Penny Arcade Makes Time 100

Precision noticed that Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins of Penny Arcade fame have made the Time 100. The writeup talks about Child's Play and PAX and lavishes deserved adoration upon the pair. I've always envied their ability to maintain control over their brand and use it for appropriately portioned good and evil ;)

Comments

Popularity contest

[Enderandrew]

Kudos to them, but sadly this was a popularity contest where the likes of Justin Bieber and such were receiving votes.

I'd rather a wide-range, rational panel try to offer their opinions rather than open up a massive internet vote.

Re:As they should!

[Enderandrew]

Didn't Halo 3's launch weekend generate more revenue than the biggest Hollywood opening weekend of all time?

Video Games are just as influential and big as the movie indudstry.

Re:As they should!

[spun]

Well it may be a false comparison, but the video game industry is now larger than the film industry in terms of revenue. The film industry made around 10.5 billion in revenues in 2008, while the video game industry made around 11.5 billion. This is counting movie and game sales and rentals. The film industry may hold more cultural cachet and influence, and more people consider films to be true art, but that is changing as well.

Re:The it's-not-funny-but-we-laugh-anyway loop.

[Dishevel]

I find about 70% of the xkcd I run into funny.

Re:As they should!

[Wyatt Earp]

No, the video game industry is not bigger than the film industry.

Film Industry in the US employs 361,000

http://www.bls.gov/oco/cg/cgs038.htm

All software publishing in the US employs 263,700

http://www.bls.gov/oco/cg/cgs051.htm

Globally video games are worth 40 billion

http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/Investing/Extra/VideoGameSalesOvertakingMusic.aspx

US film revenue is 42 billion, total box office gross is 10-11 billion, but that's only a piece of the US film industry.

http://www.allbusiness.com/media-telecommunications/movies-sound-recording/10512814-1.html

Re:Childs Play

[Anonymous Coward]

Let's not forget that it has donated money towards hospital equipment as well.

Re:Childs Play

[dank zappingly]

As I have noted from your other armchair legal opinions, you do not understand the law. You do not know anything about Penny Arcade's corporate structure or how they pay their bills or Child's Play's bills. You are accusing a charitable organization of fraud without any basis in reality. Here is a quick sample from the FAQ on their website: Q. Does Child's Play charge administrative fees? A. We try our best to have every dollar that comes in go right back to the hospitals, but there is a slight administrative cost that does get paid for with donations (for example, shipping $200,000 worth of Nintendo DS' to dozens of hospitals worldwide is not free, sadly). Historically, these charges have not exceeded 2-3%. It's true that we're a non-profit, but unlike most non-profits, we're not in it to create a self-sustainable entity. We do it to give. Again, I ask you to please stop polluting the internet with misinformation. These people are doing good work to make the lives of sick children better. By defaming them you are taking trolling to a whole new level.

Re:Childs Play

[krmt]

You've apparently missed all the heartfelt and often tearful thank-yous they get from parents with their kids in the hospital. I was in the room only a few yards away from the woman who broke down crying during PAX East thanking them for doing Child's Play because such things meant so much to her. It's on the episode of their reality show for PAX East that came out recently if you want to see it for yourself. Child's Play does make a real difference in people's lives and that shouldn't be discounted.

Re:Really, Time?

[moosesocks]

But casting him as an intellectual and a history buff? Have they ever even watched his program?

He could very well be an intellectual and history buff, who happens to become an emotional demagogue once he's in front of the camera.

In that case, he's a pathological liar.

Re:The it's-not-funny-but-we-laugh-anyway loop.

[soppsa]

Yea I agree with this, and it wasn't always the case. XKCD used to be mostly hit for me, but the last couple years the smugness has been overwhelming.

Re:Childs Play

[ElectricTurtle]

Jerry and Mike receive no payments from CPC, that's just wild, speculative bullshit on Itninja's part. Kristen Lindsay (AKA PrincessRedDot or PRD) does, I believe, and maybe one or two others, but those are living wages, not wild profits.

Re:Childs Play

[sartin]

You can also write off the income of anyone designated at 'administrators' of the charitable organization.

Before today I was completely unaware of Child's Play, so I visited Guidestar to have a look at actual numbers. This information is from their 2007 form 990 (the latest I found at Guidestar and the one that probably looks worst for expenses). It fully discloses Penny Arcade's affiliation (gee, the IRS cares about people trying to wash salaries and actually checks this sort of thing).

• Three Penny Arcade shareholders are "Directors, Officers, Trustees, or Key Employees" - none receive any compensation from Child's Play and the three combined received $515,725.25 in compensation from Penny Arcade. Looks like they're missing a huge opportunity to wash salaries in the way described.
• They paid a $37,000 for a project manager to administer $384,059 of cash and non-cash (e.g. games) grants. They allocate the project manger half to program (giving stuff away) and half to fundraising. I am a little confused by the PM, since they list no employees or independent contractors in their highest paid list.
• They spent $41,669 on fundraising expenses, most of it in three areas: $6000 for professional fundraising, $18,500 for the PM, and $12,024 for travel.
• They held a fundraising auction that lost $23,441.

I have questions as a result of that (very quick and limited) review, but none in the area of trying to wash salaries. I'm curious about where the Project Manager expense actually goes. I'm curious about the disaster of an auction - why they did it, what they learned, whether they plan to try again. I fail to see evidence of the sort of fraud you are claiming.

Corporations get into charity for multiple reasons: good public relations, donating to related interests, belief in the cause. That doesn't make promoting or giving to a charity a fundamentally bad thing. Unless you have evidence to back up your claims, the evidence I've seen suggests they are unfounded.

Re:The it's-not-funny-but-we-laugh-anyway loop.

[Late Adopter]

XKCD can be funny a lot of times, but I also find it frequently unbearably smug.

So do I, and so do the authors of http://xkcdexplained.com/

Re:Hypocrisy much?

[Dogtanian]

I'm bitching about talentless losers who demean others out of jealousy rather than any real critique. That's hardly hypocritical.

It is if you're doing it because you're jealous of them. (^_^)

Re:Childs Play

[ElectricTurtle]

Thank you for the informative background. I can illuminate the project manager a bit, she's Kristin Lindsay AKA Princess Reddot or PRD. I think there are some interviews out there on the intarwebs if you're interested. I think the 2007 auction was a flop because that was right about when the economy started to crash so people didn't really put as much into it that year. I doubt that previous or following years had similar failings.