Will the Wizards Digital Initiative still be around in 5 years?

[Turjan]

Yes it will be around. Which is to say, no it won't be around in the way you think. It won't be an "initiative" anymore because the purpose of the original initiative will have LONG been accomplished.

That's exactly how I see it. I think eTool's failure was a lack of enthusiasm behind the project. If you don't show any interest in something you allegedly want to achieve, you will fail. This time, the signs look different.

 

[Charwoman Gene]

A couple of them, actually. While in development under Fluid's control, Master Tools/eTools was closely overseen by a WotC manager (Jim Bishop to start with, then later a Byrt Martinez if I'm getting the name right, and if I'm not forgetting an intermediate step in there like a Ryan Dancey). Whether you hire your own people or hire someone else's people, you need to get the job done. And the job never did get done, in my opinion.

Jim Bishop... till he was fired.
Byrt Martinez... till he was fired.
Ryan Dancey... till he was fired.
Anthony Valterra... till he was fired.

 

[Steel_Wind]

True, but what year was that? Even a few years in the realm of technology can make a huge difference.

Plus I think they just hired a 3rd party company and let them have at it with little or no oversight.*

* Eric, I seer from a later post of yours that there was oversight...so apparantly it wasn't very good oversight, so hopefully THAT will improve.

You can have all the oversight in the world. You can have 3 meetings a day with the Hasbro Board of Directors, weekly chats with shareholders and hourly e-mail updates to Monopoly's Mr. Moneybags.

Unless you have timely delivery of beta and release candidates, a professional QA staff with a pro QA budget to match to stomp them, bugs will persist.

That isn't opinion - that's fact.

There were problems with Master Tools that were Fluid's making. CMP's problems had nothing to do with oversight.

It's harder than it looks folks.