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Jack Thompson Buys Stock in GTA Parent Company
omega9 writes "You're not reading it wrong. From an artice posted as Joystiq, "Jack Thompson has purchased shares in Take-Two interactive - otherwise known as the publisher behind the Grand Theft Auto series of games. So has JT suddenly become a financial supporter of the company he's long campaigned against? Not a chance. JT has purchased stock in the company in order that he might attend Take-Two's shareholder meetings and face up to the company's CEO, Paul Eibeler.""
the guy's a jackass, but he's at least doing something relatively sensibly.
"At one point, JT refers to Microsoft's Flight Simulator as a training simulator for the 9/11 terrorists"
I'm sure the other shareholders will be just thrilled to see this jackass try to ruin the company.
I'm sure "SlashdotMedia" will improve on all the wonders that Dice Holdings blessed us all with
So has JT suddenly become a financial supporter of the company he's long campaigned against? Not a chance.
Despite his reasoning he has in fact become a financial supporter of Take Two by investing in their stock.
Seems to me this guy is way more about self-promotion than anything else.
...growing up in a house where Daddy thinks that (flight_sim == jihad)? This guy needs attention alright, the psychiatric kind.
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Why, I think its the smell of an impending minority shareholder lawsuit.
Hmm. Smells suspisiously like feces, too.
Hell, long before 9/11 I used to buzz the Twin Towers all of the time. I'm not trolling. Back then it was stupid, innocent fun. (No one was hurt but a few pixels on my screen.) Now when I play the sight of the WTC makes my heart ache. And yes, I know about the patch. I chose not to use it.
Sure, the terrorists learned a bit about flying using Flight Simulator. So did many decent pilots.
I can kill you with a screwdriver, but that's not what a screwdriver is for. Don't blame the tools or the toolmakers, blame the sick bastards who use them for the wrong means.
I disagree, everyone should continue to pay attention to him, it has been the best free comedy ever. he will never win in his arguements, because he is just not good at arguing, he gets too flustered to easily and goes off on rants that no judge will ever take seriously. if he argued well, i would be against him, but in this case I want him to keep going, the longer and harder he tries, the more and more that people will associate anti-video game attitudes with wingnuts and stop paying attention to all of them. in a small part in the back of my mind i wonder if he works for someone involved in making GTA, he guarentees them press exposure. it's like with the first Postal game, the game is absolute crap as far as games go, but it was huge and the absolute only reason I ever even heard of it and then played it, was the enourmous amount of publicity it got. any press = good press. jack thompson is a solid boost of sales figures for GTA games by keeping them in the limelight. if that's bad, then i want jack thompson to ban me too.
What's JT going to do with all of the earnings he makes from the stock? Is he going to donate it to a worthy charity or just pocket it and make a profit from the company he hates so much? Poor JT...
It really depends on the articles of incorporation and bylaws of the organization. If they are pretty loose and liberal a smart guy can stir up quite abit of trouble, especially if he gets started well before the Board meeting with motions and such.
He wants to be heard, but no one else is going to listen to him inside the company. A company that is willing to publish a game that is as pure of a target for regulation as GTA is not going to listen to a shareholder who might hold 0.001% of the company's assets.
Of course, if he really wanted to make a name for himself, he'd go after Wal-Mart, Target, etc. for not actually enforcing the rating system. What good is a mature rating on a game if the stores flat out refuse to fire employees for not enforcing the rating? As for the argument that more games should be AO, that's bullshit, and even GTA with its sex scenes wasn't AO. Anyone seen the movie Taking Lives? It had a full on sex scene with Angelina Jolie that was pretty damn explicit, yet it got a R rating which is analogous to a Mature rating.
AO really shouldn't even exist because Mature implies that your player can actually handle R-rated material in a movie. The difference between NC-17 and R is purely subjective, and quite frankly, any game that really does deserve an AO rating is probably over the top and should subjected to scrutiny as it is probably wantonly pornographic and violent in a way that would make Id blush and Take Two start furiously scribbling down notes.
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I could almost understand his issue with violent video games like "Grand Theft Auto III" and such. As a father, I don't let my children play them (ages 6, 3, and 1), and reserve those for my own use. While I don't feel that such games contribute to overall violence, I also know there are many better games to be playing with my children (like "Dragon Quest VIII", "Mario Kart", etc).
But I can give a certain amount of respect to Mr. Thompson for standing up for his beliefs and going after them. Or, I would, except his true views were shown when he went after Bill Gates for making "Microsoft Flight Simulator".
By accusing MS for being part of the cause of the 9-11 attack on the World Trade Towers, I'm afraid that Mr. Thompson has shown a view that's, well, crazy, for lack of a more polite word. In his universe, flight simulators aren't used to give people an idea of what it's like to fly a plane - it's used by terrorists to kill people. In his world, Tetris probably isn't a challenging puzzle game - it's a method for people to learn how to fit blocks together to seal people inside a la "The Cask of Amontillado".
By Mr. Thompson standards, we would be banished into a world as bad as that ruled by the Taliban, where music, dancing, games, laughter and fun are simply scary things to trick people into doing evil. A game of "cops and robbers" played out by kids 20 years ago would be seen by him as encouraging crime.
So, while he might have had my respect in the past for at least working on something he perceived as a problem, he's shown himself to be in the worst light of those who would deny any human joy for fear of corruption.
Sorry, Jack. When I get home, I'm going to play a game of Chess with my daughter and Sorry with my son - or in your mind, "encouraging my daughter to commit mass atrocities on the battlefield and teaching my son to inflict suffering upon others and encouraging retribution".
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What? I own a few shares of Microsoft stock, so if I go to a shareholders meeting and demand that the open their source code, somethings going to happen? DAMN! Why didn't I think of that before?!?
Unless he bought a metric buttload of stock, he's going to have no effect on the development of any of Take Twos games, and more than any other super-minority stockholder would have on product development at any other decent-sized company.
Jesus, their market cap is 1.26 billion I really don't think they have anything to worry about from a prick who was too cheap to pony up 10k to a charity.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
If GTA trains us all to be killers
and everyone Hates Jack
why is he still walking around ?
Type unto others as you would have them type unto you.
Um, any shareholder can typically file a petition to have a proposal put to a stockholder ballot. It's apparently known as shareholder activism.
Software sucks. Open Source sucks less.
Though given this is Jack Thompson there's a good chance they won't let him speak at all.
Either way, the guy gets what he wants.
1. If they let him ask his question, he gets to be the outrageous outspoken anti-videogame guy at the shareholder's meeting. And he'll get media attention.
2. If they don't let him speak, then he gets to be the outspoken anti-videogame guy at the shareholer's meeting -- whose ideas are too controversial to be heard. And he'll get media attention.
The way the media in this country works (based on fear and exaggeration), it's a lose-lose.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
Well, he ponied up for the stock, why shouldn't he have his say? It's just capitalism, people who own things get the power to make decisions and be heard. In principle it's not much different from a shareholder campaigning to get the CEO fired or outsource some jobs or whatever else. Since he's now part owner of the company, he should have a say in proportion to his ownership (which I suspect is relatively small).
I doubt Jack Thompson is really that much of a zealot at heart. More than likely, he's just racking up enough publicity so that the next time a kid shoots someone after playing UT2K6, he'll be the first person the victims will call for representation. "Did a gamer shoot someone you love? Jack Thompson will fight hard for your rights. He'll get you the money you deserve."
I believe he's even alluded to the fact that he'd like to make the video game industry the next tobacco industry. Criminal negligence can pay big time.
Certainly not for Take Two if it get's whatever game they are pimping in the news again. The publicity will mean extra dollars to them.
Ultimately I suppose there may be an argument that the industry has to fear increasing regulation but I'm not sure it should worry them. We have reached a time where adults are people who have known games for their entire lives and see it as a 'traditional' form of entertainment. Even if government does add legal weight to ratings the adult market is big and only going to get bigger.
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