Intel. I'm not giving nVidia points on this but that makes the two situation much different.

Everyone here is assuming that nVidia would have lost a court battle over GPP and I agree. But that could have possibly won. And boy that's fucking scary. But they didn't chance it. Again, big difference in these two specific cases.

Yes you are write but you have people claiming here that nvidia did nothing illegal because they didn't go to court for it. So people don't have any right to say GPP was illegal. Some how its become about peoples feelings about nvidia and GPP was just regular business practice.
 
Nvidia clearly states their gaming brand will be aligned with nvidia cards. Gigabyte rep said they were changing the the branding because AMD cards are not considered their gaming brand.

Nvidia clearly wanted their gaming brands aligned to their cards. So No AIBs could claim otherwise regardless of what the box says. Gaming Brand exclusively aligned with Nvidia was the main sticking point of GPP.

And yet 'gaming brand exclusively aligned' didn't happen. Quite clearly.

Okay I get it, but to say oh nvidia never got in to legal trouble for it because they shut it down is equally wrong. You or I don't know why. If people taking nvidia's side can make that claim, I can make the claim from the other side. Sorry can't have one way and not the other.

Neither side can make the claim. To make a counter claim yourself and then say 'I did it because they did it!' undermines your position.
 
And yet 'gaming brand exclusively aligned' didn't happen. Quite clearly.



Neither side can make the claim. To make a counter claim yourself and then say 'I did it because they did it!' undermines your position.

Well they shut the program down. I can bet it was because big OEM refused to hand over their gaming brand and machines to Nvidia. I think that's what happened here. Two wrongs don't make a right, you are right about that. But getting tired of some people here claiming that hey nothing illegal happened because Nvidia never went to court. Matter shut. Its like people are making it black and white.

I think Nvidia saw legal battle coming and they likely thought if they didn't have major OEMs on board. It will look very bad publicly and humiliating. So they pulled the plug. The Silence fro Nvidia on GPP was spoke loudly lol. I think they didn't even want people to know about it's existence.
 
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Yes you are write but you have people claiming here that nvidia did nothing illegal because they didn't go to court for it. So people don't have any right to say GPP was illegal. Some how its become about peoples feelings about nvidia and GPP was just regular business practice.

Anti-trust stuff is grey, not black and white like say murder. And even murder must be proven in court; you can have the laws, but unless you can show that Nvidia did the exact same thing that someone else did and that someone else was judged guilty, you cannot make the claim that what Nvidia did was 'illegal'. You can certainly claim that it was wrong or potentially unlawful, just not illegal, since there is no support for that position.
 
I think Nvidia saw legal battle coming and they likely thought if they didn't have major OEMs on board. It will look very bad publicly and humiliating. So they pulled the plug.

I won't disagree with this, though my personal opinion is just that the negative PR wasn't worth keeping the GPP in place. Call it the Windows Vista effect; they likely have already initiated their next plan, as MS did with Vista and 7, with the two being identical after patching except in name in MS' case.
 
Yes you are write but you have people claiming here that nvidia did nothing illegal because they didn't go to court for it. So people don't have any right to say GPP was illegal. Some how its become about peoples feelings about nvidia and GPP was just regular business practice.

It can't be technically illegal until there is a legal process. I don't think GPP would have withstood legal scrutiny and I'm certain that, as much as anything, was nVidia dropped it. The court of public opinion is in no way shape or form a legal process.
 
It can't be technically illegal until there is a legal process. I don't think GPP would have withstood legal scrutiny and I'm certain that, as much as anything, was nVidia dropped it. The court of public opinion is in no way shape or form a legal process.

I am waiting to read what Kyle is working on. He said there is more to it. I think ASUS, Gigabyte and MSI were the small fish. Nvidia was going for big OEMs. That is where they likely got push back and they probably thought it wasn't worth the trouble.
 
He said there is more to it.

I've been waiting on the 'more to it' since his first article posted, especially since the facts on the ground- GPP partners selling AMD cards with gaming branding- contradict the facts that Kyle was given. I look forward to his investigative followup on what happened.
 
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