泥中蟠龍's Game愛歌 [A love song for games of the dragon waiting for an opportunity] The founder and the owner

泥中蟠龍's Game愛歌

[A love song for games of the dragon waiting for an opportunity]

 

The founder and the owner

 

November. 30. 2017.

Recently, I heard of a painful story from the CEO of an investment firm. To sums up,

 

“Why do most chief executive officers are the majority shareholder in the video game companies and keep holding it since the firm received investment several times? Why don't they evenly divide profits with the founding members? I think there seems to be an issue."

 

As the introduction says, I worked extensively with video game development and I'm now working with investment in game studios. An investor who provides capital to start-ups showing high growth potential is called a "venture capitalist (VC)". Among them, the number of VCs that specializes in investing in game development is not significant. Therefore, I have been given a chance often to deliver a lecture on things that a game company needs to prepare to attract investment such as the process of attracting and writing up a business plan, etc. I used to say that the higher the stakes of the CEO, the better the win situation for attracting investment. A good few venture capitalists are reluctant to invest in a game developer where the leader owns a considerably low percentage of stock. If a venture-funded business, which wants to attract a follow-up investment after its initial one, has abnormally low CEO stakes, it can be a big hindrance to encourage investors.

 

Apart from that, along with investment firm-related problems, not only the CEO but also ex-VC pointed out that most successful entrepreneurs in the local gaming industry have tended to be tight-fisted to share money with employees and to think of themselves as not a founder or chief executive officer but an owner or ruler. I also have the experience of running a video game company in the past and I'm not the exception, either. I was at a complete loss for words when I was asked what I have done to change our perception of the industry as one of the venture capitalists who specialize in a video game.

 

The national gaming industry is the engine that drives all the other content industries and there are many listed companies. Every year, a couple of video game firms go public, which makes several persons very rich with about from a few hundred billion won to a few trillion won. A new star in the industry has been born this year and it is also expected to continue next year. However, the more the new rich share in profits, the more the industry will flourish. I hope that the number of would-be entrepreneurs, who make a game they want to create from the experience of the successful developer and its team, more than the number of future CEOs, who want to be the owner of the company from taking a leaf out of the successful owner CEO's book. I should change my perception of a developer where the CEO owns a high percent stake. And I expect that the small change will make a big difference.

 

※ This is from Kyunghyang Games column by 泥中蟠龍 since September 2013.

(http://www.khgames.co.kr)

 

Translation by Kim Ki-hui

 

泥中蟠龍's Game愛歌 [A love song for games of the dragon waiting for an opportunity] G-Star and Busan International Film Festival

泥中蟠龍's Game愛歌

[A love song for games of the dragon waiting for an opportunity]

 

G-Star and Busan International Film Festival

 

November. 23. 2017.

I go to Busan a couple of times every year to attend Busan Indie Connect Festival (BIC Fest) in summer, Busan International Film Festival (BIFF) in October, and G-Star in November. Aside from relatively small-scale BIC Fest, there are many similarities between BIC Fest and the other huge international content-related events. Participants have an opportunity to look back on what has happened in each industry for the past year and see brand-new content which will be released soon. The festival is attended by celebrities and famous producers. Also, there are many content creators to attract investment for a project in preparation and overseas sales as well.

 

The majority expected that the number of audiences would decrease a lot since College Scholastic Ability Test (CSAT) pushed back a week due to earthquakes hit Pohang and the surrounding areas, however, there were many visitors unexpectedly and a national video game PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds (PUBG) stood out the most in years beating out foreign video games. Despite this good news, I felt a big difference in quality between the film festival and the game show.

 

During the BIFF, South Korea's second-most-populous city is alive with lots of media professionals. The media publish hundreds or thousands of stories on the film festival in a single day and moviegoers arrive from across the country to enjoy the event. More than a few volunteers are found throughout the city and even taxi drivers are well aware of relevant information. Whenever I went to the city, I used to secure the same hotel, which is just off Haeundae, for four years because of the shortage of accommodations in the main area. In October, the hotel owner, who remembers my face, used to ask me that I visited the city for BIFF, whereas in November, he used to wonder about the unexpected visits. The over ten-year-old game show seems to shunned by the public due in part to its low event awareness. During the event, only Haeundae and surrounding areas around Bexco are crowded. The number of tourists for the fete is much lower than the number of visitors to the film festival. Some people tend to look down on video game fans for G-Star as if they are people with nothing to do unlike respecting serious film fans for BIFF, which brings me a very uncomfortable feeling.

 

The local gaming industry constitutes a great proportion of Korea's whole industry. Even now numerous game developers are trying to make a good game. I reckon that it's an important time in improving public awareness about video games as cultural content. It was only some decades ago that cinema was also judged as being a waste of time. The gradual alteration of the audience is from a great number of movie professionals' efforts. Now is the time for video game workers to change the way the public understands the game content.

 

 

※ This is from Kyunghyang Games column by 泥中蟠龍 since September 2013.

(http://www.khgames.co.kr)

 

Translation by Kim Ki-hui

 

泥中蟠龍's Game愛歌 Who is a data monopolist?

이중반룡의 게임애가

泥中蟠龍's Game愛歌

[A love song for games of the dragon waiting for an opportunity]

 

Who is a data monopolist?

 

August. 29. 2018.

I recently read an article in which the Korea Communications Commission has launched policy developments to respond to data monopoly of companies including Google, Facebook, and Amazon etc. It also said that Google has been hit with €4.34 billion fine by EU regulators for forcing Android device manufacturers to load search engine and browser and KCC let their policy stand in the way of rectifying 'tilted playground' between multinational Internet content providers and local content corporations. I may be a person with a narrow outlook on the issue, but it doesn't give me a satisfactory explanation.

 

Before anything else, a monopoly exists when a specific person or company is the only supplier of a particular good or service. And an oligopoly is a market in which control over the supply of a commodity is in the hands of a few sellers. If a few large producers collude, it is no different from the monopolization and both can be distorted by a small number of suppliers.

 

I notice something strange here. Google specializes in Internet search engine. According to data by Opensurvey earlier this year, Naver ranked first with the largest market share at 75 percent and Google controlled about 12 percent of the entire market. So it does not make sense to take an issue with Google's monopoly.

 

As I said in the last column about net neutrality, a few Internet service providers, who provide services for accessing and using in the Internet, own one hundred percent of data supply. I don't understand why the Korea Communications Commission blames data monopoly on Internet content providers, a web portal or organization that handles the distribution of online content. Monopoly or oligopoly can be a problem when there is no alternative but to choose among a small number of suppliers. Alternative exist, no one could take issue with customer's choice. Even If this is problematic, KCC should have examine the No. 1 company first.

 

The penalty, which European Union imposed on Google, is not related to data. The multinational technology company has been slapped a record antitrust fine for abusing the dominance of its Android mobile operating system requiring smartphone manufacturers to pre-install Google Search and Chrome apps on devices. European Union's decision is to fine for abusing internet search in the smartphone market with limited number of suppliers. It's not about data monopoly, which users use.

 

If the article is true, the policy development of KCC is to protect a few local corporations and is against government policy that I expected to the new government. As I mentioned earlier data can not be monopolized. Using the term 'data monopoly' to international content providers entered South Korean market is not that different from the scarlet letter. I hope that my apprehensions, which KCC colluded with local Internet service providers and market-dominating content providers intends to build 'tilted playground', won't realize.

 

※ This is from Kyunghyang Games column by 泥中蟠龍 since September 2013.

   (http://www.khgames.co.kr)

    Translation by Kim Ki-hui