"Limitation of Usage Neither you nor the operator of any website where your Production(s) may be viewed can force a viewer to pay a "fee" to be able to view your Production(s)."
No tournament is actually ALLOWED to be PPV. NOT A SINGLE ONE.
Ups... that's quite interesting.
I wonder if they get around it by offering the VODs at a later date. Also, GSL requires payment to view their event.
No, no... GSL have a free LQ live stream. According to the Blizzard video policy, as long as there is a Live LQ for free, it's fine. GSL ask for a payment for the VODs and for the HQ stream.
"Limitation of Usage Neither you nor the operator of any website where your Production(s) may be viewed can force a viewer to pay a "fee" to be able to view your Production(s)."
No tournament is actually ALLOWED to be PPV. NOT A SINGLE ONE.
That is actually pretty interesting.
No, it's really not. Those terms are just the default. Anyone is free to talk to Blizzard and get an alternative agreement, and I'm sure MLG did this.
On February 14 2012 07:54 Grumbels wrote: Please don't let this become a 100 page thread filled with bitter arguments and complaints. :o
140 and still growing.
I'm not a huge consumer of content, especialy when there is so much of it that i would have to sit all day and watch games, so that's not even an option for me.
"Limitation of Usage Neither you nor the operator of any website where your Production(s) may be viewed can force a viewer to pay a "fee" to be able to view your Production(s)."
No tournament is actually ALLOWED to be PPV. NOT A SINGLE ONE.
That is actually pretty interesting.
It's not interesting at all. Obviously, organizations like MLG and the GSL act under a different licensing agreement. There have been PPV events over at GomTV in the past.
On February 14 2012 07:54 Grumbels wrote: Please don't let this become a 100 page thread filled with bitter arguments and complaints. :o
140 and still growing.
I'm not a huge consumer of content, especialy when there is so much of it that i would have to sit all day and watch games, so that's not even an option for me.
$20 is too much. I only pay for GSL because it's the only tournament I feel is worth the money in the scene right now. They have the best players and most entertaining games. I don't watch foreigner only tourneys because I don't find the level of play to be great or entertaining and only watch foreigner tourneys if koreans are in it. However, even with MKP being at MLG arena is not enough for me to pay for a foreigner tourney. GSL will always get my money, but I'm not sure when I'll be able to justify paying for a foreigner tourney.
On February 15 2012 02:38 OrganicDoom wrote: !!! WE WERE TRICKED !!!
MLG hyped this tourney. Gave us free online qaulifiers. Then one week before the whole thing goes down they announce this "Experiment".
Hey sc2 fans even though you've been purchasing gold memberships for a month and assumed we would follow the standard buisness model. We're now not going to let you watch the event live unless you give us $20.00. Oh by the way, as long as you stop following SC2 for a week you may be able to enjoy the vods spoiler free.
I'm shocked MLG donned the cloak and dagger and stuck it to loyal fans. They should man up and postpone this experiment until the next arena, when it can be fully transparent.
On top of all that, this may be violating a Blizzard limitations policy.
Limitation of Usage Neither you nor the operator of any website where your Production(s) may be viewed can force a viewer to pay a "fee" to be able to view your Production(s).
Don't forget the part where they claim they can't make money, yet the are holding this event in NYC. The most expensive city in the world for hotels and accommodations. Also note, that despite NYC being the most populous region in the western world, they won't have attendees at this event!!!
But we're going to pay $20 to help cover their costs......
How much of that $20 will reach the players? $1 or $2 maybe..... MLG doesn't say... they just cry poor and whine about a niche industry. Who twisted their arm to focus their entire business on SC2?
IMHO buy a t-shirt on TL if you want to support esports, donate to the next shoutcraft event..... don't support this NYC boondoggle that only MLG staff is going to attend.
MLG doesn't understand the SC2 community or the SC2 market. That much is obvious after the way they've handled this.
best post in this thread i wonder if mlg will run commercials to... i bet they will
Seconding that this is a good post. Just used my $20 to buy a shirt, which I'm absolutely confident is a better use of my money than on MLG.
If you really want to watch SC2 for $20, be my guest. But don't you dare say that those of us who don't are hurting esports or are only complaining because we're poor and stupid.
Allmost sounds like there was a bubble wich is now bursting in sc2.
How do you figure? That $20 I just gave to TL is $15 more than I've ever spent on ESPORTS in my entire life.
Part of the reason SC2 has had such large viewer numbers is because it's free. If suddenly everyone started charging, yeah those numbers are going to go way down. SC2 is what I watch when I don't have anything better to do, it's not something I structure my life around. If I have to pay for it, suddenly that flips, and I'm not ok with that.
I sayd it sounds, i am no economic expert, its just everyone were happy that everything is growing, then suddenly MLG fired alot of its staff and now asking to pay for live proadcast. If its growing, why did they need to do that suddenly. There hasnt been new big tournaments etc, NASL has decraded (i think?) also, everything seems a bit smaller then half a year ago. But again, it might be just me.
On February 15 2012 02:38 OrganicDoom wrote: !!! WE WERE TRICKED !!!
MLG hyped this tourney. Gave us free online qaulifiers. Then one week before the whole thing goes down they announce this "Experiment".
Hey sc2 fans even though you've been purchasing gold memberships for a month and assumed we would follow the standard buisness model. We're now not going to let you watch the event live unless you give us $20.00. Oh by the way, as long as you stop following SC2 for a week you may be able to enjoy the vods spoiler free.
I'm shocked MLG donned the cloak and dagger and stuck it to loyal fans. They should man up and postpone this experiment until the next arena, when it can be fully transparent.
On top of all that, this may be violating a Blizzard limitations policy.
Limitation of Usage Neither you nor the operator of any website where your Production(s) may be viewed can force a viewer to pay a "fee" to be able to view your Production(s).
Don't forget the part where they claim they can't make money, yet the are holding this event in NYC. The most expensive city in the world for hotels and accommodations. Also note, that despite NYC being the most populous region in the western world, they won't have attendees at this event!!!
But we're going to pay $20 to help cover their costs......
How much of that $20 will reach the players? $1 or $2 maybe..... MLG doesn't say... they just cry poor and whine about a niche industry. Who twisted their arm to focus their entire business on SC2?
IMHO buy a t-shirt on TL if you want to support esports, donate to the next shoutcraft event..... don't support this NYC boondoggle that only MLG staff is going to attend.
MLG doesn't understand the SC2 community or the SC2 market. That much is obvious after the way they've handled this.
Good post. And see my post on the previous page on why their expense number is a joke, even if it is in NYC. I feel like they are trying to market this to me by them crying poor, like they are some charitable organization or something.
Thank you, yes I do feel they are crying poor and making excuses for their lack of financial success.
For what it's worth, I've run and sold a software business with 50 full time employee's and I can tell you that from my experience a companies success or failure comes down the a million little decisions made by employees and management, that in total make or break the business. Its like macro, every unit and building needs to be working efficiently and in the same general direction and then you can make a business that works.
Companies with strong business models, in a strong industries sometime fail completely for internal reasons. One VP is in a pissing contest with another VP over who has more power internally, and they make bad decisions because of it. My point is, in a business of MLG's size and scope, there are 1000 factors that go into making them what they are. For them to focus on a "niche industry" or "advertising as a business model" being the problem for them..... that just sounds like they're looking for excuses to me.
Sundance needs good reasons for his investors as to why they didn't make money off SC2 in 2011, despite unprecedented growth in SC2. Activision even mentioned MLG on its conference call a couple weeks ago. Why isn't MLG making money?
He seems to be saying, its not the decisions he made, or the team he assembled to run it, its the quirks of the "esports industry". To me, its sounds like he's giving an excuses to his bosses.
When I was a boss, before I retired, I didn't like excuses.... and apparently I still don't :D
Today's business model is just not sustainable. Costs in the e-sports industry and specially in SC2 are extremely high. To run a LAN, you must face a huge investment for the location of the hall (several thousands dollars, if not more, for an MLG sized event). But SC2 LAN are specially expensive because you truly have a globalized game, so someone (either the teams or the event organizers) has to pay a small fortune on plane tickets. You also need a lot of fairly new computers as you could run into graphic lag if you use PC with bad graphic cards, and you need a top of the notch internet connection as you depend on it to play the game.
On the other hand, revenues are scarce. For a long time, the only sources of revenue were the entry fees of viewers (non existent on a closed door event as this one) and the ad revenue. Problem is the ad revenue is way smaller most people believe it is. Most events end up with red numbers, and huge event organizers are losing money. MLG only survives thanks to the gullibility of some venture capitalists that poured millions on a "booming" industry, but you can't ride for free forever. It is fair for them to try to cut their losses.
Sadly, MLG is fucked over. The ppp system works for sports events because they have a total monopoly on some sports. In boxing or in the UFC, you either pay or you don't see anything. In Starcraft, a 1000 euros monthly cup as the MSI/Millenium tournament has a roster as good as MLG. This business model is bound to fail too.
"Limitation of Usage Neither you nor the operator of any website where your Production(s) may be viewed can force a viewer to pay a "fee" to be able to view your Production(s)."
No tournament is actually ALLOWED to be PPV. NOT A SINGLE ONE.
That is actually pretty interesting.
It's not interesting at all. Obviously, organizations like MLG and the GSL act under a different licensing agreement. There have been PPV events over at GomTV in the past.
Since GomTV are affiliated with Blizzard, I guess it's right. But, from MLG, not so sure of it... Actually, I'm pretty that Blizzard would ask for a compensation is MLG would have a PPV only event. Maybe they actually are already, who know...
We will see I guess.
Still, according the the Blizzard policy, no company is allowed to stream a blizzard game PPV, except blizzard. It's in their copyright...
It's pretty much exactly this case :
"We understand that many third party websites have a "free" method to see their video content, as well as a 'premium' membership service that allows for speedier viewing.
For clarity, please note that as long as the website that hosts your Production provides a free method to allow viewers to see the Production, Blizzard Entertainment will not object to your Production being hosted on that site, regardless of the site's "for pay" premium service plans."
Maybe MLG think that allowing the view of the vods for free make up for it... Blizzard could be fine with that too.
Bye bye SC2, it was nice knowing you.
More like : Bye bye MLG, it was nice knowing you.
Maybe MLG were not profitable before because of many reasons (many employes, a lot of travel and accomodations paid by the business, etc.) but I do see Dreamhack, GSL and IPL being profitable. Hell, maybe MLG will actually turn to a "GSL-like" production, with more sparse match and events... aiming and charging for long season and... they could actually charge 10-15 or even 20$ that way and i'm sure that a lot of people would buy it. 20$ for a full month of epic SC2 4 times a week on the NA streaming time... I would get it, personally.
But yeah... 20$ for a 20 hours of games all condensed in a single week-end... no thank you.
Can't people stop arguing for just a while, and take a minute to think about how awesome the LR thread for this event will be 5% who bought the ticket and posting stuff like '' OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!'' '' THOSE STORMS HOLY SHIT''' '' WOW XXX IS SOOOO GOOD'' while the remaining 95 % will be like '' WTF IS GOING ON!??!?! LR FASTER SEEKER/DRAZERK''
On February 14 2012 16:15 VirgilSC2 wrote: Just a cross-post of my thoughts from EGAlex's thread:
Just to put some things in perspective, I did a little digging back, and there was NOTHING that would lead anyone to believe MLG's Winter Arena was NOT part of the "2012 Pro Circuit"
In this interview, the MLG Winter Arena Online Qualifiers, MLG Winter Arena, and MLG Winter Championship are all referred to as part of the 2012 Pro Circuit.
In all previous mentions of the Winter Arena (bar the initial mention of prize pools being separate from the Championship Events) no differentiation was made between the Winter Arena and Winter Championship as far as the Pro Circuit is concerned.
I think MLG should have announced this either: a) With the announcement of the new 2012 Pro Circuit [and Arenas, since apparently they are not part of the Pro Circuit] or b) With the re-vamp of the MLG Subscription Program.
Everything about this just screams "exploitation through misinformation" in my mind.
I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt and say I don't think it's purposeful exploitation through misinformation, but rather last minute decisions being made without realizing the PR implications. He popped the 'how about PPV' question on twitter a couple weeks ago-- Sundance isn't an idiot about PR, and if a PPV structure was thought about well in advance, announcements about it likely would have been incorporated into previous press releases rather than risking the backlash.
In that case it's pretty important to note that the Winter Arena (and the Online Qualifiers) is referred to as part of the 2012 Pro Circuit.
On February 14 2012 15:56 BronzeKnee wrote: This is what my Gold Membership was supposed to provide when I bought it:
Don't tell me that the Winter Arena isn't part of the MLG Circuit for 2012 and that it isn't filled with professional players, because it is both. They just changed the names around.
And this my friends, is called bait and switch, and it is illegal. Bait-and-switch is a form of fraud, most commonly used in retail sales but also applicable to other contexts. First, customers are "baited" by advertising for a product or service at a low price; second, the customers discover that the advertised good is not available and are "switched" to a costlier product.
On February 15 2012 03:52 JohnSmithy631 wrote: I have a solution. I will pay 20$. FOR ALL OF YOU. I will purchase MLG and stream it for all of you :D I'll post my stream on MLG weekend.
John
This is yet another reason why 20 dollars for a weekend of streams is a bad idea.
Re-streams aren't really allowed are they ?:D Would be kinda cool though....
It would be kinda fun to see
MajorLeagueGaming - 2500 viewers
JohnSmithy631 - 33000 viewers
That is so optimistic man. Sooo optimistic.
I think you're under-optimistics.
There were 3.5 million unique viewers for providence, which at least 50% was for starcraft 2. That turns out to be 1.75 million unique viewers.
They need just .14% of the viewers from providence to pay to break 2500.
Anyway since its not a live event, as there are no spectators, whats the point of renting an stadium and hire casters/players. Seems completely waste of money and pointless
On February 15 2012 04:19 legaton wrote: Well, i guess we are just hearing the bubble pop
Today's business model is just not sustainable. Costs in the e-sports industry and specially in SC2 are extremely high. To run a LAN, you must face a huge investment for the location of the hall (several thousands dollars, if not more, for an MLG sized event). But SC2 LAN are specially expensive because you truly have a globalized game, so someone (either the teams or the event organizers) has to pay a small fortune on plane tickets. You also need a lot of fairly new computers as you could run into graphic lag if you use PC with bad graphic cards, and you need a top of the notch internet connection as you depend on it to play the game.
On the other hand, revenues are scarce. For a long time, the only sources of revenue were the entry fees of viewers (non existent on a closed door event as this one) and the ad revenue. Problem is the ad revenue is way smaller most people believe it is. Most events end up with red numbers, and huge event organizers are losing money. MLG only survives thanks to the gullibility of some venture capitalists that poured millions on a "booming" industry, but you can't ride for free forever. It is fair for them to try to cut their losses.
Sadly, MLG is fucked over. The ppp system works for sports events because they have a total monopoly on some sports. In boxing or in the UFC, you either pay or you don't see anything. In Starcraft, a 1000 euros monthly cup as the MSI/Millenium tournament has a roster as good as MLG. This business model is bound to fail too.
Bye bye SC2, it was nice knowing you.
You are being too dramatic. SC2 isn't going to go away because of this, and everything isn't going to fail... but things might have to be toned down if live events cannot continue to be profitable. I wonder if these events (as they are now) really are losing money. MLG IEM and Dreamhack seem to be going on strong for awhile now, and I don't see why that can't continue, even if they have to cut back in areas.
I like how people keep reposting that blizzard licensing quote, which they quite clearly saw elsewhere rather than discovered on their own, in a 140 page thread as if there is any chance at all it hasn't been posted over and over again
On February 15 2012 04:23 Brandish wrote: What is the difference between an "arena event" and a regular pro circuit event?
if everything that was normally free before is still free but they just added new features for more money whats the issue?
perhaps i'm not understanding Sundance's statement
also if the VODS are all going to be free after the event its not like the content is going to be completely unaccessible
The arena event is 32 players (top 8 from providence, top 8 from 3 reigonal qualifiers) and top 16 at event get pool play for championship event and the winner getssomething like 10k.
Questionable move to isolate what seems to be a huge part of the viewers with an excessive price point, and not offer a free stream or even a discount to your loyal Gold subs. As a long time fan, I'm disappointed. MLG, you have lost my business.
On February 15 2012 04:27 syllogism wrote: I like how people keep reposting that blizzard licensing quote, which they quite clearly saw elsewhere rather than discovered on their own, in a 140 page thread as if there is any chance at all it hasn't been posted over and over again