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The revenue from the sub-licenses will be fairly split between Gretech and the Broadcasting Station
Sponsor: All revenue from Sponsorships will be the property of the broadcasting station
These two are completely out-of-line for the amount of money they are requesting for the right to broadcast. I can understand part of that clause for ownership but Blizzard is just going out way too much for IP rights.
Can someone...anyone...please explain to me the significance of IP rights to the point where it has to be defended this harshly? Is Blizzard going to explode because some league is going to continue running and broadcasting tournaments of a game that 10+ years old? I don't understand the why other than "Oh lets crush this league so we can make even more money off of it". As I see it, StarCraft 2 was a huge success to them regardless of the StarLeague, MSL, and ProLeague circuits.
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+ Show Spoiler +On November 14 2010 05:02 Zona wrote:
As others have said, 1 year is really not stable.
50/50 ownership is something I would never agree to if I were sitting on the other side of the table...
All the player houses, the mapmakers, the commentating, the production values and structure supplied by one side...and merely the license supplied by other other side results in this other side getting 50% ownership?
And I don't know what the last point involves, but depending on its implications it could be a huge drag as well.
Years ago Blizzard branding was pretty prominent in broadcasts, but recently it's all faded away. The bad blood might have started earlier, when it seems Kespa tried to get a license but Blizzard wouldn't talk, long before SC2 was announced.
I definitely agree with Captain Peabody's assertion that Activision Blizzard wants control...just look at the new Bnet for more evidence - the foundation of the new Bnet is that everything is controlled by Activision Blizzard's servers. However the desire for control does not necessarily mean they'll work hard to preserve what's been built.
Kespa has had many missteps on the way - but if you examine governing authorities in the births of other sports - including prominent sports like baseball, football, basketball and more - you'll see that they all had problems in their infancy, too. Scandals, player mistreatment, prejudice, and more - and on a larger scale. It's too much to describe in one post, but how Blizzard handled tournaments and such in the past does not make me confident in them as stewards of a pro scene.
As well, it's not necessarily in a game publisher's interest to have a long-lasting pro scene for their games, since they are constantly trying to sell new games. I've mulled over issues for quite awhile and I've come to the conclusion that the time when the game publisher's (or developer's) interests and the competitive scene's interest are aligned is when the publisher benefits from continued interest in the same game. This occurs in games such as free-to-play ad-supported games. Games structured in this manner would be ideal to create a competitive scene around (if the particular game allows it), as it's also in the publisher's interest to extend interest in, and the lifetime of the game.
One thing I do wish is for everyone to not assume that a scene like BW's can be easily built...after all there have been NONE like it in the decades that electronic gaming have existed. If the contributions of players such as Ongamenet, MBCGame, or the progaming team sponsors (i.e. the sponsors Kespa represent) were so easy to duplicate, we've have dozens of competitive scenes like BW by now. But we don't have any like that at all.
A possible end result of this mess is great damage to the BW scene, and no scene to rise up to replace it on the same scale. After all, it's been virtually a decade and nothing quite like it has appeared.
Zona, thanks for your efforts in making such a well-done post; I could not have said it better myself! Indeed, there is just too much corporate meddling in this and I do fear for the survival of BW. Like you said, there will never be another proscene like BW in Korea ever for a long time to come, not with its huge depth, and I fail to have any confidence in the thought that Blizzard can hope to sustain all that with good intentions. =\
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On November 14 2010 05:24 Neo7 wrote:
The revenue from the sub-licenses will be fairly split between Gretech and the Broadcasting Station
Sponsor: All revenue from Sponsorships will be the property of the broadcasting station
These two are completely out-of-line for the amount of money they are requesting for the right to broadcast. I can understand part of that clause for ownership but Blizzard is just going out way too much for IP rights.
Can someone...anyone...please explain to me the significance of IP rights to the point where it has to be defended this harshly? Is Blizzard going to explode because some league is going to continue running and broadcasting tournaments of a game that 10+ years old? I don't understand the why other than "Oh lets crush this league so we can make even more money off of it". As I see it, StarCraft 2 was a huge success to them regardless of the StarLeague, MSL, and ProLeague circuits.
StarCraft 2 was very successful and is still being sold decently well. But the thing is, it didn't sell 11 million copies like Brood War did. Why settle for a lot of money when, if Blizzard can get rid of Brood War and have SC2 take off in South Korea, they can make a huge shit ton of money?
I'm not trying to say that KeSPA is sparkling clean or anything, both KeSPA and Blizzard are in this for monetary gain. But the difference is that if KeSPA wins we could easily see Brood War continue for another decade imo, if Blizzard wins we'll soon see the death of Brood War as we know it.
This is all opinion based, but I think Blizzard has done a good job of reinforcing my opinion. Especially with the terms offered by Gretech (which probably were influenced by Blizz).
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I'd have to say that Activision/Blizzard have once again shown that they value money now over money in the future. No one has ever owned a sport, so why do they think that they can get away with that now? This game should have been huge in Korea, but Blizzard screwed it up.
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KeSPA has a very child-like attitude when things don't go their way and I've seen it throw some ugly fits that were just wrong. Even so, it's not going to kill Blizzard to let them continue on much less harsh terms. I don't see Namco throwing a hissy fit over "IP Rights" for Tekken 6 in MBCGame's Tekken Crash tournaments and Namco is doing strong as ever.
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United States238 Posts
On November 14 2010 05:31 Neo7 wrote:
KeSPA has a very child-like attitude when things don't go their way and I've seen it throw some ugly fits that were just wrong. Even so, it's not going to kill Blizzard to let them continue on much less harsh terms. I don't see Namco throwing a hissy fit over "IP Rights" for Tekken 6 in MBCGame's Tekken Crash tournaments and Namco is doing strong as ever.
I'm sure Namco would have few words to say if MBCGame suddenly decided to say "Tekken's copyright doesn't exist. No one owns it. Now we're going to make money from it, and we are going to use Tekken in whatever way we want to use it. Thanks."
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thats alot of money to pay for advertising the game for them
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The length should be longer. Otherwise it seems pretty reasonable.
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Should definitely be more years, or x number of season/starleagues IMO.
Does anyone know how much MBC game and OGN make. Or know how much they pay Kespa/sponsors for their current license?, I hear alot about how it is too expensive yet no evidence to support it...
The bottom line is that Blizzard has nothing to lose, they don't make any money of off BW anyway, if it does die, it is no skin off their back. They can hold here as long as they want.
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To me it seems like alot of people come to a conclusion in this without knowing background information or knowing how this kind of negotiations usually go. I personally find it very hard to say whether the terms are unrealistic or not. It would probably require someone who has at least some knowledge over this kind of contract to give more insight into why certain are in it etc.
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On November 14 2010 02:41 whoseline wrote:
i have a question:
does ogn/mbc currently give broadcasting fees to kespa?
if so, how much?
Yes, and it makes sense too. All the sponsors pay for their teams/salaries/outfitting/housing/etc. As for revenues, MBC and OGN are the only ones that draw any (in the form of ads/viewership) while all the other sponsors do not. So they pay a part of said revenue back to fund the leagues.
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It's my uninformed guess that this contract is designed to give blizzard/gretch an unfair negotiating advantage after the contract, so that certain smaller points that would be incredibly convenient for ogn/mbc in their success with their leagues must be seperately approved by blizzard, like for example time slots, and blizzard could be making this contract seem more generous than it really is.
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Sometimes I wish there would come along an open source 2D RTS that gets embraced by the gamers so that we don't have to deal with these dinosaurs and their quest for world domination. You heard it here first.
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9071 Posts
the terms dont really matter, even if we ignore them all for a second the contract is for only one bloody year - thats laughable. It pretty much means OGN/MBC or KeSPa for that matter are in no way in control of their own production, they cant make longterm plans or even say where the companies will go in just a year. What Blizzard is saying is like "we will allow you to do your shit for just one year, go figure", its completely retarded - imagine if Microsoft could pull out the same thing for example "hey blizzard, SC2 will run on windows for just one year, then we will talk again"... this contract is so fucking in your face, its completely out of my mind how someone could think of one year long period for smth like that.
If Blizzard are so confident, they should just sell the rights of BW for 10 or so years for the price of 20p and watch how their magnificent new creation, SC2, replaces the old lady.
Edit 2: the whole thing doesnt really look like "final offer". Its more like the original intentions of Blizzard/Gretech.
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Lol at SC2 stops running in Windows next year.. How could i have not think of that xD
Anyhow, yea 1 year is pretty ridiculous.. Not to mention the part where you must be Blizz's approval whenever you wanna touch SC.. If Ksepa sign this it is like a death sentence..
@ people who said: "lol noobs who speculate w/o evidence that Blizz is trying to kill blah blah blah"
Whether or not they will kill is a separate matter. Signing off to another person the rights to kill you (pro-scene) at any given moment is suicide. All the more so if guy in question have good reasons to want you dead (killing off competitors to make up for the underwhelming GSL2 finals). If Kespa signs this here, imo theres no telling what kind of hell they ll be in for in the future.
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anyone figure out that the 50/50 gretech gets will be donated to charity? Possibly as in gamers.
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I think the terms are reasonable. The NFL/NBA/FIFA have way more restrictive legalese with their TV broadcasters.
I don't know what it is in Korea, but the US has tons of "good faith" clauses or such in contract negotiations. If this happened here, the broadcasters can agree to the one year term and Gretech/Blizzard just can't materially change the contract for the next year without justification. Does anyone know if Korea has estoppel?
And I think it's unreasonable for people to claim how successful BW is in Korea then turn around and make the argument that nobody makes any money out of it. If the progamers are significantly underpaid, Kespa is a non-profit and the broadcasters aren't making any money out of it, why does this industry even exist in the first place? The fact that it's been existing for 10 years mean that at least one of those things must not be true. Somebody must be financially benefiting from it.
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People seem to assume that after the first year Blizzard would require some outrageous terms. It's not in their best interest. They want to make money and asking for the biggest fee the stations are willing to pay is in their best interest.
Unions and employers often make contracts for one year and people around the world are still working.
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Estonia4504 Posts
On November 14 2010 07:30 Lokian wrote:
anyone figure out that the 50/50 gretech gets will be donated to charity? Possibly as in gamers.
How can you possibly consider that a charity? IMO, they should also set their money demands really low, and ask for less than 50% of the content. This would give the other side some room for breathing, and allow for trust building from here on out. Making this a "final" offer, especially considering you want the ginormous sum of 540k per year from both combined for CHARITY, of all things, seems like a huge dick move. Give them something they want, get something you want (recognition of most of your rights, for example).
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On November 14 2010 07:35 andrewlt wrote:
I think the terms are reasonable. The NFL/NBA/FIFA have way more restrictive legalese with their TV broadcasters.
I don't know what it is in Korea, but the US has tons of "good faith" clauses or such in contract negotiations. If this happened here, the broadcasters can agree to the one year term and Gretech/Blizzard just can't materially change the contract for the next year without justification. Does anyone know if Korea has estoppel?
And I think it's unreasonable for people to claim how successful BW is in Korea then turn around and make the argument that nobody makes any money out of it. If the progamers are significantly underpaid, Kespa is a non-profit and the broadcasters aren't making any money out of it, why does this industry even exist in the first place? The fact that it's been existing for 10 years mean that at least one of those things must not be true. Somebody must be financially benefiting from it.
Exactly, everybody has to understand that money is what keeps this industry going. There is no way the licence fee could be the issue here, even gomtv manages to come up with around that amount in prize money.
Even the 1 year limit isn't that outrageous considering that esport has only been around for ~10 years.
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