On January 31 2011 11:42 Xafnia wrote: I pretty much don't care or follow GSL because of the lack of vods. I've watched maybe 1-2 series per GSL since season 2.
They are killing the interest in their own product, it's pretty silly.
esports will never survive if it is not financially solvent, and than means paying customers.
You pay $10 and you get what, 50 hours worth of VODs? Yeah, horrible deal!
Bobster, that's the MOST viewed, if you check the recent ones and compare the numbers to Husky's videos then there's a big gap and I think it takes all the videos in one series into consideration so the views on each adds up into the total.
I don't get it.. even A poutine is over $5... A chicken breast sandwich from Subway has similar price as a GSL whole season ticket. come on, It costs only $10. You can buy the ticket if you decide not to buy a sandwich.
you prefer eating a sandwich rather watching a whole GSL season?
On January 31 2011 10:48 PukinDog wrote: It is worth it, PERIOD.
Where else can you see the best players in SC2 playing each other, with commentary, in HQ, and watch the VODs over and over again?
Want to work on your splitting? Simple, go watch Foxer vs Kyrix on Zel Naga Caverns in Season 2 over and over again until you pick up how he does it. (Good luck)
Problem with your macro? Check out how players like Nada and MVP will actually que up 2-3 SCVs sometimes before they push or drop.
Idra seems to always know exactly how many banes and lings will bust a main. Freeze a VOD and count them, bitches!
Watch how players abuse the high ground, and where to best place that Spine Crawler to fight off that Thor on the Cliff, like only Idra and Fruitdealer can.
When I watch the GSL vods, I take note of the strategies used, what works, what didnt and why. I am building an Excel spreadsheet going all the way back to Season 2. (season 1 had poor balance)
Sure, there are YouTube VODs, but I prefer Tastosis, regardless of their bias and premature GG predictions. They are funny, knowlegeble, and often will throw in some insight that I would never have picked up on my own.
When you consider, that these GSL seasons are less than the cost of a decent pizza, what the hell are we even arguing about? If you cant afford the GSL, should you really be playing video games? Get a job. If you are a kid, cut some fucking grass. Shit, cut my grass, I'll buy you a season.
Buy it.
Bitches.
Worth the $? Hell yes.
Worth it to people who know little to nothing about ESports or SCII and you are trying to convert over, or people who watch 1-10 SCII matches a month at most? Hell No.
To me it's not about the hardcore fans, it's a fantastic deal to them, but the casuals are hurt by this move. The casuals make up the bulk of the audience.....
Screw Casuals.
Casual viewers are not what this game needs. Blizzard has sold 4M copies of this game. If 10% of those purchasers watch the GSL, then GOM will be fat dumb and happy.
They should appeal to the hardcore SC & SC2 players, not some herp-a-derp jerk who bought the game based on a review in PC World. That person does NOT help the community.
Anyone who has to be convinced to love this game, is NOT someone I want GOM to waste a minute on trying to convince them. If you dont love Starcraft, F-off and go play something else.
This is a hardcore game, for hardcore gamers. It is NOT for everyone, because it is too damn hard to get good at it. When you try to appeal to the masses, that usually means dumb'ing it down for them.
Love this game or leave it.
You are so off base here it's not funny. The casuals run every sport. This is true from Football to MMA. You need casuals. You need to grow, because right now Esports is pretty small compared to other traditional sports, we NEED the casuals.
Dude, you dont know what you are talking about.
Do you think NFL Football is run by Casuals? NBA Basketball?
In the NFL, most of the money comes from the TV contract, Sky-boxes and jersey sales, not from those who buy tickets for a game anymore. That is a fact. Ask any TV network executive if they would rather have the one or two games they get to broadcast to the masses, or the shitload of dough being raked in by DirecTV for the NFL package, that people pay hundreds for each season.
Casual viewers dont even run Woman's Basketball. If not for lesbians, that shit would be off the air tomorrow, and there is nothing CASUAL about Lesbians.
There would be no hardcore viewers if casuals didn't teach them about said sport. Period. If sports had only hardcores, it wouldn't exist.
Soccer and Hockey prove you are wrong. Especially Soccer, where it is hardcore and nothing else. Those who keep trying to push it on Americans (casual viewers) keep failing miserably.
Hell, I remember back when Hockey considered using a larger puck, or one that glowed in the dark, etc. They finally figured out that there are those of us who love Hockey, and those that dont, and that is that.
Those are completely made up facts. Everyone knows about hockey and soccer and thus are casuals. How would people know about hockey and soccer without everyone telling them about it?
The hockey/soccer fan base would have started out with like 100 hardcore fans and nobody would watch now if that small group of people didn't grow. Everyone starts a casual.
On January 31 2011 11:46 ChaseR wrote: Bobster, that's the MOST viewed, if you check the recent ones and compare the numbers to Husky's videos then there's a big gap and I think it takes all the videos in one series into consideration so the views on each adds up into the total.
I said it's the most viewed videos in my post. And I said that I consider these pretty good numbers, not that they're equal to Husky's (his YT viewership is pretty damn sick).
I've stated my views on live TV and the availability of online streams several times before in this thread, so I won't repeat myself again, but I think Gom is doing a pretty good job so far.
On January 31 2011 11:39 PukinDog wrote:Soccer and Hockey prove you are wrong. Especially Soccer, where it is hardcore and nothing else. Those who keep trying to push it on Americans (casual viewers) keep failing miserably.
wow. Well, I don't even know what to tell you here, since that is roughly as far as you can get from my (and probably most other's) opinion on the matter.
Football is huge because everyone knows about it and is watching/following it, not only the hardcore fans. It is literally the exact opposite of what you said.
They don't even have 1920x1080 VODS on GomTV.net ( and they aren't in the best quality... the bitrate is fairly low for what the details in the game can actually output )
macro blocks, color depth, pixelation ( TL has this in red underlines... ) all very noticeable... Why pay for bad quality on the vods when they can clearly do better...other than a Korean dub
10 bucks for this month wasn't bad. plus you have access for life. its much like paying for a dvd of a show. i don't mind right now. i'm happy as long as they don't raise the prices.
On January 31 2011 11:56 Figgy20000 wrote: It's $10 for a whole season and you are supporting Esports. It's more than worth it to support gomtv for hosting such an amazing event.
Yeah seriously its like one hour of labor for a shit ton of content. Hopefuly gom will continue to price their season because they deserve it.
Compared to MLG i would pay double what Gom is charging now for a season ticket.
On January 31 2011 11:42 Xafnia wrote: I pretty much don't care or follow GSL because of the lack of vods. I've watched maybe 1-2 series per GSL since season 2.
They are killing the interest in their own product, it's pretty silly.
esports will never survive if it is not financially solvent, and than means paying customers.
You pay $10 and you get what, 50 hours worth of VODs? Yeah, horrible deal!
yeah .. like how BW is over 10 year right?
oh wait ..
most people doesn't get the the impact of casuals/non-gamers watching the game ..
do you think that 3/4 year old bisu fan girl plays? No ..
do you think those stalker/fan girls play hardcore BW or do they even play at all? No ..
I would watch the VOD's on gomtv if they were free. Instead I watch them on other sites for free. That means gomtv is losing my advertising revenue, and their revenue is going to another site just because they decide to upload some videos.
This is the internet people.... the idea that you can regulate and keep any data off the internet is rediculous. Nearly every other site relies on viewership and advertising revenue to make their profit. Gomtv needs to get with the program.
On January 31 2011 12:10 jdseemoreglass wrote: I would watch the VOD's on gomtv if they were free. Instead I watch them on other sites for free. That means gomtv is losing my advertising revenue, and their revenue is going to another site just because they decide to upload some videos.
This is the internet people.... the idea that you can regulate and keep any data off the internet is rediculous. Nearly every other site relies on viewership and advertising revenue to make their profit. Gomtv needs to get with the program.
Because you can access it somewhere else makes it okay to do so and cheat GOMtv out of money they need to continue producing the content that you enjoy? You, sir, have a terrible mindset.
On January 31 2011 12:10 jdseemoreglass wrote: I would watch the VOD's on gomtv if they were free. Instead I watch them on other sites for free. That means gomtv is losing my advertising revenue, and their revenue is going to another site just because they decide to upload some videos.
This is the internet people.... the idea that you can regulate and keep any data off the internet is rediculous. Nearly every other site relies on viewership and advertising revenue to make their profit. Gomtv needs to get with the program.
Your logic makes no sense. thats like saying developers should give games for free since they are very pirated with ease anyway. I do however agree with a youtube channel or replays released like a month after the actual season.
On January 31 2011 12:10 jdseemoreglass wrote: I would watch the VOD's on gomtv if they were free. Instead I watch them on other sites for free. That means gomtv is losing my advertising revenue, and their revenue is going to another site just because they decide to upload some videos.
This is the internet people.... the idea that you can regulate and keep any data off the internet is rediculous. Nearly every other site relies on viewership and advertising revenue to make their profit. Gomtv needs to get with the program.
Because you can access it somewhere else makes it okay to do so and cheat GOMtv out of money they need to continue producing the content that you enjoy? You, sir, have a terrible mindset.
You can't claim that I am cheating them of money simply because they are choosing to charge other people for it. Those people can pay if they like... I would rather watch for free, and I won't feel anymore guilty than when I watch free videos on youtube or anywhere else.
On January 31 2011 12:10 jdseemoreglass wrote: I would watch the VOD's on gomtv if they were free. Instead I watch them on other sites for free. That means gomtv is losing my advertising revenue, and their revenue is going to another site just because they decide to upload some videos.
This is the internet people.... the idea that you can regulate and keep any data off the internet is rediculous. Nearly every other site relies on viewership and advertising revenue to make their profit. Gomtv needs to get with the program.
Thanks for stating the obvious for the people who are "Esports saviors" contributing their $10 every month. The fact of the matter is that as long as they won't give it away for free, and as long as people don't want to spend money on the internet, there will be places to get it for free illegitimately. If they just gave it away for free on their site, they'd get all the views and accurate numbers of how many people are watching.
Of course, gomtv is only going to lose money forcibly shutting down torrent site after torrent site to no end. It's a lose-lose situation, and it sucks, but that's how the internet goes. They really do need to get with the program.
The great part is that they seem to have 2011 all squared away financially already, so my choice to not buy a ticket won't hurt them at all (yet).
On January 31 2011 11:42 Xafnia wrote: I pretty much don't care or follow GSL because of the lack of vods. I've watched maybe 1-2 series per GSL since season 2.
They are killing the interest in their own product, it's pretty silly.
esports will never survive if it is not financially solvent, and than means paying customers.
You pay $10 and you get what, 50 hours worth of VODs? Yeah, horrible deal!
yeah .. like how BW is over 10 year right?
oh wait ..
most people doesn't get the the impact of casuals/non-gamers watching the game ..
do you think that 3/4 year old bisu fan girl plays? No ..
do you think those stalker/fan girls play hardcore BW or do they even play at all? No ..
also, 10$ is worth more in other countries.
BW has advertising revenue in its main country. GOM can't offer the same level of advertising because it's online and streamed towards a wide foreign audience. Plugging Sony Ericson and Pepsi isn't enough to carry those bills.
$10 is also worth a lot less in other countries.
Saying the pay per view model doesn't work is ridiculous. MMA seems to be doing fine with it, and until the fights got boring, boxing was as well. SC2 is never going to be like baseball or football, and it's doubtful they'll ever reach those sort of profit margins on advertising revenue alone. It's a niche activity, so it's revenue model works like one. I'm perfectly fine with that and I think GOM does a fantastic job. Especially when VODs are uploaded within hours of completion.
A lot of people in this thread are extremely ignorant of bandwidth costs. There's a reason all the video streaming sites are huge capital ventures and Youtube was in the red until a year ago, and they've got a scale advantage. Thinking that GOM could cover those costs through website ad dollars is absurd.
The first set of every match is free. If someone unacquainted with SC2 wants to get into it, they easily can. Of course they could get more views by making them free, but would they make more money? Since none of you are business managers and not aware of the factors involved, I'm going to put my trust in GOM's MBAs over your internet BSes.
On January 31 2011 12:10 jdseemoreglass wrote: I would watch the VOD's on gomtv if they were free. Instead I watch them on other sites for free. That means gomtv is losing my advertising revenue, and their revenue is going to another site just because they decide to upload some videos.
This is the internet people.... the idea that you can regulate and keep any data off the internet is rediculous. Nearly every other site relies on viewership and advertising revenue to make their profit. Gomtv needs to get with the program.
Because you can access it somewhere else makes it okay to do so and cheat GOMtv out of money they need to continue producing the content that you enjoy? You, sir, have a terrible mindset.
You can't claim that I am cheating them of money simply because they are choosing to charge other people for it. Those people can pay if they like... I would rather watch for free, and I won't feel anymore guilty than when I watch free videos on youtube or anywhere else.
No, I can because you are.
They produce this content which they own, other people steal this and by proxy you steal it as well. "It's okay because someone else stole it first" does not make it so.
ETA: You'll note that even someone speaking in your defense used the term "illegitimate." I don't understand how you can not understand that what you're doing is ripping off a business.
EPT
