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On October 31 2012 08:18 SWayne wrote:Show nested quote +On October 31 2012 08:09 Timerly wrote:On October 31 2012 07:35 UrsusRex wrote:
Well I'll just take your word for that Gutz I'm sure you fully comprehend how the German legal system works. I on the other hand don't think it would be such a bad thing for ESL to die. Its one less tournament over saturating the market and its demise might actually be a good thing. Another struggling tournament not paying SC2 players isn't something esports needs right now. We need to know what we have works, less garbage like the ESL will only improve the quality of SC2. Letting bad companies fail is a part of capitalism and as a viewer I'm ready to no longer watch and let ESL fail. Having watched it for over a year now there is nothing that comes to mind that makes me value this tournament group and want to keep it over any of the others. Not the casters not their tournaments. For the ESL (read: Turtle Entertainment) the latest available data is their balance from 2010. They had large investments in 09/10 which were basically purely financed via loans. Obviously these loans need to be paid back first if they want to continue operations without getting killed by the interest. Because players seldom demand interest to be paid for late payments (and because of finely crafted contracts) TE saves money by paying late and thus can continue to operate. The way it looks right now (mind you, this is before SC2 went into full bloom) the company can run for a while longer but it's a pretty risky venture compared to the overall market. All ESL prize money was paid out eventually so far, something which other organisations couldn't say of themselves...if they still existed (hey CPL!). TE has existed for longer than any other major e-sports company/league out there and there is a reason for that. They provide a league for basically ANY game on the market, a unique position which no other firm even had the courage to tackle. They have operated without fail for over a decade and you can't tell me they are not valuable to 99% of gaming communities. Their tournaments have premiere quality, regularly creating huge upsets and bringing out new players to shine because of a format which rewards qualifying over being famous and being invited. The guys who run TE are hardcore in the best sense of the word. Ex Quake World players who drove hours to hurl their 17' CRTs into huge halls and play for 100€ prize money and maybe a piece of hardware. Show some respect for your elders. This is in contrast to what for example MLG (actually 90% of esports companies) are doing, who only run the profitable venue events and don't bother actually building communities. They also finance via huge angel/venture capital investments which to my knowledge (speculation) probably flow into paying out prizes as well. That is an option which TE is probably considering but not taking unless absolutely necessary. I'm pretty sure any investor would make them kill most of their amateur leagues. Is it right to pay out very late? Surely not. But you can't just let the one organization actually running big events in the whole world (how many others do that? hint, it's easily expressable in binary) die. All communities outside of Korea and the USA would suffer greatly from that. No Feast to come out and challenge Koreans. No dark horse Darkforce. Maybe not even Stephano. Mind now? The ESL is the reason why esports is not developing. I hope the ESL goes down in the future, to make place for a greater company who know to run a successfull business.
It's just plain stupid to say the ESL/Turtle is the reason esports is not developing. Without them e-sports in Germany and also in a lot of other countries in Europe would have no built structures and almost no events. Before Dreamhack ventured out of Sweden there was basically nothing besides ESL events. They also brought esports into German media and work together with partners in media and politics to support it even more. Thanks to IEM esports was also brought to people and places no other organisation would care about.
Yes, late pay of prize money is very bad and has hurt their reputation but to take away all they've done because of it is even worse.
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There was a thread that ranked IEM as the worst when it comes to paying prize money.
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On October 31 2012 05:19 Sprungjeezy wrote:
Is it just me, or do posts like this "X player says Y" seem kind of like spam. If we cared what the person was doing/saying/whining about, we would follow their twitter/facebook. Now if there was a thread that collaborated all of the players who were upset with ESL's payment schedule or lack of one then it might be interesting to me.
dont be an idiot. I dont follow every pro in the hopes they might say something entertaining. Just like I don't follow Bill Cosby or obama on twitter, but if Bill threatens to woop Obama's ass, I would like to hear about it.
but if we do what you suggest, we need to start a thread about movie star's who threaten the president JUST IN CASE someone does, that way we can post it there instead of creating an individual thread about it.
see how retarded this sounds?
We are over saturated with starcraft tournies anyway. If they don't pay out, don't give them the viewership.
THANKS OP, for bringing this to my attention.
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On October 31 2012 08:43 UrsusRex wrote:Show nested quote +
How excatly is it possible in your mind for any event to "hurt" Starcraft2? What the fuck is wrong with you people...
It simply has to do with the environment their actions create. In this case mistrust from viewers and resentment from players who go unpaid. I view this as hurting SC2 and so do many people. Its a legitimate point. Where's yours? Show nested quote +Uninspired casting? They had day9/Tastetosis/Bitterdam ( and Rotterdam actually got into casting with his first caster job at esl ) Who they had at whatever point in the past for whatever brief period of time doesn't interest me and has no bearing on their quality of service now. Now they have casters like Khaelaris and ones who are even more uninteresting to the point I can't even remember their names even though I've seen them cast. I also don't enjoy artosis and his casting at the last IEM if I recall correctly was pretty boring, maybe because he didn't have tasteless but either way it didn't add to ESL's quality or value.
People are shitting themselves over stuff that is far beyond the actual issue. If you're concerned about the late payments hurting the scene that's legitimate, bashing IEM over their choice of casters (which is usually pretty good and more importantly international/multilingual) makes no sense. Do you seriously consider that as the number one reason they're not a quality tournament in your opinion?
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Good call by Goody to stand up and quit. Kind of trashy to not play the price money to the player by ESL. Very disappointed that nothing changed -.-
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Makes me wonder what the internal finances of some of these esports organizations looks like. I'm thinking MLG is probably the only big one turning a profit at this point.
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On October 31 2012 08:43 UrsusRex wrote:Show nested quote +
How excatly is it possible in your mind for any event to "hurt" Starcraft2? What the fuck is wrong with you people...
It simply has to do with the environment their actions create. In this case mistrust from viewers and resentment from players who go unpaid. I view this as hurting SC2 and so do many people. Its a legitimate point. Where's yours? Show nested quote +Uninspired casting? They had day9/Tastetosis/Bitterdam ( and Rotterdam actually got into casting with his first caster job at esl ) Who they had at whatever point in the past for whatever brief period of time doesn't interest me and has no bearing on their quality of service now. Now they have casters like Khaelaris and ones who are even more uninteresting to the point I can't even remember their names even though I've seen them cast. I also don't enjoy artosis and his casting at the last IEM if I recall correctly was pretty boring, maybe because he didn't have tasteless but either way it didn't add to ESL's quality or value.
My point is that there arent 'actions' just this single one which is explainable given the circumstances all im saying is that youre overreacting way to much, but i guess thats not too suprising given that the sc2 community really likes to be 'offended'
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You really think there wouldnt be any other company if the ESL doesnt exists? Before you flame my post, you should really consider the facts. There hasnt been any real changes since 2008 for example. Technical problems at events arent rare, the German Pro Series has been neglected, the ESL TV Stream has one of the worst quality out there. Seems like the ESL doesn't want to compete with the quality of Dreamhack TV. The prizemoney is still the same. Where is the Starcraft version of the WC3L?
To say "the ESL cant do something, the sponsors dont pay the money" is just dumb. How can you host a big esports event without having money on your bank? Shouldn't a company like the ESL have the money BEFORE they host the events? When the ESL is professional as you say, shouldn't the sponsors trust them and pay the money beforehand?
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On October 31 2012 08:57 iamho wrote:
Makes me wonder what the internal finances of some of these esports organizations looks like. I'm thinking MLG is probably the only big one turning a profit at this point.
Seriously? They only exist because of venture capital and have been trying all these PPV-models to find a way of somehow making a profit. Without their VC they'd face some serious problems.
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On October 31 2012 08:03 Eralur wrote:Show nested quote +On October 31 2012 07:20 GuTz wrote:
You cannot get blood from a stone. I think that the reason they do not pay out is because they do not have the money. It's not like E-Sports is really all that lucrative at the moment, they likely spent more money in their earlier stages then they could afford at the time in anticipation of the growth of E-Sports which never really happened. They then had to adjust back, and are paying out prize pools as fast as they can even though they are in the red for about 200k Euros according to an earlier post.
They had a debt of 2.8 Million in 2010 which was 500k lower than 2008 but only 100k lower than in 2009, according to a random guy in a stream chat that dept raised to 5 million by now, i didnt check it myself but it seems logical that they started to invest heavily starting in 2009 anticipating esports to grow with sc2 but it didnt grow as much as they expected.
The latest financial data released is from 2010. Unless that guy works in the financial department of Turtle Entertainment or is an owner (Gesellschaftler) there is no way for him to know, their current financial situation.
On October 31 2012 08:04 Anta wrote:yap... you offer price money... YOU PAY PRICE MONEY! within a proper time. Show nested quote +On October 31 2012 08:03 Eralur wrote:On October 31 2012 07:20 GuTz wrote:
You cannot get blood from a stone. I think that the reason they do not pay out is because they do not have the money. It's not like E-Sports is really all that lucrative at the moment, they likely spent more money in their earlier stages then they could afford at the time in anticipation of the growth of E-Sports which never really happened. They then had to adjust back, and are paying out prize pools as fast as they can even though they are in the red for about 200k Euros according to an earlier post.
They had a debt of 2.8 Million in 2010 which was 500k lower than 2008 but only 100k lower than in 2009, according to a random guy in a stream chat that dept raised to 5 million by now, i didnt check it myself but it seems logical that they started to invest heavily starting in 2009 anticipating esports to grow with sc2 but it didnt grow as much as they expected. in germany it is called Insolvenzverschleppung.
Well, to be perfectly fair, they also had €1.2 million in outstanding money in 2010 (Forderungen). So they owed 2.8 mio but somebody owed them 1.2 mio. Also, it is quite common to have tons of liabilities. For example, you take a loan to start-up your business. You are expected to pay it in say 10 years. During the whole period this loan is liability, but your company can still be profitable.
Source (still the same)
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On October 31 2012 09:01 SWayne wrote:
To say "the ESL cant do something, the sponsors dont pay the money" is just dumb. How can you host a big esports event without having money on your bank? Shouldn't a company like the ESL have the money BEFORE they host the events? When the ESL is professional as you say, shouldn't the sponsors trust them and pay the money beforehand?
They don't and shouldn't, welcome to modern capitalism.
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The best analogy to the ESL is a bank that is "too big to fail". Some people say it should go down. Others fear that the consequences will be too big and will lead to a collapse of the European scene. ESL declaring bankruptcy is the closest thing to "esports dying - in Europe" imaginable.
Other posts already mentioned why ESL is important beyond their premier tournaments. Just one more thought: Try to think of European players that did NOT start out (benefitted alot) with an ESL organized league/tournament? I can't think of many. Basically all WC3 players solely existed because of the ESL. I picked up Stephano's and Nerchio's name thanks to the GO4SC2s. Would these players choose the same path if there wasn't an ESL? Who knows.
Make no mistake, I find the practice of not paying out players in reasonable time very bad as well. But I don't think anyone could fill the void ESL would leave. Dreamhack is our equivalent to MLGs. Awesome tournaments, but it's not the "daily bread" of the average (semi-)pro and doesn't really establish new talents. Who else? A lot of small fishes in the pond that only organize small one-off tournaments and showmatches. I fear that the European scene will quickly turn more into the American one. Where popularity is often more important than skill and only a few sponsored players can get their name out there by traveling to the events which prevents new talent from entering the scene.
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I don't have the effort to translate my text in english, but i would like to share my result;
[spoiler=german text] 4. Sonstige Rückstellungen
In den sonstigen Rückstellungen sind im Wesentlichen Rückstellungen für Urlaub und Provisionen enthalten.
:wtf:
Sonstige Verbindlichkeiten 1.520.792,87 €
:lol:
Das sind 53,56 % von den 2.806.775,86 € Verbindlichkeiten* (Schulden) die für private Zwecke der "privilgierteren" Gesellschafter gemacht wurden.
In die eigene Tasche gewirtschaftet :thumbdown:
*Verbindlichkeiten sind Schulden eines Unternehmes.[/spoiler]
So, after reading the report from 2010, they had depts of 2.806.775,86 €.
53,56 % of this depts, were mentioned as "vacation and kickbacks"
In other words: 50% of the overall depts were made by associates for their own benefits additionally to their generelly income.
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People are shitting themselves over stuff that is far beyond the actual issue. If you're concerned about the late payments hurting the scene that's legitimate, bashing IEM over their choice of casters (which is usually pretty good and more importantly international/multilingual) makes no sense. Do you seriously consider that as the number one reason they're not a quality tournament in your opinion?
I can't comment on their non English casting but their regular casting has been noticeably less exciting than other tournaments when i watched it. There is also fewer successful professional players in their tournaments and they have a smaller price pool and focus on multiple esports in a region that already has better solely dedicated SC2 leagues. I just think ESL has the least to offer and since I think we are already over saturated with SC2 tournaments I would be happy to see ESL no longer casting SC2. I think that's a decision that benefits the entire SC2 scene. The non payment to players is just the final straw for me to no longer watch the least valuable SC2 tournament.
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On October 31 2012 09:01 SWayne wrote:
To say "the ESL cant do something, the sponsors dont pay the money" is just dumb. How can you host a big esports event without having money on your bank? Shouldn't a company like the ESL have the money BEFORE they host the events? When the ESL is professional as you say, shouldn't the sponsors trust them and pay the money beforehand?
I have no insider knowledge or anything, but certainly in some industries sponsors can pay different amounts based on the number of views, and hence wouldn't pay until after the event.
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On October 31 2012 06:55 ACrow wrote:Show nested quote +On October 31 2012 06:45 Starshaped wrote:
I think this is pretty serious and has been going on for far too long, so everyone please pay attention:
Price is the cost of a product, like a book, or a car, or a house. "The price of this book is too high."
Prize is an award, like when you win a tournament. "The prize for first place was 100 euro." Do I have to feel ashamed when I say that I just learned a new thing today?
Of course not. You should be more ashamed if you did not learn something new every day.
Anyway, still looking forward to watching Goody compete, wherever it may happen to be. He's always a fun player to watch.
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You need to keep in mind that EPS is basically German only scene.
We have teams like Alternate who are only interested in the German market, the same can be said about XMG and probably ESC.
An atn player earlier said in this thread: "I only participate, because my sponsor wants me to".
It's sponsor exposure to the German audience. Having players play in the local (German) league (EPS) might be enough of a reason to sponsor players who arent good enough on an international level.
Without those leagues there's no reason to sponsor those players.
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My point is that there arent 'actions' just this single one which is explainable given the circumstances all im saying is that youre overreacting way to much, but i guess thats not too suprising given that the sc2 community really likes to be 'offended'
This isn't a single action it is a consistent behavior from IEM and add to that their poor player quality, lower price pools, bad casting and we get the worst tournament in SC2. That's not me being offended. This is how genuinely view the ESL. I believe they are a negative influence because of their poor quality of games and decisions towards the players. Just because I don't buy in to ESL's self serving excuses doesn't mean I'm out to demonize them. I'm sure they have many reasons for what they do, but I don't care. Bottom line is they diminish SC2 and for that I support them moving on.
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On October 31 2012 09:15 Zocat wrote:
You need to keep in mind that EPS is basically German only scene.
We have teams like Alternate who are only interested in the German market, the same can be said about XMG and probably ESC.
An atn player earlier said in this thread: "I only participate, because my sponsor wants me to".
It's sponsor exposure to the German audience. Having players play in the local (German) league (EPS) might be enough of a reason to sponsor players who arent good enough on an international level.
Without those leagues there's no reason to sponsor those players.
Yes. The german EPS is very good for us german players, without it i think we would be worse off. I actually think Goody will continue to play EPS, he was probably just angry.
The prizemoney being paid out so late is of course really annoying and it shouldnt happen, but there is not much that can be done about it unfortunately...
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EPT
