The bee is Nintendo!
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Eurogamer: Sony's PSN made more money than all of Nintendo last fiscal year
- Thread starter Justified
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The bee is Nintendo!
This is a dumb post.
Sony posted their financial reports, showing their revenue, and other people noticed this. There was no bragging by Sony.
Sigh.
kirby_cholo
Banned
I really hope you don't run a company if you got ONLY THAT IDEA from those numbers / that article.
Did Sony say this of Zhuge and EG say it?
And really its just for comparisons sake. Seriously, Nintendo might need to look into charging for online. Many hated it for PS4 but if its a product you want... it wont matter.
ConciseCarp
Neo Member
I've just looked through the Financial Results and i can not see anywhere where it quotes the profit from PSN...
The quote that was added to the OP from Donnie quotes $785 million, but that is the same figure as the one in the OP, which is for all of 'Playstation'.
Where is the profit figure for just PSN?
Sorry if I'm being pedantic, but I can't find any proof of the OP title. I'm not saying it's not true, but I'd like to know the figure.
The quote that was added to the OP from Donnie quotes $785 million, but that is the same figure as the one in the OP, which is for all of 'Playstation'.
Where is the profit figure for just PSN?
Sorry if I'm being pedantic, but I can't find any proof of the OP title. I'm not saying it's not true, but I'd like to know the figure.
Both companies desserve their respective positions financially right now. Sony doing all they can to please their fans by bringing tons of content, discounts, games and all of that through a nice online infrastructure and on top of that, they have the most powerful console of the generation.
Nintendo is doing the absolute exact opposite. Heavily ignore fans to the point they create games nobody asked for or if they do they will mess up with the gameplay in some sort so it can have something "unique" wich would be nothing but a useless gimmick (there's a few exceptions obviously but you get the idea). Their games almost never have worthy discounts and their hardware is beyond outdated as heck, and still quite expensive for the price they are asking for. People doesn't want to buy $300 hardware just to play the new Smash anymore. And last but not least, their online infraestructure is baaaaaad or pretty much inexistent. Good thing they don't charge for it.
The results are obvious and I simply cannot believe how Nintendo managed to survived this whole generation with such an awful vision. Despite all of that, I genuinely hope they can turn things around with NX.
Nintendo is doing the absolute exact opposite. Heavily ignore fans to the point they create games nobody asked for or if they do they will mess up with the gameplay in some sort so it can have something "unique" wich would be nothing but a useless gimmick (there's a few exceptions obviously but you get the idea). Their games almost never have worthy discounts and their hardware is beyond outdated as heck, and still quite expensive for the price they are asking for. People doesn't want to buy $300 hardware just to play the new Smash anymore. And last but not least, their online infraestructure is baaaaaad or pretty much inexistent. Good thing they don't charge for it.
The results are obvious and I simply cannot believe how Nintendo managed to survived this whole generation with such an awful vision. Despite all of that, I genuinely hope they can turn things around with NX.
Liabe Brave
Member
And ZhugeEX reported the wrong numbers in his tweet. He makes mistakes like this pretty frequently when posting. Quite apart from his banned status, this is a good reason to go by primary sources and not his reposts.
Spieler Eins
Member
Going from market leader to straight up dead already is pretty miraculous. The incompetence needed for that is almost unimaginable. But yeah, Nintendo's been straight up shitting on their fans since WiiU launch, while Sony found out that listening to hardcore gamers actually makes sense. And that's how you get there.
I wish NX would improve, but currently they look as delusional as ever. Piss poor Federation Force damage control, contuining Sticker Star despite fan feedback, no cross buy for a new SNES VC, terrible Starfox, charging extra for the laughing stock Project Guard and now skipping E3 and keeping the image that until march (at earliest) you won't get another console game from them. I thought WiiU would have taught them the right things, but currently I'm starting to lose all hope.
The Artisan
Member
He was a cool and informative guy. I still wonder what this was.
I think they crunched the numbers themselves from the available data
Liabe Brave
Member
You're misunderstanding the title. It's "made more money" as in revenue, not profit. Look again and you'll see that the ~500 billion yen numbers from PSN and the whole of Nintendo are explicitly stated as sales. The sentence that compares profit states Nintendo versus Playstation (i.e. Sony's entire gaming division), not PSN.
Movalpolos
Banned
Depressingly accurate.
They're not actually skipping E3, they're just not showing any NX stuff in their E3 direct.
Which is still ridiculous.
Zeuanimals
Member
They need to completely overhaul how they handle accounts if they're going to start charging for online. But I kind of doubt they will unless 3rd parties fully back the NX. If it turns out to be another Wii U in terms of 3rd party support, not many people will bother with paying that subscription just for 1st party games.
I don't think it'll do them any good either since people who own one or both the PS4 and Xbone will probably already be paying for one subscription, if not two. Another subscription won't be very appealing, especially if it's not going to be the main console of choice for someone.
TheRealTalker
Banned
nephilimdj
Member
As I have said in the past, not having 3rd parties is huge, 30% of digital sales and royalties all adds up. Can you imagine how much MS and Sony made from GTAV alone?
PSN Store on PS3 having a dedicated US military recruitment tab is pretty great though.
PSN Store on PS3 having a dedicated US military recruitment tab is pretty great though.
old manatee
Banned
Nintendo really dropped the ball with their account system and the virtual console.
It's been a long time coming. Nintendo's conservatism regarding online gaming hasn't made any sense for over a decade now. I was willing to give them a pass with the Gamecube but by the time the Wii hit the market, they should have had an online service that at least resembled what the competition are offering.
Imagine for a moment online Pokémon Battles/Trading behind a Nintendo Network paywall.
$$$$$$
ThoughtsOfSpeaking
Banned
I think its fair to say that Sony has done far more to encourage sales of digital games than Microsoft and Nintendo. Weekly sales, promotion of indies throughout the store, higlighting price drops clearly, giving way more payment options, PS+ discounts all over the place....
Its reflected in their download charts too. Its not just the big AAAs that get love.
They do however need to work on their regional pricing. Nobody can explain to me why EU PSN is so damn expensive in comparsion to retail for big games. Even if we argue that retail undercut RRP, That doesnt explain why there are so many games that are even more expensive than the likes of GAME or HMV.
Sony first party are some of the worst offenders too, so no its not just a publisher issue.
on the other hand, it has helped to make indies/smaller games look more attractive.
Its reflected in their download charts too. Its not just the big AAAs that get love.
They do however need to work on their regional pricing. Nobody can explain to me why EU PSN is so damn expensive in comparsion to retail for big games. Even if we argue that retail undercut RRP, That doesnt explain why there are so many games that are even more expensive than the likes of GAME or HMV.
Sony first party are some of the worst offenders too, so no its not just a publisher issue.
on the other hand, it has helped to make indies/smaller games look more attractive.
I guess it's impressive but what is not that impressive to me is that Sony made 88.7bn yen in total profits on playstation compared to Nintendos 32.8bn yen
Especially when you take into account Sony sold almost 18 million ps4s compared to however many Wii Us Nintendo sold. I can't find it, just 200k in the past 3 months so a million maybe?
It seems to me like if Nintendo actually had a decently selling third place console they'd make more money off it than Sony does on PS in first place.
Seriously, how did they not even make three times Nintendo's profits when they sold about 18* as many consoles as they did? Seems odd.
Especially when you take into account Sony sold almost 18 million ps4s compared to however many Wii Us Nintendo sold. I can't find it, just 200k in the past 3 months so a million maybe?
It seems to me like if Nintendo actually had a decently selling third place console they'd make more money off it than Sony does on PS in first place.
Seriously, how did they not even make three times Nintendo's profits when they sold about 18* as many consoles as they did? Seems odd.
old manatee
Banned
The ps4 costs a lot to make.
That much though? Im pretty sure it was profitable from day one too so they must be making more off it 2 years later than at it's launch.
Surely that can't be the main reason.
My guess is that although the 3DS isn't as successful as the DS, it is still decent enough to push Nintendo numbers.
Also, Sony consoles are more powerful and expensive to make. Wii U and 3DS are very underpowered for the price they sell at.
I agree though, sometimes it feels Sony isn't capitalizing enough on its win.
Tallshortman
Member
Nintendo's revenue isn't purely 3DS and WiiU. They have a fairly successful merchandising and licensing businesses.
Schnozberry
Member
Nintendo has more first party software, and also sells a lot of high margin items like Amiibo, licensed content from their IP, and more Amiibo.
ThoughtsOfSpeaking
Banned
A lot of Sony software development and localisation is loss leading. Add marketing deals, supporting a massive third party dev netowrk, growing emerging markets and supporting the console in over 100 countries and it becomes more understandable.
Nintendo arent as insular as Microsoft when it comes to WW sales, but its clear that there are many parts of the world that like Microsoft, they dont give a fuck about. There is also the issue of Nintendo pricing. They keep their products at very high margins in comparsion.
nephilimdj
Member
Well they are leaking massive money if amiibo is high margin, since they sold 20million in last 1 year
*edit: changed number
Steve Youngblood
Member
I've noticed some confusion about the status of using ZhugeEX as a news source and I think we need to clear the air about it, as the previous messages may be ambiguous to some. I'm going to note in advance that I have neither banned ZhugeEX nor had any direct interactions with him on or off the site. I say that not to clear myself of any perceived culpability as to why he is banned, but just to note in advance that I don't have any personal vandetta against the user and can try to speak objectively on the situation (italics added to note you don't automatically need to defer to my judgement).
Now I think there's some confusion among users as to whether or not news Zhuge is reporting can be discussed here. And the shortest answer I can give in response is a question: why are we discussing a Zhuge tweet? If this is real, legitimate breaking news, then obviously I don't think it behooves us -- one of the most active gaming forums on the internet -- to ignore it just because of who the source is. But is this stuff really news that is being broken by Zhuge? That's sort of the problem.
We don't usually go into detail about user bans, but in this case it may warrant more transparency than what is usually offered. It may also require me to go on a bit of a tangent about how moderation works here. Firstly, he was banned three times for on site reasons before finally getting booted permanently for off-site reasons. Let's go through them.
Ban 1: Telling another user to "fuck off."
Ban 2: Needless console warrior nonsense while reporting on an event in Shanghai.
Ban 3: This idiotic post in response to someone arguing that they think the Xbox One has a better lineup.
Now this in and of itself doesn't paint the picture of such a problematic poster that deserves a permanent ban. But the offsite behavior just became intolerable to us. Here's where I explain moderation. Moderators here are not paid. Now that's not meant as an argument to drum up sympathy and lobby for pay. I'm just providing context. We are volunteers who do this in our spare time. That doesn't mean that we are automatically off the hook for any mistakes that we make. But I do think it's worth understanding the situation. Users don't pay to post here and we aren't paid to moderate. So it's not like there's tons of pressure for volunteer mods to peer review and antagonize each other nor are there layers of middle management in place to meticulously oversee the decisions we make. Now there is some degree of peer review both before and after bans. We often consult before bans and most of us read the internal ban review thread as new bans are made. Where I'm going with this is to caution that if you ask Mod A about a ban and don't get the answer you want, proceeding to go ask Mods B & C probably aren't going to yield more fruitful results.
That's just some background. The flipside is that a site needs users to succeed. I understand that if people feel like they are being punished unjustly, they deserve some recourse. People often find a way to argue their case off site. Whether it's finding a mod on social media or sending an email to the support site, I don't think users should feel intimidated into not speaking up if they have issues. I'd say more often than not even if a decision isn't overturned, the arguments are at least read and considered. That may not be of great solace to you, but I just think it's important to note that complaints aren't summarily tossed aside as we arrogant assholes laugh from on high. I think we all know that the site isn't as big as it is just to see us put on a moderation clinic. Honestly, I think the better the job we do the less noticeable it is that we're doing anything at all.
But going back to Zhuge, the issue was that he would pester whoever would listen offsite about what a grave injustice each ban was. And it wasn't just a one-off venting post, but a constant barrage of complaints. Particularly worse was zeroing in on the mod that banned him the first time after learning who was responsible which is information that is almost never given out. After his second ban, he claimed not to understand why he was banned. A mod put him in touch with the mod who banned him. He asked for an explanation. The mod explained. He asked for more explanation. The mod continued to explain. He sent them constant twitter DMs arguing about it to the point where from our perspective it rose to the level of harassment. This was discussed by the mod team, but the mod in question requested that we not take any further action at the time, since we generally prefer not to moderate offsite behavior except in extreme cases. While all this was going on, Zhuge was also asking people to post things in various threads for him, and encouraging them to PM mods about his ban. All this over a three week ban.
Even now, he acts utterly bewildered as to why he was banned when from our vantage point it seems pretty clear. As best I can tell, he expected special treatment because of his status of breaking news and sales numbers. And while that may be of some utility, I want to note that it doesn't make him a celebrity. He provides some useful analysis and translations of information that is out there, and has access to some proprietary sales data, but he's not a hard-hitting journalist out there dishing out scoops that can't be found anywhere else. There was this feeling that he provided an invaluable service to the forum. And because of that, he seemed to feel justified borderline harassing anyone on staff that would listen about why he shouldn't have been banned each and every time.
Whereas we feel as though it's just as much about trying to promote himself as it is about being helpful and wanting to participate in our community. That's the issue now. If legitimate news is being broken and Zhuge is the source, then I don't think it's a problem to discuss it here. And if we're going to do that, then it's only fair to state where the news came from and properly source it. But as he is a permabanned member, we're not interested in providing him a platform so that he can promote himself as a newsmaker. And that's where the issues we were noticing came from.
Looking at his Twitter, the situation is all over the place:
https://twitter.com/ZhugeEX/status/725575824779415552
Here he asks for this to be posted on our site. This is clearly not kosher. If he wasn't banned we wouldn't be fine with him promoting his own Twitter. Why would we encourage someone doing it on his behalf?
https://twitter.com/ZhugeEX/status/725731094289633280
Later he complains about not knowing why he was banned and complains that we use his tweets despite him being banned immediately after complaining that he can't be sourced because he's banned: https://twitter.com/ZhugeEX/status/725730793809543168
Given what has transpired, there's no interest on our part in reconsidering Zhuge's ban. We understand if you as a user feel somewhat uneasy as you think that Zhuge was a great, informative poster. But we feel more than justified sticking to our decision here. And our feeling is not one of needless pettiness about completely shutting the door on an ex-member in as much as we are not interested in promoting a banned user's efforts to analyze and/or re-report news that can be found from other sources.
Now I think there's some confusion among users as to whether or not news Zhuge is reporting can be discussed here. And the shortest answer I can give in response is a question: why are we discussing a Zhuge tweet? If this is real, legitimate breaking news, then obviously I don't think it behooves us -- one of the most active gaming forums on the internet -- to ignore it just because of who the source is. But is this stuff really news that is being broken by Zhuge? That's sort of the problem.
We don't usually go into detail about user bans, but in this case it may warrant more transparency than what is usually offered. It may also require me to go on a bit of a tangent about how moderation works here. Firstly, he was banned three times for on site reasons before finally getting booted permanently for off-site reasons. Let's go through them.
Ban 1: Telling another user to "fuck off."
Ban 2: Needless console warrior nonsense while reporting on an event in Shanghai.
He's looking at the Xbox booth.
Xbox One has been very popular on social media in China recently as evidenced by this picture.....
Ban 3: This idiotic post in response to someone arguing that they think the Xbox One has a better lineup.
Now this in and of itself doesn't paint the picture of such a problematic poster that deserves a permanent ban. But the offsite behavior just became intolerable to us. Here's where I explain moderation. Moderators here are not paid. Now that's not meant as an argument to drum up sympathy and lobby for pay. I'm just providing context. We are volunteers who do this in our spare time. That doesn't mean that we are automatically off the hook for any mistakes that we make. But I do think it's worth understanding the situation. Users don't pay to post here and we aren't paid to moderate. So it's not like there's tons of pressure for volunteer mods to peer review and antagonize each other nor are there layers of middle management in place to meticulously oversee the decisions we make. Now there is some degree of peer review both before and after bans. We often consult before bans and most of us read the internal ban review thread as new bans are made. Where I'm going with this is to caution that if you ask Mod A about a ban and don't get the answer you want, proceeding to go ask Mods B & C probably aren't going to yield more fruitful results.
That's just some background. The flipside is that a site needs users to succeed. I understand that if people feel like they are being punished unjustly, they deserve some recourse. People often find a way to argue their case off site. Whether it's finding a mod on social media or sending an email to the support site, I don't think users should feel intimidated into not speaking up if they have issues. I'd say more often than not even if a decision isn't overturned, the arguments are at least read and considered. That may not be of great solace to you, but I just think it's important to note that complaints aren't summarily tossed aside as we arrogant assholes laugh from on high. I think we all know that the site isn't as big as it is just to see us put on a moderation clinic. Honestly, I think the better the job we do the less noticeable it is that we're doing anything at all.
But going back to Zhuge, the issue was that he would pester whoever would listen offsite about what a grave injustice each ban was. And it wasn't just a one-off venting post, but a constant barrage of complaints. Particularly worse was zeroing in on the mod that banned him the first time after learning who was responsible which is information that is almost never given out. After his second ban, he claimed not to understand why he was banned. A mod put him in touch with the mod who banned him. He asked for an explanation. The mod explained. He asked for more explanation. The mod continued to explain. He sent them constant twitter DMs arguing about it to the point where from our perspective it rose to the level of harassment. This was discussed by the mod team, but the mod in question requested that we not take any further action at the time, since we generally prefer not to moderate offsite behavior except in extreme cases. While all this was going on, Zhuge was also asking people to post things in various threads for him, and encouraging them to PM mods about his ban. All this over a three week ban.
Even now, he acts utterly bewildered as to why he was banned when from our vantage point it seems pretty clear. As best I can tell, he expected special treatment because of his status of breaking news and sales numbers. And while that may be of some utility, I want to note that it doesn't make him a celebrity. He provides some useful analysis and translations of information that is out there, and has access to some proprietary sales data, but he's not a hard-hitting journalist out there dishing out scoops that can't be found anywhere else. There was this feeling that he provided an invaluable service to the forum. And because of that, he seemed to feel justified borderline harassing anyone on staff that would listen about why he shouldn't have been banned each and every time.
Whereas we feel as though it's just as much about trying to promote himself as it is about being helpful and wanting to participate in our community. That's the issue now. If legitimate news is being broken and Zhuge is the source, then I don't think it's a problem to discuss it here. And if we're going to do that, then it's only fair to state where the news came from and properly source it. But as he is a permabanned member, we're not interested in providing him a platform so that he can promote himself as a newsmaker. And that's where the issues we were noticing came from.
Looking at his Twitter, the situation is all over the place:
https://twitter.com/ZhugeEX/status/725575824779415552
Here he asks for this to be posted on our site. This is clearly not kosher. If he wasn't banned we wouldn't be fine with him promoting his own Twitter. Why would we encourage someone doing it on his behalf?
https://twitter.com/ZhugeEX/status/725731094289633280
Later he complains about not knowing why he was banned and complains that we use his tweets despite him being banned immediately after complaining that he can't be sourced because he's banned: https://twitter.com/ZhugeEX/status/725730793809543168
Given what has transpired, there's no interest on our part in reconsidering Zhuge's ban. We understand if you as a user feel somewhat uneasy as you think that Zhuge was a great, informative poster. But we feel more than justified sticking to our decision here. And our feeling is not one of needless pettiness about completely shutting the door on an ex-member in as much as we are not interested in promoting a banned user's efforts to analyze and/or re-report news that can be found from other sources.
Did you put much thought process into this? You realise that Nintendo sells way more than the Wii U, yes?
Also nevermind that its more than five times the profit on like-for-like comparison, or much higher as a proportion of revenue.
Edit: I don't care that Zhuge is banned, it seems a bit pointless to close a discussion thread just because the OP based it on his tweet, its not like the Sony FY results weren't going to get their own thread in short order without him. I think the mod who changed the title to reflect his quote shouldn't have, though it is an amusing anecdote its no more amusing than many of the comparisons made and discussed by still serving gaf members. Its not like Zhuge possesses special insight.
Don Draper's Hat
Member
Sorry if this is a stupid question, but does this mean Sony made more money solely from people signing up to PS+, or does it also include sales from the PS Store?
Schnozberry
Member
They spent something like 500 million in capital dollars on R&D last year.
vinnygambini
Why are strippers at the U.N. bad when they're great at strip clubs???
Can anyone find the data on SONY's IR results? I can't find shit on the release or powerpoint materials.
I did yes and I'm well aware Nintendo sells more than the Wii U however the PS4 sold more than the 3DS and Wii U combined by quite a lot. Sony also makes more gaming related items than just the PS4. They also sell subscriptions to play online which Nintendo does not, have a home console user base that's probably 5* as high as Nintendo's and actually have third-party games that sell on their systems, which they take a cut of.
And no, it says right in the OP, Nintendo made 6.5% profit off its revnue while Sony made 5.7% profit.
I'm not really sure what you mean by five times the profit on like-for-like comparison. PS4 to Wii U sales profits? Then I would still expect it to be much higher than five times that considering they sold 18x as many consoles in the same time frame.
Like someone said above, it seems like Sony isn't capitalizing on its success and to me they should be making a lot more than they currently are.
generic_username
I switched to an alt account to ditch my embarrassing tag so I could be an embarrassing Naughty Dog fanboy in peace. Ask me anything!
There is no point spinning this. Why would you expect it to be much higher? Your multipliers does not make sense. Profits dont scale like that.
Kagoshima_Luke
Gold Member
It's not even better than XBL right now. They are making bank because they are the best selling console and PS Plus is now mandatory for most online play, not because PSN is the best service.
vinnygambini
Why are strippers at the U.N. bad when they're great at strip clubs???
Official source:
Page 23 of the document.
http://www.sony.net/SonyInfo/IR/library/fr/15q4_sony.pdf
Edit: If the previous thread was locked because it wasn't citing an official source, and yet the article got its source from the tweet. Isn't it the same thing in the end
Edit2: Got a better grip, thanks Steve
Page 23 of the document.
http://www.sony.net/SonyInfo/IR/library/fr/15q4_sony.pdf
Edit: If the previous thread was locked because it wasn't citing an official source, and yet the article got its source from the tweet. Isn't it the same thing in the end
Edit2: Got a better grip, thanks Steve
I'm not trying to spin anything. He asked if I put much thought into my initial post and I was showing that yes I did put some thought into it.
All I was saying is the fact that Sony sold almost 18x as many home consoles as Nintendo ALONE would have led me to think their profits would be a lot higher than they currently are compared to Nintendo's. Sheesh.
I'm aware both companies make more than just those two items, yes but I guess I was thinking Sony made more money off console sales than they actually do.
Edit: this is in the OP
Nintendo:
Total sales - $4.65 billion
Total profit - $303 million (6.5% profit)
Sony:
Total game related sales - $13.72 billion ($4.69 billion from Network)
Total game related profit - $785 million (5.7% profit)
Game related sales vs Nintendo - +194%
Game related profit vs Nintendo - +159%
I was assuming that the % of profit was in relation to their revenue. If it's not, sorry, it's late.
Night Angel
Member
Thanks for the post, Steve. Maybe now we won't have to read 30 posts about "why was Zhuge banned" every sales thread.
I can picture you frothing at the mouth while typing this 😄
wonderful103
Member
Why are there still people that defend paying for online?
ThoughtsOfSpeaking
Banned
I think this is fair.
One thing I noticed about Zhuge from day one is the fact that he is a bit overzelous, to say the least. He is one of those people that once he gets a bee in his bonnet, he doesnt let it go.
While that makes his gathering of data excellent, it can have negative consquenses.
Thank you for the transparancy. We need a bit more of that around here I think. It would clear up any suggestions of mod bias and pettiness. I understand this place isnt a democracy and mods arent answerable to members, but being a bit more forthcoming is never a bad thing.
The "This user is banned and asking why risks a ban too" attitude doesnt help anyone and just causes frustration and resentment.
ConciseCarp
Neo Member
Well maybe I am being pedantic then, but having more sales is not the same as making more money. For me, making money = profit. I could make £1,000,000 in sales, but costs could be £1,000,001, so I've lost money.....
Jack The Nipper
Banned
Imo Steve he has an interesting unhealthy relationship with numbers and while I wouldn't say what he's doing is a waste of time but definitely not one I'd enjoy. I'd say his unhealthy use of collecting data makes sense for his harassment and just not letting it go. Can definitely understand why he is banned when you need to go outside and chill out over a message board instead of just letting it go which seems he couldn't.
In those situations its fine to clear the air. Better to have both sides of the story
In those situations its fine to clear the air. Better to have both sides of the story
Because Nintendo milks a higher profit margin out of their customers.
You'll see some of their fans in here defending it, as if that's somehow good for them.
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