On April 18 2013 03:44 Canucklehead wrote: This is like tennis paying out the same prize pool for winning a random tennis tournament and winning wimbledon or golf paying the same for a lesser golf tourney and the masters. Makes no sense, other than affirmative action for foreigners and giving them charity money.
There's not affirmative action for foreigners. Everyone is free to enter whatever system they want. Koreans are entering both the NA and EU leagues. In fact, the entire point of this (as said by Blizzard in interviews) is to have the Koreans actually enter the foreign scene and take their infrastructure with them as they move abroad.
There is affirmative action. Koreans aren't free to go where they want, only those on foreigner teams can afford to for the most part.
Not to mention 24 players were seeded directly into the premiere leagues, and the majority of seeds were given to non-koreans. People like hellokitty and maker got seeds over much much better Korean players. If that isn't affirmative action, I don't know what is.
The community has said that foreigners should just buck up and move to Korea if they want to be relevant. This is said with little regard to the actual costs of doing that or the culture shock. Suddenly there's an incentive for Koreans to move to NA/EU and there's outrage over that? The answer as to why lots of foreigners don't live in Seoul and participate in the Code A qualifiers is that it's freakin' expensive to do, yet no one seemed to care about cost and feasibility while shouting down seeds given to foreign major tournament winners (an actual incentive to get people to move to Korea).
Seriously, it's a double standard. The community was all about the old system which demanded that people move to Korea, and now they are upset about a system that encourages Koreans to move to a different continent? Why should Koreans have the privilege of not having to move to a foreign country and culture to make a living in SC2 when that's exactly what the community demanded of foreign progamers?
Because they're better. Just like it's okay to "force" the best soccer players to move to Europe but it would be stupid to force European leagues to have the same prize pool as African leagues and now some of the best soccer players have to play in Botswana.
The problem with your example is that many soccer players in Europe aren't from Europe, and European clubs don't have the highest level of skill. All of the world-class Africans travel to Europe, but we don't complain that they are forced to go to where the money is. Brazilian teams are equal in skill (they've won more club world cups), but they make far less money than European clubs.
That's bullshit, European clubs have the highest level of skill by a gigantic margin. The club world cup is about as important as the official baseball world championship.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: Hypothetical example: if the MLS made NFL-like money, then they would be able to pay their players salaries competitive with EU teams. Would you be very upset if EU players moved to the US to play in this league?
If it happened naturally? No. If FIFA just decided to remove a third of European Leagues, cut their prize pool in half and slap a huge prize on the MLS to make players leave Europe, then yes, of course I'd be upset.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: The fact is that for SC2, the money is in the Western scene. That's where the sponsors are. That's where the audience is. It's not the job of the Western audience to subsidize the Korean scene. If Koreans want to make more money playing Starcraft, they might want to move to the West.
This has absolutely nothing to do with sponsors. This is not GOM trying to adapt or Korean team sponsors wanting their teams to go to the USA. This was Blizzards decision.
You don't get to look at the results of an official FIFA sanctioned event and claim that it's bullshit. It's literally designed to determine what the best club team is. Even discounting that, South American players are far more skillful than their European counterparts. Why should they have to move to Europe when their continent has all of the talent for soccer?
This has EVERYTHING to do with exposure. More people will buy SC2 in NA and EU than in Korea. It's pretty simple. If blizzard wants to sell commercials on their streams, then the audience will matter. You're going to get bigger audiences for NA/EU primetime than KR primetime. More than that: it's about the longevity of the scene. If the SC2 scene stays Korea-centric, then it fails as a global esport, and Western audiences and money will evaporate. The whole point of this is to break the Korea-centricity of the current scene.
On April 18 2013 03:44 Canucklehead wrote: This is like tennis paying out the same prize pool for winning a random tennis tournament and winning wimbledon or golf paying the same for a lesser golf tourney and the masters. Makes no sense, other than affirmative action for foreigners and giving them charity money.
There's not affirmative action for foreigners. Everyone is free to enter whatever system they want. Koreans are entering both the NA and EU leagues. In fact, the entire point of this (as said by Blizzard in interviews) is to have the Koreans actually enter the foreign scene and take their infrastructure with them as they move abroad.
There is affirmative action. Koreans aren't free to go where they want, only those on foreigner teams can afford to for the most part.
Not to mention 24 players were seeded directly into the premiere leagues, and the majority of seeds were given to non-koreans. People like hellokitty and maker got seeds over much much better Korean players. If that isn't affirmative action, I don't know what is.
The community has said that foreigners should just buck up and move to Korea if they want to be relevant. This is said with little regard to the actual costs of doing that or the culture shock. Suddenly there's an incentive for Koreans to move to NA/EU and there's outrage over that? The answer as to why lots of foreigners don't live in Seoul and participate in the Code A qualifiers is that it's freakin' expensive to do, yet no one seemed to care about cost and feasibility while shouting down seeds given to foreign major tournament winners (an actual incentive to get people to move to Korea).
Seriously, it's a double standard. The community was all about the old system which demanded that people move to Korea, and now they are upset about a system that encourages Koreans to move to a different continent? Why should Koreans have the privilege of not having to move to a foreign country and culture to make a living in SC2 when that's exactly what the community demanded of foreign progamers?
Because they're better. Just like it's okay to "force" the best soccer players to move to Europe but it would be stupid to force European leagues to have the same prize pool as African leagues and now some of the best soccer players have to play in Botswana.
The problem with your example is that many soccer players in Europe aren't from Europe, and European clubs don't have the highest level of skill. All of the world-class Africans travel to Europe, but we don't complain that they are forced to go to where the money is. Brazilian teams are equal in skill (they've won more club world cups), but they make far less money than European clubs.
That's bullshit, European clubs have the highest level of skill by a gigantic margin. The club world cup is about as important as the official baseball world championship.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: Hypothetical example: if the MLS made NFL-like money, then they would be able to pay their players salaries competitive with EU teams. Would you be very upset if EU players moved to the US to play in this league?
If it happened naturally? No. If FIFA just decided to remove a third of European Leagues, cut their prize pool in half and slap a huge prize on the MLS to make players leave Europe, then yes, of course I'd be upset.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: The fact is that for SC2, the money is in the Western scene. That's where the sponsors are. That's where the audience is. It's not the job of the Western audience to subsidize the Korean scene. If Koreans want to make more money playing Starcraft, they might want to move to the West.
This has absolutely nothing to do with sponsors. This is not GOM trying to adapt or Korean team sponsors wanting their teams to go to the USA. This was Blizzards decision.
You don't get to look at the results of an official FIFA sanctioned event and claim that it's bullshit. It's literally designed to determine what the best club team is. Even discounting that, South American players are far more skillful than their European counterparts. Why should they have to move to Europe when their continent has all of the talent for soccer?
A) Yes, I do. No (and I mean absolutely no) soccer fan takes the Club WC seriously. It's like the NBA All Star Game. It's fun, but nobody cares about the results. More than that, a casual soccer fan wouldn't even know it existed.
On April 18 2013 03:44 Canucklehead wrote: This is like tennis paying out the same prize pool for winning a random tennis tournament and winning wimbledon or golf paying the same for a lesser golf tourney and the masters. Makes no sense, other than affirmative action for foreigners and giving them charity money.
There's not affirmative action for foreigners. Everyone is free to enter whatever system they want. Koreans are entering both the NA and EU leagues. In fact, the entire point of this (as said by Blizzard in interviews) is to have the Koreans actually enter the foreign scene and take their infrastructure with them as they move abroad.
There is affirmative action. Koreans aren't free to go where they want, only those on foreigner teams can afford to for the most part.
Not to mention 24 players were seeded directly into the premiere leagues, and the majority of seeds were given to non-koreans. People like hellokitty and maker got seeds over much much better Korean players. If that isn't affirmative action, I don't know what is.
The community has said that foreigners should just buck up and move to Korea if they want to be relevant. This is said with little regard to the actual costs of doing that or the culture shock. Suddenly there's an incentive for Koreans to move to NA/EU and there's outrage over that? The answer as to why lots of foreigners don't live in Seoul and participate in the Code A qualifiers is that it's freakin' expensive to do, yet no one seemed to care about cost and feasibility while shouting down seeds given to foreign major tournament winners (an actual incentive to get people to move to Korea).
Seriously, it's a double standard. The community was all about the old system which demanded that people move to Korea, and now they are upset about a system that encourages Koreans to move to a different continent? Why should Koreans have the privilege of not having to move to a foreign country and culture to make a living in SC2 when that's exactly what the community demanded of foreign progamers?
Because they're better. Just like it's okay to "force" the best soccer players to move to Europe but it would be stupid to force European leagues to have the same prize pool as African leagues and now some of the best soccer players have to play in Botswana.
The problem with your example is that many soccer players in Europe aren't from Europe, and European clubs don't have the highest level of skill. All of the world-class Africans travel to Europe, but we don't complain that they are forced to go to where the money is. Brazilian teams are equal in skill (they've won more club world cups), but they make far less money than European clubs.
That's bullshit, European clubs have the highest level of skill by a gigantic margin. The club world cup is about as important as the official baseball world championship.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: Hypothetical example: if the MLS made NFL-like money, then they would be able to pay their players salaries competitive with EU teams. Would you be very upset if EU players moved to the US to play in this league?
If it happened naturally? No. If FIFA just decided to remove a third of European Leagues, cut their prize pool in half and slap a huge prize on the MLS to make players leave Europe, then yes, of course I'd be upset.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: The fact is that for SC2, the money is in the Western scene. That's where the sponsors are. That's where the audience is. It's not the job of the Western audience to subsidize the Korean scene. If Koreans want to make more money playing Starcraft, they might want to move to the West.
This has absolutely nothing to do with sponsors. This is not GOM trying to adapt or Korean team sponsors wanting their teams to go to the USA. This was Blizzards decision.
You don't get to look at the results of an official FIFA sanctioned event and claim that it's bullshit. It's literally designed to determine what the best club team is. Even discounting that, South American players are far more skillful than their European counterparts. Why should they have to move to Europe when their continent has all of the talent for soccer?
This has EVERYTHING to do with exposure. More people will buy SC2 in NA and EU than in Korea. It's pretty simple. If blizzard wants to sell commercials on their streams, then the audience will matter. You're going to get bigger audiences for NA/EU primetime than KR primetime. More than that: it's about the longevity of the scene. If the SC2 scene stays Korea-centric, then it fails as a global esport, and Western audiences and money will evaporate. The whole point of this is to break the Korea-centricity of the current scene.
Wait..your telling me that the reason that everyone is doing this is to sell ads and make money off of those ads? You mean Blizzard isn't doing trying to kill Esports in Korea, but tying to make money by marketing it to the largest group of people who bought SC2.
Thats, like, crazy man. Just crazy. Why would people want to move where the money is?
On April 18 2013 03:44 Canucklehead wrote: This is like tennis paying out the same prize pool for winning a random tennis tournament and winning wimbledon or golf paying the same for a lesser golf tourney and the masters. Makes no sense, other than affirmative action for foreigners and giving them charity money.
There's not affirmative action for foreigners. Everyone is free to enter whatever system they want. Koreans are entering both the NA and EU leagues. In fact, the entire point of this (as said by Blizzard in interviews) is to have the Koreans actually enter the foreign scene and take their infrastructure with them as they move abroad.
There is affirmative action. Koreans aren't free to go where they want, only those on foreigner teams can afford to for the most part.
Not to mention 24 players were seeded directly into the premiere leagues, and the majority of seeds were given to non-koreans. People like hellokitty and maker got seeds over much much better Korean players. If that isn't affirmative action, I don't know what is.
The community has said that foreigners should just buck up and move to Korea if they want to be relevant. This is said with little regard to the actual costs of doing that or the culture shock. Suddenly there's an incentive for Koreans to move to NA/EU and there's outrage over that? The answer as to why lots of foreigners don't live in Seoul and participate in the Code A qualifiers is that it's freakin' expensive to do, yet no one seemed to care about cost and feasibility while shouting down seeds given to foreign major tournament winners (an actual incentive to get people to move to Korea).
Seriously, it's a double standard. The community was all about the old system which demanded that people move to Korea, and now they are upset about a system that encourages Koreans to move to a different continent? Why should Koreans have the privilege of not having to move to a foreign country and culture to make a living in SC2 when that's exactly what the community demanded of foreign progamers?
Because they're better. Just like it's okay to "force" the best soccer players to move to Europe but it would be stupid to force European leagues to have the same prize pool as African leagues and now some of the best soccer players have to play in Botswana.
The problem with your example is that many soccer players in Europe aren't from Europe, and European clubs don't have the highest level of skill. All of the world-class Africans travel to Europe, but we don't complain that they are forced to go to where the money is. Brazilian teams are equal in skill (they've won more club world cups), but they make far less money than European clubs.
That's bullshit, European clubs have the highest level of skill by a gigantic margin. The club world cup is about as important as the official baseball world championship.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: Hypothetical example: if the MLS made NFL-like money, then they would be able to pay their players salaries competitive with EU teams. Would you be very upset if EU players moved to the US to play in this league?
If it happened naturally? No. If FIFA just decided to remove a third of European Leagues, cut their prize pool in half and slap a huge prize on the MLS to make players leave Europe, then yes, of course I'd be upset.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: The fact is that for SC2, the money is in the Western scene. That's where the sponsors are. That's where the audience is. It's not the job of the Western audience to subsidize the Korean scene. If Koreans want to make more money playing Starcraft, they might want to move to the West.
This has absolutely nothing to do with sponsors. This is not GOM trying to adapt or Korean team sponsors wanting their teams to go to the USA. This was Blizzards decision.
You don't get to look at the results of an official FIFA sanctioned event and claim that it's bullshit. It's literally designed to determine what the best club team is. Even discounting that, South American players are far more skillful than their European counterparts. Why should they have to move to Europe when their continent has all of the talent for soccer?
A) Yes, I do. No (and I mean absolutely no) soccer fan takes the Club WC seriously. It's like the NBA All Star Game. It's fun, but nobody cares about the results. More than that, a casual soccer fan wouldn't even know it existed.
B) South America doesn't have all of the talent.
Anyway, my point still stands. South America has a large preponderance of talent, but soccer fans aren't upset that they are forced to move to Europe to make more money than they could if they stayed home. We should see the same thing here. Koreans can make money in Korea, but they can also travel outside of Korea to make money where there is more exposure and money.
On April 18 2013 03:44 Canucklehead wrote: This is like tennis paying out the same prize pool for winning a random tennis tournament and winning wimbledon or golf paying the same for a lesser golf tourney and the masters. Makes no sense, other than affirmative action for foreigners and giving them charity money.
There's not affirmative action for foreigners. Everyone is free to enter whatever system they want. Koreans are entering both the NA and EU leagues. In fact, the entire point of this (as said by Blizzard in interviews) is to have the Koreans actually enter the foreign scene and take their infrastructure with them as they move abroad.
There is affirmative action. Koreans aren't free to go where they want, only those on foreigner teams can afford to for the most part.
Not to mention 24 players were seeded directly into the premiere leagues, and the majority of seeds were given to non-koreans. People like hellokitty and maker got seeds over much much better Korean players. If that isn't affirmative action, I don't know what is.
The community has said that foreigners should just buck up and move to Korea if they want to be relevant. This is said with little regard to the actual costs of doing that or the culture shock. Suddenly there's an incentive for Koreans to move to NA/EU and there's outrage over that? The answer as to why lots of foreigners don't live in Seoul and participate in the Code A qualifiers is that it's freakin' expensive to do, yet no one seemed to care about cost and feasibility while shouting down seeds given to foreign major tournament winners (an actual incentive to get people to move to Korea).
Seriously, it's a double standard. The community was all about the old system which demanded that people move to Korea, and now they are upset about a system that encourages Koreans to move to a different continent? Why should Koreans have the privilege of not having to move to a foreign country and culture to make a living in SC2 when that's exactly what the community demanded of foreign progamers?
Because they're better. Just like it's okay to "force" the best soccer players to move to Europe but it would be stupid to force European leagues to have the same prize pool as African leagues and now some of the best soccer players have to play in Botswana.
The problem with your example is that many soccer players in Europe aren't from Europe, and European clubs don't have the highest level of skill. All of the world-class Africans travel to Europe, but we don't complain that they are forced to go to where the money is. Brazilian teams are equal in skill (they've won more club world cups), but they make far less money than European clubs.
That's bullshit, European clubs have the highest level of skill by a gigantic margin. The club world cup is about as important as the official baseball world championship.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: Hypothetical example: if the MLS made NFL-like money, then they would be able to pay their players salaries competitive with EU teams. Would you be very upset if EU players moved to the US to play in this league?
If it happened naturally? No. If FIFA just decided to remove a third of European Leagues, cut their prize pool in half and slap a huge prize on the MLS to make players leave Europe, then yes, of course I'd be upset.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: The fact is that for SC2, the money is in the Western scene. That's where the sponsors are. That's where the audience is. It's not the job of the Western audience to subsidize the Korean scene. If Koreans want to make more money playing Starcraft, they might want to move to the West.
This has absolutely nothing to do with sponsors. This is not GOM trying to adapt or Korean team sponsors wanting their teams to go to the USA. This was Blizzards decision.
You don't get to look at the results of an official FIFA sanctioned event and claim that it's bullshit. It's literally designed to determine what the best club team is. Even discounting that, South American players are far more skillful than their European counterparts. Why should they have to move to Europe when their continent has all of the talent for soccer?
A) Yes, I do. No (and I mean absolutely no) soccer fan takes the Club WC seriously. It's like the NBA All Star Game. It's fun, but nobody cares about the results. More than that, a casual soccer fan wouldn't even know it existed.
B) South America doesn't have all of the talent.
Anyway, my point still stands. South America has a large preponderance of talent, but soccer fans aren't upset that they are forced to move to Europe to make more money than they could if they stayed home. We should see the same thing here. Koreans can make money in Korea, but they can also travel outside of Korea to make money where there is more exposure and money.
The Boston Bruins has a single American player. The rest are not from the US and we are currently importing another Swedish player. Players move to new regions to make money in all competitive anything. There isn't some hockey mecca where all players reside and the US just dumps money into the region to promote the best players in the world. The players move to entertain the fans, not the other way around.
On April 18 2013 03:44 Canucklehead wrote: This is like tennis paying out the same prize pool for winning a random tennis tournament and winning wimbledon or golf paying the same for a lesser golf tourney and the masters. Makes no sense, other than affirmative action for foreigners and giving them charity money.
There's not affirmative action for foreigners. Everyone is free to enter whatever system they want. Koreans are entering both the NA and EU leagues. In fact, the entire point of this (as said by Blizzard in interviews) is to have the Koreans actually enter the foreign scene and take their infrastructure with them as they move abroad.
There is affirmative action. Koreans aren't free to go where they want, only those on foreigner teams can afford to for the most part.
Not to mention 24 players were seeded directly into the premiere leagues, and the majority of seeds were given to non-koreans. People like hellokitty and maker got seeds over much much better Korean players. If that isn't affirmative action, I don't know what is.
The community has said that foreigners should just buck up and move to Korea if they want to be relevant. This is said with little regard to the actual costs of doing that or the culture shock. Suddenly there's an incentive for Koreans to move to NA/EU and there's outrage over that? The answer as to why lots of foreigners don't live in Seoul and participate in the Code A qualifiers is that it's freakin' expensive to do, yet no one seemed to care about cost and feasibility while shouting down seeds given to foreign major tournament winners (an actual incentive to get people to move to Korea).
Seriously, it's a double standard. The community was all about the old system which demanded that people move to Korea, and now they are upset about a system that encourages Koreans to move to a different continent? Why should Koreans have the privilege of not having to move to a foreign country and culture to make a living in SC2 when that's exactly what the community demanded of foreign progamers?
Because they're better. Just like it's okay to "force" the best soccer players to move to Europe but it would be stupid to force European leagues to have the same prize pool as African leagues and now some of the best soccer players have to play in Botswana.
The problem with your example is that many soccer players in Europe aren't from Europe, and European clubs don't have the highest level of skill. All of the world-class Africans travel to Europe, but we don't complain that they are forced to go to where the money is. Brazilian teams are equal in skill (they've won more club world cups), but they make far less money than European clubs.
That's bullshit, European clubs have the highest level of skill by a gigantic margin. The club world cup is about as important as the official baseball world championship.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: Hypothetical example: if the MLS made NFL-like money, then they would be able to pay their players salaries competitive with EU teams. Would you be very upset if EU players moved to the US to play in this league?
If it happened naturally? No. If FIFA just decided to remove a third of European Leagues, cut their prize pool in half and slap a huge prize on the MLS to make players leave Europe, then yes, of course I'd be upset.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: The fact is that for SC2, the money is in the Western scene. That's where the sponsors are. That's where the audience is. It's not the job of the Western audience to subsidize the Korean scene. If Koreans want to make more money playing Starcraft, they might want to move to the West.
This has absolutely nothing to do with sponsors. This is not GOM trying to adapt or Korean team sponsors wanting their teams to go to the USA. This was Blizzards decision.
You don't get to look at the results of an official FIFA sanctioned event and claim that it's bullshit. It's literally designed to determine what the best club team is. Even discounting that, South American players are far more skillful than their European counterparts. Why should they have to move to Europe when their continent has all of the talent for soccer?
A) Yes, I do. No (and I mean absolutely no) soccer fan takes the Club WC seriously. It's like the NBA All Star Game. It's fun, but nobody cares about the results. More than that, a casual soccer fan wouldn't even know it existed.
B) South America doesn't have all of the talent.
Anyway, my point still stands. South America has a large preponderance of talent, but soccer fans aren't upset that they are forced to move to Europe to make more money than they could if they stayed home. We should see the same thing here. Koreans can make money in Korea, but they can also travel outside of Korea to make money where there is more exposure and money.
You are very wrong. South America got a large talent pool but nothing compared to the European talent pool. If you were right there will only be SA players in the biggest league in EU and that is not the case. French/Italien/Spanish/english/german players are the main influx of players in the biggest leagues. Only the very best of of SA is coming to EU same with Asia and Africa.
Btw I also find it ironic that an American having a discussion about football/soccer with Europeans:D
There's not affirmative action for foreigners. Everyone is free to enter whatever system they want. Koreans are entering both the NA and EU leagues. In fact, the entire point of this (as said by Blizzard in interviews) is to have the Koreans actually enter the foreign scene and take their infrastructure with them as they move abroad.
There is affirmative action. Koreans aren't free to go where they want, only those on foreigner teams can afford to for the most part.
Not to mention 24 players were seeded directly into the premiere leagues, and the majority of seeds were given to non-koreans. People like hellokitty and maker got seeds over much much better Korean players. If that isn't affirmative action, I don't know what is.
The community has said that foreigners should just buck up and move to Korea if they want to be relevant. This is said with little regard to the actual costs of doing that or the culture shock. Suddenly there's an incentive for Koreans to move to NA/EU and there's outrage over that? The answer as to why lots of foreigners don't live in Seoul and participate in the Code A qualifiers is that it's freakin' expensive to do, yet no one seemed to care about cost and feasibility while shouting down seeds given to foreign major tournament winners (an actual incentive to get people to move to Korea).
Seriously, it's a double standard. The community was all about the old system which demanded that people move to Korea, and now they are upset about a system that encourages Koreans to move to a different continent? Why should Koreans have the privilege of not having to move to a foreign country and culture to make a living in SC2 when that's exactly what the community demanded of foreign progamers?
Because they're better. Just like it's okay to "force" the best soccer players to move to Europe but it would be stupid to force European leagues to have the same prize pool as African leagues and now some of the best soccer players have to play in Botswana.
The problem with your example is that many soccer players in Europe aren't from Europe, and European clubs don't have the highest level of skill. All of the world-class Africans travel to Europe, but we don't complain that they are forced to go to where the money is. Brazilian teams are equal in skill (they've won more club world cups), but they make far less money than European clubs.
That's bullshit, European clubs have the highest level of skill by a gigantic margin. The club world cup is about as important as the official baseball world championship.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: Hypothetical example: if the MLS made NFL-like money, then they would be able to pay their players salaries competitive with EU teams. Would you be very upset if EU players moved to the US to play in this league?
If it happened naturally? No. If FIFA just decided to remove a third of European Leagues, cut their prize pool in half and slap a huge prize on the MLS to make players leave Europe, then yes, of course I'd be upset.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: The fact is that for SC2, the money is in the Western scene. That's where the sponsors are. That's where the audience is. It's not the job of the Western audience to subsidize the Korean scene. If Koreans want to make more money playing Starcraft, they might want to move to the West.
This has absolutely nothing to do with sponsors. This is not GOM trying to adapt or Korean team sponsors wanting their teams to go to the USA. This was Blizzards decision.
You don't get to look at the results of an official FIFA sanctioned event and claim that it's bullshit. It's literally designed to determine what the best club team is. Even discounting that, South American players are far more skillful than their European counterparts. Why should they have to move to Europe when their continent has all of the talent for soccer?
A) Yes, I do. No (and I mean absolutely no) soccer fan takes the Club WC seriously. It's like the NBA All Star Game. It's fun, but nobody cares about the results. More than that, a casual soccer fan wouldn't even know it existed.
B) South America doesn't have all of the talent.
Anyway, my point still stands. South America has a large preponderance of talent, but soccer fans aren't upset that they are forced to move to Europe to make more money than they could if they stayed home. We should see the same thing here. Koreans can make money in Korea, but they can also travel outside of Korea to make money where there is more exposure and money.
You are very wrong. South America got a large talent pool but nothing compared to the European talent pool. If you were right there will only be SA players in the biggest league in EU and that is not the case. French/Italien/Spanish/english/german players are the main influx of players in the biggest leagues. Only the very best of of SA is coming to EU same with Asia and Africa.
Btw I also find it ironic that an American having a discussion about football/soccer with Europeans:D
I also find that pretty amusing. From the discussions I have determined that South America and European regions have the best talent pool for football depending on who you ask. Also, if you don't agree with the person on where the talent pool is, you clearly no nothing about football.
The part that I find super funny is when people are shocked that players are moving to where the most money is. The US has been important the best athletes for years. We are of the opinion that it doesn't matter where your from as long as you play hard when your on my local team. And this wouldn't be the first time that a league used money to try and evenly distribute the talent pool across several areas to prevent on region/team from crushing every other region/team.
There's not affirmative action for foreigners. Everyone is free to enter whatever system they want. Koreans are entering both the NA and EU leagues. In fact, the entire point of this (as said by Blizzard in interviews) is to have the Koreans actually enter the foreign scene and take their infrastructure with them as they move abroad.
There is affirmative action. Koreans aren't free to go where they want, only those on foreigner teams can afford to for the most part.
Not to mention 24 players were seeded directly into the premiere leagues, and the majority of seeds were given to non-koreans. People like hellokitty and maker got seeds over much much better Korean players. If that isn't affirmative action, I don't know what is.
The community has said that foreigners should just buck up and move to Korea if they want to be relevant. This is said with little regard to the actual costs of doing that or the culture shock. Suddenly there's an incentive for Koreans to move to NA/EU and there's outrage over that? The answer as to why lots of foreigners don't live in Seoul and participate in the Code A qualifiers is that it's freakin' expensive to do, yet no one seemed to care about cost and feasibility while shouting down seeds given to foreign major tournament winners (an actual incentive to get people to move to Korea).
Seriously, it's a double standard. The community was all about the old system which demanded that people move to Korea, and now they are upset about a system that encourages Koreans to move to a different continent? Why should Koreans have the privilege of not having to move to a foreign country and culture to make a living in SC2 when that's exactly what the community demanded of foreign progamers?
Because they're better. Just like it's okay to "force" the best soccer players to move to Europe but it would be stupid to force European leagues to have the same prize pool as African leagues and now some of the best soccer players have to play in Botswana.
The problem with your example is that many soccer players in Europe aren't from Europe, and European clubs don't have the highest level of skill. All of the world-class Africans travel to Europe, but we don't complain that they are forced to go to where the money is. Brazilian teams are equal in skill (they've won more club world cups), but they make far less money than European clubs.
That's bullshit, European clubs have the highest level of skill by a gigantic margin. The club world cup is about as important as the official baseball world championship.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: Hypothetical example: if the MLS made NFL-like money, then they would be able to pay their players salaries competitive with EU teams. Would you be very upset if EU players moved to the US to play in this league?
If it happened naturally? No. If FIFA just decided to remove a third of European Leagues, cut their prize pool in half and slap a huge prize on the MLS to make players leave Europe, then yes, of course I'd be upset.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: The fact is that for SC2, the money is in the Western scene. That's where the sponsors are. That's where the audience is. It's not the job of the Western audience to subsidize the Korean scene. If Koreans want to make more money playing Starcraft, they might want to move to the West.
This has absolutely nothing to do with sponsors. This is not GOM trying to adapt or Korean team sponsors wanting their teams to go to the USA. This was Blizzards decision.
You don't get to look at the results of an official FIFA sanctioned event and claim that it's bullshit. It's literally designed to determine what the best club team is. Even discounting that, South American players are far more skillful than their European counterparts. Why should they have to move to Europe when their continent has all of the talent for soccer?
A) Yes, I do. No (and I mean absolutely no) soccer fan takes the Club WC seriously. It's like the NBA All Star Game. It's fun, but nobody cares about the results. More than that, a casual soccer fan wouldn't even know it existed.
B) South America doesn't have all of the talent.
Anyway, my point still stands. South America has a large preponderance of talent, but soccer fans aren't upset that they are forced to move to Europe to make more money than they could if they stayed home. We should see the same thing here. Koreans can make money in Korea, but they can also travel outside of Korea to make money where there is more exposure and money.
You are very wrong. South America got a large talent pool but nothing compared to the European talent pool. If you were right there will only be SA players in the biggest league in EU and that is not the case. French/Italien/Spanish/english/german players are the main influx of players in the biggest leagues. Only the very best of of SA is coming to EU same with Asia and Africa.
Btw I also find it ironic that an American having a discussion about football/soccer with Europeans:D
I figured that you wouldn't know much about the NHL which is a better example as Plansix just said. Not a knock, but most Americans don't know much about the NHL either. Hockey is a 2nd rate sport these days.
I didn't say that it would only be SA players, but that there would be a large amount of them moving for monetary reasons. The point is that we don't get upset about athletes moving from their home countries for monetary reasons in any other sport, why are we suddenly upset about it for SC2? Don't think that these players are moving to Europe because "that's where the best skill is." They are moving because that's where the money and audience is.
Every single sport in history reaches the point where its homeland is no longer the center of that sport's world. Example: the center of football in America has migrated from the midwest to the southeast, and we have players from the midwest lining up to play in the southeastern league. This is also starting to happen in baseball where some of the best talent is coming from the Caribbean, and Japan has some really solid players.
There is affirmative action. Koreans aren't free to go where they want, only those on foreigner teams can afford to for the most part.
Not to mention 24 players were seeded directly into the premiere leagues, and the majority of seeds were given to non-koreans. People like hellokitty and maker got seeds over much much better Korean players. If that isn't affirmative action, I don't know what is.
The community has said that foreigners should just buck up and move to Korea if they want to be relevant. This is said with little regard to the actual costs of doing that or the culture shock. Suddenly there's an incentive for Koreans to move to NA/EU and there's outrage over that? The answer as to why lots of foreigners don't live in Seoul and participate in the Code A qualifiers is that it's freakin' expensive to do, yet no one seemed to care about cost and feasibility while shouting down seeds given to foreign major tournament winners (an actual incentive to get people to move to Korea).
Seriously, it's a double standard. The community was all about the old system which demanded that people move to Korea, and now they are upset about a system that encourages Koreans to move to a different continent? Why should Koreans have the privilege of not having to move to a foreign country and culture to make a living in SC2 when that's exactly what the community demanded of foreign progamers?
Because they're better. Just like it's okay to "force" the best soccer players to move to Europe but it would be stupid to force European leagues to have the same prize pool as African leagues and now some of the best soccer players have to play in Botswana.
The problem with your example is that many soccer players in Europe aren't from Europe, and European clubs don't have the highest level of skill. All of the world-class Africans travel to Europe, but we don't complain that they are forced to go to where the money is. Brazilian teams are equal in skill (they've won more club world cups), but they make far less money than European clubs.
That's bullshit, European clubs have the highest level of skill by a gigantic margin. The club world cup is about as important as the official baseball world championship.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: Hypothetical example: if the MLS made NFL-like money, then they would be able to pay their players salaries competitive with EU teams. Would you be very upset if EU players moved to the US to play in this league?
If it happened naturally? No. If FIFA just decided to remove a third of European Leagues, cut their prize pool in half and slap a huge prize on the MLS to make players leave Europe, then yes, of course I'd be upset.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: The fact is that for SC2, the money is in the Western scene. That's where the sponsors are. That's where the audience is. It's not the job of the Western audience to subsidize the Korean scene. If Koreans want to make more money playing Starcraft, they might want to move to the West.
This has absolutely nothing to do with sponsors. This is not GOM trying to adapt or Korean team sponsors wanting their teams to go to the USA. This was Blizzards decision.
You don't get to look at the results of an official FIFA sanctioned event and claim that it's bullshit. It's literally designed to determine what the best club team is. Even discounting that, South American players are far more skillful than their European counterparts. Why should they have to move to Europe when their continent has all of the talent for soccer?
A) Yes, I do. No (and I mean absolutely no) soccer fan takes the Club WC seriously. It's like the NBA All Star Game. It's fun, but nobody cares about the results. More than that, a casual soccer fan wouldn't even know it existed.
B) South America doesn't have all of the talent.
Anyway, my point still stands. South America has a large preponderance of talent, but soccer fans aren't upset that they are forced to move to Europe to make more money than they could if they stayed home. We should see the same thing here. Koreans can make money in Korea, but they can also travel outside of Korea to make money where there is more exposure and money.
You are very wrong. South America got a large talent pool but nothing compared to the European talent pool. If you were right there will only be SA players in the biggest league in EU and that is not the case. French/Italien/Spanish/english/german players are the main influx of players in the biggest leagues. Only the very best of of SA is coming to EU same with Asia and Africa.
Btw I also find it ironic that an American having a discussion about football/soccer with Europeans:D
I also find that pretty amusing. From the discussions I have determined that South America and European regions have the best talent pool for football depending on who you ask. Also, if you don't agree with the person on where the talent pool is, you clearly no nothing about football.
The part that I find super funny is when people are shocked that players are moving to where the most money is. The US has been important the best athletes for years. We are of the opinion that it doesn't matter where your from as long as you play hard when your on my local team. And this wouldn't be the first time that a league used money to try and evenly distribute the talent pool across several areas to prevent on region/team from crushing every other region/team.
Dude, you're an American, it's soccer :p
Better phrasing "European Football" because there are many types of football of which American and Australian are the best types. :p
The community has said that foreigners should just buck up and move to Korea if they want to be relevant. This is said with little regard to the actual costs of doing that or the culture shock. Suddenly there's an incentive for Koreans to move to NA/EU and there's outrage over that? The answer as to why lots of foreigners don't live in Seoul and participate in the Code A qualifiers is that it's freakin' expensive to do, yet no one seemed to care about cost and feasibility while shouting down seeds given to foreign major tournament winners (an actual incentive to get people to move to Korea).
Seriously, it's a double standard. The community was all about the old system which demanded that people move to Korea, and now they are upset about a system that encourages Koreans to move to a different continent? Why should Koreans have the privilege of not having to move to a foreign country and culture to make a living in SC2 when that's exactly what the community demanded of foreign progamers?
Because they're better. Just like it's okay to "force" the best soccer players to move to Europe but it would be stupid to force European leagues to have the same prize pool as African leagues and now some of the best soccer players have to play in Botswana.
The problem with your example is that many soccer players in Europe aren't from Europe, and European clubs don't have the highest level of skill. All of the world-class Africans travel to Europe, but we don't complain that they are forced to go to where the money is. Brazilian teams are equal in skill (they've won more club world cups), but they make far less money than European clubs.
That's bullshit, European clubs have the highest level of skill by a gigantic margin. The club world cup is about as important as the official baseball world championship.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: Hypothetical example: if the MLS made NFL-like money, then they would be able to pay their players salaries competitive with EU teams. Would you be very upset if EU players moved to the US to play in this league?
If it happened naturally? No. If FIFA just decided to remove a third of European Leagues, cut their prize pool in half and slap a huge prize on the MLS to make players leave Europe, then yes, of course I'd be upset.
On April 18 2013 05:07 Branman wrote: The fact is that for SC2, the money is in the Western scene. That's where the sponsors are. That's where the audience is. It's not the job of the Western audience to subsidize the Korean scene. If Koreans want to make more money playing Starcraft, they might want to move to the West.
This has absolutely nothing to do with sponsors. This is not GOM trying to adapt or Korean team sponsors wanting their teams to go to the USA. This was Blizzards decision.
You don't get to look at the results of an official FIFA sanctioned event and claim that it's bullshit. It's literally designed to determine what the best club team is. Even discounting that, South American players are far more skillful than their European counterparts. Why should they have to move to Europe when their continent has all of the talent for soccer?
A) Yes, I do. No (and I mean absolutely no) soccer fan takes the Club WC seriously. It's like the NBA All Star Game. It's fun, but nobody cares about the results. More than that, a casual soccer fan wouldn't even know it existed.
B) South America doesn't have all of the talent.
Anyway, my point still stands. South America has a large preponderance of talent, but soccer fans aren't upset that they are forced to move to Europe to make more money than they could if they stayed home. We should see the same thing here. Koreans can make money in Korea, but they can also travel outside of Korea to make money where there is more exposure and money.
You are very wrong. South America got a large talent pool but nothing compared to the European talent pool. If you were right there will only be SA players in the biggest league in EU and that is not the case. French/Italien/Spanish/english/german players are the main influx of players in the biggest leagues. Only the very best of of SA is coming to EU same with Asia and Africa.
Btw I also find it ironic that an American having a discussion about football/soccer with Europeans:D
I also find that pretty amusing. From the discussions I have determined that South America and European regions have the best talent pool for football depending on who you ask. Also, if you don't agree with the person on where the talent pool is, you clearly no nothing about football.
The part that I find super funny is when people are shocked that players are moving to where the most money is. The US has been important the best athletes for years. We are of the opinion that it doesn't matter where your from as long as you play hard when your on my local team. And this wouldn't be the first time that a league used money to try and evenly distribute the talent pool across several areas to prevent on region/team from crushing every other region/team.
Dude, you're an American, it's soccer :p
Better phrasing "European Football" because there are many types of football of which American and Australian are the best types. :p
Quite, you blow my cover! I am trying to speak to them about soccerball and the massive conflict as to which region has the larger number of talented players compared to the other regions with another amount of talent players. From my careful study, either one or both regions has a metric butt ton of talent players, while other other region has just a single ass load. Also, apparently their systems both support and discourage diversity while also supporting the best teams and the worst teams with and without welfare.
On April 18 2013 05:59 Branman wrote: The point is that we don't get upset about athletes moving from their home countries for monetary reasons in any other sport, why are we suddenly upset about it for SC2?
I assume that in most other sports the teams that these players move to from their home countries have the means to provide them with a great practice environment. I don't know how fair the comparison to sports like football really is, since all football teams practice together under the supervision of a coach. That's the thing. Not all teams have that kind of infrastructure in SC2, in fact do you know which ones do? The Korean ones.
It's really not a matter of "omg sellout", although it's very true that their motivation behind this *is* the money, but that's understandable. It's a matter of "by moving to NA/EU, their training will suffer greatly" which eventually leads to their skill stagnating or even dropping considerably (see Rain, PuMa etc)
On April 18 2013 05:59 Branman wrote: The point is that we don't get upset about athletes moving from their home countries for monetary reasons in any other sport, why are we suddenly upset about it for SC2?
I assume that in most other sports the teams that these players move to from their home countries have the means to provide them with a great practice environment. I don't know how fair the comparison to sports like football really is, since all football teams practice together under the supervision of a coach. That's the thing. Not all teams have that kind of infrastructure in SC2, in fact do you know which ones do? The Korean ones.
It's really not a matter of "omg sellout", although it's very true that their motivation behind this *is* the money, but that's understandable. It's a matter of "by moving to NA/EU, their training will suffer greatly" which eventually leads to their skill stagnating or even dropping considerably (see Rain, PuMa etc)
This. There's also the fact that the Korean leagues were crippled somewhat by this announcement, which is a little different than just providing opportunities outside of Korea.
On April 18 2013 05:59 Branman wrote: The point is that we don't get upset about athletes moving from their home countries for monetary reasons in any other sport, why are we suddenly upset about it for SC2?
I assume that in most other sports the teams that these players move to from their home countries have the means to provide them with a great practice environment. I don't know how fair the comparison to sports like football really is, since all football teams practice together under the supervision of a coach. That's the thing. Not all teams have that kind of infrastructure in SC2, in fact do you know which ones do? The Korean ones.
It's really not a matter of "omg sellout", although it's very true that their motivation behind this *is* the money, but that's understandable. It's a matter of "by moving to NA/EU, their training will suffer greatly" which eventually leads to their skill stagnating or even dropping considerably (see Rain, PuMa etc)
This. There's also the fact that the Korean leagues were crippled somewhat by this announcement, which is a little different than just providing opportunities outside of Korea.
Well the teams will learn to deal with it and overcome the problem of living in NA and keeping you skill up through practice. Polt has been able to remain competitive and Violet is pretty impressive as well, while both living in NA.
The simple fact is that there the NA scene is where a lot of the money is when it comes to sponsors and ad revenue. Blizzard has started a league in NA and give the Korean players and team the option to compete in that region. The Korean players and teams can either A: Come to the NA region, compete and figure out how to keep their practice up while they do it. Or B: let the NA players have the prize money and exposure. And the only reason Korean players and team are going to figure out that problem is if they would be stupid not to(ie, like the current WCS system). And they will figure it out, because it is in their best interest to do so.
Also, in response to Master's questions. NHL players move because of the money. They can practice anywhere there are good players and a hockey rink. Sometimes, they move because of the money and they like the fans or team. But mostly because of the money.
So if I understand correctly, the difference in format is that NA/EU Code A has less players, top 8 advance like GSL, but the losers of the first matches are not elimintated. Then, in the Up and Downs, the bottom 8 are eliminated there. This makes it less luck based so you don't get eliminated facing a korean in round 1 while someone else get's to face Hellokitty. Makes sense. However only changing 8 players every seasons makes it hard to break into.
As for the Korean chart, there's something there I don't get that I think is new.... it looks like there's a direct qualification into the Up and Down matches? "Top 2" from an open qualifier? Does that mean you can seed directly into Code S in a given season (albeit not easily)?
On April 17 2013 00:46 LighT. wrote: Biggest complaint: Theres no bias towards Korea although there should be a little bit of leverage towards them.
Exactly this, in both prize pool, but more importantly in qualification points and seasonal finals spots
Really should be top 8 korea, top 4 na, top 4 europe for seasonal and at least a 1.7x Kr 1.3x Eu 1.0x NA point bias or something.. Looking at the WCS Kr lineup makes the NA lineup look pathetic, it's sad these tournaments are held in equal weight, extremely poor design lol IDK what's the big deal about weighing regions when UEFA does the same for Champions League, the biggest "joint-league" tournament in the world for any sport ever.
On April 18 2013 03:44 Canucklehead wrote: This is like tennis paying out the same prize pool for winning a random tennis tournament and winning wimbledon or golf paying the same for a lesser golf tourney and the masters. Makes no sense, other than affirmative action for foreigners and giving them charity money.
lol what? Actually it's more like tennis paying out the same prize pool for Wimbledon, Rolland Garros, the US Open and the Aus Open, which would make a lot of sense. Also, it's like having other, smaller tournaments pay out less money, while giving points to qualify for those few major tournaments.
lol, that's how tennis works, that's how this WCS system works. There are minor kinks, but the prize money is not bad, and the points system is good enough for the first season.
On April 18 2013 03:44 Canucklehead wrote: This is like tennis paying out the same prize pool for winning a random tennis tournament and winning wimbledon or golf paying the same for a lesser golf tourney and the masters. Makes no sense, other than affirmative action for foreigners and giving them charity money.
lol what? Actually it's more like tennis paying out the same prize pool for Wimbledon, Rolland Garros, the US Open and the Aus Open, which would make a lot of sense. Also, it's like having other, smaller tournaments pay out less money, while giving points to qualify for those few major tournaments.
Huh you just named 4 tennis majors? Majors have all the top players going to them, whether it be tennis or golf. Tiger woods, federer etc don't go to all tournaments, but always go to the majors.
I don't consider WCS NA and WCS EU to be majors in terms of skill. It's artificially made into a "major" by blizzard with their prize pool. I think you're confusing prize pool in a tournament with skill. Last year WCS finals gave out 100k to the winner. Are you going to try to tell me that was the most skillful tournament because it had the highest prize pool for the year? The competition there was a farce and parting won it by beating only 1 kr.
On April 18 2013 03:44 Canucklehead wrote: This is like tennis paying out the same prize pool for winning a random tennis tournament and winning wimbledon or golf paying the same for a lesser golf tourney and the masters. Makes no sense, other than affirmative action for foreigners and giving them charity money.
lol what? Actually it's more like tennis paying out the same prize pool for Wimbledon, Rolland Garros, the US Open and the Aus Open, which would make a lot of sense. Also, it's like having other, smaller tournaments pay out less money, while giving points to qualify for those few major tournaments.
Huh you just named 4 tennis majors? Majors have all the top players going to them, whether it be tennis or golf. Tiger woods, federer etc don't go to all tournaments, but always go to the majors.
I don't consider WCS NA and WCS EU to be majors in terms of skill. It's artificially made into a "major" by blizzard with their prize pool. I think you're confusing prize pool in a tournament with skill. Last year WCS finals gave out 100k to the winner. Are you going to try to tell me that was the most skillful tournament because it had the highest prize pool for the year? The competition there was a farce and parting won it by beating only 1 kr.
Who cares? Sadly Blizzard as not invented teleportation or cloning to solve your problem. All three leagues are happening in different regions, in different time zones. The best players cannot be three places at once to scoop up all the prize money. Because some of the matches will be held while they are sleeping, other players who might be less skills can win that tournament. So unless Flash, Life and Innovation learn to pull the trick from the Man of Steel, they will have to play in Korea.
I guess all events could change their rules where their prize pool was based directly on the number of Koreans that signed up if that would make you happy.
On April 18 2013 03:44 Canucklehead wrote: This is like tennis paying out the same prize pool for winning a random tennis tournament and winning wimbledon or golf paying the same for a lesser golf tourney and the masters. Makes no sense, other than affirmative action for foreigners and giving them charity money.
lol what? Actually it's more like tennis paying out the same prize pool for Wimbledon, Rolland Garros, the US Open and the Aus Open, which would make a lot of sense. Also, it's like having other, smaller tournaments pay out less money, while giving points to qualify for those few major tournaments.
Huh you just named 4 tennis majors? Majors have all the top players going to them, whether it be tennis or golf. Tiger woods, federer etc don't go to all tournaments, but always go to the majors.
I don't consider WCS NA and WCS EU to be majors in terms of skill. It's artificially made into a "major" by blizzard with their prize pool. I think you're confusing prize pool in a tournament with skill. Last year WCS finals gave out 100k to the winner. Are you going to try to tell me that was the most skillful tournament because it had the highest prize pool for the year? The competition there was a farce and parting won it by beating only 1 kr.
I guess all events could change their rules where their prize pool was based directly on the number of Koreans that signed up if that would make you happy.
Yes, it would as I've already pointed out before, I would be completely fine with a hard region lock if the NA/EU prizepool was 33% of the KR one. Then the prizepool would reflect more appropriately on the skill level in it. That is how it works in other sports.
EPT
Not a knock, but most Americans don't know much about the NHL either. Hockey is a 2nd rate sport these days. 
