Liz Schuh on Dragon/Dungeon moving to the web

[Umbran]

I think I see a growing trend here for things to be personal. Please step back from that.

We do not have the required information to say for certain if any given decision makes sense. So, we should not be asserting for certain that it does or does not.

We should not have any expectation to be given that information - it would necessarily include a great amount of business information to which, honestly, we have no rights.

So, everyone here is speculating. Please remember that, and behave accordingly.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Here's something else for you to chew on, RK - you can request it all you like, until you're blue in the face, but WotC is under precisely zero obligation to you to provide it.

Absolutely correct.

And I am under zero obligation not to grouse about their decisions. In a free market economy, my right to grouse and to not pony up to their new product are the best means I have to try to induce WotC to make (or allow to be made) the producs I desire.

OTOH, there is a big difference between collecting licensing fees and doing work in-house. Presumably, WotC collected what it considered a reasonably fee whether the mags succeeded or not. The mags succeeded beyond expectation. If one then concludes that WotC pulled the licensing deal because they weren't making the expected margin.....Well, that requires some steps between A and B that seem to be omitted.

When you had 300 jobs lost, that was presumably because the company was spending X dollars, and expected a profit margin of X + Y. The jobs were part of the X dollars spent. The company knew that they could make X + Y if they spent X elsewhere, and therefore did so.

Similarly, as a store owner, I expect to make an average markup of 100% of eeverything I sell. I buy for half retail cost, and sell for retail cost. Part of that markup is profit, and the rest is expense (store location, advertising, whatever). If I am offered the chance to sell something where the cost to me is 75% of retail, it isn't generally worth my while -- I would be far wiser to stock up on items that I make a higher return on.

OTOH, if someone were to come to me and say "We'd like to produce Golden City Comics Magazine, and will pay you Z + W% of profits from the magazine to do so" I would have to have a compelling reason not to do so. Indeed, I would have to have a compelling reason to not renew the license -- either I thought that the magazine was interfering with my primary business (either due to competition or due to bringing ill repute upon my store), or I thought I could get a better licensing deal elsewhere.

"Profit margin" doesn't come into in the same way (unless I think that I can get a better licensing deal elsewhere) because this is pure profit with no overhead.

But, like I said, YMMV, and obviously does.

 

[hexgrid]

Here's something else for you to chew on, RK - you can request it all you like, until you're blue in the face, but WotC is under precisely zero obligation to you to provide it.

And even if they did provide it, it'd serve no purpose but to fuel more threads like this one.

 

[Vigilance]

Are you suggesting that WotC doesn't know why they didn't renew Dragon & Dungeon, or that they don't know why they believe they can't have both the mags and their DI? Because that is, for many, the question of the hour.

Im suggesting that Scott Rouse has used phrases like "NDA'd 9 ways from Sunday" and "NDA'd out the wazoo".

Clearly there are contractual limits to what he can say. He has come here to say what he CAN, and admittedly that's not much, but he is trying to walk a tightrope and say what he can.

And he's been straightforward about why he has to be vague.

 

[Raven Crowking]

And even if they did provide it, it'd serve no purpose but to fuel more threads like this one.

Very probably true.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Im suggesting that Scott Rouse has used phrases like "NDA'd 9 ways from Sunday" and "NDA'd out the wazoo".

Clearly there are contractual limits to what he can say. He has come here to say what he CAN, and admittedly that's not much, but he is trying to walk a tightrope and say what he can.

And he's been straightforward about why he has to be vague.

Sure. I'm not suggesting that any particular individual isn't being as open as they can under the circumstances. I'm suggesting that WotC as a corporation got caught flat-footed on the third round of combat.

It's natural that they should now want to recover from that. I certainly would. I am suggesting that we look at what's being put out now in that light.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

RC,

I think the point others are making about margins is as follows (mind you, it's all speculation, and not necessarily even MY speculation, just how I interpret what they're saying):

WotC essentially made two separate decisions.

One was to create digital content, including magazine-like content, and charge for it. How much and what kind of content, and how much to charge - these are things we don't know. We DO know they're going to be adding SOMETHING, and we're all but certain we'll have to pay for at least some of it.

The other was to bring the (at least somewhat valuable) Dungeon and Dragon brands back in-house. WotC appears to want the NAMES back (perhaps especially for the 'dragon compendium' style products they've indicated will likely appear).

However, running a print magazine business would have far too low a profit margin for WotC. They probably sell more of any given sourcebook than either magazine has circulation, and books have a much better profit margin than magazines. As a result, the brands, upon returning to WotC's direct control so they can make use of them in other endevours, are no longer represented by print magazines.

This leaves WotC not having to produce comparatively unprofitable ventures but able to use their brands.

 

[BryonD]

You lose online content when you stop paying. You lose downloaded content when a HDD crashes.

I don't lose magazines when I stop paying each month, nor do I lose my magazine with a hardware failure.

As others have pointed out... That is what back-ups are for.
I've got all kinds of electronic data and if my hard drive fails I'll buy a new one and re-load.
If someone isn't up to simple back-ups then it is their own fault.

If a magazine is destroyed or lost, well, that is that. (Care to point out how this is wrong? I mean, if backing up files is to much to ask then maintaining an ever growing magazine stack in good shape must be beyond hope. And this doesn't even touch on the overwhelming advantage that electronic media has in searching for old articles.)

When it comes to security that I will have something for a long long time electronic data beats paper by a mile.

 

[Brown Jenkin]

I don't think anyone is saying that print or digital is better. They each have thier own uses and pros and cons. What people are complaining about is that rather than serving both customer bases they have chosen to serve only one. Before it was the print people, now it is the digital people. The print people are (IMO) justified in complaining that WotC has chosen not to serve thier needs anymore. What we (for I am one of these people) are asking for is why our needs are no longer worth serving. The print people arn't saying there can't be a DI, just that it needn't be an either or option. Paizo has stated that they would have liked to continue on and they were paying WotC licence fees to do so. So I don't think it is too unreasonable of a request to ask why the print people are no longer considered worth getting money from. I realize that WotC doesn't want to give away its all its finances, but they can surely come up with something to respond with that doesn't give everything away. I am not talking about individuals posting here (who obviously don't have the authority to do so), but the PR department whose job it is to make the company look good. Right now that part of the company from an outside perspective doesn't seem to be doing thier job.

 

[freebfrost]

When it comes to security that I will have something for a long long time electronic data beats paper by a mile.

How's that 5 1/4" floppy disk backup from 1980 doing? Was it formatted for Tandy or DOS or Commodore? Was it a WordPerfect document?



Media changes. Hardware and software standards change. Paper doesn't.