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CA10824 Posts
For reference: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/viewmessage.php?topic_id=72427
Many people were concerned about the future of Hanbit Stars, as Hanbit decided to pull out of sponsorship. Well, it looks like there is finally some good news.
ItemMania, a 6 year old gaming-related company has decided to be their new sponsor! They deal with online gaming item transactions for MMORPGs.
So basically, the Hanbit team is safe, and will probably have a new name to be announced sometime soon.
ItemMania_Free?
Credits: Shim Hyun @ fomos.co.kr
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omg Yay!!!! I was worrying so much about Free
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ItemMania hosted tournaments/leagues for sc already some while ago iirc. draco participated in one of those
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Good news for the team. Hopefully they'll be able to put together something like Daezang/GGplay/Free of yore.
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United States10774 Posts
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I wonder if what sort of changes (if any) are going to come about other than the name and sponsor. Hopefully something to make them a bit more competitive.
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well at least item mania doesn't sound much weirder than we made fox..they got that going for them
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YAY i cheer for this!!! so oldschool team must prevail!
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What was the issue with Hanbit? Company not doing well and cutting back?
ItemMania, a 6 year old gaming-related company has decided to be their new sponsor! They deal with online gaming item transactions for MMORPGs.
Never realized there's market big enough for a company specializing in virtual trade to be viable, amazing how influential all these MMORGs have become.
Anyway pretty happy for these guys, sc scene still going strong, hopefully : )
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great news indeed! there're still a lot of interests in ProLeague <3
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LOL I can already see them wearing "WoW gold 24 hour delivery!" ads on their uniforms.
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Hopefully their team will have a better life now, watching Real Story Progamer about their head coach, it seemed pretty sad.
''IM_Free'' doesn't sand too bad to me or ''IM_Pretty'' lol.
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Great news
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Oh wait......wasn't there an ItemMania tournament? Haha the names were confusing, so I didn't know who was who ^^;;
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On July 31 2008 18:42 clazziquai wrote: Oh wait......wasn't there an ItemMania tournament? Haha the names were confusing, so I didn't know who was who ^^;; ye; they had pick id's like ItemMania_1, ItemMania_2, etc.
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Well, it's a start. I don't think the investment will be huge, but for sure there will be changes in drafting/recruiting policies, training regime, etc. If they could pull a nice move and bring some good player to support Free while breeding their most promising rookies(they have a couple of them), they could grow big in a few months as STX did.
Dunno, they could recall Daezang back once he is done with the army. He is not playing that well lately, but he is not that bad of a lineup filler for PL. At least better than what they've got right now.
Or aim for one of those players who have misteriously vanished, like Casy or UpMagic. Ok, UpMagic will never leave eStro, and maybe Casy has too big of a contract for the new sponsor to take on, but I'm sure there are some underused talented gamers who could use a change of team.
Anyways, this makes my day a little bit happier. Thanks for the news.
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This is good news. I think Ganzi has some potential too, other than Free.
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Woah, finally. GGPlay is gonna regret his decision to leave HanBit too soon!
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CA10824 Posts
On July 31 2008 19:37 ForAdun wrote: Woah, finally. GGPlay is gonna regret his decision to leave HanBit too soon! haha, yeah i know what you mean. but at the same time i have a feeling he got a pretty nice contract from CJ since he signed on pretty much right after his OSL win.
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On July 31 2008 18:02 roadrunner_sc wrote:What was the issue with Hanbit? Company not doing well and cutting back? Show nested quote + ItemMania, a 6 year old gaming-related company has decided to be their new sponsor! They deal with online gaming item transactions for MMORPGs.
Never realized there's market big enough for a company specializing in virtual trade to be viable, amazing how influential all these MMORGs have become.
Very influential... especially WoW's 10 million customers have led to this phenomenon. John Romero (or was it someone else) said that such a "service" business model around one particular game would be required in the future when most players simply play a MMORPG all the time. I.e. companies and the developers themselves selling items and other special add-on content. It's reasonable if you think about it... a MMORPG is basically open-end, and there's the social aspect to it, so many players will play it for a LONG time, and most players don't care about role-playing, just about getting better items and improving their character (so-called powergamers). Before, the market could count on games not living that long, so the vast majority of players would move on to another game soon. With MMORPGs that's different, players will stick to one for a long time, but the market still wants/needs to make money from this.
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Online items for MMORPGs. I laughed so hard at this. GL
They better not give them a lot of free shit for MMORPGs or they'll never train!
You're using that word 'Social' very loosely my friend. It isn't formal communication to any extent.
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Good point. They better not get em hooked on WoW or some shit ( yellow T_T)
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3 Lions
United States3705 Posts
Mania Stars? idk Mania_Free isn't too bad
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On July 31 2008 20:38 0xDEADBEEF wrote:Show nested quote +On July 31 2008 18:02 roadrunner_sc wrote:What was the issue with Hanbit? Company not doing well and cutting back? ItemMania, a 6 year old gaming-related company has decided to be their new sponsor! They deal with online gaming item transactions for MMORPGs.
Never realized there's market big enough for a company specializing in virtual trade to be viable, amazing how influential all these MMORGs have become. Very influential... especially WoW's 10 million customers have led to this phenomenon. John Romero (or was it someone else) said that such a "service" business model around one particular game would be required in the future when most players simply play a MMORPG all the time. I.e. companies and the developers themselves selling items and other special add-on content. It's reasonable if you think about it... a MMORPG is basically open-end, and there's the social aspect to it, so many players will play it for a LONG time, and most players don't care about role-playing, just about getting better items and improving their character (so-called powergamers). Before, the market could count on games not living that long, so the vast majority of players would move on to another game soon. With MMORPGs that's different, players will stick to one for a long time, but the market still wants/needs to make money from this. qft, i was lucky enough to quit Lineage 2 and sell my account for money.Game was dominated by chinese companys gathering/trading in-game currency,items and selling it for real money...unbeliveable how much people would pay for most wanted items.Great way to earn money, but you destroy the game at the same time.
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*shudder* I didn't really like HanbitStars, now they have a weird company name sponsoring them?
ItemMania HAHAHAHA
IM_Free would look a little better I think
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Melbourne5338 Posts
On July 31 2008 23:51 Itachii wrote:Show nested quote +On July 31 2008 20:38 0xDEADBEEF wrote:On July 31 2008 18:02 roadrunner_sc wrote:What was the issue with Hanbit? Company not doing well and cutting back? ItemMania, a 6 year old gaming-related company has decided to be their new sponsor! They deal with online gaming item transactions for MMORPGs.
Never realized there's market big enough for a company specializing in virtual trade to be viable, amazing how influential all these MMORGs have become. Very influential... especially WoW's 10 million customers have led to this phenomenon. John Romero (or was it someone else) said that such a "service" business model around one particular game would be required in the future when most players simply play a MMORPG all the time. I.e. companies and the developers themselves selling items and other special add-on content. It's reasonable if you think about it... a MMORPG is basically open-end, and there's the social aspect to it, so many players will play it for a LONG time, and most players don't care about role-playing, just about getting better items and improving their character (so-called powergamers). Before, the market could count on games not living that long, so the vast majority of players would move on to another game soon. With MMORPGs that's different, players will stick to one for a long time, but the market still wants/needs to make money from this. qft, i was lucky enough to quit Lineage 2 and sell my account for money.Game was dominated by chinese companys gathering/trading in-game currency,items and selling it for real money...unbeliveable how much people would pay for most wanted items.Great way to earn money, but you destroy the game at the same time.
I wouldn't think Itemmania specialises in the illegal bot farming and such side of MMO trading. First thing that came to mind for me was the popular korean mmo format where the game is free to play, but there was an item shop for additional/better/prettier items that required real money.
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United States12607 Posts
This is great news for the Hanbit team. Hopefully the new sponsor will be more generous than Hanbit and help the team recruit new players and develop their skills. I've felt really bad for Hanbit this season, they played pretty much solely for the love of the game.
Much respect.
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This is HORRIBLE news!
Imagine if you can, the following scenario:
Item-Mania moves in, and mandates that all former Hanbit teams must spend a small amount of time playing a predetermined mmorpg with Item-Mania services. It's a perfectly reasonable request, since as sponsored players the team should at least know something about what their sponsor does (PR and such). Well soon Free gets hooked on WoW, since as a highly skilled gamer he can easily start churning out high level accounts for cash, much like some of the old timers got hooked on poker.
Before you know it, half of the team is skipping out on practice time because they're outside LARPing! Hanbit tanks in the proleague, not winning a single set all season, and we never see any of their players in individual leagues again!
This is the beginning of the end!
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On August 01 2008 01:11 number1gog wrote: This is HORRIBLE news!
Imagine if you can, the following scenario:
Item-Mania moves in, and mandates that all former Hanbit teams must spend a small amount of time playing a predetermined mmorpg with Item-Mania services. It's a perfectly reasonable request, since as sponsored players the team should at least know something about what their sponsor does (PR and such). Well soon Free gets hooked on WoW, since as a highly skilled gamer he can easily start churning out high level accounts for cash, much like some of the old timers got hooked on poker.
Before you know it, half of the team is skipping out on practice time because they're outside LARPing! Hanbit tanks in the proleague, not winning a single set all season, and we never see any of their players in individual leagues again!
This is the beginning of the end! ...........
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Erhm, kind of a strange sponsor but as long as they have the money I guess it's okay.
On August 01 2008 01:49 SpiritAshura wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2008 01:11 number1gog wrote: This is HORRIBLE news!
Imagine if you can, the following scenario:
Item-Mania moves in, and mandates that all former Hanbit teams must spend a small amount of time playing a predetermined mmorpg with Item-Mania services. It's a perfectly reasonable request, since as sponsored players the team should at least know something about what their sponsor does (PR and such). Well soon Free gets hooked on WoW, since as a highly skilled gamer he can easily start churning out high level accounts for cash, much like some of the old timers got hooked on poker.
Before you know it, half of the team is skipping out on practice time because they're outside LARPing! Hanbit tanks in the proleague, not winning a single set all season, and we never see any of their players in individual leagues again!
This is the beginning of the end! ........... and soon the LARPers will take over the world.
nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo...!
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On August 01 2008 01:11 number1gog wrote: This is HORRIBLE news!
Imagine if you can, the following scenario:
Item-Mania moves in, and mandates that all former Hanbit teams must spend a small amount of time playing a predetermined mmorpg with Item-Mania services. It's a perfectly reasonable request, since as sponsored players the team should at least know something about what their sponsor does (PR and such). Well soon Free gets hooked on WoW, since as a highly skilled gamer he can easily start churning out high level accounts for cash, much like some of the old timers got hooked on poker.
Before you know it, half of the team is skipping out on practice time because they're outside LARPing! Hanbit tanks in the proleague, not winning a single set all season, and we never see any of their players in individual leagues again!
This is the beginning of the end!
I know. The same thing happened to other proteams. Look at Samsung. Stork has to stand in front of a Samsung store wearing the dino suit promoting Samsung products. Same for Jangbi and the others. At first the coaches complained about it saying it drained away their attention, but what could they do? Its a perfectly reasonable request, since players should know about what their sponsor does.
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You all are aware that WeMade fox does alot of MMORPGS aren't you?
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I hope they rename HanbitStars to the ItemMania GoldFarmers!
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Honestly I think this is bad news a step backward for korean SC. Look at all the companys that have a pro team. They are big international (Samsung, Fox) or big serious Korean Companys (basicially all the others.
I have never heard of Item Mania before but after researching about I see that it is operating in a gray area of legality.
Further it is only gaming related (all the other companys have non gaming products like Handys (KTF, SKT) food CJ, sportswear (Lecaf) and getting ****** (ACE).
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On August 01 2008 02:38 HanN00b wrote: Honestly I think this is bad news a step backward for korean SC. Look at all the companys that have a pro team. They are big international (Samsung, Fox) or big serious Korean Companys (basicially all the others.
I have never heard of Item Mania before but after researching about I see that it is operating in a gray area of legality.
Further it is only gaming related (all the other companys have non gaming products like Handys (KTF, SKT) food CJ, sportswear (Lecaf) and getting ****** (ACE).
On August 01 2008 02:04 Woyn wrote: You all are aware that WeMade fox does alot of MMORPGS aren't you?
Plus Hanbitsoft was a gaming company, distributor of SC in korea?
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If they remove 2v2 in proleague hanbit are gonna lose the only thing they don't totally suck at.
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On August 01 2008 02:38 HanN00b wrote: Honestly I think this is bad news a step backward for korean SC. Look at all the companys that have a pro team. They are big international (Samsung, Fox) or big serious Korean Companys (basicially all the others.
I have never heard of Item Mania before but after researching about I see that it is operating in a gray area of legality.
Further it is only gaming related (all the other companys have non gaming products like Handys (KTF, SKT) food CJ, sportswear (Lecaf) and getting ****** (ACE).
How can it be a step backward? A team getting a sponsor? A team NOT getting a sponsor would be a step backwards.
And Fox, of Wemade Fox has nothing to do with Fox, the conservative right wing network. Actually, Wemade is a company related to the gaming world, just like Hanbit or ItemMania. In fact, they develop games, MMORPGs included.
MBC Hero are sponsored by MBC Game, the gaming channel of MBC channel.
Same could be said about OGN.
eStro.... well, they only do progaming teams so.... no comment.
And all the other sponsor have interest in the young audience of progaming, be it SKT of KTF(what do korean youngsters love more than cellphones?), CJ(they make food, movies, buildings, you name it), Lecaf(a nice way to try to make it into the top of mind of sportswear buyers, among Nike and Adidas).
The only one I cant really figure out is STX with their ships and steel industry, but Im sure they have their marketing reasons.
So, no, its not a step backwards.
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Compare STX, SKT, KTF, CJ, Lecaf and Samsung
with Item Mania.
There is nothing more to say.
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Look at estros sponsor, Arena. Look at 2005 and before team sponsors. This isn't exactly a step backward, its just different.
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at least the team isn't just gonna die now
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KTF= telecommunications firm, specializing in mobile phones. SKT= South Korea Telecom. CJ=In the business of Production, Films, Food, Transport. Samsung= World's largest electronic company. Item Mania=Selling you WoW gold.
seriously, they just dont fit in.
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Perhaps they're trying to target the ten million WoW subscribers. ^^;;
IM_Free FIGHTING!! RAWR!!
For a limited time only buy your WoW pet a IAMMANIAFAN T-SHIRT FANBOY SHIRT and CHEERFUL!
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On August 01 2008 05:39 dinmsab wrote: KTF= telecommunications firm, specializing in mobile phones. SKT= South Korea Telecom. CJ=In the business of Production, Films, Food, Transport. Samsung= World's largest electronic company. Item Mania=Selling you WoW gold.
seriously, they just dont fit in.
Arena - Swimsuit company STX - Cargo and Shipping
These do?
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I hope Item Mania supports Hello Kitty: Island Adventures. I'm stuck on the 'Boo-Boo-Kitty-Fuck' boss in Britney Spears Grand Canyon.
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Who cares who the sponsor is? As long as they get proper fundings, what matters is that team continues to live on.
Some years ago, Samsung's sponsorship was a joke. It has NOTHING to do with what it is these days. The times when Doggy was the team ace, lol. Actually teams like SUMA G.O, who really had a crappy sponsorship, were in better economical conditions than Samsung Khan. Orion is not as big as Samsung, but I can assure you the team wasn't fed with chocopies.
More important than what the sponsor does for a living, it's how much they are willing to invest on the team. For all I care, Pelicana could sponsor a team and call them the Pelicana Fried Chikens if they give them a proper training facility and care about who is being drafted and waived.
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Hum wonder what the logo will be Mania FIGHTING ionno
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51136 Posts
On August 01 2008 05:48 Woyn wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2008 05:39 dinmsab wrote: KTF= telecommunications firm, specializing in mobile phones. SKT= South Korea Telecom. CJ=In the business of Production, Films, Food, Transport. Samsung= World's largest electronic company. Item Mania=Selling you WoW gold.
seriously, they just dont fit in.
Arena - Swimsuit company STX - Cargo and Shipping These do?
just to add
wemade - games developer ogn - games channel mbc - games channel lecaf - clothing
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On August 01 2008 06:51 GTR-2-Go wrote: lecaf - clothing
Really? They must be terrible then. Ok the current uniforms are decent but the previous ones were the most hideous ones I've ever seen.
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O well its nice to see Hanbit team keep playing. I heard they were going to be sold but actually not play. Besides everything has a team now a days. Korea Navy has an online team but that is it.
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Melbourne5338 Posts
On August 01 2008 07:12 0xDEADBEEF wrote:Really? They must be terrible then. Ok the current uniforms are decent but the previous ones were the most hideous ones I've ever seen.
they also make STX uniform and thats not too bad. better than sktt1's
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I think they make the Airforce uniform, or they did first season ACE was around, I dunno if they changed it up
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This is awesome! thanks LID
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the first game company to sponsor a gaming team w00 o.O
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btw, CJ is in the courier business too. I saw a few of their trucks pass by my house a few times. I cant help but imagine MJY in a CJ uniform driving one of those things....
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that guy in the 2nd picture looks like E.T.
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On August 01 2008 11:48 dinmsab wrote: btw, CJ is in the courier business too. I saw a few of their trucks pass by my house a few times. I cant help but imagine MJY in a CJ uniform driving one of those things.... LOOL mjy on b team duties of driving a truck + Show Spoiler +
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A sponsor better than no sponsor. I hope that someone high in Item Mania can take a critical look at Hanbit's lineup and create a winning team again.
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On August 01 2008 10:44 ZidaneTribal wrote: the first game company to sponsor a gaming team w00 o.O
No. Wemade and Hanbit are game companies. OGN is a channel focused entirely on games. Same for MBCGame. And before modern days, there were other sponsors who were based on gaming for a living. For gods sake, ItemMania is less related to games than Wemade or Hanbit.
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On August 01 2008 05:39 dinmsab wrote: KTF= telecommunications firm, specializing in mobile phones. SKT= South Korea Telecom. CJ=In the business of Production, Films, Food, Transport. Samsung= World's largest electronic company. Item Mania=Selling you WoW gold.
seriously, they just dont fit in.
Item mania is not a serious company. OGN, MBC are gaming channels, ok they are gaming related but at least they are serious companys.
Imagine Item Mania would sponsor a soccer club like Real Madrid. Its just a joke. Even if they pay more money than any other sponsor. Before they bought HanBit the western and chinese esport sponsors were different. Korea had normal sponsors like soccer clubs. Western esports mostly only gaming known companys (mb except INTEL). With Item Mania this changed.
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In response to earlier posts: you guys made up IM_Free, the IM_ tag which looks much better than ItemMania. Second option sounds bad, but my first thought was -we got used to "OGN Sparkyz" ugly logo, "WeMade" isn't irritating anymore so lets be optimistic as we can take any dumbass name they make up ;-)
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IM Stars.
That sounds genius.
IM_free
get it? Lol
EDIT: Oh, seems like it's been said. But in case you didn't get it. IAm_free.
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IM goodfriend, IM sea.really geez horrible jokes.
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On August 01 2008 22:34 HanN00b wrote:Show nested quote +On August 01 2008 05:39 dinmsab wrote: KTF= telecommunications firm, specializing in mobile phones. SKT= South Korea Telecom. CJ=In the business of Production, Films, Food, Transport. Samsung= World's largest electronic company. Item Mania=Selling you WoW gold.
seriously, they just dont fit in.
Item mania is not a serious company. OGN, MBC are gaming channels, ok they are gaming related but at least they are serious companys. Imagine Item Mania would sponsor a soccer club like Real Madrid. Its just a joke. Even if they pay more money than any other sponsor. Before they bought HanBit the western and chinese esport sponsors were different. Korea had normal sponsors like soccer clubs. Western esports mostly only gaming known companys (mb except INTEL). With Item Mania this changed.
Once again, you are wrong. There are plenty sponsors in football that are not necessarily top of mind brands. Real Madrid has bwin, a bets/gambling company, same for Sevilla with 888.com, Everton has Chang beer for sponsor, a beer that having drank asian beer, I wouldn't touch, and those are at least kinda known due to watching them on european leagues. But there are a lot of teams that don't have first rate company sponsors, but they get paid, which is what matters.
So according to you, any lesser company that is not in the Forbes top 20 shouldnt have a right to advertise in any team as sponsors. Well, theres two kind of advertising, the one to make you stay in the top of mind of consumers(Samsung in Chelsea or Samsung Khan) and the one to make yourself known to the consumer(all the sponsors you find unworthy, including ItemMania). So everytime, in any sport, when a brand that is not CocaCola, Samsung, Microsoft, Toyota, and such kinds sponsors a team, thats a step backwards?
I'm not saying ItemMania is the best thing to ever happen to progaming, and for sure it wont have the economical backup that sponsors like KTF or SKT can bring up, but it is in no way a step backwards. If HanbitStars didn't get a sponsor and had to disappear, THAT is a step backwards.
Who knows, maybe Lotte offered to sponsor, but what they were offering was way worse than what ItemMania offered. Which i doubt, cause the team sucks, the teams ACE is famous for choking and has zero charisma, and among all the bottom 4 teams, it seems to have the less potential and less attractiveness to fans and audience. So you do the math and tell me who the hell would want to sponsor an almost dead team whos best player didn't go anywhere in the individual leagues and his performance in PL has been anything but stellar. Thank god someone got interested.
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