MLG Winter Arena to be PPV

On February 25 2012 23:09 natebreen wrote:

On February 25 2012 23:06 mockturtle wrote:

On February 25 2012 22:39 zezamer wrote:
I don't understand why would anyone support PPV. MLG has just made mistakes that makes their business bad.

I don't understand why anyone would support an advertising model.

The second any major company decides that something about a Starcraft tournament is objectionable to them (a top player who is sponsored by a rival company, a conglomerate feud with Activision, whatever), they have the power to put a stop to it by threatening to stop funding it.

"We'll support companies that support esports!" -- excellent. That mouse or motherboard you just bought includes their marketing budget in the overhead, so the cost of a PPV is built into the mouse.

If advertisers foot the bill for your starcraft tournaments, then the second SteelSeries or Asus or whatever marketing research suggests that Starcraft fans won't buy enough of their stuff to pay the advertising bills, they'll stop funding it. eSports has risen and fallen for years in the west, and a major factor has been the majority of the money coming from hardware advertisers who are hesitant to promote a two year old game with low system requirements since hardcore players of that game have little need for new graphics cards or CPUs. S. Korea on the other hand is so dense and player participation so high that local adverting is varied, fruitful, and not dependent on short term surges in popularity. EG is sponsored by companies like Intel and SteelSeries. oGs is sponsored by "Mom's Touch" -- a Korean chicken restaurant.]

If advertisers foot the bill for tournaments, no one gives a shit about people in countries who won't buy their stuff. If Monster Energy drink doesn't sell in Panama, then viewers from Panama don't matter. If a tournament gets an even distribution of users from all around the world, they need to either develop a way to sell regional advertising all over the world or write off large portions of their users as potential advertising revenue.

If you foot the bill, Starcraft is around as long as you are interested in it, to the degree you are interested in it, the way you want to see it.

Personally, I would prefer if tournaments maintain some free content -- like Day 1/group stage for free in SD, and save the PPV only for later rounds with a couple price points (a standard and deluxe). But regardless, I'm very glad to see people move past an advertising model because the phrase "ROI" is the nail in the coffin for Starcraft.

Well said.

MLG Winter Arena to be PPV - Page 217