[Editor's note: HarassmentPanda gives us the lowdown on the Entertainment Software Association and what it means to all of us. It's a very informative read and is a very important topic to all gamers to understand. -- CTZ]
Recently, the Internet has been abuzz with discussion surrounding Activision and Vivendi’s decision not to continue their membership with the Entertainment Software Association (”ESA”). Coupled with a rumored defection by LucasArts, gamers have begun to wonder if this is a portent of troubled times for the gaming industry’s premier trade association. While it is too early to declare that the ESA is “rapidly taking on water,” a continued decline in membership over the next year could signal trouble.
Overall, news of the Activision/Vivendi departure was met with a predominantly favorable response from gamers. While there was an occasional expression of concern for the future of the organization, the majority of gamers seemed to be bewildered with what the ESA actually does. As a result, many were proud of Activision and Vivendi for pulling out of an organization they viewed as being largely irrelevant.
Interestingly, complaints went beyond anonymous remarks from Internet users. Wedbush Morgan’s Michael Pachter chastised the ESA for being too passive since the departure of former president Doug Lowenstein. And, perhaps strangest of all, Mike Wilson, CEO of Gamecock Studios, recently released a snarky video announcing that he is running for ESA President. More after the jump.
Despite these complaints, the vast majority of hostility towards the ESA has come from gamers and journalists. The gaming industry, on the other had, has been largely supportive of the ESA’s efforts. Industry heavy-weights Capcom and Electronic Arts have come forth and shown their support for the ESA and Take-Two, a company in perhaps the best position to judge the ESA’s performance, has stated that it “supports the Entertainment Software Association, its leadership and its efforts on behalf of the industry” and that “Mike Gallagher has done an outstanding job as president of the ESA…"
The reason for the ESA having a fair number of opponents among gamers is not hard to cognize and was well put by Mike Musgrove of the Washington Post:
The [ESA] makes headlines on game news sites only when there’s been an anti-piracy crackdown or a new uproar over a game’s rating. Neither of those types of story tends to win the organization fans in the gamer community.
However, it is time for the ESA to make headlines for entirely new reasons. It’s time for gamers to discuss what the ESA does and why it is so imperative that this organization continue to defend the interests of the gaming industry.
What is the ESA and what does it do?
Perhaps the most fundamental problem with public perception of the ESA is that most gamers do not understand the nature or intent of the organization. Prior to writing this article, I conducted an unscientific poll and found that gamers typically believed one of three things about the ESA:
(1) the ESA is the group that “is supposed to sue all those people making videogame laws,”
(2) the ESA “arrests all of those people selling modchips,” or
(3) “the ESA doesn’t do anything.” Granted, the majority of gamers have never heard of the ESA, but this sampling was taken from gamers informed enough to know what the ESA is, but decidedly less informed than the extremely “hardcore” gaming community. (Disclosure: Those polled were GameStop employees.)
To a certain extent, answers (1) and (2) are both correct. The ESA does involve itself with defending against anti-game legislation and it also helps organizations, such as Immigration and Customs Enforcement, arrest and prosecute game pirates. However, the true intent of the ESA is far more expansive. According to the ESA Web site, the organization is “dedicated to serving the business and public affairs needs of companies that publish video and computer games for videogame consoles, personal computers, and the Internet.” What does this mean? Well, it means that the ESA is the videogame industry’s trade association.
In the most basic sense, a trade association is a public relations organization that is funded by corporations in a common industry. Trade associations typically promote an industry by lobbying, advertising, making political donations, and educating the public about the relevant industry. More specifically, the ESA actively combats copyright infringement, censorship, and government regulation of videogames and regularly publishes business and consumer research concerning the video game industry. Additionally, the ESA is responsible for founding the Electronic Entertainment Expo (”E3″), the Entertainment Software Rating Board (”ESRB”), and the VideoGame Voters Network (”VGVN”). Put in this framework, it is clear that the ESA has a fair number of projects, but one important question remains:
Why should gamers care?
First, despite impressive sales, videogames continue to lack political credibility. While generally under the radar of most gamers, the ESA has taken giant strides toward legitimizing videogames as a valid concern for leaders on Capitol Hill. Even with $17.9 billion in sales across 2007, most political leaders did not view videogames as a legitimate concern of their constituents. Instead, the few times games were brought up in congress, it was usually part of a bill designed to limit the “negative effects of gaming on children.”
As of this writing, the ESA is the only organization that has attempted to buck this pernicious trend. Between the announcement of a new political action committee dedicated to supporting politicians who are friends of the gaming industry and the creation of the VideoGame Voters Network, the ESA has taken steps to influence politicians in the two areas that matter most: money and votes. The ESA’s attempts to organize both contributers and voters into a unified, grass-roots movement has been immensely important to the political maturation of the gaming industry. Despite the relatively low-profile of many of these efforts, these activities form the absolutely essential foundation required to ensure that gamers have a significant voice in the political process.
Second, gamers should care about the ESA because it is the gaming industry’s only form of organized political influence in Washington. Whether another, more effective organization could be formed would provide enough discussion for an entirely new post, but, as it currently stands, the ESA is the only organized group continuously lobbying for the gaming industry in Washington. The importance of effective lobbying cannot be understated, particularly for an industry still clamoring to gain political and cultural credibility. From frozen pizza to healthcare consultants, the number of trade associations lobbying the US government in some form is staggering. The importance of lobbying is no mere hyperbole, the mass assemblage of lobby groups across numerous industries makes two things clear: (1) lobbying works and (2) without an effective lobby, even the most noble causes will be lost among the thousands of groups bellowing for their constituents.
Aside from lobbying efforts, the ESA has created an organization that would be nigh impossible to sustain without the backing of the gaming industry at large: the VideoGame Voters Network. While still in relative infancy, the VGVN has already proven an effective tool for organizing voting-age gamers into a common collective. Within the span of a week, the VGVN surpassed a membership of 10,000 voters and now boasts membership well over 100,000. Through their Web site, the VGVN has successfully informed both voters and politicians about issues in the videogame industry and further launched several state-wide campaigns to battle videogame legislation.
Third, the ESA is responsible for supporting the successful litigation of numerous anti-videogame bills. While many gamers criticize the ESA by claiming that the organization is too hands-off with its litigation efforts, people fail to recognize the work that the ESA has done in numerous states. First, it is important to recognize that the ESA’s job is not to serve as private council for every game publisher that is brought to court. Such involvement is impossible from a practical standpoint; litigation is expensive and the ESA cannot provide support in every case. Instead, the ESA picks its court battles carefully and only takes action when the outcome of a decision is critical for the industry as a whole. The ESA has been a key player in industry victories against state legislation seeking to regulate or censor games. Among these victories are decisions against the Minnesota VideoGames Act, Michigan’s bill regulating the sale of violent videogames, the Illinois regulation on videogame sales, and the St. Louis violent videogame bill. Each of these decisions has proven to be an important victory for First Amendment protection of video games and has often resulted in damage awards for game publishers.
Conclusion
Despite my seemingly lavish praise for the ESA, I will impart one caveat emptor: the ESA is still a publisher-owned organization. While the political aims of publishers have so far been in line with the concerns of the average gamer, there is always a point where the interests of consumers and publishers will diverge. The clearest example of this was in the scaling back of E3. Gamers came to love the glitz and glamor of the industry’s largest trade show, but the ESA decided to scale back the event when it became little more than a massive pissing contest between publishers. While this move was not favored by the press, the ESA hoped it would better serve the interests of its constituent publishers — whether this is true has yet to be seen.
In sum, the ESA is an organization that is largely misunderstood by the gaming community and extremely important to health of our hobby as a whole. While seemingly opaque at first blush, the ESA is surprisingly frank and upfront with its policy and goals. While I don’t expect everyone to agree with the methods or policy behind every ESA decision, I hope that everyone reading this is now in a position to answer to oft-posed question, “What does the ESA actually do, anyway?”
[Interested in more political shenanigans in the videogame industry? Check out HarassmentPanda's blog, Laws of Play. -- CTZ]
Contest:
7:21 PM on 05.12.2008
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I do miss Lowenstein's relentless assaults on anti-gaming issues, however, and Mike Gallagher struck me as a little wet behind the ears for the job.
Great post.
No srsly, JAWESOME.
Also you know a law student has written a post when (1) a sentence like this appears: (Disclosure: Those polled were GameStop employees.), (2)the term caveat emptor is used or other Lating, (3) ideas and examples are broken down with numbers in parenthesis before them for easier reference later in the article.
Finally, how the fuck do you text wrap?
Isn't there another group for video game consumers now? I forget the name, or if I just made it up or not, but I feel like they would be able to address your final caveat in this.
Seriously, I feel like this is required reading for all gamers that are passionate about keeping video games a part of society.
The group you are thinking of is the [url=hthttp://www.theeca.com/]Entertainment Consumers Association[/url] and is another worthwhile organization, but has a decidedly different focus.
And to everyone inquiring about blockquotes and text wrap, it's all XHTML. Just type up the code and use the "video embed" feature to post it. Please do not exploit this little trick.
*sigh*
This is a fantastic article, and I hope some of the other blogs pick it up as well. As Ashley Davis said above me, Knowledge Is Power. I for one only learned of the VGVN through your article. They may have just found another member.
I really had no idea what the ESA was before now, but it's easy to comprehend it's importance. If only you could turn this article into a pamphlet, we might grow to appreciate the ESA like gun owners appreciate the NRA, or comic readers the CBLDF.
I personally wish people would actually read up on this before badmouthing ESA. Everyone has a good/bad side. Though I don't understand why a gaming company would want to pull out of this. It's just hurting their chances of gaming being bigger than it already is. Move forward, not back.
Does it just plain blow for us, the end user? Hard to say--it depends on Vivendi's intent. If they intend to support and defend video games as a legitimate media form, then things may go well for us. Keep in mind, they spent the cheese ($18.9B) to acquire Activision. I doubt they'd be throwing down that kind of cash if they weren't willing to defend their investment.
So people like Robbie Bach, President of the Entertainment & Devices Division at Microsoft, and other industry leaders making up the ESA's board of directors is not enough control for you?
The majority of publishers see no reason to leave the ESA, so it's relatively absurd (and irrelevant) to suggest that they form their own organization. It's gamers and the media who largely foster a negative opinion of the ESA, which is what this article is all about. Read it. You might learn something.
ESRB ratings are in no way dependent upon ESA membership, so Acitivision and Vivendi will continue to have their games rated as usual.
@ CRYOCIDE
Activision and Vivendi are enormous companies (soon to be one enormous company) that can certainly defend themselves, but the creation of a strong trade association allows smaller developers access to the same advertising and political resources that the larger publishers benefit from. Furthermore, a trade association allows for consistent political activity, whereas individual companies will only lobby when absolutely necessary for their own business -- this certainly slows the political legitimization of video games.
There is no doubt that Activision and Vivendi are business savvy and it's possible that they are just be disappointed with growing ESA fees as they expand while smaller devs "free ride" off of their increased contributions.
very frontpage worthy! congratz panda!
also very enlightening for us europeans that don't really have that mutch to do with ESA...
There are 5 publishers not showing up for E3: Vivendi, Activision, NCSoft, id, and Her Interactive. As Vivendi and Activision are no longer members of the ESA, this is no surprise. The other three remain ESA members, but are unable to attend for other reasons. NCSoft has specifically stated that their failure to attend E3 this year is because of conflicts with the development cycle of their games and is in no way related to the ESA or its leadership. Furthermore, Michael Pachter has stated that he believes the date for this year's E3 is a big problem for certain publishers (he specifically mentions Activision) and this has been affirmatively demonstrated by NCSoft.
Regardless, participation in E3 and support for the ESA are entirely different issues; companies can not participate in E3 and still be perfectly content with the myriad other duties the ESA performs.
Other than that, I can't even really cognize what points you are trying to make in that jumble of text. If you think that a new organization could better perform the job of the ESA, you are not alone among gamers. This is a point I made in my article. But, the influence of the ESA is undeniable and it's important for gamers to understand what the group does.
I didn't make any erroneous assumptions; I didn't come out and say whether or not people should agree with the current course of the ESA at all. I simply attempted to inform the masses about the policy and activities of the ESA. I'm saying that, as a gamer, you should care about what the ESA does, but I'm not telling you to blindly support any group. I have no problem with you expressing your point of view. I only have a problem with you saying the article was irrelevant without actually having read a word.
I'm glad I took the time to read this, as while the ESA aren't perfect, they are all we have to protect our way of life and ensure that we get a fair deal, while adhering to government laws, self policing ratings and such.
I was gonna post this as a blog, but I gathered many might not see it, so here goes.
I think Vivendi/Activision not attending E3 is really down to the ESA's handling of E3 altogther, nothing more really. At first E3 was fine, but as the years rolled on and gamers began to infiltrate the trade show, they never policed this issue enough. On top of all that, the ESA messed 07's E3 totally, in the eyes of many. With confidence now dented and E3 returning to Los Angeles again, many publishers now fear spending more money on expensive stands, but perhaps lack confidence in their product against other competitions product.
The problem of gamers sneaking into E3 could be easily solved and kept to a minimum. Say for instance a raffle was held every year, where all gamers could enter but a selected limited and numbered few, could win passes to enter (with all winners getting full access (and their winning numbers also submitted to all publishers/developers). This would help solve part of the Solid Snake like gamers sneaking in (as terms and condition could be enforced, like being freshly presntable and funk free). Another idea perhaps, would be for E3 to do what's done in japan with Tokyo Game Show, which is to open the show for an extra day to the public, letting them try the new upcoming games and easing the congestion. Gamers will attend then, even if they had to pay a hiked price for the privelege. An age restriction might also help cut things down (say, no one under 12 or 13). Even the idea of holding a Video Armageddon type contest, while E3 is running, either near or across town for gaming prizes and stuff should be considered, because such events will still help cut congestion to reasonable levels and keep gamers happy. Perhaps winners of that could get passes for the following years E3. People love to win stuff.
If you are at E3 for a small, medium or large major gaming/media organisation/website etc, specific passes should be presented for each, once each press type can be validated, with working website links, evidence of such work, ID checks etc. If this were enforced, it might also help confidence of publishers/developers.
Another problem is that E3 has also been moved, from May to July, this is probably what has effected NC Soft so much that they can't attend, as it leaves a few months before christmas, to get product ready (those lost months could be vital to some). A May or even June show, would have been more viable than July, since summer time is games industry drought time, where little goes on. I don't think the ESA consulted publishers and developers on this (correct if wrong here), so obviously friction has been caused, resulting in the exodus of some.
For the ESA, who I feel us gamers especially misunderstand and underappreciate, they have to restore confidence with Activision etc, to return to E3 and not be setting up their own small sideshows. Even E3 07' saw a scattered lot of this, and such fruit may have given some the idea to bail, perhaps. As a result of E3 07', putting on your own sideshow is now the new black.
Perhaps better market research, amongst publishers and developers, as well as gamers and the gaming press, might also help the ESA get a better idea of what E3 should be and can be, so long as they have the will to make it so.
Hey, maybe Dtoid should lead, by hold a Q and A feature on how to fix E3, where we can answer questions (be you industry, press or gamer kind) and pass findings to the ESA. If every gaming website did this kind of thing yearly, we'd get more of a say in the planning of E3, and then not be so disappointed when it goes wrong. Maybe then some might not bail either.
Never hurts to try at all. Go Dtoid.
Also glad to see some, who might not otherwise, pay attention to this, as while politics can boring, its many facets effect every game we can buy, play and enjoy.
Sorry, for the mammoth post.
OK, back to more GTA4 crap and rumors about Miyamoto's sex life.
Panda, thanks for the info. I did not know that.
If you don't care about the industry that makes your games, or have anything useful to say, then why bother posting at all. Sure, Dtoid is fun, but you can't expect everything to be a joke, do you?
Add something worthwhile if you can. I don't know, maybe you lack the ability to do so.
Sure that Activision and Vivendi will do great by there own, but it will still be really difficult.
Excellent write up Panda, as always, and gratz for the front page!
You're not a caveman. But your avatar says you are, so that must be what you're trying to be.