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E-Sports doesn't need special treatment. It doesn't need to be a special case in which journalists hold back so teams can get more revenue due to traffic.
E-Sports needs to evolve and grow around this, as a real, profitable industry.
The more journalists like Slasher the better!
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I think one of the temptations people have when it comes to the recently controversial subject of journalism is to compare the e-sports industry to the broader sports industry. This is a very simplistic view that misses out on a lot of important differences. In a lot of ways, StarCraft II teams and baseball teams couldn't be more different.
Bill Baer, an ESPN sportswriter, recently posted on TL to lend his thoughts to the discussion about the Slasher controversy. I decided to respond with a post of my own because I disagreed quite strongly with Mr. Baer on a variety of points.
There was one line in particular in Bill's piece that struck me as missing the point. Here it is:
In traditional sports, teams and journalists work together, dispassionately. Teams know it is in their best interest to allow them access, even if they may report things they would otherwise want kept secret
There is a reason that baseball teams don't object to having their secrets spilled. The reason is that their sources of income are completely insulated from such breaches.
According to New York Magazine, the revenue of the New York Yankees can be broken down as follows:
Sources of Revenue: Stadium tickets: $117 million (4.2 million tickets at an average of $28 each); YES network TV/radio rights: $60 million; Major League TV and licensing: $30 million; concessions: $10 million; sponsorships and advertising: $30 million; premium seating: $27 million; local radio: $13 million; catering: $5 million; other: $10 million.
The introduction of a new player for a team like the Yankees has absolutely no potential to make them any money directly. It has the potential to make money indirectly, for instance by encouraging people to buy tickets to see a new player play. But how the announcement is made doesn't have any effect whatsoever on the team's revenue. This is why, as Baer notes, baseball teams are happy to let journalists do the hype-building and announcements:
And yet, when the Phillies finally signed Lee on the 15th, it wasn't the Phillies who broke the news; it was journalist Jon Heyman, then with Sports Illustrated. Heyman's reporting did nothing to reduce the hype around the signing; Amaro did not complain that the surprise would reduce eyeballs on the Phillies web site. In fact, it was never an issue.
Here, Baer unwittingly highlights the key difference between traditional sports and E-Sports that invalidates a good portion of his argument. "Amaro did not complain that the surprise would reduce eyeballs on the Phillies web site," because Amaro knew that pageviews on the Phillies web site represented an infinitesimally small portion of his team's revenue and, by extension, his own paycheck.
That's not how a team like EG or TL works.
E-sports organizations like Evil Geniuses market themselves to sponsors as "New Media Agencies" capable of granting a sponsor exposure to a wide, receptive and valuable audience of fans. As such, every opportunity to secure page views represents an opportunity for an E-sports organization to make money.
You may have noticed that evilgeniuses.net does not run advertisements the way many websites do. There are no banners to click on and discover a new online flash game, no announcements that you have won a prize of some kind, and no invitations to online dating sites. What you will see if you look at a page on EG's site is an array of sponsors displayed on every page.
EG relies on page view statistics as part of its pitch when recruiting sponsors, and therefore when securing revenue.
When EG or TL announce a player, they put a lot of effort into making the announcement look as enticing and interesting as possible. This is because the announcement itself represents an opportunity to give each team's sponsors exposure. That's not how things work in baseball.
When Slasher spoils the announcement of a TL player's acquisition, it decreases the number of people who click the actual announcement when it goes up a week later. This decreases the number of people who see the sponsor logos included in that post, and therefore decreases TL's ability to obtain sponsors in the future.
Whether Slasher should be allowed to publish such spoiler pieces is not something anyone is disputing. He can do whatever he wants with whatever information he obtains. Whether Slasher is hurting the industry when he spoils announcements is another, more interesting question. The fact is that sabotaging a team's announcement page views sabotages their ability to secure sponsors in the future, and therefore does hurt the industry over time. This is not a concern in traditional sports media because player announcements and other "insider info" like that reported on MLBTradeRumors.com do not cut into MLB team revenues in any way.
Nonetheless, Baer makes a direct comparison between MLBTradeRumors and Slasher's work:
There is a website solely dedicated to posting rumors about teams and players (MLBTradeRumors.com), and it's very well-respected within the industry. The writers are given press access, players and members of team front offices visit the site daily, and there is no tension between the two sides. Aside from MLBTR, ESPN, FOX Sports, CBS Sports, and a host of other media outlets employ journalists to break news in exactly the way Breslau has done within e-sports.
In e-sports, there IS tension between the two sides, and sites dedicated to posting rumors are NOT well-respected within the industry. That's because e-sports is not like regular sports.
Does Alex Garfield have a right to prohibit Slasher from publishing spoiler pieces like the one about Snute's signing? Of course not! But he never professed to have this right. However, does Alex Garfield have a right to be mad as hell when Slasher takes 35,000 page views off one of his major player announcements with a spoiler piece? Of course he does.
And do e-sports organizations like EG and TL have a right to prefer sharing interviews and inside scoops with the journalism sources that AREN'T screwing them over 24/7? Of course! Do they have a right to cut off communication with Slasher, a demonstrated threat to their ability to recruit sponsors? They absolutely, 100% do!
Honestly, I think HuK said it best in a series of tweets earlier today:
In the end its pretty simple in my eyes. It a conscious choice of being a tabloid magazine and leaking everything before it happens. Or being a TIME magazine kind of thing and getting the more prestigious interviews, in-depth analysis, and professional aspect of the scene. But you can't really be both when so much of journalism depends on relationships with people in the scene. There is nothing wrong with being either; but u really cant be both.
That's what a lot of people don't understand about the Slasher controversy. In the end, it isn't about whether Slasher has a right to publish whatever spoiler pieces he wants. It isn't even about whether Alex Garfield has a right to embargo Slasher.
Part of being a good journalist, and I can guarantee you that Bill Baer would agree with this 100%, means staying on good terms with your sources.
If Slasher continues screwing over e-sports organizations like EG and TL, then he can't expect to use them as sources in the future. It's as simple as that.
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I really dont understand, its slashers job to report
what he was doing was well within his right and he needed to do it to write papers to make money
even if it wasnt the best thing he could do.
its still his job to do it
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With E-Sports teams depending primarily on both content production and publication/media attention, does that mean any secondary publication agencies only count toward competition. Or is there only a cross section of content that both sides stand to monetarily benefit from releasing?
After looking up the NFL, they too depend on media attention but, it's just a much smaller slice of the pie. So the cross section of competing media attention is just much larger for E-Sports teams and surrounding media. Alex just needs to accept that some media publication is large portion of the teams incom and therefore competition for media sites. If you drop a 100$ bill next to a friend (Slasher also cares deeply about E-Sports) that is still competing for success, he has an obligation to pick it up.
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I think that there has to be a balance. When people apply the real-world business consequences of markets to a fledgling industry like esports, it's likely to hurt it. That's what happened with the case of EG vs Rod Breasleu. Real-world market principals were applied and it had some negative affect. Will esports die because of it? Absolutely not. Is this a one-for-one exchange where esfiworld (or wherever it was reported) took the revenue that EG would have received on this matter? Perhaps not.
In conclusion, I think this whole episode had a relatively small negative impact on the industry of esports. And that's the point I think we should all take from it. It's relatively minor - but it's a net loss.
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On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:I think one of the temptations people have when it comes to the recently controversial subject of journalism is to compare the e-sports industry to the broader sports industry. This is a very simplistic view that misses out on a lot of important differences. In a lot of ways, StarCraft II teams and baseball teams couldn't be more different. Bill Baer, an ESPN sportswriter, recently posted on TL to lend his thoughts to the discussion about the Slasher controversy. I decided to respond with a post of my own because I disagreed quite strongly with Mr. Baer on a variety of points. There was one line in particular in Bill's piece that struck me as missing the point. Here it is: Show nested quote +In traditional sports, teams and journalists work together, dispassionately. Teams know it is in their best interest to allow them access, even if they may report things they would otherwise want kept secret There is a reason that baseball teams don't object to having their secrets spilled. The reason is that their sources of income are completely insulated from such breaches. According to New York Magazine, the revenue of the New York Yankees can be broken down as follows: Show nested quote +Sources of Revenue: Stadium tickets: $117 million (4.2 million tickets at an average of $28 each); YES network TV/radio rights: $60 million; Major League TV and licensing: $30 million; concessions: $10 million; sponsorships and advertising: $30 million; premium seating: $27 million; local radio: $13 million; catering: $5 million; other: $10 million. The introduction of a new player for a team like the Yankees has absolutely no potential to make them any money directly. It has the potential to make money indirectly, for instance by encouraging people to buy tickets to see a new player play. But how the announcement is made doesn't have any effect whatsoever on the team's revenue. This is why, as Baer notes, baseball teams are happy to let journalists do the hype-building and announcements: And yet, when the Phillies finally signed Lee on the 15th, it wasn't the Phillies who broke the news; it was journalist Jon Heyman, then with Sports Illustrated. Heyman's reporting did nothing to reduce the hype around the signing; Amaro did not complain that the surprise would reduce eyeballs on the Phillies web site. In fact, it was never an issue. Here, Baer unwittingly highlights the key difference between traditional sports and E-Sports that invalidates a good portion of his argument. "Amaro did not complain that the surprise would reduce eyeballs on the Phillies web site," because Amaro knew that pageviews on the Phillies web site represented an infinitesimally small portion of his team's revenue and, by extension, his own paycheck. That's not how a team like EG or TL works. E-sports organizations like Evil Geniuses market themselves to sponsors as "New Media Agencies" capable of granting a sponsor exposure to a wide, receptive and valuable audience of fans. As such, every opportunity to secure page views represents an opportunity for an E-sports organization to make money. You may have noticed that evilgeniuses.net does not run advertisements the way many websites do. There are no banners to click on and discover a new online flash game, no announcements that you have won a prize of some kind, and no invitations to online dating sites. What you will see if you look at a page on EG's site is an array of sponsors displayed on every page. EG relies on page view statistics as part of its pitch when recruiting sponsors, and therefore when securing revenue. When EG or TL announce a player, they put a lot of effort into making the announcement look as enticing and interesting as possible. This is because the announcement itself represents an opportunity to give each team's sponsors exposure. That's not how things work in baseball. When Slasher spoils the announcement of a TL player's acquisition, it decreases the number of people who click the actual announcement when it goes up a week later. This decreases the number of people who see the sponsor logos included in that post, and therefore decreases TL's ability to obtain sponsors in the future. Whether Slasher should be allowed to publish such spoiler pieces is not something anyone is disputing. He can do whatever he wants with whatever information he obtains. Whether Slasher is hurting the industry when he spoils announcements is another, more interesting question. The fact is that sabotaging a team's announcement page views sabotages their ability to secure sponsors in the future, and therefore does hurt the industry over time. This is not a concern in traditional sports media because player announcements and other "insider info" like that reported on MLBTradeRumors.com do not cut into MLB team revenues in any way. Nonetheless, Baer makes a direct comparison between MLBTradeRumors and Slasher's work: Show nested quote +There is a website solely dedicated to posting rumors about teams and players (MLBTradeRumors.com), and it's very well-respected within the industry. The writers are given press access, players and members of team front offices visit the site daily, and there is no tension between the two sides. Aside from MLBTR, ESPN, FOX Sports, CBS Sports, and a host of other media outlets employ journalists to break news in exactly the way Breslau has done within e-sports. In e-sports, there IS tension between the two sides, and sites dedicated to posting rumors are NOT well-respected within the industry. That's because e-sports is not like regular sports. Does Alex Garfield have a right to prohibit Slasher from publishing spoiler pieces like the one about Snute's signing? Of course not! But he never professed to have this right. However, does Alex Garfield have a right to be mad as hell when Slasher takes 35,000 page views off one of his major player announcements with a spoiler piece? Of course he does. And do e-sports organizations like EG and TL have a right to prefer sharing interviews and inside scoops with the journalism sources that AREN'T screwing them over 24/7? Of course! Do they have a right to cut off communication with Slasher, a demonstrated threat to their ability to recruit sponsors? They absolutely, 100% do! Honestly, I think HuK said it best in a series of tweets earlier today: Show nested quote +In the end its pretty simple in my eyes. It a conscious choice of being a tabloid magazine and leaking everything before it happens. Or being a TIME magazine kind of thing and getting the more prestigious interviews, in-depth analysis, and professional aspect of the scene. But you can't really be both when so much of journalism depends on relationships with people in the scene. There is nothing wrong with being either; but u really cant be both. That's what a lot of people don't understand about the Slasher controversy. In the end, it isn't about whether Slasher has a right to publish whatever spoiler pieces he wants. It isn't even about whether Alex Garfield has a right to embargo Slasher. Part of being a good journalist, and I can guarantee you that Bill Baer would agree with this 100%, means staying on good terms with your sources. If Slasher continues screwing over e-sports organizations like EG and TL, then he can't expect to use them as sources in the future. It's as simple as that.
I think Slasher has an obligation to report the news. Yes it's important for Slasher to have a good relationship with his sources, but it's also a two-way street. TL and EG can throw a hissy fit and black-ban Slasher from any future inside gossip, rumour, tips etc but would it really be in their interest? Relationships are always a two-way street and I think it would be silly of EG and TL to do something silly like completely removing themselves from any dealings with Slasher. It has a lot of potential to bite them in the ass down the line.
This is just my opinion, but I'd rather see both organisations--two of the premiere in the SC2 international e-sports world--use it as a learning experience as to how they might better engage with the e-sports media in the future to stop things like this happening. I'd hope there'd be scope to sit down with Slasher, explain their take on the issue and maybe work with eachother towards a mutually beneficial arrangement in the future.
It's much easier to make friends than create enemies. I can understand the frustration of losing out on the promotion of their own news but lashing out at the messenger (Slasher) is not the right option. Take it as a learning opportunity and implement strategies in the future to mitigate risks around significant announcements relating to your team.
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I personally don't understand why this is even an argument. It seems like the vocal minority who think that Slasher did anything wrong are the same people that directly benefit from the "growing of esports". Esports isn't going to grow on your terms, it's either going to naturally evolve like every other sport, or it's going to just die.
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On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:E-sports organizations like Evil Geniuses market themselves to sponsors as "New Media Agencies" capable of granting a sponsor exposure to a wide, receptive and valuable audience of fans. As such, every opportunity to secure page views represents an opportunity for an E-sports organization to make money.
You may have noticed that evilgeniuses.net does not run advertisements the way many websites do. There are no banners to click on and discover a new online flash game, no announcements that you have won a prize of some kind, and no invitations to online dating sites. What you will see if you look at a page on EG's site is an array of sponsors displayed on every page.
EG relies on page view statistics as part of its pitch when recruiting sponsors, and therefore when securing revenue.
When EG or TL announce a player, they put a lot of effort into making the announcement look as enticing and interesting as possible. This is because the announcement itself represents an opportunity to give each team's sponsors exposure. That's not how things work in baseball.
When Slasher spoils the announcement of a TL player's acquisition, it decreases the number of people who click the actual announcement when it goes up a week later. This decreases the number of people who see the sponsor logos included in that post, and therefore decreases TL's ability to obtain sponsors in the future.
Whether Slasher should be allowed to publish such spoiler pieces is not something anyone is disputing. He can do whatever he wants with whatever information he obtains. Whether Slasher is hurting the industry when he spoils announcements is another, more interesting question. The fact is that sabotaging a team's announcement page views sabotages their ability to secure sponsors in the future, and therefore does hurt the industry over time. This is not a concern in traditional sports media because player announcements and other "insider info" like that reported on MLBTradeRumors.com do not cut into MLB team revenues in any way.
It comes with being a mostly online space, where pageviews are one of the few only available metric. The team owner's notion is that this projected -yet to happen- traffic was reserved for them from the beginning.
The question would be whether teams and organizations ought to adhere to common competition. As long as the information is not illegally obtained, they have lost. Not money, but the race and thus the money. While the information is not yet out there, said traffic also isn't, and therefore cannot be owned by anybody. There is no reason to believe the teams wouldn't profit more without leaks, but the conception that they were entitled to these profits per se is questionable.
Now, given the state of the industry, there are valid considerations of self-regulation, growth-inducing strategies or even protectionism. There are arguments to be made for the well-being of teams. Of course any team is well within its rights to advocate their cause and they should do it. But one has to acknowledge the existence of other involved parties and whose interests might not be inherently more or less significant.
At least myself, I have no idea which way to prioritize who. But I do believe that no party is wrong in pushing their interests in and itself, and it's much more complicated than "whatever hurts party X in any way is bad".
On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:Nonetheless, Baer makes a direct comparison between MLBTradeRumors and Slasher's work: Show nested quote +There is a website solely dedicated to posting rumors about teams and players (MLBTradeRumors.com), and it's very well-respected within the industry. The writers are given press access, players and members of team front offices visit the site daily, and there is no tension between the two sides. Aside from MLBTR, ESPN, FOX Sports, CBS Sports, and a host of other media outlets employ journalists to break news in exactly the way Breslau has done within e-sports. In e-sports, there IS tension between the two sides, and sites dedicated to posting rumors are NOT well-respected within the industry. That's because e-sports is not like regular sports. Does Alex Garfield have a right to prohibit Slasher from publishing spoiler pieces like the one about Snute's signing? Of course not! But he never professed to have this right. However, does Alex Garfield have a right to be mad as hell when Slasher takes 35,000 page views off one of his major player announcements with a spoiler piece? Of course he does. And do e-sports organizations like EG and TL have a right to prefer sharing interviews and inside scoops with the journalism sources that AREN'T screwing them over 24/7? Of course! Do they have a right to cut off communication with Slasher, a demonstrated threat to their ability to recruit sponsors? They absolutely, 100% do!
I think there is little contention on this part. Do note however, that there really aren't that much dedicated rumor sites in e-sports, except of maybe Rakaka. What specific course of action to take is ultimately every side's own decision. I think everyone involved is well aware of the possible ramifications whichever way they'll go (and have gone).
On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:Honestly, I think HuK said it best in a series of tweets earlier today: Show nested quote +In the end its pretty simple in my eyes. It a conscious choice of being a tabloid magazine and leaking everything before it happens. Or being a TIME magazine kind of thing and getting the more prestigious interviews, in-depth analysis, and professional aspect of the scene. But you can't really be both when so much of journalism depends on relationships with people in the scene. There is nothing wrong with being either; but u really cant be both. That's what a lot of people don't understand about the Slasher controversy. In the end, it isn't about whether Slasher has a right to publish whatever spoiler pieces he wants. It isn't even about whether Alex Garfield has a right to embargo Slasher. Part of being a good journalist, and I can guarantee you that Bill Baer would agree with this 100%, means staying on good terms with your sources. If Slasher continues screwing over e-sports organizations like EG and TL, then he can't expect to use them as sources in the future. It's as simple as that.
It seems, Rod is testing grounds. He may have disgruntled some. But given responses even from other team owner's, the rift might not be that severe. There is possibility he misjudged the extent of how far he's able to go, but as human relationships are not black and white friction is bound to happen. I don't know whether you intended to imply he's a bad journalist by contrasting it to what makes a good one- but it's a little disingenuous to imply that the very best have only made friends along their way.
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Why was The_Stampede banned for his post? He added to the discussion, so I can only assume its because a mod personally disagreed with his opinion. Is saying Alex Garfield acted idiotically ban worthy?
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I think most people discussing this are focusing too much on the first issue argued in ITG and not the second. I don't think Slasher is technically in the wrong with his methods. If he has some news that he thinks should be spread, as a journalist, that's what he will do. My issue, and iNcontroL and TB commented on it as well, is that Slasher puts zero effort into these releases. He COULD get that juicy interview if he held out longer, he COULD be the first with player access at an event, but he prefers the one-liner repeated-byline stories. As TB and Garfield both observed, it just seems like Slasher is being deliberately lazy in his journalism. They both know he can do better, has done better even, and they're disappointed with the route he has chosen.
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I love this piece. It shows that E-Sports is still growing. Soon maybe to become Major, but as the blogger tweeted "if esports can't handle legitimate journalism, it doesn't deserve to prosper." that statement SHOWS how much things have grown. Alex just needs to start learning from his mistakes than to turn the public opinion on Slasher.
Whenever EG pulls this kind of drama (mostly off ITG). I just stop watching anyone associated with EG for a while, but drama always dies down. and I hope EG learns and moves on instead of whining and making everyone hate one person. I support Slasher, he is a really good guy, please dont go away.
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On January 17 2013 12:10 rotegirte wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:E-sports organizations like Evil Geniuses market themselves to sponsors as "New Media Agencies" capable of granting a sponsor exposure to a wide, receptive and valuable audience of fans. As such, every opportunity to secure page views represents an opportunity for an E-sports organization to make money.
You may have noticed that evilgeniuses.net does not run advertisements the way many websites do. There are no banners to click on and discover a new online flash game, no announcements that you have won a prize of some kind, and no invitations to online dating sites. What you will see if you look at a page on EG's site is an array of sponsors displayed on every page.
EG relies on page view statistics as part of its pitch when recruiting sponsors, and therefore when securing revenue.
When EG or TL announce a player, they put a lot of effort into making the announcement look as enticing and interesting as possible. This is because the announcement itself represents an opportunity to give each team's sponsors exposure. That's not how things work in baseball.
When Slasher spoils the announcement of a TL player's acquisition, it decreases the number of people who click the actual announcement when it goes up a week later. This decreases the number of people who see the sponsor logos included in that post, and therefore decreases TL's ability to obtain sponsors in the future.
Whether Slasher should be allowed to publish such spoiler pieces is not something anyone is disputing. He can do whatever he wants with whatever information he obtains. Whether Slasher is hurting the industry when he spoils announcements is another, more interesting question. The fact is that sabotaging a team's announcement page views sabotages their ability to secure sponsors in the future, and therefore does hurt the industry over time. This is not a concern in traditional sports media because player announcements and other "insider info" like that reported on MLBTradeRumors.com do not cut into MLB team revenues in any way. It comes with being a mostly online space, where pageviews are one of the few only available metric. The team owner's notion is that this projected -yet to happen- traffic was reserved for them from the beginning. The question would be whether teams and organizations ought to adhere to common competition. As long as the information is not illegally obtained, they have lost. Not money, but the race and thus the money. While the information is not yet out there, said traffic also isn't, and therefore cannot be owned by anybody. There is no reason to believe the teams wouldn't profit more without leaks, but the conception that they were entitled to these profits per se is questionable. Now, given the state of the industry, there are valid considerations of self-regulation, growth-inducing strategies or even protectionism. There are arguments to be made for the well-being of teams. Of course any team is well within its rights to advocate their cause and they should do it. But one has to acknowledge the existence of other involved parties and whose interests might not be inherently more or less significant. At least myself, I have no idea which way to prioritize who. But I do believe that no party is wrong in pushing their interests in and itself, and it's much more complicated than "whatever hurts party X in any way is bad". Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:Nonetheless, Baer makes a direct comparison between MLBTradeRumors and Slasher's work: There is a website solely dedicated to posting rumors about teams and players (MLBTradeRumors.com), and it's very well-respected within the industry. The writers are given press access, players and members of team front offices visit the site daily, and there is no tension between the two sides. Aside from MLBTR, ESPN, FOX Sports, CBS Sports, and a host of other media outlets employ journalists to break news in exactly the way Breslau has done within e-sports. In e-sports, there IS tension between the two sides, and sites dedicated to posting rumors are NOT well-respected within the industry. That's because e-sports is not like regular sports. Does Alex Garfield have a right to prohibit Slasher from publishing spoiler pieces like the one about Snute's signing? Of course not! But he never professed to have this right. However, does Alex Garfield have a right to be mad as hell when Slasher takes 35,000 page views off one of his major player announcements with a spoiler piece? Of course he does. And do e-sports organizations like EG and TL have a right to prefer sharing interviews and inside scoops with the journalism sources that AREN'T screwing them over 24/7? Of course! Do they have a right to cut off communication with Slasher, a demonstrated threat to their ability to recruit sponsors? They absolutely, 100% do! I think there is little contention on this part. Do note however, that there really aren't that much dedicated rumor sites in e-sports, except of maybe Rakaka. What specific course of action to take is ultimately every side's own decision. I think everyone involved is well aware of the possible ramifications whichever way they'll go (and have gone). Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:Honestly, I think HuK said it best in a series of tweets earlier today: In the end its pretty simple in my eyes. It a conscious choice of being a tabloid magazine and leaking everything before it happens. Or being a TIME magazine kind of thing and getting the more prestigious interviews, in-depth analysis, and professional aspect of the scene. But you can't really be both when so much of journalism depends on relationships with people in the scene. There is nothing wrong with being either; but u really cant be both. That's what a lot of people don't understand about the Slasher controversy. In the end, it isn't about whether Slasher has a right to publish whatever spoiler pieces he wants. It isn't even about whether Alex Garfield has a right to embargo Slasher. Part of being a good journalist, and I can guarantee you that Bill Baer would agree with this 100%, means staying on good terms with your sources. If Slasher continues screwing over e-sports organizations like EG and TL, then he can't expect to use them as sources in the future. It's as simple as that. It seems, Rod is testing grounds. He may have disgruntled some. But given responses even from other team owner's, the rift might not be that severe. There is possibility he misjudged the extent of how far he's able to go, but as human relationships are not black and white friction is bound to happen. I don't know whether you intended to imply he's a bad journalist by contrasting it to what makes a good one- but it's a little disingenuous to imply that the very best have only made friends along their way.
Hey thanks for the thoughtful reply!
I don't think there's anything wrong with Slasher posting spoilers from an ethical perspective. Slasher can post spoilers all he wants, he has every right to, and he can still consider himself a good journalist if that's what he does. He's getting views and looking out for his own interests and that's all well and good.
But he can't expect teams to keep giving him interviews and information if that's the kind of journalist he decides to become.
My post was designed to address two views that I consider misconceptions. Both of these misconceptions have been brought up in this thread's comments, as well as on r/starcraft and so on:
Misconception #1: Alex Garfield had no right to be mad at Slasher.
Alex Garfield had every right to be pissed at Slasher. Slasher has, time and time again, with full knowledge of the consequences of his actions, sabotaged EG's launch announcements and therefore EG's ability to appeal to sponsors in the future.
What Baer seems to suggest in this thread's original post is that because team owners in baseball don't get mad about spoilers, team owners in StarCraft II also shouldn't get mad about spoilers. Thus a major thrust of my post was to explain the differences between baseball and e-sports that make this comparison invalid.
Misconception #2: Alex Garfield was out of line when he called for a black-list of Slasher.
Anybody who thinks EG doesn't have a right to black-list somebody hasn't thought things through very well.
I believe you agree with me on this point. What information EG chooses to give Slasher is completely up to them. If Slasher screws over e-sports organizations, they are less likely to help out Slasher in the future, and there's nothing wrong with that. It's just how things work.
Like I said, a good journalist knows to maintain a good relationship with his sources. Slasher's sources are clearly not teams like EG and TL, and therefore he has not maintained a good relationship with them. That was his choice, made consciously, and the consequence of this choice may be that he has more trouble in the future working through official channels, for instance to get interviews with EG or TL players. Hopefully he's maintaining good relationships with the inside sources who provide the meat for most of his "inside scoop" stories — because if he alienates all the e-sports organizations, those secret inside sources will be all he'll have left.
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On January 17 2013 11:57 RowdierBob wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:I think one of the temptations people have when it comes to the recently controversial subject of journalism is to compare the e-sports industry to the broader sports industry. This is a very simplistic view that misses out on a lot of important differences. In a lot of ways, StarCraft II teams and baseball teams couldn't be more different. Bill Baer, an ESPN sportswriter, recently posted on TL to lend his thoughts to the discussion about the Slasher controversy. I decided to respond with a post of my own because I disagreed quite strongly with Mr. Baer on a variety of points. There was one line in particular in Bill's piece that struck me as missing the point. Here it is: In traditional sports, teams and journalists work together, dispassionately. Teams know it is in their best interest to allow them access, even if they may report things they would otherwise want kept secret There is a reason that baseball teams don't object to having their secrets spilled. The reason is that their sources of income are completely insulated from such breaches. According to New York Magazine, the revenue of the New York Yankees can be broken down as follows: Sources of Revenue: Stadium tickets: $117 million (4.2 million tickets at an average of $28 each); YES network TV/radio rights: $60 million; Major League TV and licensing: $30 million; concessions: $10 million; sponsorships and advertising: $30 million; premium seating: $27 million; local radio: $13 million; catering: $5 million; other: $10 million. The introduction of a new player for a team like the Yankees has absolutely no potential to make them any money directly. It has the potential to make money indirectly, for instance by encouraging people to buy tickets to see a new player play. But how the announcement is made doesn't have any effect whatsoever on the team's revenue. This is why, as Baer notes, baseball teams are happy to let journalists do the hype-building and announcements: And yet, when the Phillies finally signed Lee on the 15th, it wasn't the Phillies who broke the news; it was journalist Jon Heyman, then with Sports Illustrated. Heyman's reporting did nothing to reduce the hype around the signing; Amaro did not complain that the surprise would reduce eyeballs on the Phillies web site. In fact, it was never an issue. Here, Baer unwittingly highlights the key difference between traditional sports and E-Sports that invalidates a good portion of his argument. "Amaro did not complain that the surprise would reduce eyeballs on the Phillies web site," because Amaro knew that pageviews on the Phillies web site represented an infinitesimally small portion of his team's revenue and, by extension, his own paycheck. That's not how a team like EG or TL works. E-sports organizations like Evil Geniuses market themselves to sponsors as "New Media Agencies" capable of granting a sponsor exposure to a wide, receptive and valuable audience of fans. As such, every opportunity to secure page views represents an opportunity for an E-sports organization to make money. You may have noticed that evilgeniuses.net does not run advertisements the way many websites do. There are no banners to click on and discover a new online flash game, no announcements that you have won a prize of some kind, and no invitations to online dating sites. What you will see if you look at a page on EG's site is an array of sponsors displayed on every page. EG relies on page view statistics as part of its pitch when recruiting sponsors, and therefore when securing revenue. When EG or TL announce a player, they put a lot of effort into making the announcement look as enticing and interesting as possible. This is because the announcement itself represents an opportunity to give each team's sponsors exposure. That's not how things work in baseball. When Slasher spoils the announcement of a TL player's acquisition, it decreases the number of people who click the actual announcement when it goes up a week later. This decreases the number of people who see the sponsor logos included in that post, and therefore decreases TL's ability to obtain sponsors in the future. Whether Slasher should be allowed to publish such spoiler pieces is not something anyone is disputing. He can do whatever he wants with whatever information he obtains. Whether Slasher is hurting the industry when he spoils announcements is another, more interesting question. The fact is that sabotaging a team's announcement page views sabotages their ability to secure sponsors in the future, and therefore does hurt the industry over time. This is not a concern in traditional sports media because player announcements and other "insider info" like that reported on MLBTradeRumors.com do not cut into MLB team revenues in any way. Nonetheless, Baer makes a direct comparison between MLBTradeRumors and Slasher's work: There is a website solely dedicated to posting rumors about teams and players (MLBTradeRumors.com), and it's very well-respected within the industry. The writers are given press access, players and members of team front offices visit the site daily, and there is no tension between the two sides. Aside from MLBTR, ESPN, FOX Sports, CBS Sports, and a host of other media outlets employ journalists to break news in exactly the way Breslau has done within e-sports. In e-sports, there IS tension between the two sides, and sites dedicated to posting rumors are NOT well-respected within the industry. That's because e-sports is not like regular sports. Does Alex Garfield have a right to prohibit Slasher from publishing spoiler pieces like the one about Snute's signing? Of course not! But he never professed to have this right. However, does Alex Garfield have a right to be mad as hell when Slasher takes 35,000 page views off one of his major player announcements with a spoiler piece? Of course he does. And do e-sports organizations like EG and TL have a right to prefer sharing interviews and inside scoops with the journalism sources that AREN'T screwing them over 24/7? Of course! Do they have a right to cut off communication with Slasher, a demonstrated threat to their ability to recruit sponsors? They absolutely, 100% do! Honestly, I think HuK said it best in a series of tweets earlier today: In the end its pretty simple in my eyes. It a conscious choice of being a tabloid magazine and leaking everything before it happens. Or being a TIME magazine kind of thing and getting the more prestigious interviews, in-depth analysis, and professional aspect of the scene. But you can't really be both when so much of journalism depends on relationships with people in the scene. There is nothing wrong with being either; but u really cant be both. That's what a lot of people don't understand about the Slasher controversy. In the end, it isn't about whether Slasher has a right to publish whatever spoiler pieces he wants. It isn't even about whether Alex Garfield has a right to embargo Slasher. Part of being a good journalist, and I can guarantee you that Bill Baer would agree with this 100%, means staying on good terms with your sources. If Slasher continues screwing over e-sports organizations like EG and TL, then he can't expect to use them as sources in the future. It's as simple as that. I think Slasher has an obligation to report the news. Yes it's important for Slasher to have a good relationship with his sources, but it's also a two-way street. TL and EG can throw a hissy fit and black-ban Slasher from any future inside gossip, rumour, tips etc but would it really be in their interest? Relationships are always a two-way street and I think it would be silly of EG and TL to do something silly like completely removing themselves from any dealings with Slasher. It has a lot of potential to bite them in the ass down the line. This is just my opinion, but I'd rather see both organisations--two of the premiere in the SC2 international e-sports world--use it as a learning experience as to how they might better engage with the e-sports media in the future to stop things like this happening. I'd hope there'd be scope to sit down with Slasher, explain their take on the issue and maybe work with eachother towards a mutually beneficial arrangement in the future. It's much easier to make friends than create enemies. I can understand the frustration of losing out on the promotion of their own news but lashing out at the messenger (Slasher) is not the right option. Take it as a learning opportunity and implement strategies in the future to mitigate risks around significant announcements relating to your team.
If Slasher is going to lose them money (and himself indirectly) then it is purely in TL and EG's interests to not work with him in the slightest. Slasher needs to realize that this is not pro sports and that he has to maintain his relationships with teams and that those relationships involve him not hurting their major sources of income.
He can still profit in other ways with his insider info. I believe Alex said that he offered him exclusive interviewing rights which Slasher never took him up on.
What do you think Slasher gets more off of? Him breaking the news in a poor manner with no analysis and say... 50k people see it and go clicking on TL/EG and maybe a few on his site.
Or putting out the info just after TL and EG do and they get maybe 80-100k people viewing things with better hype and he does analysis and then gets one of a kind interviews the next day to put out when the hype is at it's strongest. He then profits from those extra people wanting to see his interviews.
Not only does it benefit him in that way but now EG and TL are happy with him and might even give him some future stories if he does a good job. They can work together now. Slasher didn't lose them money, EG and TL make their sponsors happy and get more money from them possibly, and both sides benefit more than the other way.
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On January 17 2013 12:33 clever_us wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 12:10 rotegirte wrote:On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:E-sports organizations like Evil Geniuses market themselves to sponsors as "New Media Agencies" capable of granting a sponsor exposure to a wide, receptive and valuable audience of fans. As such, every opportunity to secure page views represents an opportunity for an E-sports organization to make money.
You may have noticed that evilgeniuses.net does not run advertisements the way many websites do. There are no banners to click on and discover a new online flash game, no announcements that you have won a prize of some kind, and no invitations to online dating sites. What you will see if you look at a page on EG's site is an array of sponsors displayed on every page.
EG relies on page view statistics as part of its pitch when recruiting sponsors, and therefore when securing revenue.
When EG or TL announce a player, they put a lot of effort into making the announcement look as enticing and interesting as possible. This is because the announcement itself represents an opportunity to give each team's sponsors exposure. That's not how things work in baseball.
When Slasher spoils the announcement of a TL player's acquisition, it decreases the number of people who click the actual announcement when it goes up a week later. This decreases the number of people who see the sponsor logos included in that post, and therefore decreases TL's ability to obtain sponsors in the future.
Whether Slasher should be allowed to publish such spoiler pieces is not something anyone is disputing. He can do whatever he wants with whatever information he obtains. Whether Slasher is hurting the industry when he spoils announcements is another, more interesting question. The fact is that sabotaging a team's announcement page views sabotages their ability to secure sponsors in the future, and therefore does hurt the industry over time. This is not a concern in traditional sports media because player announcements and other "insider info" like that reported on MLBTradeRumors.com do not cut into MLB team revenues in any way. It comes with being a mostly online space, where pageviews are one of the few only available metric. The team owner's notion is that this projected -yet to happen- traffic was reserved for them from the beginning. The question would be whether teams and organizations ought to adhere to common competition. As long as the information is not illegally obtained, they have lost. Not money, but the race and thus the money. While the information is not yet out there, said traffic also isn't, and therefore cannot be owned by anybody. There is no reason to believe the teams wouldn't profit more without leaks, but the conception that they were entitled to these profits per se is questionable. Now, given the state of the industry, there are valid considerations of self-regulation, growth-inducing strategies or even protectionism. There are arguments to be made for the well-being of teams. Of course any team is well within its rights to advocate their cause and they should do it. But one has to acknowledge the existence of other involved parties and whose interests might not be inherently more or less significant. At least myself, I have no idea which way to prioritize who. But I do believe that no party is wrong in pushing their interests in and itself, and it's much more complicated than "whatever hurts party X in any way is bad". On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:Nonetheless, Baer makes a direct comparison between MLBTradeRumors and Slasher's work: There is a website solely dedicated to posting rumors about teams and players (MLBTradeRumors.com), and it's very well-respected within the industry. The writers are given press access, players and members of team front offices visit the site daily, and there is no tension between the two sides. Aside from MLBTR, ESPN, FOX Sports, CBS Sports, and a host of other media outlets employ journalists to break news in exactly the way Breslau has done within e-sports. In e-sports, there IS tension between the two sides, and sites dedicated to posting rumors are NOT well-respected within the industry. That's because e-sports is not like regular sports. Does Alex Garfield have a right to prohibit Slasher from publishing spoiler pieces like the one about Snute's signing? Of course not! But he never professed to have this right. However, does Alex Garfield have a right to be mad as hell when Slasher takes 35,000 page views off one of his major player announcements with a spoiler piece? Of course he does. And do e-sports organizations like EG and TL have a right to prefer sharing interviews and inside scoops with the journalism sources that AREN'T screwing them over 24/7? Of course! Do they have a right to cut off communication with Slasher, a demonstrated threat to their ability to recruit sponsors? They absolutely, 100% do! I think there is little contention on this part. Do note however, that there really aren't that much dedicated rumor sites in e-sports, except of maybe Rakaka. What specific course of action to take is ultimately every side's own decision. I think everyone involved is well aware of the possible ramifications whichever way they'll go (and have gone). On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:Honestly, I think HuK said it best in a series of tweets earlier today: In the end its pretty simple in my eyes. It a conscious choice of being a tabloid magazine and leaking everything before it happens. Or being a TIME magazine kind of thing and getting the more prestigious interviews, in-depth analysis, and professional aspect of the scene. But you can't really be both when so much of journalism depends on relationships with people in the scene. There is nothing wrong with being either; but u really cant be both. That's what a lot of people don't understand about the Slasher controversy. In the end, it isn't about whether Slasher has a right to publish whatever spoiler pieces he wants. It isn't even about whether Alex Garfield has a right to embargo Slasher. Part of being a good journalist, and I can guarantee you that Bill Baer would agree with this 100%, means staying on good terms with your sources. If Slasher continues screwing over e-sports organizations like EG and TL, then he can't expect to use them as sources in the future. It's as simple as that. It seems, Rod is testing grounds. He may have disgruntled some. But given responses even from other team owner's, the rift might not be that severe. There is possibility he misjudged the extent of how far he's able to go, but as human relationships are not black and white friction is bound to happen. I don't know whether you intended to imply he's a bad journalist by contrasting it to what makes a good one- but it's a little disingenuous to imply that the very best have only made friends along their way. Hey thanks for the thoughtful reply! I don't think there's anything wrong with Slasher posting spoilers from an ethical perspective. Slasher can post spoilers all he wants, he has every right to, and he can still consider himself a good journalist if that's what he does. He's getting views and looking out for his own interests and that's all well and good. But he can't expect teams to keep giving him interviews and information if that's the kind of journalist he decides to become. My post was designed to address two views that I consider misconceptions. Both of these misconceptions have been brought up in this thread's comments, as well as on r/starcraft and so on: Misconception #1: Alex Garfield had no right to be mad at Slasher.Alex Garfield had every right to be pissed at Slasher. Slasher has, time and time again, with full knowledge of the consequences of his actions, sabotaged EG's launch announcements and therefore EG's ability to appeal to sponsors in the future. What Baer seems to suggest in this thread's original post is that because team owners in baseball don't get mad about spoilers, team owners in StarCraft II also shouldn't get mad about spoilers. Thus a major thrust of my post was to explain the differences between baseball and e-sports that make this comparison invalid. Misconception #2: Alex Garfield was out of line when he called for a black-list of Slasher.Anybody who thinks EG doesn't have a right to black-list somebody hasn't thought things through very well. I believe you agree with me on this point. What information EG chooses to give Slasher is completely up to them. If Slasher screws over e-sports organizations, they are less likely to help out Slasher in the future, and there's nothing wrong with that. It's just how things work. Like I said, a good journalist knows to maintain a good relationship with his sources. Slasher's sources are clearly not teams like EG and TL, and therefore he has not maintained a good relationship with them. That was his choice, made consciously, and the consequence of this choice may be that he has more trouble in the future working through official channels, for instance to get interviews with EG or TL players. Hopefully he's maintaining good relationships with the inside sources who provide the meat for most of his "inside scoop" stories — because if he alienates all the e-sports organizations, those secret inside sources will be all he'll have left.
I love that TL is so much more unbiased and you can see both sides of things. Reddit is a crap hole of Fuck so and so. Good post. I support Slasher continuing his journalism but I completely get why Nazgul and Alex are pissed and agree with most of what they said. I think Slasher has to realize these differences to improve his own business.
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On January 17 2013 12:37 mrtomjones wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 12:33 clever_us wrote:On January 17 2013 12:10 rotegirte wrote:On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:E-sports organizations like Evil Geniuses market themselves to sponsors as "New Media Agencies" capable of granting a sponsor exposure to a wide, receptive and valuable audience of fans. As such, every opportunity to secure page views represents an opportunity for an E-sports organization to make money.
You may have noticed that evilgeniuses.net does not run advertisements the way many websites do. There are no banners to click on and discover a new online flash game, no announcements that you have won a prize of some kind, and no invitations to online dating sites. What you will see if you look at a page on EG's site is an array of sponsors displayed on every page.
EG relies on page view statistics as part of its pitch when recruiting sponsors, and therefore when securing revenue.
When EG or TL announce a player, they put a lot of effort into making the announcement look as enticing and interesting as possible. This is because the announcement itself represents an opportunity to give each team's sponsors exposure. That's not how things work in baseball.
When Slasher spoils the announcement of a TL player's acquisition, it decreases the number of people who click the actual announcement when it goes up a week later. This decreases the number of people who see the sponsor logos included in that post, and therefore decreases TL's ability to obtain sponsors in the future.
Whether Slasher should be allowed to publish such spoiler pieces is not something anyone is disputing. He can do whatever he wants with whatever information he obtains. Whether Slasher is hurting the industry when he spoils announcements is another, more interesting question. The fact is that sabotaging a team's announcement page views sabotages their ability to secure sponsors in the future, and therefore does hurt the industry over time. This is not a concern in traditional sports media because player announcements and other "insider info" like that reported on MLBTradeRumors.com do not cut into MLB team revenues in any way. It comes with being a mostly online space, where pageviews are one of the few only available metric. The team owner's notion is that this projected -yet to happen- traffic was reserved for them from the beginning. The question would be whether teams and organizations ought to adhere to common competition. As long as the information is not illegally obtained, they have lost. Not money, but the race and thus the money. While the information is not yet out there, said traffic also isn't, and therefore cannot be owned by anybody. There is no reason to believe the teams wouldn't profit more without leaks, but the conception that they were entitled to these profits per se is questionable. Now, given the state of the industry, there are valid considerations of self-regulation, growth-inducing strategies or even protectionism. There are arguments to be made for the well-being of teams. Of course any team is well within its rights to advocate their cause and they should do it. But one has to acknowledge the existence of other involved parties and whose interests might not be inherently more or less significant. At least myself, I have no idea which way to prioritize who. But I do believe that no party is wrong in pushing their interests in and itself, and it's much more complicated than "whatever hurts party X in any way is bad". On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:Nonetheless, Baer makes a direct comparison between MLBTradeRumors and Slasher's work: There is a website solely dedicated to posting rumors about teams and players (MLBTradeRumors.com), and it's very well-respected within the industry. The writers are given press access, players and members of team front offices visit the site daily, and there is no tension between the two sides. Aside from MLBTR, ESPN, FOX Sports, CBS Sports, and a host of other media outlets employ journalists to break news in exactly the way Breslau has done within e-sports. In e-sports, there IS tension between the two sides, and sites dedicated to posting rumors are NOT well-respected within the industry. That's because e-sports is not like regular sports. Does Alex Garfield have a right to prohibit Slasher from publishing spoiler pieces like the one about Snute's signing? Of course not! But he never professed to have this right. However, does Alex Garfield have a right to be mad as hell when Slasher takes 35,000 page views off one of his major player announcements with a spoiler piece? Of course he does. And do e-sports organizations like EG and TL have a right to prefer sharing interviews and inside scoops with the journalism sources that AREN'T screwing them over 24/7? Of course! Do they have a right to cut off communication with Slasher, a demonstrated threat to their ability to recruit sponsors? They absolutely, 100% do! I think there is little contention on this part. Do note however, that there really aren't that much dedicated rumor sites in e-sports, except of maybe Rakaka. What specific course of action to take is ultimately every side's own decision. I think everyone involved is well aware of the possible ramifications whichever way they'll go (and have gone). On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:Honestly, I think HuK said it best in a series of tweets earlier today: In the end its pretty simple in my eyes. It a conscious choice of being a tabloid magazine and leaking everything before it happens. Or being a TIME magazine kind of thing and getting the more prestigious interviews, in-depth analysis, and professional aspect of the scene. But you can't really be both when so much of journalism depends on relationships with people in the scene. There is nothing wrong with being either; but u really cant be both. That's what a lot of people don't understand about the Slasher controversy. In the end, it isn't about whether Slasher has a right to publish whatever spoiler pieces he wants. It isn't even about whether Alex Garfield has a right to embargo Slasher. Part of being a good journalist, and I can guarantee you that Bill Baer would agree with this 100%, means staying on good terms with your sources. If Slasher continues screwing over e-sports organizations like EG and TL, then he can't expect to use them as sources in the future. It's as simple as that. It seems, Rod is testing grounds. He may have disgruntled some. But given responses even from other team owner's, the rift might not be that severe. There is possibility he misjudged the extent of how far he's able to go, but as human relationships are not black and white friction is bound to happen. I don't know whether you intended to imply he's a bad journalist by contrasting it to what makes a good one- but it's a little disingenuous to imply that the very best have only made friends along their way. Hey thanks for the thoughtful reply! I don't think there's anything wrong with Slasher posting spoilers from an ethical perspective. Slasher can post spoilers all he wants, he has every right to, and he can still consider himself a good journalist if that's what he does. He's getting views and looking out for his own interests and that's all well and good. But he can't expect teams to keep giving him interviews and information if that's the kind of journalist he decides to become. My post was designed to address two views that I consider misconceptions. Both of these misconceptions have been brought up in this thread's comments, as well as on r/starcraft and so on: Misconception #1: Alex Garfield had no right to be mad at Slasher.Alex Garfield had every right to be pissed at Slasher. Slasher has, time and time again, with full knowledge of the consequences of his actions, sabotaged EG's launch announcements and therefore EG's ability to appeal to sponsors in the future. What Baer seems to suggest in this thread's original post is that because team owners in baseball don't get mad about spoilers, team owners in StarCraft II also shouldn't get mad about spoilers. Thus a major thrust of my post was to explain the differences between baseball and e-sports that make this comparison invalid. Misconception #2: Alex Garfield was out of line when he called for a black-list of Slasher.Anybody who thinks EG doesn't have a right to black-list somebody hasn't thought things through very well. I believe you agree with me on this point. What information EG chooses to give Slasher is completely up to them. If Slasher screws over e-sports organizations, they are less likely to help out Slasher in the future, and there's nothing wrong with that. It's just how things work. Like I said, a good journalist knows to maintain a good relationship with his sources. Slasher's sources are clearly not teams like EG and TL, and therefore he has not maintained a good relationship with them. That was his choice, made consciously, and the consequence of this choice may be that he has more trouble in the future working through official channels, for instance to get interviews with EG or TL players. Hopefully he's maintaining good relationships with the inside sources who provide the meat for most of his "inside scoop" stories — because if he alienates all the e-sports organizations, those secret inside sources will be all he'll have left. I love that TL is so much more unbiased and you can see both sides of things. Reddit is a crap hole of Fuck so and so. Good post. I support Slasher continuing his journalism but I completely get why Nazgul and Alex are pissed and agree with most of what they said. I think Slasher has to realize these differences to improve his own business.
Sir, you and I may just have had the most reasoned, thoughtful exchange that has occurred on this issue all day xD
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On January 17 2013 12:40 clever_us wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 12:37 mrtomjones wrote:On January 17 2013 12:33 clever_us wrote:On January 17 2013 12:10 rotegirte wrote:On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:E-sports organizations like Evil Geniuses market themselves to sponsors as "New Media Agencies" capable of granting a sponsor exposure to a wide, receptive and valuable audience of fans. As such, every opportunity to secure page views represents an opportunity for an E-sports organization to make money.
You may have noticed that evilgeniuses.net does not run advertisements the way many websites do. There are no banners to click on and discover a new online flash game, no announcements that you have won a prize of some kind, and no invitations to online dating sites. What you will see if you look at a page on EG's site is an array of sponsors displayed on every page.
EG relies on page view statistics as part of its pitch when recruiting sponsors, and therefore when securing revenue.
When EG or TL announce a player, they put a lot of effort into making the announcement look as enticing and interesting as possible. This is because the announcement itself represents an opportunity to give each team's sponsors exposure. That's not how things work in baseball.
When Slasher spoils the announcement of a TL player's acquisition, it decreases the number of people who click the actual announcement when it goes up a week later. This decreases the number of people who see the sponsor logos included in that post, and therefore decreases TL's ability to obtain sponsors in the future.
Whether Slasher should be allowed to publish such spoiler pieces is not something anyone is disputing. He can do whatever he wants with whatever information he obtains. Whether Slasher is hurting the industry when he spoils announcements is another, more interesting question. The fact is that sabotaging a team's announcement page views sabotages their ability to secure sponsors in the future, and therefore does hurt the industry over time. This is not a concern in traditional sports media because player announcements and other "insider info" like that reported on MLBTradeRumors.com do not cut into MLB team revenues in any way. It comes with being a mostly online space, where pageviews are one of the few only available metric. The team owner's notion is that this projected -yet to happen- traffic was reserved for them from the beginning. The question would be whether teams and organizations ought to adhere to common competition. As long as the information is not illegally obtained, they have lost. Not money, but the race and thus the money. While the information is not yet out there, said traffic also isn't, and therefore cannot be owned by anybody. There is no reason to believe the teams wouldn't profit more without leaks, but the conception that they were entitled to these profits per se is questionable. Now, given the state of the industry, there are valid considerations of self-regulation, growth-inducing strategies or even protectionism. There are arguments to be made for the well-being of teams. Of course any team is well within its rights to advocate their cause and they should do it. But one has to acknowledge the existence of other involved parties and whose interests might not be inherently more or less significant. At least myself, I have no idea which way to prioritize who. But I do believe that no party is wrong in pushing their interests in and itself, and it's much more complicated than "whatever hurts party X in any way is bad". On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:Nonetheless, Baer makes a direct comparison between MLBTradeRumors and Slasher's work: There is a website solely dedicated to posting rumors about teams and players (MLBTradeRumors.com), and it's very well-respected within the industry. The writers are given press access, players and members of team front offices visit the site daily, and there is no tension between the two sides. Aside from MLBTR, ESPN, FOX Sports, CBS Sports, and a host of other media outlets employ journalists to break news in exactly the way Breslau has done within e-sports. In e-sports, there IS tension between the two sides, and sites dedicated to posting rumors are NOT well-respected within the industry. That's because e-sports is not like regular sports. Does Alex Garfield have a right to prohibit Slasher from publishing spoiler pieces like the one about Snute's signing? Of course not! But he never professed to have this right. However, does Alex Garfield have a right to be mad as hell when Slasher takes 35,000 page views off one of his major player announcements with a spoiler piece? Of course he does. And do e-sports organizations like EG and TL have a right to prefer sharing interviews and inside scoops with the journalism sources that AREN'T screwing them over 24/7? Of course! Do they have a right to cut off communication with Slasher, a demonstrated threat to their ability to recruit sponsors? They absolutely, 100% do! I think there is little contention on this part. Do note however, that there really aren't that much dedicated rumor sites in e-sports, except of maybe Rakaka. What specific course of action to take is ultimately every side's own decision. I think everyone involved is well aware of the possible ramifications whichever way they'll go (and have gone). On January 17 2013 10:44 clever_us wrote:Honestly, I think HuK said it best in a series of tweets earlier today: In the end its pretty simple in my eyes. It a conscious choice of being a tabloid magazine and leaking everything before it happens. Or being a TIME magazine kind of thing and getting the more prestigious interviews, in-depth analysis, and professional aspect of the scene. But you can't really be both when so much of journalism depends on relationships with people in the scene. There is nothing wrong with being either; but u really cant be both. That's what a lot of people don't understand about the Slasher controversy. In the end, it isn't about whether Slasher has a right to publish whatever spoiler pieces he wants. It isn't even about whether Alex Garfield has a right to embargo Slasher. Part of being a good journalist, and I can guarantee you that Bill Baer would agree with this 100%, means staying on good terms with your sources. If Slasher continues screwing over e-sports organizations like EG and TL, then he can't expect to use them as sources in the future. It's as simple as that. It seems, Rod is testing grounds. He may have disgruntled some. But given responses even from other team owner's, the rift might not be that severe. There is possibility he misjudged the extent of how far he's able to go, but as human relationships are not black and white friction is bound to happen. I don't know whether you intended to imply he's a bad journalist by contrasting it to what makes a good one- but it's a little disingenuous to imply that the very best have only made friends along their way. Hey thanks for the thoughtful reply! I don't think there's anything wrong with Slasher posting spoilers from an ethical perspective. Slasher can post spoilers all he wants, he has every right to, and he can still consider himself a good journalist if that's what he does. He's getting views and looking out for his own interests and that's all well and good. But he can't expect teams to keep giving him interviews and information if that's the kind of journalist he decides to become. My post was designed to address two views that I consider misconceptions. Both of these misconceptions have been brought up in this thread's comments, as well as on r/starcraft and so on: Misconception #1: Alex Garfield had no right to be mad at Slasher.Alex Garfield had every right to be pissed at Slasher. Slasher has, time and time again, with full knowledge of the consequences of his actions, sabotaged EG's launch announcements and therefore EG's ability to appeal to sponsors in the future. What Baer seems to suggest in this thread's original post is that because team owners in baseball don't get mad about spoilers, team owners in StarCraft II also shouldn't get mad about spoilers. Thus a major thrust of my post was to explain the differences between baseball and e-sports that make this comparison invalid. Misconception #2: Alex Garfield was out of line when he called for a black-list of Slasher.Anybody who thinks EG doesn't have a right to black-list somebody hasn't thought things through very well. I believe you agree with me on this point. What information EG chooses to give Slasher is completely up to them. If Slasher screws over e-sports organizations, they are less likely to help out Slasher in the future, and there's nothing wrong with that. It's just how things work. Like I said, a good journalist knows to maintain a good relationship with his sources. Slasher's sources are clearly not teams like EG and TL, and therefore he has not maintained a good relationship with them. That was his choice, made consciously, and the consequence of this choice may be that he has more trouble in the future working through official channels, for instance to get interviews with EG or TL players. Hopefully he's maintaining good relationships with the inside sources who provide the meat for most of his "inside scoop" stories — because if he alienates all the e-sports organizations, those secret inside sources will be all he'll have left. I love that TL is so much more unbiased and you can see both sides of things. Reddit is a crap hole of Fuck so and so. Good post. I support Slasher continuing his journalism but I completely get why Nazgul and Alex are pissed and agree with most of what they said. I think Slasher has to realize these differences to improve his own business. Sir, you and I may just have had the most reasoned, thoughtful exchange that has occurred on this issue all day xD
We should delete it then. Might cause trouble! 
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On January 17 2013 05:19 jmbthirteen wrote:Show nested quote +On January 17 2013 05:17 Grimmyman123 wrote:On January 17 2013 05:08 jmbthirteen wrote:
Also, about Alex's rant about how what Slasher does only helps himself, isn't what EG wants only helps EG? Thats the point of business right? Last I checked, Slasher needs to help himself too. Journalism in esports isn't in a great place either, yet it is absolutely a necessary function of esports. I can understand if you do not grasp the concept of advertising and media relation economics. Basically, for the BEST benefit to ALL parties, the main source or team releases first, and the journalists release second, shortly after the main source. Both put out a good product or content for maximum effect. Both ride the wave. For maxmimum effect, it only works one way. if thats best, then why does no other industry work this way? esports needs to adapt
You throw a 500 million dollars a year into esports, and the economy of this industry will change overnight.
Until then, esports is a family, and one of the kids is stepping on the big brothers toes thinking he isn't hurting anyone.
@mrtomjones The problem with Slasher, is he thinks he is the the saviour of esports "journalism", freedom of the press and all that jazz. He doesn't really care at all what happens to esports. If anything, the collapse of teams is just more news for him to publish.
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Support Slasher 100%. I enjoy when he breaks news early, and wait in anticipation for the team to confirm and deny it. He makes me feel like I have a "behind the scenes" access into the rumors and rumblings between players and teams. I don't care if his announcements aren't flashy. I don't care how it's done. This is the reality as the scene grows. Deal with it.
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I feel like most of the arguments for the journalism are comparing them to mainstream sports, without acknowledging the fundamental issues as to why its different. ie. How revenue is created in esports.
I really think there needs to be give and take here, big announcements should be embargo'd and at the same time the teams can feed the journalists with announcements from time to time. or at least make them part of it.
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EPT
