From Massively:
“This whole concept of freemium play, in my opinion, is the most radical form of entertainment socialism since Obama got elected. You’ve got a whole bunch of one-percenters paying for a bunch of freeloaders.”
-Scott Dodson, Bobber Entertainment
I was not even sure what to do with that quote. It was so wrong on so many levels that I immediately assumed it was made in jest and was only being reported as serious by people looking to stir the pot for page views.
And I was right. He was playing a role on the panel at that point.
Nice job Massively! A new Editor in Chief means a new editorial line?
Still, some of the discussion on the ethics panel at GDC Online, as reported elsewhere, does raise interesting questions.
The Ancient Gaming Noob 
Yeah, that quote is… dumb. The larger discussion is interesting, though.
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I like this:
“‘Sticky’ is not, generally, a good quality. I think we have this subtle language of control for our customers, and when paired with our ability to collect data, it raises some interesting ethical questions.”
…especially since it applies equally to the subscription model.
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@Tesh – I am hoping that this will be one of the panels they make available for free on the GDC web site to view. That and the Damion Schubert presentation.
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“entertainment socialism since Obama got elected”
The whole thing is total, utter nonsense, but I really cannot even begin to try and comprehend this part of the quotation. Perhaps I’m missing something here, but I thought the whole “Obama is a socialist” shtick was, even in the US, a moronic thing to say, but how on earth does Obama becoming the American Faction Leader count as entertainment socialism? Did Obama’s campaign team “subsidise” the other 99% of the US population with their devilishly clever campaigning?
Am confuzzled.
Also: paid writers at Massively analysing something and using factual, reasoned arguments to make a case that supports basic common sense and the consumer? OHOHOHOHOHOHOHO, you and your funny ideas, Mr Wilhelm. Being paid just means they get to write trash that most “amateur” bloggers wouldn’t touch even if they had ads.
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@Dril – He was being provocative on purpose, playing the over-the-top cynical conservative card. That was the point of the quote in the context of the panel.
Taking him to task on that quite is like going after Gielgud for promoting regicide because he played the lead role in MacBeth.
Okay, maybe not Gielgud. I just pulled a Shakespearean actor out of the air and that probably errs way too far on the side of famous. But somebody who played MacBeth.
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@Wilhelm – Patrick Stewart?
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Socialism isn’t a dirty word where I live so I found the quote doubly hard to parse.
The issue of exploiting people with mental health issues bears some deeper examination, though.
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This seems to be happening more and more in the technology press in general. Fact checking is not a dirty phrase people.
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I’ve met Scott Dodson before. He’s actually a fairly sharp guy, and yeah I figure he was playing up a role on the panel. It’s pretty common to have people take “extreme” positions on a panel discussion like that to keep things from devolving into, “Yeah, we all pretty much agree on this reasonable part here” and then nobody getting invited back. :)
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@Psychochild
Surely there’s room to actually play devil’s advocate (and play it well) rather than simply acting like a moron so the panel is quasi-interesting? An interesting debate would be far better, to my mind, than trying to force in nonsensical phrases that have nothing to do with the discussion at hand.
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