What do I want? An apology.

[Enforcer]

Working on it! The one to Doug McCrae was just a lot shorter.

 

[Deimodius]

So it is not lost above, because I think it is an important point, here is is again:

The only people who are really affected by the cancellation of the magazines are those who purchased it. Those who _didn't_ are irrelevant to the discussion since the existence, or cancellation of the magazines has no affect on them. Thus a poll asking (or including) NON-readers whether or not the magazines should be allowed to die in print format does not demonstrate the will of the people who will actually be affected by the outcome of the poll.

If the magazines had been allowed to continue concurrently with the DI, people who were already NOT readers of the mag would likely subscribe to the DI in the same proportion (of non-mag readers) who will be subscribing now. Thus the ONLY people WotC wants to force to move from mag to DI are the consumers of the magazine!

Their decision affects 0% of players who were NOT consumers of the magazines.
Their decision affects 100% of the players who ARE consumers of the magazines.
(Note: I am not suggestion that 100% of mag consumers are angry, just that it is a fact they are affected by the decision).

WotC _should_ have asked two questions, one to the consumers of the mags, and one to the non-consumers.

Consumers: Would you prefer to have the content of Dragon and Dungeon availlable online _instead_ of print.

Non-consumers: Would you like online content?

If the majority of mag non-consumers subscribe to the DI, nothing has changed.
if the majority of mag consumers _do not_ subscribe, nothing has changed.

The only way this decision actually makes sense is if the majority of magazine consumers would prefer to (and ultimately do) subscribe to the DI. That remains to be seen, but perhaps instead of suggesting that the number of people upset are the minority, you should ask if they are, in fact, the _majority_ of those who consumed the magazine.

 

[Enforcer]

Enforcer, as seen in the quote above, I believe your argument is flawed. The only people who are really affected by the cancellation of the magazines are those who purchased it. Those who _didn't_ are irrelevant to the discussion since the existence, or cancellation of the magazines has no affect on them. Thus a poll asking (or including) NON-readers whether or not the magazines should be allowed to die in print format does not demonstrate the will of the people who will actually be affected by the outcome of the poll.

If the magazines had been allowed to continue concurrently with the DI, people who were already NOT readers of the mag would likely subscribe to the DI in the same proportion (of non-mag readers) who will be subscribing now. Thus the ONLY people WotC wants to force to move from mag to DI are the consumers of the magazine!

Their decision affects 0% of players who were NOT consumers of the magazines.
Their decision affects 100% of the players who ARE consumers of the magazines.
(Note: I am not suggestion that 100% of mag consumers are angry, just that it is a fact they are affected by the decision).

WotC _should_ have asked two questions, one to the consumers of the mags, and one to the non-consumers.

Consumers: Would you prefer to have the content of Dragon and Dungeon availlable online _instead_ of print.

Non-consumers: Would you like online content?

If the majority of mag non-consumers subscribe to the DI, nothing has changed.
if the majority of mag consumers _do not_ subscribe, nothing has changed.

The only way this decision actually makes sense is if the majority of magazine consumers would prefer to (and ultimately do) subscribe to the DI. That remains to be seen, but perhaps instead of suggesting that the number of people upset are the minority, you should ask if they are, in fact, the _majority_ of those who consumed the magazine.

Your response doesn't consider competition between the two formats, nor the decision-making process at Wizards. Assuming WotC is rational (and when it comes to subsidiaries of major corporations, I'm guessing bottom-line and brand-growth were big factors here), they did the math and said, "we'll make the most money being online only." If having both a magazine and online stuff would've made the most money, we wouldn't be in this thread.

Competition-wise, the two formats would have competed for content, increasing the costs for both. The DI has less overhead, however, as their overall costs are less, and is more likely to survive and thrive, therefore Dragon would die anyways, or have worse content which still makes the magazine customers unhappy.

Now is when you think, "why can't they just run the same content?" Because enough people who read the magazine would've switched over to DI to make Dragon less popular and therefore less able to pay for the same content from the freelancers. And the freelancers want more money rather than less, and a greater audience rather than less. There's some game theory involved here. Why should Wizards allow Paizo to compete when they don't have to? It's much better to grab all the benefits for yourself, and enough magazine people will switch (and enough new people will sign up) to make it worth it. Or at least that's what they're banking on. Time will indeed tell.

 

[Ourph]

Why should WotC offer an apology?

Because they disappointed some of their customers. It is standard operating procedure in the retail business to apologize to your customers when you do something that displeases them, even if you did it on purpose as part of a sound business decision. The apology should have been offered in the announcement. Something along the lines of....

"We know many of our customers are long time fans and subscribers of these publications. To those of you who will be disappointed, inconvenienced or saddened by this decision we offer our heartfelt apologies. We hope that you will find that the content and ease of use for our new Digital Initiative goes a long way toward making up for any negative feelings you might have about this new direction for the magazines."

It's not like they killed my cat or ran my car off the road or sent me a case of photocopy paper watermarked with disturbing images of cartoon-character sex, but a good business apologizes when a customer is upset (even if it's not their fault or the customer is being unreasonable) because that is part of what "customer service" means.

 

[Henry]

Jeez, a guy goes for training for two hours...


Remember the warnings we gave before? Throwing gas on glowing embers is not part of keeping it civil. Chainsaw mage is looking at a ban, and I'm really getting tired of the rape analogies...

 

[Enforcer]

Because they disappointed some of their customers. It is standard operating procedure in the retail business to apologize to your customers when you do something that displeases them, even if you did it on purpose as part of a sound business decision. The apology should have been offered in the announcement. Something along the lines of....

"We know many of our customers are long time fans and subscribers of these publications. To those of you who will be disappointed, inconvenienced or saddened by this decision we offer our heartfelt apologies. We hope that you will find that the content and ease of use for our new Digital Initiative goes a long way toward making up for any negative feelings you might have about this new direction for the magazines."

It's not like they killed my cat or ran my car off the road or sent me a case of photocopy paper watermarked with disturbing images of cartoon-character sex, but a good business apologizes when a customer is upset (even if it's not their fault or the customer is being unreasonable) because that is part of what "customer service" means.

Except in this case an apology directly interferes with their promotion of the Digital Initiative, by directly saying it'll be disappointing. How can they get people to switch by saying "we're sorry you won't like this as much"?

 

[freebfrost]

Surely not registering an opinion is a good indicator that someone doesn't care? Also it depends what Deimodius means by 'this community'. People normally talk about ENWorlders more than they do 'ENWorlders who post in General RPG Discussion' so I would take it mean the former.

Statistically speaking, it is not.

A good example of this flaw would be as follows:

We have 50,000 posters on EnWorld. In this thread, we see that 6 people respond to a question about the Nintendo Wii.

Therefore, I can conclude that only about 0.012% of EnWorlders own a Wii.

See the problems?

 

[Ourph]

Except in this case an apology directly interferes with their promotion of the Digital Initiative, by directly saying it'll be disappointing. How can they get people to switch by saying "we're sorry you won't like this as much"?

It doesn't have to. You can say "We're sorry for taking away this product you like" while at the same time saying "Here's something we think you'll like better". So far they've only said the latter, which IMO, is a mistake.

Frankly, I could care less about an apology. I'm simply not interested in the DI... at all. It's not about being mad, I'm just not interested. However, that doesn't stop me from thinking that an apology would have been a good idea.

 

[Mr. Patient]

It's not like they killed my cat or ran my car off the road or sent me a case of photocopy paper watermarked with disturbing images of cartoon-character sex, but a good business apologizes when a customer is upset (even if it's not their fault or the customer is being unreasonable) because that is part of what "customer service" means.

Perhaps WotC should get Michael Scott to make an apology tape.

 

[Deimodius]

Your response doesn't consider competition between the two formats, nor the decision-making process at Wizards. Assuming WotC is rational (and when it comes to subsidiaries of major corporations, I'm guessing bottom-line and brand-growth were big factors here), they did the math and said, "we'll make the most money being online only." If having both a magazine and online stuff would've made the most money, we wouldn't be in this thread.

Competition-wise, the two formats would have competed for content, increasing the costs for both. The DI has less overhead, however, as their overall costs are less, and is more likely to survive and thrive, therefore Dragon would die anyways, or have worse content which still makes the magazine customers unhappy.

Now is when you think, "why can't they just run the same content?" Because enough people who read the magazine would've switched over to DI to make Dragon less popular and therefore less able to pay for the same content from the freelancers. And the freelancers want more money rather than less, and a greater audience rather than less. There's some game theory involved here. Why should Wizards allow Paizo to compete when they don't have to? It's much better to grab all the benefits for yourself, and enough magazine people will switch (and enough new people will sign up) to make it worth it. Or at least that's what they're banking on. Time will indeed tell.

Enforcer, the two formats are only competing for players who are _already_ consumers of the magazine. I have already granted that if enough mag consumers want DI instead, then the decision is founded (and economic theory would have ensured the natural demise of the mags).

The problem with the argument is that it was based on the idea that it appears only to be a minority of people who are angry, and thus no big deal. As I pointed out, the real question is whether or not the people who are angry constitute a majority of the mag consumers.

I understand the business argument. WotC wanted to control the content to control the profit. The simple fact that only magazine consumers were consumers of the magazines proves that the only reason to kill the mags was to push those consumers to the DI. People who were not already mag consumers are not part of the "competition" equation because WotC is not competing for their dollars.

Simply put: if the majority of magazine consumers prefer the DI over print, then I am wrong. if the _majority_ of magazine consumers prefer print over DI, then I am right. if WotC polled ALL users, not just those who are magazine consumers, their numbers are wrong because non-magazine consumers who responded that they prefer DI over print have skewed the findings.

Killing the mags ONLY affects magazine consumers, NOT those who were not Magazine consumers. Am I wrong about that?