The rise and fall of esports: Will the big money for watching people play video games return?

A delightful debut for
angel carreras.

With SonicFox @ Evo Japan, Cecilia D'Anastasio and Jason Chung

npr.org/2024/04/24/119…

Very huge news for the video game industry, where you can see a lot of these sorts of contracts!

New: Saudi Arabia's Savvy has spent $8.3 billion of its allotted $38 billion to make the country a gaming hub. Subsidiary Scopely may be the beneficiary of its next acquisitions, CEO Brian Ward tells me, after the $2b success of Scopely's Monopoly Go: bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

News: Take-Two is cutting 5% of jobs and 'eliminating several projects in development,' the company said in a filing today. bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

Activision confirmed our February report (bloomberg.com/news/articles/…) that changes are coming to the Call of Duty League. Teams will earn more revenue from in-game item sales, no longer pay outstanding entry fees and receive 2-year minimum revenue guarantees callofdutyleague.com/en-us/news/the…

Back from vacation. Now time to check up on games Twitter--surely things were completely normal

Devastating. Nobody did it like Pollini. Rest in peace. washingtonpost.com/obituaries/202…

New: In interviews at GDC, video game executives say we should expect big-budget games that take fewer risks and rely on well-tested IP as game dev costs balloon. “You’re going to get things that people perceive as being safe,' said an Epic Games VP. bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

'Our investigation found evidence of predatory conduct across apps including Telegram & Discord, [as well as] activity on Instagram, SoundCloud & Roblox. The platforms are aware of these groups, but have yet to eradicate them.' A *must read* from WIRED wired.com/story/764-com-…

Powerful story from Leon Yin, Davey Alba & Leonardo showing how OpenAI's GPT discriminates against names based on race and gender when ranking resumes - a worrisome finding as companies use AI systems more and more in the hiring process.
bloomberg.com/graphics/2024-…

New: Discord CEO Jason Citron told me that 'At some point, we'd probably go public.' Discord's revenue is $600 million today. That and more in my story on the company's latest product, Quests: bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

I went deep into the world of TikTok spammers who claim to makes 5 figures a month posting stolen and AI-generated clips through its partner program. This community is absolutely nuts

404media.co/inside-the-wor…

New: Call of Duty League team owners are in talks with Activision to restructure the league. Owners are looking for a bigger revenue cut, sources say: bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

Among other divisions, the layoffs will hit Insomniac (Spider-Man), Naughty Dog (The Last of Us), and Guerrilla (Horizon), three of PlayStation's most successful subsidiaries bloomberg.com/news/articles/…