Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Hasbro's CEO Reports OGL-Related D&D Beyond Cancellations Had Minimal Impact
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Ruin Explorer" data-source="post: 8940588" data-attributes="member: 18"><p>I mean, that's hyperbole, but in the other direction lol.</p><p></p><p>What went on here would have required quite a few people at the management level, and a significant amount of sign-off, as well as involving the management of multiple departments, as well as possibly external law firms and the like.</p><p></p><p>And don't you, like me, work in a corporate environment? So you know that's the case. Clueless is spot-on - clearly they were clueless, like 100% without any clues whatsoever, definitely not going to find out it was Col. Mustard in the Drawing Room with the Lead Pipe - but "a manager"? Nah this took a village, and you know it did. A village full of prime village idiots, sure, but a village nonetheless.</p><p></p><p>And let's be clear - this wasn't an "innocent error", not even by Kyle's account - Kyle was very clear that he was involved, but they wouldn't listen to him. For one specific example, he has said he kept pushing for "much higher" (I believe that's an accurate quote) thresholds (plural) for the proposed fees, and that they just wouldn't listen. It was wilfully not listening to people to push an idiotic and damaging idea. Part of being a half-decent manager is not doing stuff when you're clueless about it and listening to people saying "Uh boss...".</p><p></p><p>It wasn't even a strongly-held idea or genuine idea in the end - and that makes it worse, not better! It's good because they gave up, and I give WotC a thumbs up for that. But I don't let them off just because they didn't go through with it! If your see your neighbour setting up a flammenwerfer to burn down a wasp nest in his back yard, and you talk him down from doing that, you remember that this dude was a maniac with a nutso idea, even when his wife brings you cookies to thank you for convincing her husband not to burn down the neighbourhood in order to destroy some pesky insects and promises he won't do it again.</p><p></p><p></p><p>I mean, what do you prefer - that they were willing to let off a nuke to that would have vapourized a significant fraction of the RPG industry, and damaged some of the rest, but like, the majority of the industry might have survived?</p><p></p><p>Does that sound better to you? Because that's a pretty accurate summary of the effects of deleting the OGL 1.0a and enforcing the OGL 1.1. The devastation would have been extensive. What percentage of companies going out of business for a completely unnecessary decision WotC clearly didn't even really mean (given the outcome), would be acceptable to you lol?</p><p></p><p>Instead of them being a Disney villain, you'd prefer they were compared to a sort of nuke-happy maniac? It's like "Oh they weren't trying to take over the industry, they were just willing to destroy and damage a large part of it!". Because that's fine right? What on earth!</p><p></p><p>They backed down because they were stupid and wrong. Maybe we stop trying to rewrite history to make out that it wasn't that bad?</p><p></p><p>Agreed. My point is that given how much WotC/D&D make, and that I'd imagine Beyond has significantly south of 1m subs (based on other subscription services registered members vs. subscribers), even losing half of them wouldn't really impact WotC overall that much - the vast majority of profits likely remains from books, merch, and so on. So we have no idea - 40k-50k actual cancellations over an issue on a sub service is pretty nuts though - that's the sort of numbers that make even a service with millions of subs immediately sit up and take note - because it's very hard to find an issue which makes people <em>actually</em> cancel! The vast majority of cancellations of any service are because people don't care/aren't using it, not because they care, but but are angry.</p><p></p><p>(The only subs I've cancelled out of "negative care" rather than "not using" in the last few years have been Netflix and Beyond - I was already unsub'd from WoW when Blizzard had their crisis or they'd be on the list too. And I'm pretty sure I'm more prone to cancelling than most!)</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Ruin Explorer, post: 8940588, member: 18"] I mean, that's hyperbole, but in the other direction lol. What went on here would have required quite a few people at the management level, and a significant amount of sign-off, as well as involving the management of multiple departments, as well as possibly external law firms and the like. And don't you, like me, work in a corporate environment? So you know that's the case. Clueless is spot-on - clearly they were clueless, like 100% without any clues whatsoever, definitely not going to find out it was Col. Mustard in the Drawing Room with the Lead Pipe - but "a manager"? Nah this took a village, and you know it did. A village full of prime village idiots, sure, but a village nonetheless. And let's be clear - this wasn't an "innocent error", not even by Kyle's account - Kyle was very clear that he was involved, but they wouldn't listen to him. For one specific example, he has said he kept pushing for "much higher" (I believe that's an accurate quote) thresholds (plural) for the proposed fees, and that they just wouldn't listen. It was wilfully not listening to people to push an idiotic and damaging idea. Part of being a half-decent manager is not doing stuff when you're clueless about it and listening to people saying "Uh boss...". It wasn't even a strongly-held idea or genuine idea in the end - and that makes it worse, not better! It's good because they gave up, and I give WotC a thumbs up for that. But I don't let them off just because they didn't go through with it! If your see your neighbour setting up a flammenwerfer to burn down a wasp nest in his back yard, and you talk him down from doing that, you remember that this dude was a maniac with a nutso idea, even when his wife brings you cookies to thank you for convincing her husband not to burn down the neighbourhood in order to destroy some pesky insects and promises he won't do it again. I mean, what do you prefer - that they were willing to let off a nuke to that would have vapourized a significant fraction of the RPG industry, and damaged some of the rest, but like, the majority of the industry might have survived? Does that sound better to you? Because that's a pretty accurate summary of the effects of deleting the OGL 1.0a and enforcing the OGL 1.1. The devastation would have been extensive. What percentage of companies going out of business for a completely unnecessary decision WotC clearly didn't even really mean (given the outcome), would be acceptable to you lol? Instead of them being a Disney villain, you'd prefer they were compared to a sort of nuke-happy maniac? It's like "Oh they weren't trying to take over the industry, they were just willing to destroy and damage a large part of it!". Because that's fine right? What on earth! They backed down because they were stupid and wrong. Maybe we stop trying to rewrite history to make out that it wasn't that bad? Agreed. My point is that given how much WotC/D&D make, and that I'd imagine Beyond has significantly south of 1m subs (based on other subscription services registered members vs. subscribers), even losing half of them wouldn't really impact WotC overall that much - the vast majority of profits likely remains from books, merch, and so on. So we have no idea - 40k-50k actual cancellations over an issue on a sub service is pretty nuts though - that's the sort of numbers that make even a service with millions of subs immediately sit up and take note - because it's very hard to find an issue which makes people [I]actually[/I] cancel! The vast majority of cancellations of any service are because people don't care/aren't using it, not because they care, but but are angry. (The only subs I've cancelled out of "negative care" rather than "not using" in the last few years have been Netflix and Beyond - I was already unsub'd from WoW when Blizzard had their crisis or they'd be on the list too. And I'm pretty sure I'm more prone to cancelling than most!) [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Hasbro's CEO Reports OGL-Related D&D Beyond Cancellations Had Minimal Impact
Top