This article was released by Dailyesports this morning. It was published under the ABC-Talk section, where they don't release names of the individuals mentioned in the article.
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It won't be long before Starcraft: Broodwar leagues will vanish. From the 3rd round of Proleague onwards, BW will be completely replaced with SC2 and the ongoing tving Starleague 2012 only has 2 matches left to be played.
For a long time, BW leagues were active only in Korea and lacked a globalized element. Yet fans will miss the leagues once they vanish.
Under these conditions, there is news that one company owner is questioning why BW leagues are being abolished. This CEO, who once met up with Kespa to discuss the founding of Team 8, has a tremendous love for BW. He has been hooked on BW since his school days. The company that he runs even has in-house PC Bangs to allow staff members to play games during their breaks. There is no SC2 installed on those PCs, only BW. Isn't this CEO's love for BW really immense?
It's been said that if this CEO were to sponsor a BW league, he would be willing to fork out twice the sponsorship money of the current league sponsor. According to one Kespa insider, "because BW leagues are definitely ending, he won't be funding an SC2 individual league or Team 8." The CEO had adamantly said that "the only game I want to invest in is BW. While BW was still being maintained, I considered establishing an association with Team 8 but I have no interest in SC2 leagues."
To hear such news after the recent, massively successful match between Jangbi and Zero, the overwhelming regret felt about the abolition of BW is like a tsunami that's crushing you.
------------------------------------- Translator's comments: Who knows whether the article is even true or not. It's under ABC-Talk.
In any case, it didn't say when he spoke to Kespa about the founding of Team 8, it could have been in 2011 or 2012. We've known for some time that Kespa has had the intention to switch to SC2 at least since 2011, if not even before that. So this CEO (if he exists) would have been told about this when he approached them about sponsoring a league/team.
On July 12 2012 13:12 DystopiaX wrote: If he was so willing to fund Team 8 or another tourney then why didn't he? Or at least make his interest known to the public earlier so that something could actually have happened? This makes him sound good and all but really he didn't do much, and I doubt he was as willing to do so as he claimed he was.
he says right in the interview. its because he didn't want to invest in SC2. It was largely known at that time that sc2 was being considered for Kespa leagues, I know this CEO would have known that and likely didn't invest in Team8 because of it
On July 12 2012 20:11 Fleuria wrote: He's one of those people that say bullshit like this for fame, all for his own gain, if he had any real passion he would invested in the bw scene when it was dying and they made the decision to swap, if he sponsored the next 3 osls or something it wouldn't have died but jk all talk no game.
I wasn't going to respond since I'm coughing green stuff and all that crap but some of you need to reread the article. Perhaps it wasn't clear before but now I'm setting it straight. ABC-Talk is a section written by DES staff who hear about "insider" news/gossip that they can't give official details about.
In this case, the DES staff who wrote this article heard about CEO X from a Kespa insider. According to the author of the article anyway. So no, this isn't some kind of attempt at fame/PR by the CEO. -_-
If he was so willing to fund Team 8 or another tourney then why didn't he? Or at least make his interest known to the public earlier so that something could actually have happened? This makes him sound good and all but really he didn't do much, and I doubt he was as willing to do so as he claimed he was.
On July 12 2012 13:12 DystopiaX wrote: If he was so willing to fund Team 8 or another tourney then why didn't he? Or at least make his interest known to the public earlier so that something could actually have happened? This makes him sound good and all but really he didn't do much, and I doubt he was as willing to do so as he claimed he was.
he says right in the interview. its because he didn't want to invest in SC2. It was largely known at that time that sc2 was being considered for Kespa leagues, I know this CEO would have known that and likely didn't invest in Team8 because of it
On July 12 2012 13:12 DystopiaX wrote: If he was so willing to fund Team 8 or another tourney then why didn't he? Or at least make his interest known to the public earlier so that something could actually have happened? This makes him sound good and all but really he didn't do much, and I doubt he was as willing to do so as he claimed he was.
he says right in the interview. its because he didn't want to invest in SC2. It was largely known at that time that sc2 was being considered for Kespa leagues, I know this CEO would have known that and likely didn't invest in Team8 because of it
Weird timing for article, but I don't think CEO's can always just do whatever they want. There probably is a board of trustees, official kespa business to go through, etc that take a lot of time. Especially if he wanted to do proleague instead of just 1 individual tournament (working out the details for a whole year of sponsorship with OGN). Surprised like first 5 responses was to be so aggressive against him--even if you can do whatever you want as CEO it would take time.
Good man, maybe a little overhyped, but sad to see TT
On July 12 2012 13:24 N.geNuity wrote: Weird timing for article, but I don't think CEO's can always just do whatever they want. There probably is a board of trustees, official kespa business to go through, etc that take a lot of time. Especially if he wanted to do proleague instead of just 1 individual tournament (working out the details for a whole year of sponsorship with OGN). Surprised like first 5 responses was to be so aggressive against him--even if you can do whatever you want as CEO it would take time.
Good man, maybe a little overhyped, but sad to see TT
Hmm yeah, I don't quite get all the negativity either. Noone even knows how big a company he runs. Negotiations take time, especially when Kespa is involved.
Feels very sensationalized and unverifiable. It could be true, but even if it is, you have to remember that it's pretty easy for someone in his position to make such grandiose claims about what he would have done after all is said and done. The fact of the matter is that he, and many other corporate sponsors, just weren't giving the kind of money they needed to keep the scene BW only, and long before the SC2 talks were even restarted.
On July 12 2012 13:24 N.geNuity wrote: Weird timing for article, but I don't think CEO's can always just do whatever they want. There probably is a board of trustees, official kespa business to go through, etc that take a lot of time. Especially if he wanted to do proleague instead of just 1 individual tournament (working out the details for a whole year of sponsorship with OGN). Surprised like first 5 responses was to be so aggressive against him--even if you can do whatever you want as CEO it would take time.
Good man, maybe a little overhyped, but sad to see TT
its actually tremendous balls to say something like this, because usually in business / corporate law it's illegal to not profit maximize when you have the knowledge of options in a leadership position (liability / responsibility to share holders). People really need to give him some slack, sure it might be a mixed PR statement but saying this could mean internal opposition with in his own company.
I agree with the first few responses. I mean, props for his support but it's not like BW suddenly went away overnight. We've had pity sponsorships for the last 2 years or so where this and other companies could have shown their support. Even if KeSPA was going to dab into SC2 eventually, if the BW support was there we'd probably just see separate divisions of PL like Special Forces rather than a full on transition. But it wasn't.
On July 12 2012 13:24 N.geNuity wrote: Weird timing for article, but I don't think CEO's can always just do whatever they want. There probably is a board of trustees, official kespa business to go through, etc that take a lot of time. Especially if he wanted to do proleague instead of just 1 individual tournament (working out the details for a whole year of sponsorship with OGN). Surprised like first 5 responses was to be so aggressive against him--even if you can do whatever you want as CEO it would take time.
Good man, maybe a little overhyped, but sad to see TT
its actually tremendous balls to say something like this, because usually in business / corporate law it's illegal to not profit maximize when you have the knowledge of options in a leadership position. People really need to give him some slack, sure it might be a mixed PR statement but saying this could mean internal opposition with in his own company.
Yeah, it's quite possible. Also, companies don't usually make an announcement about sponsoring a Kespa tournament until the agreement has been signed. There's not a lot of transparency.
I'm still waiting to see where all the new money SC2 is supposed to bring in will come from. Everyone acts like the obvious reason for switching to SC2 was to get sponsorship money from international companies, but it doesn't seem that obvious to me. If they were really after international attention wouldn't they have gone with the English client and gotten English commentary by now? The whole thing feels like some kind of conspiracy where half of the puzzle pieces are missing.
oh also didnt see that this until now--read too much into "holy shit some rich guy could have sponsored BW forever"--but the article also furthers the rumour in the snm thread that round 3 is a full switch but is a pretty definitive statement (although article isn't official news).
I'd like for BW to continue just like anyone else , but also like others have stated, I think this is a little to late to do any good, but I hope for the best. I expect the worst though. T_T
EPT
