Game Design, Programming and running a one-man games business…

The small companies. How we need thee

cliffski

“Greed is eternal”

– The ferengi rules of acquisition

Think of the four people you know best you are of working age. write down their names now.

Think about what they do for a living. How many of these people work for themselves, and how many work for someone else? How many work for a company with more than one hundred employees?

I suspect that a LOT of them work for those big companies, and it’s a possibility you work for one too. I used to. In fact I worked for a company with 66,000 staff once. Big companies are every effective, they can do things small companies can’t, but as we see more and more mergers and takeovers (especially in finance) I think we are seeing the downside of the big company society.

Whenever I read a new story about games companies releasing an expansion pack, downloadable content, micro-transactions, advertising or anything like that, someone always mentions ‘greed‘. News stories about games companies are often ‘tagged as ‘greed‘. Now I’m not going to defend some of the corporate bullshit we see in this industry, but I’m wary of this growing trend to equate all companies and everything they do with ‘greed‘.

In a sense, greed is being redefined as any move designed to make money. This is mad. Making money is what companies do. Cliff Harris is a game designer who loves making games, but Positech Games is a company that exists to make money. If Positech fails, Cliff can’t make the games. OF COURSE Positech tries to make money.

The reason that i think a lot of people are equating all business, all sales techniques, and all companies as greedy, is that increasingly people have no contact with people who own and run companies. The owners are seen as faceless ‘shareholders’ who are often assumed to be millionaires in flash houses. (The vast majority of shares are held by pension funds held by ordinary people) People assume that there is a justifiable ‘them and us’ mentality between the ordinary folk (us) and the evil swine who own companies or (Shock horror!) copyrights.

Small businesses act as a buffer between the excesses of the evil mega-corps and the general population. Big businesses can’t be *too* evil or the small ones will get a competitive advantage by being nicer. EA can only go so far with DRM before Positech and Stardock make them look like gits. Big business can lead to monopoly and a lack of choice and price competition too. Small businesses serve those niches that the big boys can’t be bothered with. Even if you only buy food from WalMart and games from EA, *You* benefit from the existence of Positech, Stardock and Introversion. We are the guys keeping the big guys (relatively) honest. Nobody knows where the next google or facebook is coming from, and this keeps those big guys in tune with the market, and not totally driving the consumer nuts.

Lets hear it for the little guys, and lets try and remember that not all companies are evil, not all adverts are the spawn of satan, not all games prices or expansion packs or DLC is some evil greedy capitalist scheme. At the end of the day, everyone is just trying to pay the bills. Sometimes, if it seems like I’m just trying to sell you something, it’s because I am. That’s what I do to put food on the table. It doesn’t mean I don’t love what I do, or try and do it well.

4 thoughts on The small companies. How we need thee

  1. I have several friends who work for small companies, or own their own company. About all they have for themselves is their ability to be “nicer” then the minimum wage employee at some huge chain…

    The problem with that is they are unable to do bulk, like the chains. Where you can get a custom Surround Sound Setup and your Remote Programmed by a friend of mine who works for a small theatre company, you could get a lesser version of it installed and programmed for less at Best Buy (large American Electronics Chain)… They won’t do as good of a job, or hide the wires… but it’ll cost you less, and is insured by the company of thousands.

    People like that insurance, and, all too often, it’s the deal breaker for many. It’s the reason people will shop at WalMart for food, instead of their local market. The reason they’ll get their propane tank replaced at Lowes (a home hardware store) for $15, instead of paying a local Propane company $9 to fill it.

    The only small businesses that don’t seem to suffer (as much) from that problem would be restaurants… of course, that’s why we have such a springup of Applebee’s and Chili’s over local steakhouses, or Subway instead of the local sandwich shop.

    If there’s a dollar to be made, somebody will figure how to make more of it cost less on a wide scale.

    The big one that bothers me are the “Pet Mills” where they churn out puppies and kittens… want to talk about tainting a small business topic?

  2. There is another side to this “greed” : employees. Big companies employ a lot of people and these people need to be paid ! EA, for example, employ 8,000 people directly and maybe another 50,000 indirectly.

  3. Yes, companies are in it for the money, but customers aren’t in it to just hand the companies their wallet, they are looking for something. It’s an exchange. Greed is when companies are doing something to take more money without giving any value back. “DRM” in some ways is greedy, particularly in the area of blocking first sale rights such as reselling a game. Instead of allowing a customer to buy a used game at a lower price, the customer is forced to buy the game brand new directly from the company. This is an example of greed. Many large companies forget that they are in the business of providing goods and/or services to their customers, and instead think of their business as providing value to shareholders and that customers are means to an end.

    Back home, I have a choice of a few places to shop for food. I hardly ever shop at Walmart even though its the cheapest because I don’t like their greed. Instead, I shop at a national chain which is considered among the most expensive because the inside of the store is nice, and they provide great service. I feel like I am getting something back in exchange for paying a few extra cents on the dollar.

    CaesarsGhost:
    I had a poodle that was rescued from one of those puppy mills. She was in terrible shape. All of her hair was matted, and she was deathly afraid of tables. It took years before she’d ever be willing to stand underneath a table. She was also very quiet, hardly barked, and very sweet. The best advice on stopping puppy mills is to adopt.

  4. Why does it always boil down to DRM? I think DRM shows quite nicely that big companies can act stupid. If their goal was to get wealthy in an efficient manner, they would stop bothering about DRM (or even quit doing games altogether).

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