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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Greg Benage" data-source="post: 6862079" data-attributes="member: 93631">At worst, it's Early Bronze Age. Papyrus dates from around 2300 BCE, if I remember correctly.Wizards is a relatively small subsidiary of a large toymaker dating from 1923. They make niche hobby games that are made of paper and cardboard, and that compliments their parent company's toys, which are made of plastic. (In truth, it was probably a much bigger compliment when Pokémon was driving very large revenues, a fact which likely causes Hasbro executives great consternation.) They also publish novels that are made of paper, though like all commercial publishers, they're trying to slowly manage a transition to digital that doesn't make their distribution and retail network disappear overnight, since most of their sales still come from paper.Wizards is good at making up, writing, editing and illustrating stuff. They're also good at outsourcing the manufacturing of printed stuff, and the moving of printed stuff from factories to retail shelves. That's their core competency and their core business. They don't know much about digital stuff, except that when they let someone try to do digital stuff it usually either ends badly or results in them selling less printed stuff. This means the costs of their printed stuff increase and their sales of printed stuff decrease, and it also makes their distribution and retail partners unhappy, because they also depend on printed stuff. These companies' net profits are about five dollars and thirty-seven cents as it is, and they mostly worry about going the way of the record store.There may come a time when not enough people want printed stuff with cards, boards, and books to support even a niche business. Then Wizards will go away and Hasbro will just hold onto its IP and license it to makers of digital stuff. But right now, enough people seem to like the printed stuff that Wizards can run a lean and profitable operation and their tier partners can continue to make their five dollars and thirty-seven cents. That's not saying someone at Wizards can't propose a project or partnership to produce some digital stuff. But someone at the company with an MBA or common sense is probably going to ask, "Sounds cool. What do we know about it and how does it drive our core business"? And then the digital stuff doesn't happen because the answer to both questions is, "Nothing."</blockquote>

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