I am still wearing blinders (Origins Online)

[tekwych 1752xp 0]

GAMA, The Game Manufacturer’s Association, is the political voice of the tabletop gaming industry. This is the organization that was created to be the industry voice about trade tariffs, about internet taxation, about all the things that need to be balanced among Publishers, Manufactures, Distributors, Retailers, and Consumers. They have hosted a public convention, The Origins Game Fair, for 45 years. Attendance of the show in 2019 approach 21,000 people coming to Columbus Ohio for a weekend of playing games face to face. The physical event was canceled this year and an online, virtual convention was created to try and help people get back to some kind of normal. A virtual table that we could all gather around.

Mass media has covered the convention every year. This year they covered the issue of gathering together during COVI-19 and they covered the cancelation of the show and creation of the online show.

This week mass media covered the cancelation of the online show and the statement GAMA posted about the cancelation:

https://icv2.com/articles/news/view/45904/gama-cancels-origins-game-fair-2020

https://www.originsgamefair.com/origins-online

I read the press release and accepted the fate of the show. Look at how the industry is responding. We should pat them on the back.

This is what most of the public has seen, What many will think

. What happened in the 4 days before that press release was that many POC (People of Color) in the industry asked GAMA why they had not made ANY statement about a situation so massive, so political that it pushed a world wide pandemic of the front page. As the ‘unified’ voice of the Game industry and its lobbying arm in Washington where was the statement about where the game industry stands. GAMA chose not to reply to these questions or make any public statement.

Almost 80% of the POC that were to participate in Origins Online and a significant number of other participants including the show runner chose to no longer participate in the event.

It is most likely the actions of these individuals forced GAMA to cancel the show. A show that no longer had content of staffing to be able to exist. It was not their own feelings or desires. It was a business decision to pull out before a situation got worse.

Eric M Lang, one of the most prolific game designers and someone who often speaks up to talk about what its like to be and individual within an industry read the GAMA press release with very different eyes than mine. Eric is Black and made a statement of his own

https://twitter.com/eric_lang/status/1271095405644779521/photo/1

I did not see the erasure. I did not see how an industry was rewriting history as it happened to make sure they came out on top. I did not see the whitewashing right in front of my face.

I had seen tweets and blog posts from many of these people explain why the were stepping away from the show. I knew that BLM was a core issue for many who were stepping away. I read the GAMA press release and thought how great it was that GAMA was stepping up.

I thought I was open to equality yet I find I am still blind to the ways in which we find to keep one group above another. I need to look around myself with a new perspective.

I need to apologize to Eric and all the POC in the industry whose work, whose willingness to forfeit their livelihoods for this issue, was going to be erased and I couldn’t see it. I hope that the world I have been living and the one POC have been surviving in can finally find a single place where all can be treated for who they are and nothing else.

Sorry for the ramble but this had to come out. If there is anything in this than please share

[neal5x5 1370xp 0]

I’m not convinced that the collapse of Origins is a positive for the game industry, game designers (regardless of skin tone), or gamers in general.

[rastamannParticipant 2735xp 3]

I honestly fail to see how the industry as a whole must respond to political events, when they do not do so in the case of refugees of the multiple North African and Middle Eastern ongoing conflicts, arguably a more pressing matter, that has been a human catastrophe for the past 9 years.

I respect the views of everyone involved and firmly believe, as I always have, that ALL lives matter, but I don’t go around demanding everyone and their pet make statements about it. We change by making change happen, instead of demanding political statements from people who are, quite frankly, not in the business of making them and that are currently navigating extremely dangerous waters. This atmosphere of “with us or against us” is quite reminiscent of the Comittee of Public Safety that was implemented during the French Revolution and not at all conducive to anything other than more extreme views on either side, I think.

Finally, I fail to see how Origins going away will benefit the gaming community as a whole or advance the current political agenda in the least.

[tekwych 1752xp 0]

@neal5x5

It’s not. Origins is a major showcase for the industry to get things into the public eye in North America. I am sure that Origins will be back next year. Consumer shows have become a significant part of any companies marketing budget and the fact that more and more conventions are happening, and happening successfully, proves that.

@rastamann
But that is exactly what a trade association is supposed to do. This is not about Origins but about GAMA and who and what they represent. This is just the latest, and most public, step in a long series of struggles to define GAMA for a modern industry.

GAMA was created at a time when you could fit the names of all the board game publishers in the world on a small slip of paper. It was to be a way to help those publishers reach distributer and retailers with information about upcoming product. Early on they became a political tool to work with governments on things like trade tariffs, duties and taxes, and piracy

Now days there are tens of thousands of publishers as well as designers, artists, developers, sculptors, and more looking for representation. Along side the publishers and distributers you also have studios, manufacturing, design houses, licensing houses, and the retailers and consumers asking for a voice. Add to that things like Kickstarter and the tabletop game industry has grown exponentially without any substantial change in how GAMA operates.

Retailers got actual representation within the GAMA structure a few years ago but did not have voting rights (They are the Porto Rico or District of Columbia of GAMA) Designers and Developers are starting to be given credit for their work on many boxes but have no unified voice. When was the last time you were told who sculpted the miniature you just purchased?

Would a book get published without listing its editors? These are all people who the industry can not do without. People who, in writing, music, TV, Movies, Theatre and more would have been given credit for their work and have representation within the trade associations of those industries.

The fact the GAMA continues to ignore the groups it should be representing has been boiling in the background for quite some time. This is just the most public attempt to get a 50 year old association to grow up and actually represent its industry as it exists now, not last century.

As Erik says in his statement, this is not about a statement or about BLM or even race. This is about representation within a group. If GAMA was made up of people who actually include all of the groups that they claim to represent then missteps would be caught earlier and corrected, most likely in house before it becomes a public issue.

GAMA today announced the list of people to be voted to its board of directors, they are all males who represent publishers.

I fully believe that had this been the physical Origins show this would not have happened and that at next years Origins convention will not have any public issue. That it was a quickly created online attempt to say “here is our convention” allowed a smaller group to create a bigger wave and affect the public outcome. I do expect the GAMA Trade Show, the closed to the public industry get together, to be for more about what GAMA is and should be next year than it has in years past.

[limburger 21704xp 0]

@tekwych : the media industry is the only industry in which the names of the crew is mentioned at all.

You might know what architect designed your house (if you’re lucky and it was a prestige project), but there is practically zero chance that you will know (or know where to find) the names of all the contractors and other people who made it possible.

The same thing happens with pretty much any product we use. At best we get to see the names of a few high profile designers who are famous/connected/skilled enough to have their names printed & listed, but the vast majority of products are designed, produced and maintained by an unnamed mass of people.

Yes it would be nice to know and give credit where it is due, but at the same time … it is a job like any other. Few if any get any royalties for any of the work they do, despite the fact that the companies they work for make a lot of profit because of the work the little people did.

And yet here’s the thing : if you know who made your favourite product … how are you going to use that info ?
You can’t exactly tell company X that you need more of designer Y’s models (or fewer of designer Z), because that’s not how companies work. Besides … you’re already have a way for that : vote with your wallet.

Are you going to avoid buying stuff because of the names attached ?
Shouldn’t we look at the final product and judge it for what it was and not judge it for who made it ?
Judge a book not for its cover, but for its content ? Isn’t that what an anti-discrimination message really is ?

The democratization of the manufacturing proces has been a blessing and a curse.
It meant that anyone can make things to sell to consumers, which removes some of the barriers to getting your product in the market.
It also means that anyone can make things to sell to consumers, which floods the market.
And it’s not something that can be solved … or if it is then it surely will be worthy of a Nobel prize or something equally significant.

I think the biggest problem for this industry is that it relies on people interacting physically with the products.
You can’t replace this with a virtual marketplace, because … well that is what the internet already is.

Trying to twist this failure to do what existing websites/channels have been doing since the dawn of time into a political message is sad and lazy.  Instead of reinventing the wheel they should have looked at what already is out there and focus on that.

We already have competing websites that try to curate the flood of new products so it becomes a more managable flow of news. And as with any curation there will be a bias, because the curation is why the flow is limited.

Origins – online could have worked if they had invested in an on-line/virtual equavalent decades ago when the show began.
Except … few (if any) within this industry saw the need for an on-line  presence.

And I’ve noticed that there is a distinct fear of any technology within this hobby, which is why we’re still stuck in the dark ages while the rest of the entertainment industry (and the consumers) have moved on. There was always going to be a price to pay for this in a digital era.

Blaming outside factors for things like this is lazy and shows that the industry is unwilling to accept that they have been lagging behind for a long time.

The companies within this industry that were ahead of the curve in the digital market were also the ones that were the fastest to adapt to the problems the pandemic caused due to the cancelling of events.

You can sort of see the same thing happening with 3D printing … the companies that are adapting to that as part of their products are going to be the ones who will survive the next thing that happens in the world outside of their bubble.

To expect big events to return to form next year is to underestimate the impact it has had on how we consume news as a result.
Heck, most of us could only dream of visiting the big events anyway, so we already relied on websites to cover events of this nature.
The only thing that has happened is that the lucky few lost their favourite holiday.
Journalists within this industry now have to work for a living instead of relying on the news that is fed to them during these events.

As nice as it was to have an Origins … I think the flood of info during those events was starting to become counter-productive.
The little guys still got lost …
Only the big boys had the means to stay visible during the event.

[tekwych 1752xp 1]

Limburger wrote:

the media industry is the only industry in which the names of the crew is mentioned at all.

You call it media but I will claim the books, TV, Movies, Music, and theatre are entertainment and what are tabletop games if not a way for the consumer to be entertained. Give credit to the people who do the work. Their names are often placed somewhere in the rulebook and many sites do track what information is out there (as a curator for OTT I have suggested we track this info here)

Limburger wrote:

And yet here’s the thing : if you know who made your favourite product … how are you going to use that info ?

You can’t exactly tell company X that you need more of designer Y’s models (or fewer of designer Z), because that’s not how companies work. Besides … you’re already have a way for that : vote with your wallet.

Thats just it, I want to vote with my money. I knew that I enjoyed many games by Richard Garfield so Bought Keystone more for his name than for the game marketing. The mechanics kept me for a while but it was Richards name that got me to give money to FFG.

Plaid Hat Games let it be known that Fernanda Suarez was the artist behind Ashes: Rise of the Phoenixborn  and Catalyst gave artist credit to Echo Chernik for her work Shadowrun and I have searched out and purchased artwork form both. Jordan Weismanhas created several games that I enjoy so I am more likely to purchase a game he has worked on because it will, most likely, be something I will enjoy.  I have also picked up games because Rick Priestley or Alessio Cavatore not for the merchandising of the game but because I knew the work of the person. Many of these people are freelance and do not work for a single company. The only way to find more of something you like is determined why you like it and seak out the same. If you don’t know who designed the game mechanics or drew the art then what criteria do you use? The Publisher? Do I buy and try every game from Fantasy Flight because I enjoyed Arkham Horror?

Limburger wrote:

Are you going to avoid buying stuff because of the names attached ?…Judge a book not for its cover, but for its content ? Isn’t that what an anti-discrimination message really is ?

I have not found a designer who I came claim “I won’t buy this because of them” but there have been many games that did not get my money for  pre order because I knew the work of the people involved and felt I would need to go to be FLGS and try before I buy. Knowing the designers is a way to get my money faster, not a reason for me to withhold any money.

Limburger wrote:

I think the biggest problem for this industry is that it relies on people interacting physically with the products.

I do not see this as a problem at all. To be at a table, whether with friends or creating new ones, playing games is all about the physical social interaction. If I did not want that physical interaction I can play video games (or the digital version of some board game)

Limburger wrote:

Trying to twist this failure to do what existing websites/channels have been doing since the dawn of time into a political message is sad and lazy….few (if any) within this industry saw the need for an on-line  presence.

Sorry, None of this is relevant to the discussion of giving representation. Live show, digital show, no show docent mater if we don’t have games to play

Limburger wrote:

Blaming outside factors for things like this is lazy and shows that the industry is unwilling to accept that they have been lagging behind for a long time.

No one is blaming outside factors. Please read the statement by Erik. The issue has been around for years. COVID and BLM were simply two more coals on the fire. Coals that happened to force public light onto the subject. Any blame is on the parties not listening to each other.

Limburger wrote:

To expect big events to return to form next year is to underestimate the impact it has had on how we consume news as a result….Only the big boys had the means to stay visible during the event.

Agin not relevant to the discussion but yes, I agree. I think the the largest (Tier 1 shows) in many industries will shrink considerably. May San Diego Comic Con will get back to being a show I might be interested in agin (I doubt it) and, I hope, may of the local Tier 3 shows are going to get bigger as people who don’t want to go to the Tier 1 shows still want the experience. IMO there will be more regional shows of smaller scale. More hands on, try this game and less “This is the next big thing”. This will force the marketing machines to change. Do you attend 5 Tier 1 shows with big announcements or find 24 regional shows that will allow you to demonstrate and playtest?

Hindsight is 20/20 but at the moment does any one want to be 2020?

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