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On May 25 2011 12:04 Hatsu wrote:
People here seem very concerned with appearing "desirable" and "professional" in order to promote Esports. I personally do not think that Esports needs to abide the rules of other sports when it comes to commentating, My view is that SC2 commentary should suit the audience's taste and nothing else, really. If the audience enjoys and demands a certain amount of profanity, dirty jokes or whatever, so be it, there is nothing wrong with it.
Esports culture does need to be traditional sports culture. It is the customer's needs that dictate the rules in business. Forcing a certain casting style purely of the sake of "professionalism" is pointless.
If you ever want to expand esports' audience outside of the high-school/young adult male demographic, it certainly does have a point.
And since accomplishing that means more exposure and more money, that point is a big one.
If you ever want to see Starcraft II or other esports being broadcast on live television anywhere outside of Korea you're going to have to give up the fucks and the pussy jokes. Not everyone is 23 and has no problem with sex and profanity being casual parts of conversation.
If you still want that, there will always be plenty of casual streams and SOTG, Day9, etc.
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There are no ratings here on interlocking webbed networks, by design.
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On May 25 2011 11:47 Joedaddy wrote:
Yeah, where I'm from and how I was raised hunting and fishing is a way of life. We don't kill animals just to kill them. Each year most of the men in my family donates a deer to a foundation called "hunters for the hungry" where the processed meat is used to feed the homeless and needy. Processing the meat is part of it for us. The kids almost always follow us around and hold the ice chest lid open so we can drop the quartered meat into it.
I personally am not offended by cursing and admittedly I swear more than I should when I'm out of the house and away from my family. I don't want to impose my beliefs on anyone, nor do I believe that the SC2 community is obligated to censorship.
That said, I still wish I was able to let my daughter watch SC2 tournaments with me just like we do baseball and football. Me and my wife have made a decision though not to expose her to profane language and sexually suggestive material. I don't think people are wrong for disagreeing with me, but I don't think I'm wrong either for wanting a more family friendly e-sports scene.
Thats a pretty good statement, i don't want to question that a family friendly e-sports scene is cool.
But: You get on a level where it is acceptable to watch some dudes kill other dudes. For you its OK, because its in a video game.
Why do you apply this rule just to the killing stuff?
Why is it such a big leap for you to say: "Yes they swear there sometimes, but they are grown up and in a video game."
I just don't (and will never) get why people make this difference.
"Sex to the dorm...shh don't talk about it" - "This is the trigger, you have to aim for the head, son."
Strong violence is needed to even make this game possible, but please no bad words.
I'm not trying to impose my opinion to anybody, I just can't solve this giant mindfuck.
I fucked and cursed people, but i didn't kill anyone.
Edit:
If you ever want to see Starcraft II or other esports being broadcast on live television anywhere outside of Korea you're going to have to give up the fucks and the pussy jokes. Not everyone is 23 and has no problem with sex and profanity being casual parts of conversation.
Where does the number 23 come from?
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DeepElemBlues United States. May 25 2011 12:11
If you ever want to see Starcraft II or other esports being broadcast on live television anywhere outside of Korea you're going to have to give up the fucks and the pussy jokes. Not everyone is 23 and has no problem with sex and profanity being casual parts of conversation.
JWD United States. May 25 2011 12:11
I agree with OP for the simple reason that I am embarrassed to recommend SC2 streams to my friends because I know there's a substantial chance they'll flip on the program and hear gratuitous cursing or a second-grade-level joke.
I don't get it! Where are the caster that makes fool out of themselves? Can you name these casters that are so profane? When did it become a problem that the starcraft 2 casters weren't mainstream enough? Why are you recommending casters/streams that you have a encountered with questionable casters and still recommending it to friends. Did you enjoy them? Very strange.
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i think that they should try to an extent to keep it clean but not to have to worry about it if it slips up.
loose censorship can be a good thing but if the censorship gets outta hand ill just stop watching it and go somewhere else. i hate to listen to people trying to stay clean it just sounds fake sometimes.
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It's a relevant to point to make from the broadcasters point of view alone. There is no professional broadcasting corporation around, sports related or otherwise that doesn't think hard about the kind of content it is producing and how it might be received by the public. While shows like State of the Game are definitely aimed towards a mature audience in terms of language used and the higher level discussions being had broadcasts of leagues and tournaments such as the NASL, TSL, GSL and such should definitely consider their audiences.
Personally I don't know a lot of people who will boycott a cast because there isn't any swearing in it and I really don't see where swearing has any relevance in that particular context. On the flip side, there are parents who monitor what their children watch and cleaning up the language is definitely going to boost the young SC2 fan numbers by making it more accessible to them. If dropping something like swearing can increase viewer numbers and on the side increase respectability and credibility among sponsors then they'd be stupid not to do it.
I think the obvious suggestion is that each tournament or league actively considers what age groups they want to target and then make it very clear to viewers so that fans like the OP can easily decide which streams and VODs to watch.
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On May 25 2011 12:11 DeepElemBlues wrote:Show nested quote +On May 25 2011 12:04 Hatsu wrote:
People here seem very concerned with appearing "desirable" and "professional" in order to promote Esports. I personally do not think that Esports needs to abide the rules of other sports when it comes to commentating, My view is that SC2 commentary should suit the audience's taste and nothing else, really. If the audience enjoys and demands a certain amount of profanity, dirty jokes or whatever, so be it, there is nothing wrong with it.
Esports culture does need to be traditional sports culture. It is the customer's needs that dictate the rules in business. Forcing a certain casting style purely of the sake of "professionalism" is pointless.
If you ever want to expand esports' audience outside of the high-school/young adult male demographic, it certainly does have a point. And since accomplishing that means more exposure and more money, that point is a big one. If you ever want to see Starcraft II or other esports being broadcast on live television anywhere outside of Korea you're going to have to give up the fucks and the pussy jokes. Not everyone is 23 and has no problem with sex and profanity being casual parts of conversation. If you still want that, there will always be plenty of casual streams and SOTG, Day9, etc.
The point of my post is that every community of people has a set of values, certain preferences and a certain taste. If the SC2 community, which is the real audience that exists right now and not some hypothetical expanded audience that may or may not exist in the future, enjoys a certain type of humor than it should be satisfied. This is what any sensible and educated marketing manager would do.
An expansion of Starcraft2 to a larger audience cannot come from a change imposed on the community by external forces but rather from cultural acceptance and a natural expansion of the SC2 community as it exists now and in the future. The SC2 community is a gamers community and if it ever grows it will be through a growth in the number of gamers. If you think that avoiding dirty jokes will magically attract a legion of 40 years old dads and their kids, please explain how.
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On May 25 2011 12:11 JWD wrote:
I agree with OP for the simple reason that I am embarrassed to recommend SC2 streams to my friends because I know there's a substantial chance they'll flip on the program and hear gratuitous cursing or a second-grade-level joke.
God bless DJWheat, but the one day I tweeted to recommend TSL on my personal twitter he opened the broadcast with "What up bitches??" That is not the impression I wanted to give my friends of what the SC2 scene is like.
God forbid they suspect the SC2 community of having fun and having a friendly relationship with the players and casters.
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It doesn't bother me personally, but in principle, if we are serious about being mainstream or at least popular we need to not have barriers to watching for some audiences based on language or content which doesn't actually add anything SC wise to the casts.
Edit: Also, it does seem kind of bush league when someone screams HOLY SHIT! or something like that. There is no reason I can think of that something like "Wow! Amazing play!" wouldn't do just as well.
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Canada11363 Posts
I don't get why people are so against providing more information.
At the bare minimum, the op is looking for a label on the cast essentially describing the language content to be expected. aka information. Not censoring your precious swear words. Heaven's knows why it's so important to retain 'fuck' and 'rape' in a cast. But you do, and the op wants to know if that's the case in each tournament.
Information.
Sure it's rated Teen. And people are going to have different standards with issues of swearing, violence, sex, and disturbing content. That's why I find the MPAA ratings on movies incredibly useless and tend to check imdb to see specifically what it's rated for. Because I consider some things more disturbing then others. And apparently the op does so as well.
I don't really understand the violence apologists as they seem to think SC2 is somehow incredibly violent- everything is so small and most is mechanical. As far as intense violence, a PG movie like Prince Caspian is more violent. The point is, when one watches a SC tournament, one reasonably expects very miniature amounts of violence of very little emotional intensity (no close-ups, dieing scenes, no Saving Private Ryan moments), but one does not necessarily expect to be greeted by f-bombs and players 'getting raped'.
So the op wishes to be informed ahead of time.
Information. What do you have against it?
As a complete aside and nothing to do with this particular thread, but:
On May 25 2011 01:04 warsinger wrote:
but I'd like to hear what the always level-headed and polite TL community has to say on the issue. I'm no longer convinced this is the case. They're out there I'm sure, but sometimes I feel like they've been drowned out.
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Ugh, one of the reasons I prefer watching things on the internet is escaping all the ridiculous draconian rules the FCC imposes on conventional media. I enjoy watching a cast and hearing about how a player is getting raped or how a play was FUCKING good. I'm not suggesting you cast like Andrew Dice Clay, but if a "fuck" slips out every now and then, by all means let it.
And don't give me any of that "save the children" bs, a typical 4th grader will already know the vast majority of the American swear word lexicon, and what's the harm in them hearing it anyway? They're just words.
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Toss a big fat R on the screen prior to the cast. Bam lets do this. I guess bad language offends some people and the situations that can be raised by language. If your child goes to public school then you shouldn't concern yourself with it because they hear worse there.
Honestly most casts i watch rarely involve bad language. More sexual situations then anything to me. And younger children probably wouldn't understood/comprehend those. If they do. Great for them.
I understand how you want to shield your children from it or desire a bit more respect from the casts. Or just want a warning. I really am not partial to it.
JTV does some asking if your 18 or older but thats completely up to the channel to have that.
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I agree with this and I think it's something all casters should take into account when commentating. More and more these days parents are getting their children involved in watching Starcraft. I think any major broadcast should keep things more or less PG. I still feel like user livestreams and streamed shows should be expected to have mature content.
True!
I think many younger children are getting into eSports (duh, eSports is the future! I mean present!) and there should definitely be a little more consistency. I think the PG level would be good. This way, people would have more incentive to watch individual players' streams if they want to know their real side or want to hear them troll and BM and swear (destiny, etc. haha).
Casters, don't let language harm the future of eSports!
Those of you who say we shouldn't worry about the kids... the kids are the future! Are you saying that we should let something like bad language stop the new generations' interest? I thought it was eSports' goal to grow and become "legit" and widely accepted. Kids can tune into NBA and etc. and watch the game without worrying about explicit language.
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It's hilarious that this just came up, cause I was just thinking about this while watching the EG Master's Cup Series.
While I enjoy the preshow music, I was surprised how much cussing was left in. Eminem talking about getting "shitfaced" is fine if you intentionally want to listen to Eminem, but I was pretty surprised to hear it while waiting to watch Starcraft.
Also, the blatent "What the FUCK!" in the intro was pretty surprising too.
Now I'm not one on censorship and the likes. I definitely don't think anyone or any group should be FORCED to edit their material.
I'd just like to encourage SC organizations to wean off the cursing, especially if they want to expand their viewer base. IMHO, I just don't get what purpose it serves. I doubt people are more prone to watch a show for the cussing, but instead, are more likely to NOT watch it because of it.
Like I said, I totally believe its up to a person/organization to decide whether or not they're going to cuss. And honestly, I'm not going to stop watching if they keep it up. But for the sake of the legitimacy of the sport, I'd just like to encourage them not to.
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Northern Ireland2557 Posts
Agreed with the OP. If eSports wants to expand outside of late adolescent/young adult demograph then this needs to happen. Perfect example of this is parents watching with their children as brought up in the OP. Day9 does a pretty good job of keeping his casting friendly for all audiences (from what i've seen anyway, I don't watch the dailies). Offensive language just seems to creep in with people dropping F bombs, saying harassment/attacks did a "shitload of damage" and saying a player/army got "raped"
People are gonna have a kneejerk resistance to this and defend it by saying they dont want to become politically correct and boring but you can keep it real without profanity. Most sports commentators are forbidden to swear, I don't see why eSports should be exempt from this.
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United States12607 Posts
On May 25 2011 12:29 RockIronrod wrote:Show nested quote +On May 25 2011 12:11 JWD wrote:
I agree with OP for the simple reason that I am embarrassed to recommend SC2 streams to my friends because I know there's a substantial chance they'll flip on the program and hear gratuitous cursing or a second-grade-level joke.
God bless DJWheat, but the one day I tweeted to recommend TSL on my personal twitter he opened the broadcast with "What up bitches??" That is not the impression I wanted to give my friends of what the SC2 scene is like. God forbid they suspect the SC2 community of having fun and having a friendly relationship with the players and casters.
Fun and friendly is great, but it comes in all varieties. All I'm saying is that the PG-13 SC broadcasts don't appeal to my non-gamer-type friends, and aren't at all helping me convince those friends that they shouldn't dismiss SC2 fandom as purely for nerdy teenagers.
It's just harder to say that SC2 is a legitimate competitive/business enterprise when top SC2 broadcasts involve penis jokes.
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On May 25 2011 12:11 JWD wrote:
I agree with OP for the simple reason that I am embarrassed to recommend SC2 streams to my friends because I know there's a substantial chance they'll flip on the program and hear gratuitous cursing or a second-grade-level joke.
God bless DJWheat, but the one day I tweeted to recommend TSL on my personal twitter he opened the broadcast with "What up bitches??" That is not the impression I wanted to give my friends of what the SC2 scene is like.
Ugh. They're just having fun and being entertaining, why do people give a fuck about swearing it's 2011 not 1408. I'm quite scared all this emphasis on being ~professional~ is going to make the casting scene rather stagnant and boring. It's first and foremost a game, and games should be fun and enjoyable.
EDIT: That said I do agree with the part about stupid grade 2 jokes being pretty terrible.
But the part in your above post about business enterprise is exactly what scares me, a shift of emphasis from the fun of the game to serious businessy type boring stuff.
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Husky is okay for casting, I mean sometimes he occasionally has a "inappropriate" words, but only like in about one in seven or eight of his videos. Watching official tournaments should not be a problem, they will barely ever use profane language, such as GSL or NASL, at most "idiotic, stupid, retarded" etc., but nothing too vulgar. Sex jokes are rarely ever used, with a few exceptions such as HuK and Destiny.
I know in the OP you stated that you occasionally hear it such as the TSL, but in an organized tournament such as the GSL you will rarely hear it. It does depend on the caster, Gretorp is a bit more casual, but people such as iNcontroL and IdrA should not give you a problem.
But for fun, the most I would recommend is definitely HuskyStarCraft. Day9 usually never makes vulgar jokes for the fun of it, and only uses a few profane words here and there to "spice" up his language like the rest of us.
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Canada11363 Posts
On May 25 2011 13:11 Phenny wrote:Show nested quote +On May 25 2011 12:11 JWD wrote:
I agree with OP for the simple reason that I am embarrassed to recommend SC2 streams to my friends because I know there's a substantial chance they'll flip on the program and hear gratuitous cursing or a second-grade-level joke.
God bless DJWheat, but the one day I tweeted to recommend TSL on my personal twitter he opened the broadcast with "What up bitches??" That is not the impression I wanted to give my friends of what the SC2 scene is like. Ugh. They're just having fun and being entertaining, why do people give a fuck about swearing it's 2011 not 1408. I'm quite scared all this emphasis on being ~professional~ is going to make the casting scene rather stagnant and boring. It's first and foremost a game, and games should be fun and enjoyable. EDIT: That said I do agree with the part about stupid grade 2 jokes being pretty terrible. But the part in your above post about business enterprise is exactly what scares me, a shift of emphasis from the fun of the game to serious businessy type boring stuff.
You can say it's 2011 and not 1408. But how can you argue about how an outsider should view your game. It's their perception you're trying to argue against. When it comes down to it, you're the insider to a very niche game that is hamstrung by a gamer culture that has a reputation of consisting of angry teens.
They're the outsider and no amount of 'get with times' will convince them that penis and rape jokes, f-bombs et al aren't juvenile but actually tremendously witty in the vein of Stephen Fry. You can try I guess, but it just doesn't sound so persuasive to me.
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On May 25 2011 13:22 Falling wrote:Show nested quote +On May 25 2011 13:11 Phenny wrote:On May 25 2011 12:11 JWD wrote:
I agree with OP for the simple reason that I am embarrassed to recommend SC2 streams to my friends because I know there's a substantial chance they'll flip on the program and hear gratuitous cursing or a second-grade-level joke.
God bless DJWheat, but the one day I tweeted to recommend TSL on my personal twitter he opened the broadcast with "What up bitches??" That is not the impression I wanted to give my friends of what the SC2 scene is like. Ugh. They're just having fun and being entertaining, why do people give a fuck about swearing it's 2011 not 1408. I'm quite scared all this emphasis on being ~professional~ is going to make the casting scene rather stagnant and boring. It's first and foremost a game, and games should be fun and enjoyable. EDIT: That said I do agree with the part about stupid grade 2 jokes being pretty terrible. But the part in your above post about business enterprise is exactly what scares me, a shift of emphasis from the fun of the game to serious businessy type boring stuff. You can say it's 2011 and not 1408. But how can you argue about how an outsider should view your game. It's their perception you're trying to argue against. When it comes down to it, you're the insider to a very niche game that is hamstrung by a gamer culture that has a reputation of consisting of angry teens. They're the outsider and no amount of 'get with times' will convince them that penis and rape jokes, f-bombs et al aren't juvenile but actually tremendously witty in the vein of Stephen Fry. You can try I guess, but it just doesn't sound so persuasive to me.
Oh yeh for sure, but although the scene is niche it is reasonably decent in size - in the scheme of things, does it really need to start pulling in larger numbers of people?
EDIT: Actually re reading your post I see it's not just about attracting viewers but social acceptance in which case I have to agree because that is important in terms of having people understand and public support on legal issues etc.
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