EA gets dunked on

Do you think even the worst person can change?

It is rare, ladies and gentleman that I get to count Ars Technica as the source for a blog, but when it happens you know it's for a juicy one. In fact, this story actually relates to a little something I was complaining about the otherday inside of the game industry, as though the gods of Karma themselves were listening and went "You know what, that does sound pretty screwed!" (Of course, those in the wrong that time weren't those punished this time, but I'll take my victories where I can.) Of course, I was referring to the Blizzard situation wherein the huge discrepancy between what the employees are paid and the astronomical bonuses that get handed to management led to a situation where important ground level workers were going hungry in order to afford rent. (And that was inside of Activison/Blizzard, one of the biggest games companies in the world.) At the time I vaguely remember citing EA, either saying that this was something they would or had done; and today I can relay that they tried to do it again. With tried being the operative word there.

Electronic Arts have never been the gold standard for great and fair business practises, positive employee experiences, positive customer experiences, ethical responsibility, or literally anything beyond the capacity to wring ludicrous amounts of money out of minimal investment on their part. They're really good at that. Too good, some might say. As such, one can hardly be surprised to hear that gaming's most classic pantomime villains were planning to pat themselves on the back for another year of astounding mediocrity, to the tune of one of those huge 'executive bonuses' that these people go to sleep dreaming about. For why else does anyone get into business if it isn't to over pay oneself with funds that are better spent on the wellbeing of the company? That's like, the only incentive, isn't it? And then, of course, they can complain about not having made quite enough to meet all employee paychecks and go around slashing those, maybe slash a few jobs while your at it. (That's the typical end-goal here.)

Which is why it might have been confusing, to the fellows who've performed this nepotistic ritual for decades now, to have their shareholders vote down their plan for 'executive compensations' recently. "Wait, we have shareholders? Wait, they can do that?" According to Ars Techinca, this sort of vote (dubbed 'say-on-pay') rarely ever gets voted down, making this a huge anomaly. In fact, a recent study from Harvard Business School came to the conclusion that below 3 percent of these sorts of votes have been lost in the last decade. (Leave it EA to break new ground.) Now of course, EA are big boys and technically in charge of their own finances. They could chose to completey overturn this decision and handily fill their coffers anyway. However, doing so would require them to pout, and shirk the wishes of, 74 percent of their shareholders. Would EA be so brazen? Who knows?

But the question of how much EA was cucked for in this deal, because maybe it was just a pittance that they can move on from and easily forget. Or maybe it was 21.37 million for the EA Android-in-Chief Andrew Wilson. (A man who looks like his robotic endoskeleton was too big for his fleshy bodybag) Thats nearly 4 million more than the bonus he received last year and, distressingly, the smallest out of the proposed bumps to executive bonuses. Man with chronic foot-in-mouth syndrome, Blake Jorgensen, was looking at a 10 million buff to finances, totalling up to 20 million, alongside Laura Miele, a chief studio officer who's been smart enough not to stay in the news. Needless to say, this sort of kick in the nuts is going to hurt, but it's not like they're going to be hard-up after this so I don't feel bad ruthlessly mocking them for their lost fortunes. (Screw them.)

But why, I must ask, why did these shareholders for EA decided to bite the hand that feeds them in such a public and vicious way? Why did they decide to grow balls after all this time and throw their weight around against their playground bully-meal ticket? Why indeed. Well, as it turns out this wasn't some sort of spur-of-the-moment revolt, nor a reaction to the way that EA have been performing over the past year. (Or for their entire life span, because EA are career creeps, afterall.) As it turns out this is a precedent being set by investor activist groups to prevent the exploitation of CEO privileges when that sort of funds can be used on "Talent Development and retention." And I never thought I'd be saying this about a freaking 'investor activist' group but hear-hear! (Urgh, can I take that back? I feel dirty.)

It is so hard to come to the conclusion that the most important asset in a development studio are the talent who make the freakin' games? I feel like that's a given, but apparently not so. More and more so in recent years we've watched as talent in the industry has been looked over or straight-up abused to the point where some have called it quits in gaming entirely. I'm talking months in which people don't receive the pay that they're due, developers being over worked until they're ragged and broken, entire studios getting snapped up and gutted over something as stupid as licenses, (Looking at you for that particular one EA) and none of it ever comes with repercussions. Who could possible make these big wigs stop and change course? They're the big players in the game and they know how to make money, so the only people with the chance to give them pause would have to be the one's with their fingers on the purse strings. I suppose it's fitting, then, for that to be exactly what's happening today.

And it's not as though there's never been a set precedent of huge publishers/developers actually taking the time to ensure their employees safety before. Take Nintendo, for instance, grandfathers of the industry that they are. Rarely do you hear a word of complaint regarding the way that developers are treated under their offices. (the way they treat creativity, however, is another matter) Now that could be due to the company being Japanese and there being an inherent difference in company culture there, but anecdotal evidence paints a different picture. In times of hardship for Nintendo, such as the disastrous launch of the Wii-U, it's actually the upper management who took responsibility for their bad calls and took paycuts so that they didn't have to resort to layoffs, which would be a last case resort for Nintendo. When asked about this, the word at the time was actually rather adorable. They said that 'Nintendo employees are tasked with creating products to make people happy, how can they do that if those employees are afraid of losing their jobs and thus aren't happy themselves'. (There's a 'hear-hear' I feel less gross about giving.}

So what does this mean for the industry going forward, or more specifically for EA, well on the surface it's an incredibly slight shuffle in a positive direction, but honestly this does sort of feel more like a power-play on the part of shareholders. Perhaps I'm driven by unconscious inherent bias when I say that, but I mean it nonetheless; why would a bunch of inventors give a rats about the treatment of EA's employees? Unless it's cutting into their profits, which it might if things get too bad, there's no incentive for shareholders to so much as acknowledge EA's shadier goings-ons. But maybe this may send a message to the likes of Activision, Blizzard and- nah, Konami's too far gone on this matter. No matter how big you are, there's always someone with the power to kick you where it hurts, there's no such thing as impunity free actions.