...no comment. (For the journos.)

[Steele Magnolia]

Have you considered Wired magazine? http://www.wired.com/magazine/

Wired is a great technical magazine that provides a story focus on the cultural and social aspects of technology as well.

[FourSpeed]

Good article rae (as JaguarX noted - particularly from a gamer's PoV).

Like Khepera, I also noted some typo/grammatical stuff (though I'm not a proof reader).

The ones that immediately caught my eye:

...to sell the IP address...

Did you really mean IP address, or were you intending IP (Intellectual Property) instead?

...that the company is forged his resignation...

"is" shouldn't be there. Also, and I personally don't know, but "forgery" is a serious accusation - is that proved?  Note, I am aware that Garriot's civil suit was successful for him, but that's a bit different (though, related).

...casting more suspicions on the companies motives and way...

This should be "company's motive" - it's possessive, not plural  ;)

For Tony's quotes, I believe that each should be quotated, so I'd add a " after ...in fact, reasonable and also after ...disingenuous at best, but I'm not a grammarian either, so I'm not certain whether that is correct or not, but those look like hanging quotes to me...

In any case, hope those help - again, good article. I was interested to read it.


Regards,
4

[Rae]

*facepalm* IP address. *snrk* I'm a genius.  Yes, that is supposed to be Intellectual Property.

[Blackbird71]

*facepalm* IP address. *snrk* I'm a genius.  Yes, that is supposed to be Intellectual Property.

Also, for the purposes of the article, you may want to spell it out, rather than using the abbreviation; many readers may not be familiar with the term "IP".

I'll echo FourSpeed's corrections, and ad a few other minor points:

Their reputation also took a battering in 2008 after a lenghty court battle with Richard Garriot after the closure of Tabla Rasa, another MMO.

I'm pretty sure that this is just a typo as it is correct in the "Notes" section, but the game was "Tabula Rasa," not "Tabla Rasa."

We contacted NC Soft, asking for clarification on the statement they issued and giving them the opportunity to respond to claims by the Save COH campaign who took to forums, Facebook and Twitter wanting to know:

Asking if NC Soft considered combining servers, putting the game in maintenance mode and keeping it running without further developments or updates, or allowing people to create their own, private servers.

This seems a bit disjointed; as a sentence, the second part doesn't quite fit with the first.  All the other items in your list are quetsions while this one is a statement.  I'd change it to "Did NCSoft consider combining servers,...", but you're the author, use whatever wording you like.

While NC Soft refused to engage with their customers, or shed transparency on the attempts they claim to have made to prevent the closure of City of Heroes,

Again, the phrasing feels off; one does not "shed transparency."  You can shed light on something, or be transparent about a subject, but both at once doesn't quite work.

"City of Heroes" was the first MMORPG based not only on superheroes, but heavily on comics books,

Someone correct me on this, but shouldn't it be "comic books?" (singular on comic, plural on books)  At least that's how I'd always heard it, I could easily be wrong.

I hope this helps!

[Turjan]

*facepalm* IP address. *snrk* I'm a genius.  Yes, that is supposed to be Intellectual Property.

No need for such an epic facepalm - I was watching a documentary on the solar system the other day and would you believe the narrator actually said "The planet can wobble on its axis as much as 15 degrees celcius" :roll:

Happens to everyone :)

[JaguarX]

OK. Here's my first attempt at something for the mainstream media. It was originally going to be for the gaming press, but while I was writing it, a more interesting angle hit me on something that might be more interesting to them, so I'm gonna get going one in a little bit.

I'd really appreciate help and comments on it. I've tried to keep it unbiased, but I'm not sure how successful I've been, and I'm dyscalculic, so it took me about an hour just to work out the figures I quoted. If there's anything wrong in there, especially in the business analysis bit, please correct me.

---

For eight years, the residents of Paragon City, the fictional setting of the massive online role-playing game, City of Heroes have been battling evildoers intent on destroying their world. So perhaps, when NC Soft announced on August 31 that they were pulling the plug on the game, they shouldn't have been surprised that the people behind the avatars swung into action to save their universe.

The huge campaign was launched, spear-headed by The Titan Network, a group of players dedicated to helping others make their most out of their time in City of Heroes, and it's sister game, City of Villains. The campaign quickly gained momentum, gaining the support of New York Times best-selling author Mercedes Lackey, Neil Gaiman, Lord of the Rings star Sean Austin, The Guild's Felicia Day and comic strip Penny Arcade. 

Over 20,000 people signed a petition urging NC Soft to reconsider their decision to close the game. Players engaged in a letter writing campaign, raised the money to buy the developers dinner, sent capes and masks to NC Soft's offices in Austin, Seattle and South Korea, and held a massive unity rally that was quick to gain the attention of the gaming press.

But after weeks of silence, NC Soft issued a response on October 2, when in a statement they claimed they had "exhausted all options including the selling of the studio and the rights to the City of Heroes intellectual property, but in the end, efforts to do so were not successful."

Almost immediately, the City of Heroes community called foul. They said they knew of at least two investment groups  and one studio who had approached NC Soft with offers to buy the City of  Heroes franchise, who did not receive a response. They wanted to know why NC Soft believed it had 'exhausted all options' weeks before the game's scheduled closure on November 30.

We contacted NC Soft, asking for clarification on the statement they issued and giving them the opportunity to respond to claims by the Save COH campaign who took to forums, Facebook and Twitter wanting to know:

What attempts were made to sell Paragon Studios.
What attempts were made to sell the IP address, and how they were exhausted.
Why a number of potential investors who came forward to try and buy the rights, did not receive a response from NC Soft.
How NC exhausted all the options for the sale of the game, Paragon Studios or the Intellectual Property, given that the game is not due for closure until November 30.
Asking if NC Soft considered combining servers, putting the game in maintenance mode and keeping it running without further developments or updates, or allowing people to create their own, private servers.
Why NC Soft will not to publicly name a price that they would be willing to accept for either Paragon Studios, or City of Heroes itself.

NC Soft's public relations are handled by H&K Strategies, and it took four emails and six tweets to get them to acknowledge the request, and a response was eventually received two weeks later from Lincoln Davis, director of corporate communications at NC Soft's Seattle Office.

His response?

"I wanted to let you know that we will be declining your interview request as it relates to the sun setting of City of Heroes."

Well. That clears that up, then.

Calling themselves the world's 'premier publisher of MMO games', the South-Korean based video company includes Lineage, Guild Wars and Aion in their porfolio. But more recently, they have picked up the unenviable moniker of MMO killer. Come December 1, the company will have been responsible for closing down a third of all MMOs that have ever been unplugged.

Their reputation also took a battering in 2008 after a lenghty court battle with Richard Garriot after the closure of Tabla Rasa, another MMO. Garriot claimed he was forced out of the company and was made to sell his 400,000 shares in NCSoft's stock, losing him millions of dollars and that the company is forged his resignation announcement.  On July 30, 2010, a jury in a Texas federal court awarded him US$28 million. NC Soft appealed the decision, but in October last year the Court of Appeal upheld the decision, with the final figure boosted to $32 million, after adding in interest and attorney's fees accrued during the appeal process.

NC Soft's refusal to say exactly why the game is being closed other than 'a reallignment of company focus' and remaining tight-lipped in the media has lead to their customers becoming increasingly more vocal and casting more suspicions on the companies motives and way of operating. 

Players argue that the game remained profitable and NCsoft's Investor Relations report for August 2012 show the game had a revue of $10m-12m a year, and that sales related to City of Heroes remained fairly constant.

The report shows that City of Heroes revenues are just a tiny fraction of NCSoft's incomes when compared to the Asian powerhouses of Aion and Lineage 1 and 2, and that City of Heroes accounts for just two per cent of sales. Perhaps more tellingly, it shows that their pre-tax income was down 73 per cent year on year, to 18,934 South Korean Won – around US$17million.

While NC Soft refused to engage with their customers, or shed transparency on the attempts they claim to have made to prevent the closure of City of Heroes, Tony Vazquez, who has spear-headed the 'save'  campaign said:

"I strongly feel that NCsoft needs to seriously consider whether what it finds reasonable is, in fact, reasonable.

"When I read that NC Soft feels that it has exhausted all options for keeping City of Heroes active, I find that statement disingenuous at best.

"I feel that I have to point out that this profit from City of Heroes is part of what has made NCsoft's other titles such as Aion and Guild Wars 2 possible by funding their development.  Hopefully you can understand the anger and disappointment we felt when a mere three days after Guild Wars 2 launched--a game that our money funded—NC Soft in essence kicked us to the curb and has now repeatedly denied us the basic dignity of continuing to exist as a community.  While the money we have invested may not give us any legal standing from an ownership perspective, I believe that it does put an ethical onus on NC Soft to do whatever it can to allow the game to remain active."

The City of Heroes franchise is scheduled for 'sunset' on November 30. You can find out more about the Save City of Heroes campaign at www.savecoh.com. To sign the petition calling for NC Soft to change their minds about the game's closure, visit tinyurl.com/savecoh.

--

Notes:
"City of Heroes" was the first MMORPG based not only on superheroes, but heavily on comics books, predating Sony Online "DC Universe Online" by nearly 7 years. The free downloadable updates for the game were known as "Issues," with actual titles that added new content to the popular MMO.

Paid expansions included "City of Villains" in 2005 and "City of Heroes: Going Rogue" in 2010. The lore and backstory of the game was so popular that there were many tie-in projects in other media, including novels, a collectible card game and -- not surprisingly -- a comic book series from publisher Blue King.

"City of Heroes" had over 120,000 subscribers in the US and Europe as of September 2008 and added a free-to-play subscription model in June 2011.

Of all of the MMOs that have been closed down, NC Soft are now responsible for killing a third of them – Auto Assault, Exteel, Dungeon Runners, Tabula Rasa and now City of Heroes, earning them the moniker of MMOKiller.

For more information on the Save City of Heroes Campaign, visit www.savecoh.com.

The full text of Tony Vazquez's response to NC Soft can be found at  http://www.cohtitan.com/forum/index.php/topic,5467.0.html

For further reading, a spreadsheet of all media coverage of the Save City of Heroes campaign can be found at: http://tinyurl.com/8hhn5xv

Alright re-read it as an average media watcher at home who have no deep knowledge of the online gaming community.

It's a very solid article. Yet, there is one question that should be answered that is obvious to us, but may not be so obvious to the average American.

"Why should we care and or how does it relate to us?"

Ok, that's a little direct...
As I gamer, I know exactly what the answer to that question is and it's logical but to the mainstream, the reason isnt so obvious as how it relates to to average person that watches the news. I think it can be related to them as if something like facebook was to be scheduled for closing or something. Oh yeah dont forget to mention the job losses. People can relate to that.

I believe I will be seeing and look forward to this article going mainstream. And make sure you get due credit for writing it.

[Victoria Victrix]

My main comment would be what Cory Doctorow always says about Boing Boing proposals.

"I don't care.  MAKE me care."

And how about submitting it to Boing Boing?  You definitely have a story there now.

[Rae]

Thank you all so much for the feedback. I'll have a pop at draft two tomorrow .

[Rae]

Here's another angle to consider for your story:

NCSoft is not only doing themselves a disservice by their continued silence. I suggest that in the long run they are poisoning the well of the ENTIRE MMO industry.

When gamers really, truly as a group begin to understand the fact that at ANY time for ANY reason - even a NONSENSICAL reason - a game can be taken away - 

You're an absolute genius. I'm reworking the original one based on all the suggestions, but this is worth something on it's own. I've asked ..er..sorry, I forget the name, the person who collected the 'no rights, no reasons' thread if they're cool with me using that as the basis for another article, and they've said yes, so that's my next project.

Thank you all SO much for the help and the feedback.

[Rotten Luck]

You might want to add the fact City of Heroes community had donated thousands to charities every year.  Also could mention that we have been called the friendliest and helpful MMO communities.  We take pride in helping new players instead of insulting them with "NOOB".

Second you mentioned that NCsoft got the nickname the MMOKiller twice, and that they are responsible for a third of the loss of mmos..  Repeating it might make people believe your trying to hammer this point.  From our view it's fine but from an outsider it would seem your bis. 

[Rae]

Thanks, Rotten. I'll factor that in :)

[Atlantea]

You're an absolute genius. I'm reworking the original one based on all the suggestions, but this is worth something on it's own. I've asked ..er..sorry, I forget the name, the person who collected the 'no rights, no reasons' thread if they're cool with me using that as the basis for another article, and they've said yes, so that's my next project.

Thank you all SO much for the help and the feedback.

*Bows, blushing* All part of the service, my friend.

[JaguarX]

You might want to add the fact City of Heroes community had donated thousands to charities every year.  Also could mention that we have been called the friendliest and helpful MMO communities.  We take pride in helping new players instead of insulting them with "NOOB".

Maybe we should leave that last statement out as there are plenty of cases where we a few people  that do call people noob for asking for help and or refer them to paragonwiki.com before calling them a noob.

Wait, most of the time that happened in game so may not be any evidence to the contrary recorded. Not sure about the forum as I havent been there in a while much, but last time the forum was worse than ingame attitudes, but no where near as worse as it is now. It's not looking very friendly now at all there and hope with this article there is no link provided to that forum as it is not how this community is asa whole but to an outsider, COH official forum if they find it, will be used as a judgement of the community as a whole and the recent posts are not a very good image. We dont want them to take this then follow up the story with posting evidence of people going nuts, and acting like savages just because they are hidden behind a computer screen. The mainstrema love those stories as it fits into their view of gaming communities already.

[Rae]

Re-angled to appeal to the gaming press a little more, with the hope of following up with the 'no rights, no reason' based one that I haven't written yet.
I'm a bit worried, as it comes in at 1,200+ words, which is probably too long for most online and general news places, but about right for a magazine feature.


---

South Korean games software giant NC Soft has installed a firewall of silence around its plans to close the massively multiplayer online (MMO) game City of Heroes.

Despite petitions, celebrity endorsements and multiple appeals to keep the profitable and popular game alive, and equally strident calls for an explanation, NC Soft has responded to all pleas with a blunt "no comment".

By December 1, the company will have been responsible for closing down a third of all MMOs that have ever been unplugged.

For eight years, the residents of Paragon City, the fictional setting of the massive online role-playing game, City of Heroes have been battling evildoers intent on destroying their world. So perhaps, when NC Soft announced on August 31 that they were pulling the plug on the game and made 80 people at Paragon Studios in Mountain View, California redundant in the process, they shouldn't have been surprised that the people behind the avatars swung into action to save their universe.

The huge campaign was launched, spear-headed by The Titan Network, a group of players dedicated to helping others make their most out of their time in City of Heroes, and it's sister game, City of Villains.

The campaign quickly gained momentum, gaining the support of New York Times best-selling author Mercedes Lackey, Neil Gaiman, Lord of the Rings star Sean Austin, The Guild's Felicia Day and online comic strip Penny Arcade.

Over 21,000 people signed a petition urging NC Soft to reconsider their decision to close the game. Players engaged in a letter writing campaign, raised the money to buy the developers dinner, sent capes and masks to NC Soft's offices in Austin, Seattle and South Korea, and held a massive unity rally that was quick to gain the attention of the gaming press.

But after weeks of silence, NC Soft issued a response on October 2, when in a statement they claimed they had "exhausted all options including the selling of the studio and the rights to the City of Heroes intellectual property, but in the end, efforts to do so were not successful."

Almost immediately, the City of Heroes community called foul. They said they knew of at least two investment groups and one studio who had approached NC Soft with offers to buy the City of Heroes franchise, who did not receive a response. They wanted to know why NC Soft believed it had 'exhausted all options' weeks before the game's scheduled closure on November 30.

We contacted NC Soft, asking for clarification on the statement they issued and giving them the opportunity to respond to claims by the Save COH campaign who took to forums, Facebook and Twitter wanting to know:

What attempts were made to sell Paragon Studios.
What attempts were made to sell the intellectual property rights, and how they were exhausted.
Why a number of potential investors who came forward to try and buy the rights, did not receive a response from NC Soft.
How NC exhausted all the options for the sale of the game, Paragon Studios or the Intellectual Property, given that the game is not due for closure until November 30.
Why NC Soft did not consider combining servers, putting the game in maintenance mode and keeping it running without further developments or updates, or allowing people to create their own, private servers.
Why NC Soft will not to publicly name a price that they would be willing to accept for either Paragon Studios, or City of Heroes itself.

A response was eventually received two weeks later from Lincoln Davis, director of corporate communications at NC Soft's Seattle Office:

"I wanted to let you know that we will be declining your interview request as it relates to the sun setting of City of Heroes."

Well. That clears that up, then.

Calling themselves the world's 'premier publisher of MMO games', the South-Korean based video games company includes Lineage, Guild Wars and Aion in their portfolio. But more recently, they have picked up the unenviable moniker of MMO killer.

Their reputation also took a battering in 2008 after a lengthy court battle with Richard Garriot after the closure of Tabula Rasa, another MMO. Garriott claimed that, while quarantined after a voyage into space, he was fired, then NCSoft presented it as him leaving voluntarily. Leaving, rather than being fired, meant his stock options expired sooner, and he was forced to sell in what his lawsuit described as "one of the worst equity markets in modern history."

This lost him tens of millions of dollars, Garriott said, and the court agreed, awarding him $28 million in July 2010. NC Soft appealed the decision, but in October last year, the Court of Appeal upheld the decision, with the final figure boosted to $32 million, after adding in interest and attorney's fees accrued during the appeal process.

NC Soft's refusal to say exactly why the game is being closed other than 'a realignment of company focus' and remaining tight-lipped in the media has lead to their customers becoming increasingly more vocal and casting more suspicions on the company's motives and way of operating.

Players argue that the game remained profitable and NC Soft's Investor Relations report for August 2012 show the game had a revenue of $10m-12m a year, and that sales related to City of Heroes remained fairly constant.

The report shows that City of Heroes revenues are just a tiny fraction of NC Soft's incomes when compared to the Asian powerhouses of Aion and Lineage 1 and 2, and that City of Heroes accounts for just two per cent of sales. Perhaps more tellingly, it shows that their pre-tax income was down 73 per cent year on year, to 18,934 South Korean Won – around US$17 million.

While NC Soft refused to engage with their customers, or shed light on the attempts they claim to have made to prevent the closure of City of Heroes, Tony Vazquez, who has spear-headed the 'save' campaign said:

"I strongly feel that NC Soft needs to seriously consider whether what it finds reasonable is, in fact, reasonable.

"When I read that NC Soft feels that it has exhausted all options for keeping City of Heroes active, I find that statement disingenuous at best.

"I feel that I have to point out that this profit from City of Heroes is part of what has made NC Soft's other titles such as Aion and Guild Wars 2 possible by funding their development. Hopefully you can understand the anger and disappointment we felt when a mere three days after Guild Wars 2 launched--a game that our money funded—NC Soft in essence kicked us to the curb and has now repeatedly denied us the basic dignity of continuing to exist as a community. While the money we have invested may not give us any legal standing from an ownership perspective, I believe that it does put an ethical onus on NC Soft to do whatever it can to allow the game to remain active."

The City of Heroes franchise is scheduled for 'sunset' on November 30. You can find out more about the Save City of Heroes campaign at www.savecoh.com. To sign the petition calling for NC Soft to change their minds about the game's closure, visit tinyurl.com/savecoh.

--

Notes:

"City of Heroes" was the first MMORPG based not only on superheroes, but heavily on comics books, pre-dating Sony Online "DC Universe Online" by nearly 7 years. The free downloadable updates for the game were known as "Issues," with actual titles that added new content to the popular MMO.

Paid expansions included "City of Villains" in 2005 and "City of Heroes: Going Rogue" in 2010. The lore and backstory of the game was so popular that there were many tie-in projects in other media, including novels, a collectible card game and -- not surprisingly -- a comic book series from publishers Blue King and Top Cow.

"City of Heroes" had over 120,000 subscribers in the US and Europe as of September 2008 and added a free-to-play subscription model in June 2011.

Of all of the MMOs that have been closed down, NC Soft are now responsible for killing a third of them – Auto Assault, Exteel, Dungeon Runners, Tabula Rasa and now City of Heroes.

For more information on the Save City of Heroes Campaign, visit http://www.savecoh.com/.

The full text of Tony Vazquez's response to NC Soft can be found at http://www.cohtitan.com/forum/index.php/topic,5467.0.html

For further reading, a spreadsheet of all media coverage of the Save City of Heroes campaign can be found at: http://tinyurl.com/8hhn5xv

[Rae]

Article two is underway, with Blizzard/Funcom/SOE/Perfect World and (a little cheekily) Nexon asked if they'd be willing to sign up to a voluntary code of contact/game of rights to protect their customer's investments of time and money.

Pending no-one screaming at me that I GOT SOMETHING WRONG, on Wednesday, I'll be looking to send off the corrected-original article to a number of press-release distributing websites, as well as nowpublic.com. I'll send the more gaming-angled one  to some gaming websites.

I'm hoping to add in the information about the (apparent) Steam approach to NC Soft, too, if I can get permission from the person who posted the info here.

Fansy also said he'd forward it to a couple of his contacts. He seems to have some ace media contacts so fingers crossed he can get it in someplace.

If anyone wants to put the spelling into American and send it off to anyone they think might like it, that would be super.

[Lily Barclay]

Only thing that jumps out at me is his name is Sean Astin, not Austin.

[Rae]

Ooh, nice catch. Thanks Lily.

[Rae]

Alright.

Today, I have sent the 'firewall of silence' version as a press release to:

PCgamer.com, escapist magazine, rockpapershotgun, lorehound, MMOFallout, Starburst, eurogamer, egmnow, gamespy, blisteredthumbs, zam, insidemacgames, dealspwn, examiner.com, massively, wired, thesixthaxis, shacknews, mmorpg, mmobomb, segment next, incgames, videogamer, mcvuk, vg247, gamepolitics, kotaku, BBC click and The Guardian, gamingbus, chaoster and player attack. These are all the places I could find online that'd ever run stories about the closure of COH.

I sent a slightly (very slightly reworked) version: "South Korean games software giant NC Soft has made 80 people in Mountain View redundant, and is set to destroy a world with a population of Spain - but won't say why." to local papers that seemed to cover the Mountain View area of California, including the San Jose Mercury, and Mountain View Gazette.

I've also put it up on a couple of freebie press release distributions sites, as well as Reuters and UIP, who seem to sell news to just about everyone on the web.  It's also been submitted to www.nowpublic.com where it's waiting for approval for publication, because I've never tried to publish anything there before :-p

At this point, I think the job loss front might be the way forward for mainstream media, so if anyone can think of a suitable US news outlet or newspaper where I could forward it, please let me know who I should be sending it to. Ideally not something TOO big, where it'll probably be over looked, but big enough where exposure there is likely to get picked up by bigger papers.

I'm also going to send a copy to Fansy, since he seems to have some awesome media/webcomic contacts who could probably get this out to the wider 'net community.

If anyone has any contacts they could send it on to (*coughcoughdownixcough*), or a blog or..whatever..please, please, please plagerise the crap out of it and put it where ever the hell you want :)

I'm waiting on responses from other MMO publishers for article #2, on how MMO players basically have no rights at all :-p

[Turjan]

rae, my hat's off to you - you're a star! :D

[Atlantea]

Awesome! Let us know where this stuff sees print/posting!