Slashdot Mirror
EA's Profits Up, Workers Get Layoffs
Gamespot and GamesIndustry.biz has the news from yesterday's conference call where EA CEO Larry Probst reported higher earnings for his company in Q3, despite a small yearly decline. He also held forth on the future cost of next-gen games, which in his opinion will likely stay as high as $50 and could perhaps fetch more on retail shelves. Just before this story was to be published, Tim Butler wrote in with the news from 1Up.com that EA was laying off members of its LA studio. From the article: "According to sources close to the company, Electronic Arts is currently in the process of laying off between 50-70 team members from its minty-fresh new EA LA office. The teams affected worked on the poorly-recieved GoldenEye: Rogue Agent and the forthcoming Medal of Honor: Dogs of War FPS titles." Update: 01/27 06:34 GMT by Z : Update to the layoff article: "The first step is to rebalance the team. This has required us to let go 60 people -- from many different teams. There is no focus on any one team or any one class of individuals. It's a studio-wide thing to reset the business fundamentals and get the studio to the next level."
If you had read the friendly article, you would have seen the update:
After speaking to Neil Young, General Manager of the EA LA studio, it's now clear that the confirmed 60 layoffs are not heavily confined to one team or another, countering early rumors that the GoldenEye or Medal of Honor teams were specifically targerted -- countering the implication that the underperformance of certain games might have been the catalyst.
Maybe EA is shaking its developers up for the foreseeable battle with TakeTwo?
And it's undeniable that EA is in a good position to pull this kind of team-balancing stunt, because there are simply too many willing-to-work-25-hours-a-day multimedia graduates. If you come across an apple tree full of apples, you'll surely pick the best ones too.
Rock that crushes, Paper & Scissors that don't matter.
shouldn't they be held responsible?
Why should they be carried by better producing teams if they couldn't?
A business acting like a business! Boooooooo! Hissssssssss! Profits up and they fired people? Well, good god, only evil can be afoot. There's no other explination!
Maybe they're selling off workers as slaves in Cambodia (n.o. to any Cambodians). Otherwise, I don't see how.
Don't look at this as a layoff.
This is an invitation to enter the field of merchandising the games they built directly to consumers at the retail level. WalMart, Best Buy and Target are all hiring, and can use people knowledgable about the games themselves.
Seriously, how much money does that company make from building these games? All the hard work, blood, sweat and tears that go into being an EA employee and this is all they have to give their developers. And you know their executives are going to receive higher bonuses this year for trimming the fat.
I guess all we can say is thank you for the nedless hours of high-tech distraction your guys have provided us, at least the gaming community appreciates you.
M
"The teams affected worked on the poorly-recieved GoldenEye: Rogue Agent and the forthcoming Medal of Honor: Dogs of War FPS titles."
what did they expect ? if they keep re-hashing the same old games instead of innovating then thats the obvious outcome, perhaps if they didnt take the public for idiots then things might be different
i guess innovation is dead in the games industry as well as hollywood, oh well it was good while it lasted (at least it is for the CEO's who don't have to worry about retirement funds while sunning themselves on their sunseekers)
I gotta say, this is definitely not front page news, and its certainly not stuff that matters to most people here. Please disengage this childish and silly crusade.
I didn't hear that Rogue Agent did badly. I bought the thing and loved it.. yeah, it had some aspects that were obviously a knock off of halo, but some of it was innovative for an FPS, and parts of it were a hell of a lot of fun.
BOFHs writing games? Yeah right, I hope his ass was canned.
And the winner is... :-(
Guess this means everyone left is going to have to be pulling 100 hour work weeks!
EA is evil. EA represents the suit-and-tie, corporate-owned, mainstream conversion of the gaming industry. They represent cheesy CEOs coming over from other failed companies who are only getting into the game industry because they see massive annual revenues from this thing, not because they're into games. Merely ten years ago, we had a sort of Silver Age of gaming, from Doom to Descent to Command & Conquer to Myst to Simcity 2000 to...well, you were there. It all spanned multiple genres. Where is it now? The good games are far and few between. Now, it's the yearly update of the new Tony Hawk game, complete with skateboard fat clowns that spray graffiti, and the "underground racing" games where morons who think neon lights are a good investment tell each other how "sick" their "tricked out" cars are as obnoxious, over-compressed, repetitive rap music blasts while you race down wet, nighttime city streets. Because that's "underground!" Meanwhile, the PC industry purposely speeds itself up faster and faster to increase the yearly bullshit upgrade cycle. If you don't have a video card with two fans taking up two slots in your translucent, neon-lit PC case, your penis just isn't big enough to play the latest id Software game made up of approximately 90% pitch black darkness on-screen. Innovation? Fuck it, let's fuck up Deus Ex so we can get on the console in time while we destroy Fallout 3. After that, we'll suck the teat of the latest Microsoft DirectX release, focus-group tested with a new name ("DirectNext! Because it's the NEXT one!") guaranteed to generate 87% profit margins on new graphics card updates. And that blazing fast PC you custom-built last year? Fuck it, better ditch that because your goddamn RAM chips aren't operating at a fast enough speed to melt the paint off the wall and generate enough electromagnetic fields to shrivel the balls off your legs as you read the latest paid-for review in a dying game magazine.
I'm bitter about today's PC gaming.
They don't call them the Evil Alliance for nothing.
Team size: ~100
2004 profit (not revenue): $200m
Hours worked per week: 60-70
Bonus: $600 (in gift certificates, not cash)
There are a huge number of yeast infections in this county. Probably because we're downriver from the bread factory.
New from EA Games... Sweatshop 2005 where you start a 15 year career as a team manager putting out world class video games. You must keep your team happy-ish, while driving them to the brinks of insanity. New features include 'personal day approval' where you must decide whether letting your multimedia developer go to their mother's funeral is worth the slip in schedule. Transfer team members to other lower performing teams in order to maximize your cost/benefit ratio. Upgrade your staff with 'efficiency experts' for that extra paranoid boost of productivity. Move up the ranks of the corporate ladder while crushing those who stand in your way. Collect praise and bonuses for the slave labor of your subordinates.
I'd play it.
*yawn*
You gotta worry about the quality of the game if they got laid off even before it was released... heh.
The cynical answer to this would be "no comment." So obvious is business' contempt for education and an honest day's work now that it becomes pointless to even discuss it.
But each time anyone attempts to emphasize the fact that business has turned its back on just about everything except its quarterly earnings, we get "nobody owes you a living so get over it."
The fact is, it is wrong to fire people like this. It is absolutely wrong. These companies are damaging, and in a lot of cases destroying the careers of people who work for a living. It isn't fair and it isn't right.
EA has no problem investing millions and tens of millions to build colossal glittering corporate edifices where they can hold meetings about whom to fire this week. But on payday they claim costs are too high.
W-4 employment is obsolete.
Business isn't willing to pay for products, innovation and careers, so we get brands, mortgage commercials and layoffs.
Working at EA sucks, then they lay you off.
This VGCats comic from this monday seems to be particularly timely.
Replying with Microsoft, gets me modded as Funny or Flamebait.
Replying with SCO, gets me modded as either Troll or Insightful.
Replying with IBM gets me modded as Overrated.
So that leaves HP doesn't it? I can't keep up with who is our friend this week on slashdot.
Jonathanjk.com
That being said, after reading all of the crap that EA has been putting their employees through, I refuse to buy a game from them anymore. The last sports game I bought was Tiger Woods Golf 2004 for my PS2, and that WILL be the last game I'll buy from EA. Period. I refuse to give my money to a company that gets away with the slave labor antics and rediculous headcutting that EA has graced us with. While all those 100-hour-a-week programmers get sent to unemployment, EA's CEO still gets his 7-figure salary and a fat bonus. And YES, I realize that my Old Navy jeans are made in China and my polo shirt was made in some third-world country. Exploitation goes on worldwide, and I've come to terms with it. This is just one battle that I choose to let affect my purchasing decisions.
So basically EA, fuck you. I'll take my $100 a year that I would have spent on your products and go to one of the two or three remaining competitors left in console gaming. Or maybe I'll go buy some basement-made games like Uplink instead. Or maybe I'll just say screw you all and go buy used NES games, which still entertain me way more than your 'Sports Title $YEAR' titles ever will. Either way EA, you can kiss my money goodbye.
"Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned for SEGA. ..."
Well, long time ago, people felt threatened by machines that were replacing manual labor, so they simply smashed and broke the machines.
;-)
They probably weren't right. But...
But it seems to me that perhaps a random lynching or two of scrooge-ish CEOs by angry ex-employees might deliver a potent message to any prospective pursuants of this squeeze-then-kill strategy. You know, make them think twice or somesuch...
Hardware and software. More than feature movies.
Medal of Honor, Call of Duty(activision) addons and expansions.
Please DON'T make any more WW2 games until you got some truly new amazing technology to show. It has been done to death.
If there only had been made one tenth of that in the Halflife universe, I'd be happy.
Nothing wrong with making a game series, a interactive story, but I am sick and tired of WW2 weapons and storylines.
Having all those expantions with little new gameplay does not help building a solid server base on the internet for multiplayer action.
Innovation is not dead, it's just not part of their business model. It's easier to let smaller studios do the innovation, and then either buy them out or pummel them into mediocrity with a ripoff competitor that they market strongly.
To look at this and say innovation is dead within the industry is silly.
Something... making me... write... it....
1.) Lay off top-notch staff
2.) ???
3.) Profit!!
Gaaahhh... nooooooooo!
future cost of next-gen games, which in his opinion will likely stay as high as $50 and could perhaps fetch more on retail shelves.
... no matter what they have convinced themselves of or how many developers they buy out.
I can already tell you that if every next-gen EA game comes out on the shelves at a $50+ price point, I'll simply turn to other games (or, more slyly, wait until the games appear used - in which case EA gets no profit out of the resale). They may hold certain niches, but they don't own the market
I was taking one day at a time, but then several days got together and ambushed me. (from a Rhymes with Orange comic)
Please disengage this childish and silly crusade.
Hey, what's this? Anonymous Coward? Let's see who's hiding behind that mask!
(removes mask from Anonymous Coward)
*GASP* It's some guy hired by EA!
"Yes, and if you hadn't unmasked me, i'd probably had been successful at shutting up those meddling kids!"
Another case solved!
Profits dont matter as much to the investors in a company. What they care about is the increase of the stock price (in some cases dividends factored in of course).
.. well that you can blame analysts, the economy, and/or the investing public.
That's the standpoint you have to look at it from.
No was for a company's stock price not going up even if their profits grow (cause sometimes the analysts only care about profit growth rate increasing)
EA Sucks... They may have the most money, but the quality of games is terrible. The only good EA labels in my opinion are Maxis and Westwood, the rest just suck...
Let me rephrase TFA:
"As a good-will gesture, EA has cooperated with our demands and released two groups of hostages, who obviously seemed overexhausted to deliver inferior products. The hostages are currently under rehabilitation (read as: Finding a better job). Due to the fact that this good-will gesture resulted in profits for the company, EA decided that it will release more groups of hostages in the course of the year. Maybe they're not so bad after all.
And here's Mike with the weather."
Maybe they shouldn't have spent all their money on an all glass building 1/2 mile from the beach, compelete with full soccer field. Perks are nice, but nothing beats a reliable paycheck.
in bed.
You do not need to produce quality when you have created yourself a monopoly. The future for EA will be crappy sports titles for the small price of $99.99
it is only after a long journey that you know the strength of the horse.
With those hours and bonuses, how do you manage to 1) stay awake to patrol your home and 2) keep yourself in shotgun shells?
At that rate, unless you hire out, all the thieves have to do is wait until you pass out and then begin to pillage.
If you are someone who actually makes games, ie. the engineers, EA is an absolutely fabulous place to work. Although there are many studios all over the place, working conditions are wonderful. You're not going to be working on anything ground braking most likely, but that is the tradeoff.
However, if you are just another interchangeable cog, ie. artists and low to mid level producers, you will of course be worked to death and discarded when no longer needed. Shit like that happens when you have skills with very low marketplace value.
Ever since EA put Microsoft in their place over their silly attempt to force xbox live on them the xbox fanboys have been 'decrying the evil EA' every chance they can. If there is anything an EA exec likes more than stock options it's putting an industry pretender in their place...
The theory goes that when you do well, you get paid well because of it. At least, that's the theory, although it doesn't quite jive with the explanation I get for why CEOs make twenty times what I do and get raises whether or not the company does well.
If companies have the rights of people, why shouldn't I expect them to behave as I am expected to? Perhaps that's the point - companies and their investors get the benefits of an entity with the rights of a person and which is exempt from the responsibilities that that person would have. You can't eat the seed corn and expect there to be a harvest next fall, but hey that corn tastes good, doesn't it?
This sense of fairness is amplified by the nearness many people here might have towards the employees. The people getting fired could be them, after all - people who like their work but don't feel like getting squeezed when times are good and screwed when times are bad. And all along, those that made the good/bad decisions for which they paid walk away with their pockets full.
This is just business as usual. I guess it's too much to hope for that the usual wouldn't suck so badly.
Get a grip already.
I have to say it's quite enlightening to see how low people will stoop when it's their business on the line. Bring on The 80's Guy!
Grease & Counterbalance
constantly "taking" money from others, then start your own own business. If you can't then stop your fucking whining on slashdot and work for someone. But if you're the type that can't run a business and you're layed off and can't find a job, well that's just natural selection at work and means you just need to be taken out of the gene pool.
I don't want to have to defend EA here, but do we really know if they're worse than the rest of the industry? I'd never work for a company like that, but let's remember that this whole thing started from the blog of a wife of an EA programmer. Now we have slashdot posting everything they do. I'm not saying they *aren't* the antichrist, but let's actually consider first whether there's some manipulation or just plain shoddy reporting at fault too.
-Looking for a job as a materials chemist or multivariat
don't you have a law preventing mergers that may reduce market competition? EA is getting WAY too big, and yet it's still eating up companies.
... here at EA we call those "lunch breaks"
Down load it off a torrent, nntp, or some other P2P tech.
If you like it, then buy it afterwards.
If its EA, fuck'em.
Nothing gets the slashdot geeks fired up quite as much as a good firing. I'll tell you a little secret -- most every large company does this. They hire people like crazy, then every couple years they fire all the ones that didn't work out as a group and call it a layoff.
Doing it this way prevents all sorts of legal issues where people sue for getting fired without cause. If they are part of a group layoff, the company can simply call it scaling back the workforce and largely indemnify themselves.
Most of those fired would likely have been fired months ago when it was determined that they were incompetent, but doing it that way is too messy. Having been through many of these 'cycles' at the company I work for, I always find it interesting that within one month of the firing, the company is once again hiring again, only those fired are inelligable for re-employment for a minimum of one-year (company policy -- sneaky sneaky).
This whole thing is likely little more than a company getting rid of the bad apples without having to worry about the lawyers.
Step 1: Have workers make lots of units Step 2: Sell lots of units Step 3: Fire workers so you don't have to spend the money you just made on their salaries Step 4: Profit Whaddya know? No missing step!
UTF-8: There and Back Again
http://penny-arcade.com/view.php3?date=2005-01-26& res=l
I've got the big house. I've got the BMWs (note plural), I've got the swimming pool, the land, horses. The whole bit.
Because I after my team breaks their backs, working 80 hours a week minimum on that software project for my company, I lay them off so I can afford the big house, the BMWs, the swimming pool, the land, the horses, etc.
I can tell you'll never make it.
Because I lay people like you off before they have the chance to be promoted.
Gee, profits are up, they're going to lay off workers, and the games are going to get more expensive. Happy days all around!
Seriously though, all of this downsizing is nice and dandy for short term profits, and high CEO salaries, but how are these companies going to function in the long term when there are no more consumers left to buy their wares?
-G
www.pixelstatic.com
... of another similar thing.
Ericsson (you know, the people who makes cell-phones and other related items, before they merged with Sony) a few years back was doing really badly and losing tons of money. So they fired a whole bunch of people (5000+ emplyees got the axe) and suspended any christmas perks for the employees because they were losing millions on a daily basis. No corporate christmas dinners, no corporate gifts.
This of course didn't apply to the people in charge. They gave themselves a fat bonus for being so awesome! I guess some people are created more equal than others.
I enjoy large posteriors and I cannot prevaricate.
1. Company profits up
2. Workers laid off
3. Higher retail prices for consumers
Yep, looks like a win-win-win!
Soylent Green is peoplicious!
You can have one of two companies:
One has 100% "original and ongoing investors" and no workers.
The other has 100% workers and no "original and ongoing investors".
Which has a chance of succeeding?
I ask this question to point out that the workers are very important to a company's operations. Moreso than the investors. ( note, investment is good, yada yada, etc, etc. but put it in perspective, workers *and* investors make the economy work ). EA also would not exist without it's workers.
emt 377 emt 4
Either A) why didn't you fire them sooner if they're bad at their job(s)? (Most logical answer : Bad management, which means there needs to be shakedowns), B) why fire them when you can afford to keep them on payroll? (Most logical answer : They weren't satisfied by sales, corporate greed is at hand here) or C) why not just shuffle them around if they don't/didn't get along? (Most logical answer : It was a bad idea/design from the start and they needed a scapegoat(s).)
Anyway you look at it, layoffs during a good quarter ALWAYS means something is wrong with the company. Its simple corporate business logic. If these layoffs occured during a BAD quarter, they could justify it with trying to save money or something, but a GOOD quarter? Uh uh.
if they laid off ALL their employees, their liabilities would be zero and their profits infinite!
7 November 2006: The day Americans realized corruption and incompetence weren't addressing 11 September 2001
When did he stop performing? Man, Cinnamon Girl is one of the best songs of all time! Damn you, computers, for snuffing the talent of one of rock's greatest artists!
That's just GREAT - more unemployed programmers walking the streets of LA.... It's too bad that India don't open up and let us Yanks work over there.
I own my own business. My income is rolling in while I'm out playing golf with your bosses during time you're in your office dreaming of that day you'll get to drive that BMW anywhere else but the 5:00 traffic jam on the way home from work.
They finally get a vacation, and hopefully unemployment. Unemployment for 99hrs/week = Working 0 hrs/week and drawing 10x better salary. I'd be happy.
Anybody who's seen Michael Moore's The Big One would know that this is the standard way that companies operate. Lay off everyone just when you're starting to go good. Sad to see a Canadian company doing it though.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
Damn, it's the EMI from the RAM that's doing that? All this time I thought it was the Red Bull and Viagra. Whew!!!
Look at Starcraft, came out after warcraft II, but took the same specs Warcraft II required. Not all good games that were cutting edge reuired the latest and greatest gaming equipment.
A mix between this two:
Transport Tycoon
Dungeon Keeper
Features:
- Secure your empire by taking over other smaller game developers
- Secure gaming rights over major sporting events
- Harvest massive amounts of stock market interest by generating hype over version 2 of your boughtover game
- Hire armies of fresh 3D programmers and Graphics programmers from universities around the world
- Start massive projects with humanely impossible deadlines
- Torture your employees by making them work long hours without breaks to complete your projects.
- Publish games before the holiday seasons to milk the most profits
- Manage your economy by closing down studios and sacking employees once your project is complete
- Destory all who oppose your empire!
System Requirements:
Lotsa of money
Links with the media
Alots of misguided geeks and nerds
Ever-growing Computer Hardware industry
EA has commented that they are considering increases of prices, but I don't think the American consumer will buy it. What the consumer WILL buy, however, is special edition games that give a small advantage.
Perhaps they will allow you to play on exclusive servers online, or they will include manuals and maps that should have been included in the 'standard' edition. They'll also probably only release games on DVD if you're willing to pay an extra $20 for them (for the computer), and people will pay, because they don't want to mess around with installing 15 cd's. Once a game company is doing this, they should be able to increase the price of the normal edition, which will cause consumers to spend the extra $10 or whatever for the special edition, then raise the special edition price, then repeat.
Typical corporation shit..Profits are up by huge percentages but "hey lets lay people off....". Its not the games as EA usually puts out shallow crap just the usual corporate greed.
Whenever sweatshopping/Nike/Asia comes up, there are millions of drones claiming its just capitalism and if they took the jobs, the workers clearly wanted them and are thus better off anyways. This doesn't apply when it's happening to you?
"" How about taking the safety labels off everything, and let the stupidity-problem solve itself? """
Pay attention to the past 5 years.
This company hires or through purchases works developers until they deliver on game code base first, then releases many and maintain those that can help other developers on other projects ramp up and cross develop.
Such a strategy is what keeps them dominant in the broad gaming market.
More developers should wake up take a cue from Id.
From what I hear most gaming companies are pricks. This is due to the large amount of grads available. Extremely high staff turnover of the entire industry. I say all game developers should band together on a hobby project and make the ultimate game and then divide the profits. Then when you have a 100+ team with $200M profits hey guess what? That 2Mil each. Wouldnt it be nice if the fuckers who were doing all the work got all the money. I hate project / Company managers. They all think the same way. "Hmmm we made $200 million of this game. Damn we are good. Every Senior executive gets a 2mil bonus. Hmmm we dont have enough projects to keep them working 70hr weeks. Fire enough people so every1 needs to work 70 hours. Thatll keep the efficiency up." I heard a good idea that was completely scoffed upon by corporate lobbies in australia. No company employee may be paid 20x more than the lowest paid employee or 10x more than the average wage. Whatever is higher. Doesnt that seem fair? Does a manager work harder than 20 staff? If they think so i would like to see them tell that to their faces. Fucking bullshit is all i can say. (Excuse my french)
It's supply and demand really. It's not that the guy making 10 times as much money works 10 times harder. It's that the guy has certain skills that the company thinks are vital. He is that highly paid because people with this particular skill are sufficiently rare.
Now, you can certainly debate whether the person in question actually does have the skill, or whether that skill is really that valueable to the company, but you can't really argue the principle involved. Companies aren't in the business of paying more for something than they think they have to.
Last I looked, Derek Jeter didn't have a 10 times better batting average than the typical MLB player...
EA is evil.
It is? Why and how? I'd like to hear you back up your opinion...
EA represents the suit-and-tie, corporate-owned, mainstream conversion of the gaming industry
What gives you this impression? Where does this thinking come from? Personal working there? Visiting there?
They represent cheesy CEOs coming over from other failed companies who are only getting into the game industry because they see massive annual revenues from this thing, not because they're into games
Which CEOs exactly would that be? Here's the current list: http://www.info.ea.com/company/company_bios.php
It all spanned multiple genres
Huh?...all the games you mentioned basically "defined" genres, not "crossed" them.
Because that's "underground!"
Just because you don't like a certain type of games does not make them bad.
And as for all the rest of your ranting, I personally somewhat agree, just not in the way you wrote it. However, now you are getting into the business plan of some hardware manufacturers in a paragraph you started off with "EA is evil". Leaped way off track...
Stop whining if you lost your job. Become a damn consultant! I was making $4500 a month working at a fulltime job as a grad fresh out of college with an M.S. I got laid off with their entire R&D department. So instead of looking around for another corporate butt to kiss, "please massuh, give me a job...", I started my own consulting company at the age of 25.
Six months later, I'm raking in $8100 a month and surprisingly no one questions my age. I have two patents in the works, and I'm on the verge of renting an office down the street so I can walk to work. I and only I am responsible for my own success or failure.
Life rocks!
'Be always mindful, even when ditch-digging.' --D. T. Suzuki
The US has totally forgotten about labor and companies are getting reputations at the speed of the Internet. EA is one such company and there are a lot of others. The software industry is UNIQUE in that it requires relatively few resources to create product for sale. As more and more skilled programmers turn away from the corporate blackhole to creating their own wares, companies like EA will die off. Labor is what makes companies solid and as long as folks clamor for these jobs the company will always be in charge. It's not easy doing it yourself but in no other industry is it more possible. Go solo.
changing the script on the programmers/designers would kinda fuck up all their plans. Did you stop to think that maybe the programers wrote the original script around what they where able to do given the time/money they had? Or the limitations of the engine? Maybe if things hadn't gotten shuffled aournd on them, they good have produced a much more solid game.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
I find it funny how their Vancouver studio has hired 5 times as many people over the last 6 months as were fired from the LA studio, and there was no mention of it.
Perhaps this is EA waking up? Rogue Agent was a very uninspired game, maybe they were cutting the genuine fat from that studio. I have no idea, but someone has to offer a different perspective on this issue. To be realistic, I very much doubt that the blame for Rogue Agents lukewarm success can be evenly distributed across 60 heads.
I'm not supprised by this. This is a horrible day that will scar those 60 in LA for many months to come, possibly causing breakups, bankruptcy, and depression, but in the corporate world, it's Wednesday.
- Mr.Oreo
I have in front of me the sleeve of Bill Budge's Pinball Construction Set, circa 1984. On the back is says the following:
ABOUT OUR COMPANY: We're an association of electronic artists who share a common goal. We want to fulfill the potential of personal computing. That's a tall order. But with enough imagination and enthusiasm we thing there's a good chance for success. Our products, like this progra, are evidence of our intent. If you'd like to get involved, please write us at:
Electronic Arts
2755 Campus Drive
San Mateo, CA 94403
It sucks what happens when the f'ing suits take over. Oh how I long for the golden days...
-R
Have you paid attention at all? The layoff story? The working conditions? The using layoffs to temporarily increase profits so that the bigshots can make more money?
Fuck you, and fuck your dead mother.
That bit of lazy rooking has me in a pit of depression this morning. Thanks.
And have EA blame the layoffs (despite of higher earnings) on piracy in 3..2..1...
Too bad people now will start making upgrades to this rant, instead on concentrating in creating new, original, even better, rants...
Talk about wiping your ass with silk toilet roll.
Sigh, one-step logic seems to prevail as usual on slashdot. If capitalism can create games, no other economic system can! Huzzah!
./revolution
Rebalance the team, reset the business fundamentals, next level... what is this guy actually saying? This roughly translates to "firing 60 random scapegoats to safe managements' ass for leading the studio in the wrong direction".
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
You're completely missing the point, and probably have a really wrong-headed view of what makes an economy work, or at least what keeps people putting investment money into companies in the first place. EA wouldn't exist at all without its original and ongoing investors.
Your completely missing the point, and probably have a really wrong-headed view of what makes a Community work, or at least what keeps people putting money into companies to exploit other's work in the first place. EA wouldnt exist at all without capital-owners able to construct an economic system where they reap rewards from other people's labour, and are permitted (encouraged) to destory other people's lives.
Have you ever heard that workers create the wealth? We workers Capital-owners (the corporate bosses) cannot be permitted to *USE* our peers as simple tools. We must be given more respect, greater long-term concern.
Re:Oh no! (Score:4, Insightful)
by ScentCone (795499) on Wednesday January 26, @07:44PM (#11486983)
What sickens me is that we live in a world with an economic system where the most logical thing to do when your profits are up is to fire workers.
You're completely missing the point, and probably have a really wrong-headed view of what makes an economy work, or at least what keeps people putting investment money into companies in the first place. EA wouldn't exist at all without its original and ongoing investors.
What you're not getting is that the only reason EA's profits grow is because they consistently (or often enough) make the hard descisions to drop (and add) people and resources wherever they think it will impact their bottom line in the right way. They're not right about every decision, but it's the overall approach that works. To assume a causal connection between their bump in profits (which shows up after months of activity and reporting thereon), and the more immediate tactical decision about their overhead and productivity in LA - that suggests a bit of myopia on your part about the scale of their operations, about business competition, about free markets in general, and about highly competitive frivalous industries (like video games) in particular.
The system you decry is the very one that allows us to have an entire industry dedicated to entertaining geeky game players.
Programmers would create games in different economic models. An economy which is ethically bound to support social welfare (like, say, Canada, France, Germany for instance).
If it weren't for that system, those jobs never would have existed in the first place.
Yes. And music wouldnt exist without the RIAA. Film without MPAA. Cheese wouldnt exist without Kraft. No author would find work or publish without HarperCollins.
Not only do the capital owners have no real input in the final product. Their sole purpose is to scheme, fight and elbow other producers (in the ways that make them MORE MONEY, not make BETTER XZYWidgets).
The goals of the Owner class is to make more money. The goals of the worker class is to make the products you covet, and thereby exchange their labour for money.
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Now, in your mind your racing on about competition breeding innovation. How economies are only efficient with competition and "Freedom". Inspite of the USofAmerican economic dogma you (surely) hold so dear, 'make as much money as you can' goal counter productive.
It builds instability. It creates consumerist behaviour. USofAmericans have been reduced to mindless consume/slave hydra.
The Community you are creating is worthless. Not only is it devoid of spirtuality, emotion, ethics and social-welfare of any-kind; it is unsustainable. If the abject stupidity doesnt collapse in on itself in an orgy of greed then the physical bounds of the planet will show you that aquiring your Nth pair of RunningShoes is a worthless goal.
You must reconsider that your alligience to Unf
It's oligarchy.
If it were capitalism, the executives would be subject to the same market forces as the employees, and wouldn't be able to get away with abuses like this. The difference:
When an executive screws up, they get forced out, but it's called something else, like "spending more time with the family" or "finding new challenges" and it's accompanied with a big bonus. Take a look at the guy from Fanny Mae, for instance. He got almost $1e7 in bonus, and a higher retirement pay than I get for working salary. And he left for screwing up.
As a contrast, employees may be doing a perfectly fine job, and be declared "surplus," and have to scramble for a new job, because they don't get golden parachutes. I know some, and they were neither deadwood nor excess fat.
The living have better things to do than to continue hating the dead.
I do not feel bad at all for the guys that were involved in making Rogue Agent. That was one of the worst FPS's i've ever played. A complete insult to the original game.
This has nothing directly to do with any specific game, released or forthcoming; the best possible link to gaming that can be conjured is indirect. (And by that standard, almost any story on slashdot could be classified as having an indirect relation to gaming.)
I find it offensive that this would be thrust into the "Games" section, completely slanted to generate outrage against EA, when there is quite obviously more than one side to the story here. This story is purely "Politics" - and not everyone shares the politics of Labor, guys. You tend to get much better discussions when the article and summary aren't slanted to produce a narrow-band response.
A friend works in one of the California studios and makes, well - a lot more than I do. I find it interesting that whenever they get ahead of schedule or finish early, they get extra vacations or sabbaticals. It's not unusual for his to go on a company sponsored cruise or vacation 2 times a year and then get a paid 2 month sabbatical. I'm starting to think this is [actually] more about a bad game than corporate cutting the fat.
This is just silly. Everyone says that the EA employees shouldn't be 'worked to death' in their air conditioned, personalized, comfy cubicles, but everybody also b1tches when a game has an error in it, or is just the same thing year after year.
There _may be_ some room for EA to relax and still cut prices, or take it easier on EA employees, but they're not in this game to lose. They just can't play like that. If they're doing something wrong, then make it illegal. But most of these guys get burned out and quit- which they're all free to do any time. And that's the way some industries are. It beats the hell out of farming- and the money's good, too.
Meanwhile, Nintendo has reported a drop in profits and cut its full-year profit forecast. Nintendo's third-quarter profit plunged 43% to 21.31bn yen ($205m; £110m), against 37.43bn yen a year earlier.
A strong yen and weak GameCube console sales prompted it to cut its full-year forecast by 20bn yen to 70bn yen.
Competition is intense in the market for games software, with US companies Electronic Arts - the company behind The Sims, Take-Two Interactive Software and Activision - all vying for market share.
Full article here
I shot the sheriff
A month ago you said, "I was punted from one job as a contractor after 3 months because the manufacturing moved to China. I was punted from another job after 6 months because the firmware and manufacturer moved to China and India. So I joined up with a small company as a consultant, and I'm working a job for both of my previous employers, making 1.5x what I was before!"
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Your situation get's better with every post. How can be down? See the above in context here:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=133066&cid=11
More pathetic anti-EA propaganda.
From what I've read about EA's slavedriver anti-employee work policies, this is likely a blessing in disguise. Hopefully the employees can find work elsewhere.
Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter. - Martin Luther King, Jr.
metaphors are suspect.
I could easily sling a hundred images that would support the parent's question (ever hear the parable of the Grasshopper and the Ant?)
The devil is "in the details".