EPTI really hope Blizzard are confident in what they're doing and call KeSPA's bluff on this one. SC2 can survive and thrive without KeSPA. On the other hand, it would be a shame if KeSPA then became stubborn and refused to negotiate out of spite, even though they'd lose revenue without embracing SC2. I wouldn't put that past them at this point.
Pro-game teams snub Blizzard? - Page 3
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dmfg
United Kingdom591 Posts
I really hope Blizzard are confident in what they're doing and call KeSPA's bluff on this one. SC2 can survive and thrive without KeSPA. On the other hand, it would be a shame if KeSPA then became stubborn and refused to negotiate out of spite, even though they'd lose revenue without embracing SC2. I wouldn't put that past them at this point. | ||
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Lixler
United States265 Posts
On March 03 2010 19:55 Rothbardian wrote: How come Ford/Subaru/GM/Chevrolet/etc. don't make money (control) from the cars racing in premier races across the world? Because you own that product once you buy it and you can do with it as you want since it is your property. Blizzard is not entitled to anything once you buy their product. When I buy something I expect to own it. Anyways, let's be done with this. I hope Kespa goes down the proverbial toilet. There is money to be had, and someone else will fill the void, and you can't get much worse than Kespa....so whoever it is by default would at least be somewhat better! I think this would be the reason they're pushing Battle.net. In the car analogy, they're trying to own the track ( <_< ) so that while the customer owns the car/game, they still need to pay for the thing it has to be run on (which I assume is how racing works). | ||
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MiraMax
Germany532 Posts
On March 03 2010 19:55 Rothbardian wrote: How come Ford/Subaru/GM/Chevrolet/etc. don't make money (control) from the cars racing in premier races across the world? Because you own that product once you buy it and you can do with it as you want since it is your property. Blizzard is not entitled to anything once you buy their product. When I buy something I expect to own it. I don't want to enter a legal discussion, but your analogy does not apply. Whatever you expect when you "buy" software is not important, it is a simple matter of fact that you do not "own" it (just like you don't "own" a song, if you buy the CD). Intellectual property is not bought, like a car is, you merely buy the licence to use it (that's also why intellectual property cannot be "stolen", in the same legal sense a car can be). Blizzard had a good legal case to shut down Kespa, if they would really want it (ever more so if they could sue them in the U.S., which they probably can't though). However, they would probably alienate a big part of their hardcore fanbase in Korea, so it would not be a good idea. Their approach with SC2 is very "clever" there, because they will probably force users to play on battle.net as part of the licence agreement (which is exactly why they don't offer LAN support imo). This will make it very hard for Kespa to run the show without Blizzard for SC2 and is probably also why Kespa wants to show off their "power" as long as they still can. | ||
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StarBrift
Sweden1761 Posts
On March 03 2010 19:32 FakeSteve[TPR] wrote: lol there are enough talented, diligent korean SC players that the current roster of every pro SC team can be totally absent from SC2 and there will still be a large korean presence if blizzard's got everything on lockdown, KeSPA can't do shit about it. They can't interfere with SC2 teams outside their sphere of influence, and they can't organize or broadcast pro SC2. They're retarded to think they're a vital part of the infrastructure ^_^ This. KeSPA is so incredibly naive if they think they have any value what so ever in the sc2 scene. Also its kind of funny how they make KeSPA sound like some kind of gamer union. Looks to me like their purpose is the opposite of a union. Treat the players as badly as possible to gain as much m oney as possible. KeSPA is NOT progaming. | ||
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Bane_
United Kingdom494 Posts
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cyclone25
Romania3344 Posts
Blizzard should show some respect here, instead of trying to ignore them and get straight to teams/players. I totally understand Kespa's position since they did so much for SC in Korea. You can't just ignore them ... | ||
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bEsT[Alive]
606 Posts
On March 03 2010 19:07 {88}iNcontroL wrote: In the end it isn't blizzard that gets hurt by Kespa's arrogance however.. it will be the proteams/kespa. Going to war with the company that CREATED/MAINTAINS and OWNS the game you base your entire existence sounds absolutely retarded. Yes I understand the gray area involved and the "complicated" actuality of this but.. I cannot imagine kespa benefiting in the end from this "war." Agreed Inc. I figured they would pull something like this though and everything in there sounds accurate. Besides that, the players are paid to play SC:BW, not SC2. There is no reason for anyone in Pro League to play it. Some players will make the switch. | ||
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Boonbag
France3318 Posts
As much as I dislike Kespa... I dislike Blizz just as much. Together they might be well able to fuck up esports. Besides, Blizzard's vision of Esports is laughable, while one could argue Kespa is a bit "more realistic" because of their (shit?) experience in the business. I still don't understand people talking about Esports outside Korea. Wake up, it doesn't exist. That's where Korean "rights over Esports" come from. Because they fucking created it. Edit : More. If Blizzard wants to make esports what about they buy half a building in a major american city and make there a broadcasting studio ? Truth is blizzard wants the broadcasting money without doing any broadcasting. haha. | ||
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writer22816
United States5775 Posts
On March 03 2010 21:45 cyclone25 wrote: Why so much hate towards Kespa?? Blizzard should show some respect here, instead of trying to ignore them and get straight to teams/players. I totally understand Kespa's position since they did so much for SC in Korea. You can't just ignore them ... Agree here. I don't know how much control should be given to either party in the Blizzard vs Kespa war but some of the kespa hate here is pretty unwarranted. Think where would SC1 progaming be if only blizzard had a say and no one else? Remember how the blizzard maps, league, strategy guide, etc sucked? Without foreign bodies like kespa, SC1 would be nowhere near what it is now today. | ||
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Caphe
Vietnam10817 Posts
Outside Korea, there is no esport. You can not call a tournament of some random games here and there is esport. E-sport is like any other sport( football/basketball...) they are systems that include players amatures and pros. They also include TV broadcasters. OGN/ MBC Game are like ESPN and Starsport of the e-sport scence. They also include a comittee that keep things organize and updating the rule. That comittee in e-sport is KeSPA( is it Korea E-Sport Association?)。 Blizzard cant just kick the comittee out off the table. And the last thing is the Korean culture, like I mentioned in my previous post. Koreans are protective, and pro-teams like Samsung, KTF will never turn their back on KeSPA so as the Korean progamers. As much as I want e-sport work out for SC2, and as much as I love Blizzard, but I think Blizzard has to back down at some point if they really care about the e-sport in general. | ||
Plexa
Aotearoa39261 Posts
On March 03 2010 20:59 _EmIL_ wrote: There are many indepth threads about the issue but heres the jist of itPlease enlighten me. Don't just say im wrong, say where and give what you think. I'm fairly new to SC community but this is my impression. Exactly how is it then? And can someone confirm what this guy is saying? - kespa came into existence comparatively late in the piece - foundations of esports can mostly be attributed to boxer - the teams do not see kespa as fathers at all - kespa is mostly made up of coaches of proteams these days (last i heard coach park of skt was charing it) - kespa's existence has not helped SC stay alive one bit, indeed it almost killed SC when it sold the Proleauge rights (which it really didn't own anyway) to IEG | ||
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Windblade
United States161 Posts
Boxer openly says he's on Blizzards side or something to that effect | ||
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mrdx
Vietnam1555 Posts
If you don't know that, you haven't followed progaming long enough. If you think of "KeSPA" as an umbrella term for the players, the teams, and the entire eSports infrastructure in Korea, you're dead wrong. Btw who said without KeSPA Blizzard will have to create the whole scene again from step 1? They can just hand SC2 and tournament hosting rights to GOM, problem solved. | ||
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Biff The Understudy
France8140 Posts
On March 03 2010 19:07 {88}iNcontroL wrote: In the end it isn't blizzard that gets hurt by Kespa's arrogance however.. it will be the proteams/kespa. Going to war with the company that CREATED/MAINTAINS and OWNS the game you base your entire existence sounds absolutely retarded. Yes I understand the gray area involved and the "complicated" actuality of this but.. I cannot imagine kespa benefiting in the end from this "war." I don't like Kespa, but I rather think that in this case, Blizzard just saw that they could make a shiload of more money on the back of the pro-scene and that Kespa is perfectly right not to accept blindly this blackmail. Why did Blizzard removed lan from SC2? Think about that. I don't like Kespa, but I don't like Blizzard, even though they do amazing games. They are just profit whore. Look at the obscene price of a month of WoW. Point being, I think Blizzard is wrong, because although they didn't make any money directly from it, the pro-scene and kespa has made a huge part of the success of Starcraft and of the future success of Starcraft2. | ||
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Senx
Sweden5901 Posts
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Senx
Sweden5901 Posts
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thunk
United States6233 Posts
On March 03 2010 19:38 Puosu wrote: I think media/us don't know the exact details on this whole case, there's no way KeSPA would be stupid enough to keep fighting Blizzard like this when Morhaime could just snap his fingers and order KeSPA to be shut down in a matter of days. And a lot of things have happened since wc3 was released, sc2 has a far bigger chance of putting bw progaming to a peaceful sleep. It seems that KeSPA's pretty dumb as a corporate entity. I just wonder if SC2 has the capacity to be the eSport Blizzard thinks it can be. | ||
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d_so
Korea (South)3262 Posts
1.) Kespa has been proven to be an effective marketer of videogames to the noncompetitive, casual gamer, as well as the nongamer... and most significantly, women. As any sports marketing director knows, the way to maintain a long-term fanbase is to satisfy the hardcore fans while attracting the casual fan, especially females. It's specifically the reason why EVERY olympics, superbowl, nba championship whatever has some sort of heart-felt story about a person/player recovering/overcoming/fighting through some sort of physical/traumatic/death-in-the-family experience. And it's the same reason why Progaming Television techniques attach as much significance to the personality of a player -- as well as his sex appeal -- as their talent. On the other hand, notice how Blizzard is emphasizing online tournaments and forcing everyone to go through Bnet, eliminating the face attached to the game that makes the the Korean Starcraft Scene so personable. Would you have team loyalties, player loyalties, fan clubs, merchandise, or effeminate pictures if Bisu's face wasn't broadcast with his game? Course not! And yet Blizzard, in their quest for a WoW-like continuous revenue source, is going to create a system that not only forces royalties but counter-productively dehumanizes the game and alienates potential fans. Some of you people might bring up WoW as an example of Blizzard's ability to attract non-hardcore gamers. Trust me, MMORPGs are completely different from competitive gaming. You can get fat ugly divorcees playing such games (a la secondlife) but that is not relevant to their interest in competitive gaming. 2.) Kespa has the best E-sports revenue model. This is almost undeniable. KeSPA's revenue model is so well-run that it doesn't have to charge for seating at its games. How fucking ridiculous is that. Imagine a sport like Football or basketball or whatever being able to create enough revenue from advertising to outweigh the expenses of paying players, maintaining a stadium, front office overhead, etc. This is just so freaking mindblowing that i'm surprised it doesn't get more notice. And the reason why they're able to do this is cuz of their partnerships with OGN and MBCGame, two DEDICATED tv networks backed by huge corporations (OnMedia and MBC). You could argue they got lucky to have TV channels willing to take the risk and broadcast pro-gaming. but how the hell were they able to convince them in the first place? How were they able to show that Starcraft carries with it a tangible, outstanding interest that can be translated into advertising revenue? Once again, it goes back to marketing. Every epic new game that comes out is able to create spikes in interest for a short period of time. But you can't sustain it over the long term without attracting the casual gamer and the nongamer. You know what else helps maintain their revenue model? They don't have to worry about any "morality" strikes from upset parents with old-traditional values. Why is that? It's cuz.. 3.) KeSPA is effectively a government lobbyist. Tell me something. Do you ever fathom there will be a videogaming lobby in the US? Course not! They can't create a significant enough constituency with the current gaming crowd in america, which is becoming a bit more diverse in attracting female gamers but does not have enough "normal" people. --- Now let's talk about Blizzard. First, they make great games. Second, mostly due to WoW, blizzard no longer is interested in the "potential revenue" that comes with popularity --> interest --> advertising dollars. This is cuz they built a realizable, continuous revenue machine with WoW... and now they want a similar system with SC2. There's no other way to explain why they're making THREE games when the only thing that'll be different is storylines or why they're excluding LAN and forcing everyone to get approval from them in broadcasting their games. In other words, they're NOT creating an "esports division" because they think can do better (they can't.) but because they want to make money. This post is already tl;dr but i want to add one last point. Korea is known to be a marketing hell where only the fittest survive. Winning the approval of Korean customers is like the Gold seal of approval for every fashion brand interested in gaining an Asian fanbase. Look up Prada in Korea for one example of a brand that invested a gang of money and created all sorts of diverse marketing strategies to win the korean customers, especially since how Korea rolls, a LOT of asia follows with them. Blizzard would be smart to realize two things: 1.) ESPORTS in america will never come to fruition because there's no way to create the demand necessary for advertising revenue, and 2.) if blizzard wants to be a huge part of the Asian Esports scene, they should partner with Kespa and proliferate their revenue model + marketing strategy across the continent. | ||
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Raneth
England527 Posts
kespa killed gomtv almost as soon as soon as gom merged with blizzard by forcing almost all of the teams to withdraw, that was a major power play against blizzard, and now obviously blizzard are pissed at kespa, they couldnt really screw them over with sc1, becuase it would be shooting themselves in the foot, however, they are clearly trying to freeze kespa out of sc2 so they never loose that level of controll again, and i for one am a fan of that, kespa got too big for their boots and now they're being taken down a notch, good for blizzard, sc2 will survive and thrive with or without kespa, there will always be somone willing broardcast the shows if they think it will get ratings, kespa is powerless atm, and the massive money giant that is blizzard is going to show them who's boss! \m/ rock on blizzard | ||
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mrdx
Vietnam1555 Posts
Some posts in this thread saying Blizzard should step back against KeSPA for the future of eSports and shit but you need to realize the fact that KeSPA doesn't give a shit about the future of eSport itself. Look at how they handled the Proleague broadcasting rights issue, the Free Agents, how they banned GOM.. KeSPA is nothing but a representative of the corporates who only care about short term profits and what they could squeeze out of the progamers and the 2 channels (which are the true father of eSport if you have to point out one) | ||
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