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On January 17 2013 07:53 mrtomjones wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 07:19 rotegirte wrote:On January 17 2013 06:29 bayaka wrote:
The journalistic standards for big sports and esports should not be the same (for the time being.) Slasher is trying to be a "I am a protector of truth and justice" journalist when in actuality he isn't putting in any of the effort required for that, he is merely claiming to stand by his journalistic code in order to be able to shirk any sense of responsibility for doing things like leaking news before the teams release it.
Leaking the Jaedong/Stephano information beforehand I can see having minimal repercussions, but leaking the Snute example no doubt hurt that announcement/player. I don't buy Slasher's argument that he is anything other than a parasite at this point. To the people who say that he is doing his job, if my job was to screw people over, would it not still be screwing people over? And by that logic, where is all of the hate for Alex Garfield coming from? I appreciate Slasher's work otherwise, and I understand that that is what journalism calls for, but I don't think that journalism of this kind is helpful at all right now. Slasher's job only exists because esports exists, and as of now he is just undermining the people he should be helping out. I understand journalism is different from being a publicist, but what "real" journalism is he actually doing at the moment? It seems as though he is aiming for quantity over quality, and maybe that's his job, but that makes him a tabloid/paparazi style journalist... you call that parasitic, but at the end of the day the goal is for everyone to get a paycheck. the whole issue is about how much of the current limited pie gets allocated to what party. Slasher is not leeching off teams more than teams leeching off the cheap publicity they get from online communities. we, the audience are accustomed to the status quo that content of any kind is freely available. what exactly do TL writers get as compensation for their work? it is expected of Slasher to get the scoops out on the field, doing editorial work, providing in-depth interviews and articles (so-called "quality" work), yet it's suddenly horrible of him to look out for himself. the recent incident is all but a sign of the natural struggle for resources. and yes, it is a give and take. "we give you X and you give us Y" but every time such ramblings surface, it's the parties fighting over ground. Slasher very well might have jeopardized his relations, he may have been too greedy the last couple of times. or, the current quid-pro-quo between the organizations, teams and media is no longer felt appropriate by one of the parties. just like player contracts are re-evaluated after each term. Slasher breaking the news can be him hunting for pageviews or spotlight. or, there were insufficient incentives for him to keep quiet. EG may have offered him deals they deemed appropriate. or, what they offered was not enough. of course, given the small amount of cash available in our space, prioritization is a valid point. but undoubtedly every time it comes to distributing the cake, every party involved will tend to overstate their importance and downplay that of others. it is healthy to ask ourselves how much everyone's contributions is worth, and should be compensated for it. if that means, we want or don't want to finance full-time journalism so be it. but no one is at fault for trying to reserve their share. Slasher may find out that no one will be willing to agree to his terms. EG might find other people to fit their needs and agree to their offerings. or not. but no one, Slasher nor EG should be surprised that current power-lines are under constant contention. Slasher could get a bigger and better paycheque if he worked together with the teams and was able to get things like exclusive first interviews on these deals rather than releasing short badly written "Stepahno joined EG" type comments. I wrote a much bigger piece earlier in this thread but meh. Slasher imo is not doing what is best for him and he is obviously alienating people who he has to get along with to a certain extent if he wants to be successful.
There is no question Slasher is alienating some industry members, especially those that openly stated it. But to say "if he had taken this offer or that offer, he'll get a better paycheck" is a tad speculative. Neither you, nor EG, nor me have access to Rod's metrics. Or Gamespot's. Or Rod's evaluation of performance or his personal economics. You may be right. Or not. Can you really give an educated estimate on his profits if he had taken option X or Y? Or would be the person best suited to judge how much certain deals would have benefited Rod, be Rod himself?
This doesn't exempt him from misjudging. But at the very least, he has far more accurate access on relevant numbers.
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On January 17 2013 08:00 JBright wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 07:53 mrtomjones wrote:On January 17 2013 07:19 rotegirte wrote:On January 17 2013 06:29 bayaka wrote:
The journalistic standards for big sports and esports should not be the same (for the time being.) Slasher is trying to be a "I am a protector of truth and justice" journalist when in actuality he isn't putting in any of the effort required for that, he is merely claiming to stand by his journalistic code in order to be able to shirk any sense of responsibility for doing things like leaking news before the teams release it.
Leaking the Jaedong/Stephano information beforehand I can see having minimal repercussions, but leaking the Snute example no doubt hurt that announcement/player. I don't buy Slasher's argument that he is anything other than a parasite at this point. To the people who say that he is doing his job, if my job was to screw people over, would it not still be screwing people over? And by that logic, where is all of the hate for Alex Garfield coming from? I appreciate Slasher's work otherwise, and I understand that that is what journalism calls for, but I don't think that journalism of this kind is helpful at all right now. Slasher's job only exists because esports exists, and as of now he is just undermining the people he should be helping out. I understand journalism is different from being a publicist, but what "real" journalism is he actually doing at the moment? It seems as though he is aiming for quantity over quality, and maybe that's his job, but that makes him a tabloid/paparazi style journalist... you call that parasitic, but at the end of the day the goal is for everyone to get a paycheck. the whole issue is about how much of the current limited pie gets allocated to what party. Slasher is not leeching off teams more than teams leeching off the cheap publicity they get from online communities. we, the audience are accustomed to the status quo that content of any kind is freely available. what exactly do TL writers get as compensation for their work? it is expected of Slasher to get the scoops out on the field, doing editorial work, providing in-depth interviews and articles (so-called "quality" work), yet it's suddenly horrible of him to look out for himself. the recent incident is all but a sign of the natural struggle for resources. and yes, it is a give and take. "we give you X and you give us Y" but every time such ramblings surface, it's the parties fighting over ground. Slasher very well might have jeopardized his relations, he may have been too greedy the last couple of times. or, the current quid-pro-quo between the organizations, teams and media is no longer felt appropriate by one of the parties. just like player contracts are re-evaluated after each term. Slasher breaking the news can be him hunting for pageviews or spotlight. or, there were insufficient incentives for him to keep quiet. EG may have offered him deals they deemed appropriate. or, what they offered was not enough. of course, given the small amount of cash available in our space, prioritization is a valid point. but undoubtedly every time it comes to distributing the cake, every party involved will tend to overstate their importance and downplay that of others. it is healthy to ask ourselves how much everyone's contributions is worth, and should be compensated for it. if that means, we want or don't want to finance full-time journalism so be it. but no one is at fault for trying to reserve their share. Slasher may find out that no one will be willing to agree to his terms. EG might find other people to fit their needs and agree to their offerings. or not. but no one, Slasher nor EG should be surprised that current power-lines are under constant contention. Slasher could get a bigger and better paycheque if he worked together with the teams and was able to get things like exclusive first interviews on these deals rather than releasing short badly written "Stepahno joined EG" type comments. I wrote a much bigger piece earlier in this thread but meh. Slasher imo is not doing what is best for him and he is obviously alienating people who he has to get along with to a certain extent if he wants to be successful. How would Slasher get a bigger paycheque unless EG was giving him money (bribing) to delay his story. He has a salary from Gamespot and he has to meet quotas/deadlines.
I think what he meant is that Alex stated on ITG that he was willing to cooperate with Slasher. Slasher would get first dibs on an interview with EG's players (after PL, iirc) on the condition that Slasher does not prematurely release news. It is implied that they both informally agreed to this as it is mutual beneficial. However, Slasher, for an unknown reason,did not follow through on meeting with Alex to get said interviews. Slasher's response to Alex was that he had already done that type of work before, interviews and such.
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On January 17 2013 08:05 Ansinjunger wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 08:01 clever_us wrote:On January 17 2013 07:48 Ansinjunger wrote:On January 17 2013 03:03 Jibba wrote:
For Alex, his biggest mistake was just announcing it publicly. If you quietly blacklist Slasher, then most people would just assume Slasher is bad at getting content. "No comment" would've saved them this mess.
It's a bit ironic that Alex did more harm than good for his own cause. Although considering the SlayerS practice boycott (I'm still unsure how real that was outside of the first month) eventually came to light, it makes one wonder if a silent blacklist against Slasher would have been outed eventually, perhaps creating an even bigger scandal. Everybody who makes a post like this is missing the point that it is well within EG's rights to refuse to give Slasher information. Free press does not mean a right to have everybody tell you everything they know, and EG can withhold whatever information they want. Slasher screws over organizations like EG and TL? Then expect EG and TL to be a lot less helpful when Slasher comes around looking for the inside scoop. It's as simple as that. It's ridiculous to me that people are acting like blacklisting Slasher for cutting directly into team revenue is some kind of nefarious act. The kind of journalism that Slasher produces is harmful to e-sports teams. Therefore progaming teams are likely to get fed up with him and prefer giving their information to other sources. How can you possibly get upset about that? You missed the entire point of my post, which was in the first line. The rest was simply mentioning how secrets have a way of being outed eventually.
You said "it makes one wonder if a silent blacklist against Slasher would have been outed eventually, perhaps creating an even bigger scandal."
To which I would reply: a blacklist against Slasher is well within the rights of an e-sports organization. They don't have to give anybody information that they don't want to, and they will naturally prefer not to give it to the guy who is sabotaging their sources of revenue.
Therefore my question stands: how could you possibly get upset about a blacklist against Slasher?
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On January 17 2013 08:07 clever_us wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 07:05 sAsImre wrote:On January 17 2013 06:44 EG.lectR wrote:On January 17 2013 06:37 echO [W] wrote:On January 17 2013 05:18 EG.lectR wrote:
"Ultimately, EG's issue with Breslau's reporting is their fault. If they want information used the way they want it to be used, they need to withhold that information as they see fit, which is certainly their right."
This assumes that information is always between one party or parties which are under the same level of control. That is not the case within e-sports and there is no body which monitors that information or those conversations. Teams talk freely, players talk freely, and there are too many people involved in normal transactions [in this case, team transactions] to claim that one party can control it all and you cannot, as one entity, change that at this time. Which is how it works in the real world in professional sports across the board. GMs talk to other GMs, agents talk to other agents, players talk to other players, and of course people within the organizations that are way bigger than eSports organizations also talk. Across the board that you're referencing is a body called the NFL, MLB, NHL, and others similarly named which have specific contracts across their franchised teams which prevent them from distributing this information before an appropriate time. Even in the event of leaks, those governing bodies can quickly replace people who they feel have leaked information at no detriment to the organization. That is not the case with e-sports. Not only do those types of contracts not exist across e-sports teams, but there is no governing team body to enforce them. Plus, those teams (the e-sports ones) mentioned are incredibly fragile and operate entirely differently between organizations. we're losing money qq, let's hang someone. AFAIK such a rule doesn't work in soccer/every major sport in Europe and things are leaked all the time, doesn't look like the bayern munchen, top rugby or handball clubs are failing despite their absence of exclusivity on news lol. If your business model is awful enough to rely on getting such annoucements on your own website, well i'm glad your company (not specifically eg) is going down. funnily there is no pbm with kespa teams as far as business model goes, maybe the fact they rely on strong sponsorship and a real league instead of online jokes is the core of the answer... This is downright moronic. Major sports teams do not work the way e-sports teams do. Baseball teams get their revenue largely from stadium tickets and TV/radio rights. E-sports get their revenue from sponsors, and they do that by promising their sponsors exposure. If Slasher cuts 35,000 views off an announcement post by spoiling it a week in advance, that directly sabotages the statistics EG uses to recruit sponsors and therefore secure income. When you say "doesn't look like top rugby or handball clubs are failing despite their absence of exclusivity on news lol" you illustrate exactly how little you understand the sweeping differences between the business model of traditional sports and e-sports.
esport model sucks hard if teams rely on doing journalist job to get revenue. Surprisingly the only esport league that has a real longevity uses a similar model to most sport: a real lengthy league and huge sponsors.
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On January 17 2013 08:00 JBright wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 07:53 mrtomjones wrote:On January 17 2013 07:19 rotegirte wrote:On January 17 2013 06:29 bayaka wrote:
The journalistic standards for big sports and esports should not be the same (for the time being.) Slasher is trying to be a "I am a protector of truth and justice" journalist when in actuality he isn't putting in any of the effort required for that, he is merely claiming to stand by his journalistic code in order to be able to shirk any sense of responsibility for doing things like leaking news before the teams release it.
Leaking the Jaedong/Stephano information beforehand I can see having minimal repercussions, but leaking the Snute example no doubt hurt that announcement/player. I don't buy Slasher's argument that he is anything other than a parasite at this point. To the people who say that he is doing his job, if my job was to screw people over, would it not still be screwing people over? And by that logic, where is all of the hate for Alex Garfield coming from? I appreciate Slasher's work otherwise, and I understand that that is what journalism calls for, but I don't think that journalism of this kind is helpful at all right now. Slasher's job only exists because esports exists, and as of now he is just undermining the people he should be helping out. I understand journalism is different from being a publicist, but what "real" journalism is he actually doing at the moment? It seems as though he is aiming for quantity over quality, and maybe that's his job, but that makes him a tabloid/paparazi style journalist... you call that parasitic, but at the end of the day the goal is for everyone to get a paycheck. the whole issue is about how much of the current limited pie gets allocated to what party. Slasher is not leeching off teams more than teams leeching off the cheap publicity they get from online communities. we, the audience are accustomed to the status quo that content of any kind is freely available. what exactly do TL writers get as compensation for their work? it is expected of Slasher to get the scoops out on the field, doing editorial work, providing in-depth interviews and articles (so-called "quality" work), yet it's suddenly horrible of him to look out for himself. the recent incident is all but a sign of the natural struggle for resources. and yes, it is a give and take. "we give you X and you give us Y" but every time such ramblings surface, it's the parties fighting over ground. Slasher very well might have jeopardized his relations, he may have been too greedy the last couple of times. or, the current quid-pro-quo between the organizations, teams and media is no longer felt appropriate by one of the parties. just like player contracts are re-evaluated after each term. Slasher breaking the news can be him hunting for pageviews or spotlight. or, there were insufficient incentives for him to keep quiet. EG may have offered him deals they deemed appropriate. or, what they offered was not enough. of course, given the small amount of cash available in our space, prioritization is a valid point. but undoubtedly every time it comes to distributing the cake, every party involved will tend to overstate their importance and downplay that of others. it is healthy to ask ourselves how much everyone's contributions is worth, and should be compensated for it. if that means, we want or don't want to finance full-time journalism so be it. but no one is at fault for trying to reserve their share. Slasher may find out that no one will be willing to agree to his terms. EG might find other people to fit their needs and agree to their offerings. or not. but no one, Slasher nor EG should be surprised that current power-lines are under constant contention. Slasher could get a bigger and better paycheque if he worked together with the teams and was able to get things like exclusive first interviews on these deals rather than releasing short badly written "Stepahno joined EG" type comments. I wrote a much bigger piece earlier in this thread but meh. Slasher imo is not doing what is best for him and he is obviously alienating people who he has to get along with to a certain extent if he wants to be successful. How would Slasher get a bigger paycheque unless EG was giving him money (bribing) to delay his story. He has a salary from Gamespot and he has to meet quotas/deadlines.
EG and TL do this release that they just did instead of Slasher breaking it. Tons of excitement. Lots of hits. Slasher does the interviews with Nazgul, Alex, Jaedong, Stephano, Taeja. Slasher gets tons of views that come from the better hype that Eg and TL were able to provide. Both sides profit. Pretty simple.
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On January 17 2013 08:16 sAsImre wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 08:07 clever_us wrote:On January 17 2013 07:05 sAsImre wrote:On January 17 2013 06:44 EG.lectR wrote:On January 17 2013 06:37 echO [W] wrote:On January 17 2013 05:18 EG.lectR wrote:
"Ultimately, EG's issue with Breslau's reporting is their fault. If they want information used the way they want it to be used, they need to withhold that information as they see fit, which is certainly their right."
This assumes that information is always between one party or parties which are under the same level of control. That is not the case within e-sports and there is no body which monitors that information or those conversations. Teams talk freely, players talk freely, and there are too many people involved in normal transactions [in this case, team transactions] to claim that one party can control it all and you cannot, as one entity, change that at this time. Which is how it works in the real world in professional sports across the board. GMs talk to other GMs, agents talk to other agents, players talk to other players, and of course people within the organizations that are way bigger than eSports organizations also talk. Across the board that you're referencing is a body called the NFL, MLB, NHL, and others similarly named which have specific contracts across their franchised teams which prevent them from distributing this information before an appropriate time. Even in the event of leaks, those governing bodies can quickly replace people who they feel have leaked information at no detriment to the organization. That is not the case with e-sports. Not only do those types of contracts not exist across e-sports teams, but there is no governing team body to enforce them. Plus, those teams (the e-sports ones) mentioned are incredibly fragile and operate entirely differently between organizations. we're losing money qq, let's hang someone. AFAIK such a rule doesn't work in soccer/every major sport in Europe and things are leaked all the time, doesn't look like the bayern munchen, top rugby or handball clubs are failing despite their absence of exclusivity on news lol. If your business model is awful enough to rely on getting such annoucements on your own website, well i'm glad your company (not specifically eg) is going down. funnily there is no pbm with kespa teams as far as business model goes, maybe the fact they rely on strong sponsorship and a real league instead of online jokes is the core of the answer... This is downright moronic. Major sports teams do not work the way e-sports teams do. Baseball teams get their revenue largely from stadium tickets and TV/radio rights. E-sports get their revenue from sponsors, and they do that by promising their sponsors exposure. If Slasher cuts 35,000 views off an announcement post by spoiling it a week in advance, that directly sabotages the statistics EG uses to recruit sponsors and therefore secure income. When you say "doesn't look like top rugby or handball clubs are failing despite their absence of exclusivity on news lol" you illustrate exactly how little you understand the sweeping differences between the business model of traditional sports and e-sports. esport model sucks hard if teams rely on doing journalist job to get revenue. Surprisingly the only esport league that has a real longevity uses a similar model to most sport: a real lengthy league and huge sponsors.
You act like it is EG's choice to not have coke give them a million a month in sponsorship. Don't be ignorant. EG is doing what they can to succeed and they are one of the healthiest and wealthiest teams in SC2. They do this by generating lots of excitement and clicks etc. They do not have the option of being like the professional sports teams. I'm sure they'd be more than willing to do so if the business model was possible.
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On January 17 2013 08:17 mrtomjones wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 08:00 JBright wrote:On January 17 2013 07:53 mrtomjones wrote:On January 17 2013 07:19 rotegirte wrote:On January 17 2013 06:29 bayaka wrote:
The journalistic standards for big sports and esports should not be the same (for the time being.) Slasher is trying to be a "I am a protector of truth and justice" journalist when in actuality he isn't putting in any of the effort required for that, he is merely claiming to stand by his journalistic code in order to be able to shirk any sense of responsibility for doing things like leaking news before the teams release it.
Leaking the Jaedong/Stephano information beforehand I can see having minimal repercussions, but leaking the Snute example no doubt hurt that announcement/player. I don't buy Slasher's argument that he is anything other than a parasite at this point. To the people who say that he is doing his job, if my job was to screw people over, would it not still be screwing people over? And by that logic, where is all of the hate for Alex Garfield coming from? I appreciate Slasher's work otherwise, and I understand that that is what journalism calls for, but I don't think that journalism of this kind is helpful at all right now. Slasher's job only exists because esports exists, and as of now he is just undermining the people he should be helping out. I understand journalism is different from being a publicist, but what "real" journalism is he actually doing at the moment? It seems as though he is aiming for quantity over quality, and maybe that's his job, but that makes him a tabloid/paparazi style journalist... you call that parasitic, but at the end of the day the goal is for everyone to get a paycheck. the whole issue is about how much of the current limited pie gets allocated to what party. Slasher is not leeching off teams more than teams leeching off the cheap publicity they get from online communities. we, the audience are accustomed to the status quo that content of any kind is freely available. what exactly do TL writers get as compensation for their work? it is expected of Slasher to get the scoops out on the field, doing editorial work, providing in-depth interviews and articles (so-called "quality" work), yet it's suddenly horrible of him to look out for himself. the recent incident is all but a sign of the natural struggle for resources. and yes, it is a give and take. "we give you X and you give us Y" but every time such ramblings surface, it's the parties fighting over ground. Slasher very well might have jeopardized his relations, he may have been too greedy the last couple of times. or, the current quid-pro-quo between the organizations, teams and media is no longer felt appropriate by one of the parties. just like player contracts are re-evaluated after each term. Slasher breaking the news can be him hunting for pageviews or spotlight. or, there were insufficient incentives for him to keep quiet. EG may have offered him deals they deemed appropriate. or, what they offered was not enough. of course, given the small amount of cash available in our space, prioritization is a valid point. but undoubtedly every time it comes to distributing the cake, every party involved will tend to overstate their importance and downplay that of others. it is healthy to ask ourselves how much everyone's contributions is worth, and should be compensated for it. if that means, we want or don't want to finance full-time journalism so be it. but no one is at fault for trying to reserve their share. Slasher may find out that no one will be willing to agree to his terms. EG might find other people to fit their needs and agree to their offerings. or not. but no one, Slasher nor EG should be surprised that current power-lines are under constant contention. Slasher could get a bigger and better paycheque if he worked together with the teams and was able to get things like exclusive first interviews on these deals rather than releasing short badly written "Stepahno joined EG" type comments. I wrote a much bigger piece earlier in this thread but meh. Slasher imo is not doing what is best for him and he is obviously alienating people who he has to get along with to a certain extent if he wants to be successful. How would Slasher get a bigger paycheque unless EG was giving him money (bribing) to delay his story. He has a salary from Gamespot and he has to meet quotas/deadlines. EG and TL do this release that they just did instead of Slasher breaking it. Tons of excitement. Lots of hits. TL/EG does the interviews with Nazgul, Alex, Jaedong, Stephano, Taeja because money is cool. TL/EG gets tons of views that come from the better hype that Eg and TL were able to provide. TL/EG profit. Pretty simple.
fixed that for the real world.
you don't share what you can keep exclusive lol.
On January 17 2013 08:19 mrtomjones wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 08:16 sAsImre wrote:On January 17 2013 08:07 clever_us wrote:On January 17 2013 07:05 sAsImre wrote:On January 17 2013 06:44 EG.lectR wrote:On January 17 2013 06:37 echO [W] wrote:On January 17 2013 05:18 EG.lectR wrote:
"Ultimately, EG's issue with Breslau's reporting is their fault. If they want information used the way they want it to be used, they need to withhold that information as they see fit, which is certainly their right."
This assumes that information is always between one party or parties which are under the same level of control. That is not the case within e-sports and there is no body which monitors that information or those conversations. Teams talk freely, players talk freely, and there are too many people involved in normal transactions [in this case, team transactions] to claim that one party can control it all and you cannot, as one entity, change that at this time. Which is how it works in the real world in professional sports across the board. GMs talk to other GMs, agents talk to other agents, players talk to other players, and of course people within the organizations that are way bigger than eSports organizations also talk. Across the board that you're referencing is a body called the NFL, MLB, NHL, and others similarly named which have specific contracts across their franchised teams which prevent them from distributing this information before an appropriate time. Even in the event of leaks, those governing bodies can quickly replace people who they feel have leaked information at no detriment to the organization. That is not the case with e-sports. Not only do those types of contracts not exist across e-sports teams, but there is no governing team body to enforce them. Plus, those teams (the e-sports ones) mentioned are incredibly fragile and operate entirely differently between organizations. we're losing money qq, let's hang someone. AFAIK such a rule doesn't work in soccer/every major sport in Europe and things are leaked all the time, doesn't look like the bayern munchen, top rugby or handball clubs are failing despite their absence of exclusivity on news lol. If your business model is awful enough to rely on getting such annoucements on your own website, well i'm glad your company (not specifically eg) is going down. funnily there is no pbm with kespa teams as far as business model goes, maybe the fact they rely on strong sponsorship and a real league instead of online jokes is the core of the answer... This is downright moronic. Major sports teams do not work the way e-sports teams do. Baseball teams get their revenue largely from stadium tickets and TV/radio rights. E-sports get their revenue from sponsors, and they do that by promising their sponsors exposure. If Slasher cuts 35,000 views off an announcement post by spoiling it a week in advance, that directly sabotages the statistics EG uses to recruit sponsors and therefore secure income. When you say "doesn't look like top rugby or handball clubs are failing despite their absence of exclusivity on news lol" you illustrate exactly how little you understand the sweeping differences between the business model of traditional sports and e-sports. esport model sucks hard if teams rely on doing journalist job to get revenue. Surprisingly the only esport league that has a real longevity uses a similar model to most sport: a real lengthy league and huge sponsors. You act like it is EG's choice to not have coke give them a million a month in sponsorship. Don't be ignorant. EG is doing what they can to succeed and they are one of the healthiest and wealthiest teams in SC2. They do this by generating lots of excitement and clicks etc. They do not have the option of being like the professional sports teams. I'm sure they'd be more than willing to do so if the business model was possible.
some EG guys were involved in the NASL which was supposed to be the big western thing, ended in up a big failure at the beginning to stabilize pretty well later on but there is still no real league that would stabilize teams. Hence sc2 model in the west is pretty bad, while LoL is actually stepping up in the right direction (riot gives the money and control things, but KeSPA show that control isn't bad when you've to develop and stabilize a scene. In an overall amateurish scene you don't whine because someone gets money you "should" get. You don't whine at all toward a journalist doing its work if you're not a moron.
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On January 17 2013 08:19 sAsImre wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 08:17 mrtomjones wrote:On January 17 2013 08:00 JBright wrote:On January 17 2013 07:53 mrtomjones wrote:On January 17 2013 07:19 rotegirte wrote:On January 17 2013 06:29 bayaka wrote:
The journalistic standards for big sports and esports should not be the same (for the time being.) Slasher is trying to be a "I am a protector of truth and justice" journalist when in actuality he isn't putting in any of the effort required for that, he is merely claiming to stand by his journalistic code in order to be able to shirk any sense of responsibility for doing things like leaking news before the teams release it.
Leaking the Jaedong/Stephano information beforehand I can see having minimal repercussions, but leaking the Snute example no doubt hurt that announcement/player. I don't buy Slasher's argument that he is anything other than a parasite at this point. To the people who say that he is doing his job, if my job was to screw people over, would it not still be screwing people over? And by that logic, where is all of the hate for Alex Garfield coming from? I appreciate Slasher's work otherwise, and I understand that that is what journalism calls for, but I don't think that journalism of this kind is helpful at all right now. Slasher's job only exists because esports exists, and as of now he is just undermining the people he should be helping out. I understand journalism is different from being a publicist, but what "real" journalism is he actually doing at the moment? It seems as though he is aiming for quantity over quality, and maybe that's his job, but that makes him a tabloid/paparazi style journalist... you call that parasitic, but at the end of the day the goal is for everyone to get a paycheck. the whole issue is about how much of the current limited pie gets allocated to what party. Slasher is not leeching off teams more than teams leeching off the cheap publicity they get from online communities. we, the audience are accustomed to the status quo that content of any kind is freely available. what exactly do TL writers get as compensation for their work? it is expected of Slasher to get the scoops out on the field, doing editorial work, providing in-depth interviews and articles (so-called "quality" work), yet it's suddenly horrible of him to look out for himself. the recent incident is all but a sign of the natural struggle for resources. and yes, it is a give and take. "we give you X and you give us Y" but every time such ramblings surface, it's the parties fighting over ground. Slasher very well might have jeopardized his relations, he may have been too greedy the last couple of times. or, the current quid-pro-quo between the organizations, teams and media is no longer felt appropriate by one of the parties. just like player contracts are re-evaluated after each term. Slasher breaking the news can be him hunting for pageviews or spotlight. or, there were insufficient incentives for him to keep quiet. EG may have offered him deals they deemed appropriate. or, what they offered was not enough. of course, given the small amount of cash available in our space, prioritization is a valid point. but undoubtedly every time it comes to distributing the cake, every party involved will tend to overstate their importance and downplay that of others. it is healthy to ask ourselves how much everyone's contributions is worth, and should be compensated for it. if that means, we want or don't want to finance full-time journalism so be it. but no one is at fault for trying to reserve their share. Slasher may find out that no one will be willing to agree to his terms. EG might find other people to fit their needs and agree to their offerings. or not. but no one, Slasher nor EG should be surprised that current power-lines are under constant contention. Slasher could get a bigger and better paycheque if he worked together with the teams and was able to get things like exclusive first interviews on these deals rather than releasing short badly written "Stepahno joined EG" type comments. I wrote a much bigger piece earlier in this thread but meh. Slasher imo is not doing what is best for him and he is obviously alienating people who he has to get along with to a certain extent if he wants to be successful. How would Slasher get a bigger paycheque unless EG was giving him money (bribing) to delay his story. He has a salary from Gamespot and he has to meet quotas/deadlines. EG and TL do this release that they just did instead of Slasher breaking it. Tons of excitement. Lots of hits. TL/EG does the interviews with Nazgul, Alex, Jaedong, Stephano, Taeja because money is cool. TL/EG gets tons of views that come from the better hype that Eg and TL were able to provide. TL/EG profit. Pretty simple. fixed that for the real world. you don't share what you can keep exclusive lol.
Or they both work together because Slasher has the things that he can do well and are his job. He has inside info but works with them in some cases instead of always spilling the beans. Shocking how it can work.
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On January 17 2013 08:20 mrtomjones wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 08:19 sAsImre wrote:On January 17 2013 08:17 mrtomjones wrote:On January 17 2013 08:00 JBright wrote:On January 17 2013 07:53 mrtomjones wrote:On January 17 2013 07:19 rotegirte wrote:On January 17 2013 06:29 bayaka wrote:
The journalistic standards for big sports and esports should not be the same (for the time being.) Slasher is trying to be a "I am a protector of truth and justice" journalist when in actuality he isn't putting in any of the effort required for that, he is merely claiming to stand by his journalistic code in order to be able to shirk any sense of responsibility for doing things like leaking news before the teams release it.
Leaking the Jaedong/Stephano information beforehand I can see having minimal repercussions, but leaking the Snute example no doubt hurt that announcement/player. I don't buy Slasher's argument that he is anything other than a parasite at this point. To the people who say that he is doing his job, if my job was to screw people over, would it not still be screwing people over? And by that logic, where is all of the hate for Alex Garfield coming from? I appreciate Slasher's work otherwise, and I understand that that is what journalism calls for, but I don't think that journalism of this kind is helpful at all right now. Slasher's job only exists because esports exists, and as of now he is just undermining the people he should be helping out. I understand journalism is different from being a publicist, but what "real" journalism is he actually doing at the moment? It seems as though he is aiming for quantity over quality, and maybe that's his job, but that makes him a tabloid/paparazi style journalist... you call that parasitic, but at the end of the day the goal is for everyone to get a paycheck. the whole issue is about how much of the current limited pie gets allocated to what party. Slasher is not leeching off teams more than teams leeching off the cheap publicity they get from online communities. we, the audience are accustomed to the status quo that content of any kind is freely available. what exactly do TL writers get as compensation for their work? it is expected of Slasher to get the scoops out on the field, doing editorial work, providing in-depth interviews and articles (so-called "quality" work), yet it's suddenly horrible of him to look out for himself. the recent incident is all but a sign of the natural struggle for resources. and yes, it is a give and take. "we give you X and you give us Y" but every time such ramblings surface, it's the parties fighting over ground. Slasher very well might have jeopardized his relations, he may have been too greedy the last couple of times. or, the current quid-pro-quo between the organizations, teams and media is no longer felt appropriate by one of the parties. just like player contracts are re-evaluated after each term. Slasher breaking the news can be him hunting for pageviews or spotlight. or, there were insufficient incentives for him to keep quiet. EG may have offered him deals they deemed appropriate. or, what they offered was not enough. of course, given the small amount of cash available in our space, prioritization is a valid point. but undoubtedly every time it comes to distributing the cake, every party involved will tend to overstate their importance and downplay that of others. it is healthy to ask ourselves how much everyone's contributions is worth, and should be compensated for it. if that means, we want or don't want to finance full-time journalism so be it. but no one is at fault for trying to reserve their share. Slasher may find out that no one will be willing to agree to his terms. EG might find other people to fit their needs and agree to their offerings. or not. but no one, Slasher nor EG should be surprised that current power-lines are under constant contention. Slasher could get a bigger and better paycheque if he worked together with the teams and was able to get things like exclusive first interviews on these deals rather than releasing short badly written "Stepahno joined EG" type comments. I wrote a much bigger piece earlier in this thread but meh. Slasher imo is not doing what is best for him and he is obviously alienating people who he has to get along with to a certain extent if he wants to be successful. How would Slasher get a bigger paycheque unless EG was giving him money (bribing) to delay his story. He has a salary from Gamespot and he has to meet quotas/deadlines. EG and TL do this release that they just did instead of Slasher breaking it. Tons of excitement. Lots of hits. TL/EG does the interviews with Nazgul, Alex, Jaedong, Stephano, Taeja because money is cool. TL/EG gets tons of views that come from the better hype that Eg and TL were able to provide. TL/EG profit. Pretty simple. fixed that for the real world. you don't share what you can keep exclusive lol. Or they both work together because Slasher has the things that he can do well and are his job. He has inside info but works with them in some cases instead of always spilling the beans. Shocking how it can work.
TL/EG have people who can do the interview, doing an interview doesn't require enough skill that someone can profite from the exclusivity of this competence lol. The relationships are the main asset of every journalist, and esport ain't an exeption. You're not good because you've awesome writing/interviewing skills.
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I think this whole argument is dumb and pointless, for the following reasons.
1) Alex said it was impossible to prevent such leaks.
Alex Garfield stated that he felt that it was impossible to prevent leaks such as if you're in a bidding war over a player and the other team leaks the information, that is something you have no control over. I personally don't completely believe that, I feel like you could have the teams in question sign NDAs before the process began or something similar, but for the sake of this point we will accept Alex's statement.
2) There is a market for the information, and if Slasher doesn't report it someone else will.
If Alex, by some miracle of god, manages to convince Slasher to only work with him and embargo the information in exchange for rights etc. then congratulations to him, he will have earned himself a brief respite until someone else figures out that there is still a huge market for this information that is leaking out of an apparently unplug-able hole. The information is literally money, and companies have to protect it, or someone will come along and pick it up off the street. And then Alex can cry about it if he wants, I guess.
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Great input in my opinion, I couldn't agree more with what you said. Especially about EG withholding information they don't want to get out there
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On January 17 2013 08:16 sAsImre wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 08:07 clever_us wrote:On January 17 2013 07:05 sAsImre wrote:On January 17 2013 06:44 EG.lectR wrote:On January 17 2013 06:37 echO [W] wrote:On January 17 2013 05:18 EG.lectR wrote:
"Ultimately, EG's issue with Breslau's reporting is their fault. If they want information used the way they want it to be used, they need to withhold that information as they see fit, which is certainly their right."
This assumes that information is always between one party or parties which are under the same level of control. That is not the case within e-sports and there is no body which monitors that information or those conversations. Teams talk freely, players talk freely, and there are too many people involved in normal transactions [in this case, team transactions] to claim that one party can control it all and you cannot, as one entity, change that at this time. Which is how it works in the real world in professional sports across the board. GMs talk to other GMs, agents talk to other agents, players talk to other players, and of course people within the organizations that are way bigger than eSports organizations also talk. Across the board that you're referencing is a body called the NFL, MLB, NHL, and others similarly named which have specific contracts across their franchised teams which prevent them from distributing this information before an appropriate time. Even in the event of leaks, those governing bodies can quickly replace people who they feel have leaked information at no detriment to the organization. That is not the case with e-sports. Not only do those types of contracts not exist across e-sports teams, but there is no governing team body to enforce them. Plus, those teams (the e-sports ones) mentioned are incredibly fragile and operate entirely differently between organizations. we're losing money qq, let's hang someone. AFAIK such a rule doesn't work in soccer/every major sport in Europe and things are leaked all the time, doesn't look like the bayern munchen, top rugby or handball clubs are failing despite their absence of exclusivity on news lol. If your business model is awful enough to rely on getting such annoucements on your own website, well i'm glad your company (not specifically eg) is going down. funnily there is no pbm with kespa teams as far as business model goes, maybe the fact they rely on strong sponsorship and a real league instead of online jokes is the core of the answer... This is downright moronic. Major sports teams do not work the way e-sports teams do. Baseball teams get their revenue largely from stadium tickets and TV/radio rights. E-sports get their revenue from sponsors, and they do that by promising their sponsors exposure. If Slasher cuts 35,000 views off an announcement post by spoiling it a week in advance, that directly sabotages the statistics EG uses to recruit sponsors and therefore secure income. When you say "doesn't look like top rugby or handball clubs are failing despite their absence of exclusivity on news lol" you illustrate exactly how little you understand the sweeping differences between the business model of traditional sports and e-sports. esport model sucks hard if teams rely on doing journalist job to get revenue. Surprisingly the only esport league that has a real longevity uses a similar model to most sport: a real lengthy league and huge sponsors.
Right! Huge sponsors are EXACTLY how traditional sports work. Where would the Home Depot Yankees be if not for their title sponsor? And how would the Atlanta Coca-Cola Falcons have succeeded this season if not for the support of their title sponsor?
And you're correct - relying on doing "journalist job" to get revenue is not a good way to run a team of any kind. But announcing your new assets when you are an e-sports team is not a journalist's job - it is a chance to give your sponsors exposure. And when a journalist steals that chance to give your sponsors exposure, he is directly sabotaging your ability to recruit sponsors in the future.
The first step to getting your head straight on this controversy is to stop thinking about e-sports as baseball and to start thinking of it from the perspective of teams trying to make money. When you understand that, you'll understand why Alex Garfield and Nazgul are mad at Slasher.
And then all you have to do is understand that "freedom of press" does not mean "freedom from being blacklisted for screwing teams over all the time" and you'll have your head wrapped around the whole thing!
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On January 17 2013 08:09 Kishin2 wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 08:00 JBright wrote:On January 17 2013 07:53 mrtomjones wrote:On January 17 2013 07:19 rotegirte wrote:On January 17 2013 06:29 bayaka wrote:
The journalistic standards for big sports and esports should not be the same (for the time being.) Slasher is trying to be a "I am a protector of truth and justice" journalist when in actuality he isn't putting in any of the effort required for that, he is merely claiming to stand by his journalistic code in order to be able to shirk any sense of responsibility for doing things like leaking news before the teams release it.
Leaking the Jaedong/Stephano information beforehand I can see having minimal repercussions, but leaking the Snute example no doubt hurt that announcement/player. I don't buy Slasher's argument that he is anything other than a parasite at this point. To the people who say that he is doing his job, if my job was to screw people over, would it not still be screwing people over? And by that logic, where is all of the hate for Alex Garfield coming from? I appreciate Slasher's work otherwise, and I understand that that is what journalism calls for, but I don't think that journalism of this kind is helpful at all right now. Slasher's job only exists because esports exists, and as of now he is just undermining the people he should be helping out. I understand journalism is different from being a publicist, but what "real" journalism is he actually doing at the moment? It seems as though he is aiming for quantity over quality, and maybe that's his job, but that makes him a tabloid/paparazi style journalist... you call that parasitic, but at the end of the day the goal is for everyone to get a paycheck. the whole issue is about how much of the current limited pie gets allocated to what party. Slasher is not leeching off teams more than teams leeching off the cheap publicity they get from online communities. we, the audience are accustomed to the status quo that content of any kind is freely available. what exactly do TL writers get as compensation for their work? it is expected of Slasher to get the scoops out on the field, doing editorial work, providing in-depth interviews and articles (so-called "quality" work), yet it's suddenly horrible of him to look out for himself. the recent incident is all but a sign of the natural struggle for resources. and yes, it is a give and take. "we give you X and you give us Y" but every time such ramblings surface, it's the parties fighting over ground. Slasher very well might have jeopardized his relations, he may have been too greedy the last couple of times. or, the current quid-pro-quo between the organizations, teams and media is no longer felt appropriate by one of the parties. just like player contracts are re-evaluated after each term. Slasher breaking the news can be him hunting for pageviews or spotlight. or, there were insufficient incentives for him to keep quiet. EG may have offered him deals they deemed appropriate. or, what they offered was not enough. of course, given the small amount of cash available in our space, prioritization is a valid point. but undoubtedly every time it comes to distributing the cake, every party involved will tend to overstate their importance and downplay that of others. it is healthy to ask ourselves how much everyone's contributions is worth, and should be compensated for it. if that means, we want or don't want to finance full-time journalism so be it. but no one is at fault for trying to reserve their share. Slasher may find out that no one will be willing to agree to his terms. EG might find other people to fit their needs and agree to their offerings. or not. but no one, Slasher nor EG should be surprised that current power-lines are under constant contention. Slasher could get a bigger and better paycheque if he worked together with the teams and was able to get things like exclusive first interviews on these deals rather than releasing short badly written "Stepahno joined EG" type comments. I wrote a much bigger piece earlier in this thread but meh. Slasher imo is not doing what is best for him and he is obviously alienating people who he has to get along with to a certain extent if he wants to be successful. How would Slasher get a bigger paycheque unless EG was giving him money (bribing) to delay his story. He has a salary from Gamespot and he has to meet quotas/deadlines. I think what he meant is that Alex stated on ITG that he was willing to cooperate with Slasher. Slasher would get first dibs on an interview with EG's players (after PL, iirc) on the condition that Slasher does not prematurely release news. It is implied that they both informally agreed to this as it is mutual beneficial. However, Slasher, for an unknown reason,did not follow through on meeting with Alex to get said interviews. Slasher's response to Alex was that he had already done that type of work before, interviews and such.
What I meant is, that there is a possibility that Slasher miscalculated. Or the equal possibility, that what EG offered to Slasher was not enough. I have currently little time to attend to the thread, but my basic outline would be following:
There is distinction in what a party
1) can offer
2) tries to offer
3) deems worthy of an offer
So if you take two sides, the rift between negotiation partners stems from a difference in the combination of those 3 points. i.e.
Scenario A
EG
1) can offer X
2) tries to get away with Y
3) deems Z as realistic
Slasher
1) thinks EG is capable to offer A
2) tries to get B
3) deems C as realistic
So, there is plenty of room for mismatches in every potential scenario.
My point is, that the mere fact one side offered something doesn't mean a deal is to be completed. And, lots of room for either side to misjudge. Just wanted to portray my impression that the whole thing is only the process of power-struggle and each side trying to get the best out of it
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On January 17 2013 08:27 clever_us wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 08:16 sAsImre wrote:On January 17 2013 08:07 clever_us wrote:On January 17 2013 07:05 sAsImre wrote:On January 17 2013 06:44 EG.lectR wrote:On January 17 2013 06:37 echO [W] wrote:On January 17 2013 05:18 EG.lectR wrote:
"Ultimately, EG's issue with Breslau's reporting is their fault. If they want information used the way they want it to be used, they need to withhold that information as they see fit, which is certainly their right."
This assumes that information is always between one party or parties which are under the same level of control. That is not the case within e-sports and there is no body which monitors that information or those conversations. Teams talk freely, players talk freely, and there are too many people involved in normal transactions [in this case, team transactions] to claim that one party can control it all and you cannot, as one entity, change that at this time. Which is how it works in the real world in professional sports across the board. GMs talk to other GMs, agents talk to other agents, players talk to other players, and of course people within the organizations that are way bigger than eSports organizations also talk. Across the board that you're referencing is a body called the NFL, MLB, NHL, and others similarly named which have specific contracts across their franchised teams which prevent them from distributing this information before an appropriate time. Even in the event of leaks, those governing bodies can quickly replace people who they feel have leaked information at no detriment to the organization. That is not the case with e-sports. Not only do those types of contracts not exist across e-sports teams, but there is no governing team body to enforce them. Plus, those teams (the e-sports ones) mentioned are incredibly fragile and operate entirely differently between organizations. we're losing money qq, let's hang someone. AFAIK such a rule doesn't work in soccer/every major sport in Europe and things are leaked all the time, doesn't look like the bayern munchen, top rugby or handball clubs are failing despite their absence of exclusivity on news lol. If your business model is awful enough to rely on getting such annoucements on your own website, well i'm glad your company (not specifically eg) is going down. funnily there is no pbm with kespa teams as far as business model goes, maybe the fact they rely on strong sponsorship and a real league instead of online jokes is the core of the answer... This is downright moronic. Major sports teams do not work the way e-sports teams do. Baseball teams get their revenue largely from stadium tickets and TV/radio rights. E-sports get their revenue from sponsors, and they do that by promising their sponsors exposure. If Slasher cuts 35,000 views off an announcement post by spoiling it a week in advance, that directly sabotages the statistics EG uses to recruit sponsors and therefore secure income. When you say "doesn't look like top rugby or handball clubs are failing despite their absence of exclusivity on news lol" you illustrate exactly how little you understand the sweeping differences between the business model of traditional sports and e-sports. esport model sucks hard if teams rely on doing journalist job to get revenue. Surprisingly the only esport league that has a real longevity uses a similar model to most sport: a real lengthy league and huge sponsors. Right! Huge sponsors are EXACTLY how traditional sports work. Where would the Home Depot Yankees be if not for their title sponsor? And how would the Atlanta Coca-Cola Falcons have succeeded this season if not for the support of their title sponsor? And you're correct - relying on doing "journalist job" to get revenue is not a good way to run a team of any kind. But announcing your new assets when you are an e-sports team is not a journalist's job - it is a chance to give your sponsors exposure. And when a journalist steals that chance to give your sponsors exposure, he is directly sabotaging your ability to recruit sponsors in the future. The first step to getting your head straight on this controversy is to stop thinking about e-sports as baseball and to start thinking of it from the perspective of teams trying to make money. When you understand that, you'll understand why Alex Garfield and Nazgul are mad at Slasher. And then all you have to do is understand that "freedom of press" does not mean "freedom from being blacklisted for screwing teams over all the time" and you'll have your head wrapped around the whole thing!
I love cheering for the home depot yankees! It is a pity EG has said no to the billion dollar sponsorship offer from Pampers. We could be cheering for the EG Pampers Diapaers all stars!
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Garfield's wrong here. If you don't want a journalist reporting your top secret news, perhaps he should be focusing on leaks within his organisation and trying to patch them up.
Slasher is doing his job. EG needs better PR staff or a plumber.
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With the motivations at hand here, driven by the need to simply make a living - blackballing is not the answer.
This is probably never going to be exposed, but on what level has the investigation reached? I can absolutely see the reasons discussed by all sides, and the anger resulting as well. Still begs the question - how exactly was this information leaked? Who leaked it? IMO, this is quite possibly the most important thing to nail down and addressed immediately.
If it's true that the information was gathered from a stream, due to players inadvertently communicating with their friends - then could this not be identified? Let's imagine for a moment that Alex sat every single EG member down, posed the question "We had an information leak. Who among us leaked?". Of course this would be a very uncomfortable situation but EG has strong enough bonds to stay together, regardless of the leaker, are they not?
With information literally worth X number of dollars, I personally cannot vilify someone who came across said info(whether it be discovered informally or even by accident) and then going ahead to broadcast that.
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Thank you for weighing in on this topic, Bill Baer. I could not have said it better.
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The problem is, Slasher isn't the 'enemy' here, so to speak.
Perhaps orgs like EG and TL could be a bit more proactive in using Slasher and other e-sports journos as part of their communications strategies.
Simply raging at and blaming a journo for stealing your thunder is ridiculous (especially when Slasher is just doing his job as a responsible journalist). Slasher isn't the problem here: the communications strategies of EG and TL are (and I say this with all due respect).
Rather than raging at the journos, perhaps they could look into how they can work with them in future when it comes to player movements like this.
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Wow, great write up man. 5/5
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Excellent blog. I agree 100%. If EG didn't want the info leaked and potentially exploited, that is their responsibility. Slasher's leaks were not putting any lives in danger, and should not have warranted the reaction from Mr. Garfield that he gave.
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EPT
