Blog FeedIGN Eats Some More
Now, I’m skeptical. While EA is on the prowl on one front, IGN seems to be handling the other. I never used 3D Gamers for anything more than downloads, but they were good downloads. My ISP mirrors their files so I got them speedily and without a download limit penalty. 3D Gamers released some Q & A’s about the takeover at the bottom of this page, and although they try and play down the change, one Q/A in particular stood out to me:
Q. I don’t believe you, 3D Gamers will disappear!
A. Is that a question? Look at other sites that IGN has merged with or acquired, like GameSpy, Rotten Tomatoes and TeamXbox, and see how they are doing. 3D Gamers is here to stay.
Now, I think that the general idea of including that question was to assure readers that the change doesn’t instantly mean that things are going to turn for the worst. However, I don’t think it’s any real secret that IGN’s “merger” with GameSpy was the cause of quite a few bad things. Thankfully I never saw the more intrusive ads thanks to Firefox’s AdBlock, but the community definately took a beating, with some key staff being laid off to the detriment of pretty much everyone, and the corporate feel seeping down into the community itself.
On the other hand, however, we have Rotten Tomatoes and TeamXbox, which don’t appear to have been affected badly, at least from what I have seen (which to be honest is not much). Reading over 3D Gamer’s forum, it will be interesting to see how the community takes it. But in the second post on this page, Rams pretty much has hit the nail on the head from my point of view.
12th February | Reply
Welcome to the corporate world. We might not like it (personally, I don’t much care as I left the community prior to Gamespy’s take-over and simply lament the loss of the Weekly Grudge) but the businesses merge all the time, mostly because one has skills or IP that that other needs in order to expand, or both are too small to survive. There’s very little point in one company taking over another just for the hell of it because the other one is probably too weak and you’re just pissing your money away.
Basically, it’s just consolidation unless 3D Gamers had something worth knowing about. I really don’t see this as part of some sort of Evil Empire, just probably the only way that web sites can become profitable. I mean, I can see how Gamespy makes money through the technology but what does IGN make/sell? I seriously doubt that the advertising brings in THAT much money to cover their costs, particularly given a still somewhat iffy global economy.
Anyway, all Chris needs to do is make this web site somewhat more attractive to a potential buyer and then cash-in…
12th February | Reply
An interestion idea. Cyrris, would you sell Aelon to IGN?
12th February | Reply
I believe most of IGN’s money would have come from the IGN Insider subscription service. At least, before they bought GameSpy and stuff (now they can make money off Fileplanet subs, GameSpy Arcade, and other software). The thing is, each of IGN’s acquisitions seem to have been directly under the “If you can’t beat ‘em, buy ‘em” moniker, with the exception of GameSpy.
Looking over the TeamXbox site, I see nothing that would give IGN much of an income aside from the site store, which doesn’t have that much in it. RottenTomatoes doesn’t seem to having anything except for a shop, where it sells movie posters and DVDs/Soundtracks.
IGN already had a Gaming network with Vault sites, so they didn’t need the GameSpy Network with the Planet sites. It does make sense, however, that they wanted FilePlanet and the software, because I dare say that’s where the money is. That’s fair enough. But having TeamXbox and RottenTomatoes doesn’t make sense to me. IGN already has it’s own Xbox stuff, and they also have FilmForce, which seems to compete quite directly with RT. Like TeamXbox and RottenTomatoes, 3D Gamers has nothing to offer IGN except compeition, as far as I can see.
I’m sure that there are legitimate business decisions behind these acquisitions, but then I’d say the same thing for all of EA’s as well.
12th February | Reply
As for IGN buying Aelon, (as funny as a corporate identity purchasing a blog sounds), I’m not sure. I do this without any real obligations because I can’t afford to have them - if they were paying me to stay and blog then that’d be an obligation I’m not sure I’d want. I’d need a sufficiently large amount of money. And I mean unrealistically large.
On the other hand if they gave me a lump sum and said they didn’t want me around anymore, then yeah, I’d give it to them, take the money, and start another blog somewhere else with all the cash. No problem there. I could then get a domain name that’s easier to pronounce first time.
12th February | Reply
Just as an aside to this topic, I wonder whether a gaming community can be viewed in the same way as a consumer market? Does buying another web site immediately enable you to capture more of the market in the same way that Oracle’s acquisition of PeopleSoft/JD Edwards, or do you just gain a business with a market that might just walk away?
Essentially I am just wondering whether buying a competing web site can be viewed in the market dominance that buying competing consumer companies can be, or whether the Internet communities are so fickle and easily mobile that they’ll just go elsewhere? Is there any business benefit from buying a competing web site as an aim to capturing a bigger market? On this topic I am not sure. Certainly the communities are mobile, but I wonder whether the owners of IGN consider this or whether they do have a different goal in mind (the previously mentioned acquisition of skills/infrastructure/IP).
Anyway, just me rambling on again.
12th February | Reply
Well, as is the case with all of IGNs acquisitions so far, they essentially leave the brand name as it is, as well as the communities. Obviously I can only say how I’ve seen things happen with GameSpy, and I’d imagine the other acquisitions would have been somewhat different, as they were all much smaller and didn’t all have as much overlapping content like GameSpy and IGN had (and have) with each other.
From an outsiders perspective I suppose it would look more like an alliance. They share news, link to each others content, etc… but it starts to get more than that. GameSpy and IGN now have one integrated Customer Support centre. Also, they share the same community manager, so the person who directly oversees the IGN community (message boards and such) also oversees that of GameSpy’s now. So internally the changes were quite sgnificant. That was also shown with some staff layoffs…
The communities don’t move because there is not enough of an external change to justify them doing so. The editors on each site remain, so there is still unique content on each. I suppose that because I have more insight as to what goes on inside (as I’m friends with moderators, and am a veteran in the community), I can see how the internal changes affect things more than most. I can say that thus far the changes in GameSpy’s community has not been good, but it’s really more of a testament to the dedication of the mods that the community has not been overly affected despite the changes with the powers that be. Without going into detail, IGN taking over has lead to some heated discussions regarding policy changes and stupid staff appointments.
It’s not just about communities though. IGN buying all these sites means it’s overall number of pageviews increases substantially. IGN puts their ads on the newly acquired sites, and turns those extra pageviews into more ad revenue. Plus, as I said, the proceeds from software sales and any relevant online stores and subscription services all go towards IGN. In that respect, I guess it is a lot like your average commercial takeover.
25th February | Reply
Isn’t 3D Gamers a competitor to FilePlanet? If FilePlanet is where the money is, why would they dare keep 3D Gamers open and free?