Submitted 1 year ago by L4s@lemmy.world [bot] to technology@lemmy.world
CEO Bobby Kotick will leave Activision Blizzard on January 1, 2024 | Schreier: Kotick will depart after 33 years, employees are “very excited.”::Schreier: Kotick will depart after 33 years, employees are “very excited.”
Hope he burn in hell. He’s the best example of how not to run a company. It’s insane that he’s not been let go for years now.
That entirely depends on your expectations of a company CEO
www.macrotrends.net/stocks/…/stock-price-history
I can’t think of a company that wouldn’t hire someone with this kind of stock performance over 30 years.
The issue is really that consumers just keep spending money on things that they hate.
If they did that, no tick would have been gone a long long time ago
I think you’re right. I’m pointing moee to his leadership and how he has allowed sexism and other bad behavior to go on without any consequences. He even told an assistant that he would have her killed… pcgamer.com/more-shocking-activision-blizzard-rev…
He might earn himself and the stockholders a lot of money… But in my eyes he’s a great example of why I don’t like capitalism, but that is another discussion tho!
ATVI’s stock performance only looks impressive if you don’t compare it to anything. Here’s a graph comparing ATVI to ONEQ, which is an ETF that tracks the NASDAQ composite index. If anything, ATVI has been slightly underperforming the market average for most of Kotick’s tenure as CEO.
To see what “outperforming the market” looks like, compare ATVI to NVDA. NVDA’s stock has increased 16,000% in the 15 years that Kotick has been CEO of ATVI.
Or to see some video game company stocks that have outperformed the market, compare ATVI to TTWO (Take Two) or CCOEY (Capcom).
From a purely financial perspective, Kotick was middling at best. He deserves no plaudits. There were plenty of other NASDAQ companies that outperformed the market during the time he was CEO of ActiBlizz, including other video game companies.
Most consumers just don’t care or don’t know at all who Bobby Kotick is. Call of Duty is so popular, but the people that follow the market or the game industry well enough to know the people behind games aren’t that many.
This fucking goblin enabled systemic rape in his organization. He deserves prison.
Which ring of hell is he planning on spending his retirement within?
Harvey Weinstein, but using him is practically cheating.
I hear his actual testicles (testicle?) look like they have eyeballs as well. There were a lot of similar accounts from the women he abused who used terms like “genital deformity” and “botched surgeries” when recounting the sex he forced upon them.
John Riccitiello , former EA CEO, and now former unity CEO
I am so glad he is gone. I stopped playing any blizzaed games partially because of this shmuck… and partially because the games became trash. Here’s hoping things will turn around now that he is gone.
Yeah, i’m sure microsoft won’t do anything to increase monetization on their 69 billion dollar purchase. The objective is to make blizzard’s games better by minimizing highly profitable systems like microtransactions, battle passes, DLC season passes, xp boosters, in game real money stores.
They wouldn’t be buying these properties to try and milk as much profit as possible at all. No sir.
Hey, this is the last hope I have. There’s not a lot of it, but there is a tiny chance that maybe maybe maybe things will get better. Very likely not, but, you know, one could hope.
Microsoft-Activision-Blizzard to design pachinko machines and mobile games, exclusively.
Now when I think about it, the chronologically last Blizzard games I’ve enjoyed were WarCraft III TFT and old WoW on pirate servers. (My favorite is Tides of Darkness, obviously)
So - I don’t know in which direction would things be turning around, what is there left even since those times?
He looks like Bilbo Baggins in the scene where he’s overcome with desire for the ring and tries to take it from Frodo.
HRAAAAGH!
Yet I would still rather hang out with fiend frodo
Is there a scarybilbo lemmy sub yet?
Limp dick Kotick should have been fired long ago.
I’m out if the loop. Can someone explain?
While CEO of Activision, Kotick’s termination without cause, or “Termination by employee for good reason following a change of control,” guaranteed him nearly $300 million. Bloomberg reports that Kotick’s windfall will likely be $375 million now that Microsoft’s acquisition has gone through.
That’ll teach 'em
the shareholders will identify a suitable replacement my dudes, no need to cheer up over this
Such a punchable face. Damn
Blizzard will stay the rotten corpse of something great it is right now
They drag the corpses of their games along for money real good. Sometimes I think about the amount of people still paying a wow subscription and just sigh.
What a piece of shit
We’ve replaced Kotick with Microsoft lol
A big upgrade.
We don’t know that yet. I dislike Kotick as well, but doubtful that much changes from the monetization standpoint of the company.
From a purely morale standpoint, it’s mostly a W. But it’s not like Kotick isn’t getting his golden parachute and wiping his tears away with $100 bills.
And there was much rejoicing
Nice to see Microsoft is cleaning house one day after the aquisition went through, starting with the root of the problem. This is very likely part of the deal and is gonna bring about some long needed changes.
This is standard. You always get rid of the upper management. You give them a lot of money and a round of applause and then you put your own people in. Everyone at the top will be Microsoft.
Kotick gave himself a few hundred million as a bonus a few years ago.
This was likely the plan before the activation. I doubt this came as a surprise to Kotick.
Remember when kotick threatened to kill an assistant, and then they were fired and paid to not talk about it?
Microsoft must have a policy of no stealing breast milk, poor guy lost his job to that (fr tho, he will get a really nice bonus and will never ‘pay’ for the terrible work environment he created)
Vote me as a CEO I will
Sounds good but that is the job of the development lead, the CEO is there to make sure the money keeps flowing.
So what would your strategies be to bring more money on the table for Activision blizzard?
Time to polish up my resume.
Add some kielbasa
Fuck yeah, brother! I’m excited to apply for the new Activision Blizzard, too! What a time to be alive! <3
Damn I already got competition?
ITT: people who think the guy getting a $375M golden parachute is taking a huge L.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
It’s “a massive change for the video game industry,” Schreier writes, which seems almost restrained, given Kotick’s longevity and recent history.
Kotick, who has led Activision for more than 30 years and orchestrated its merger with Blizzard, had considered stepping down in late 2021.
Activision was also sued by its shareholders and pressured by state treasurers over its secrecy and responses regarding the California lawsuit.
In early 2022, Microsoft announced its intent to buy Activision, and the timing, according to reports from Bloomberg and the Wall Street Journal, was not a coincidence.
Kotick told VentureBeat after the Microsoft announcement that he didn’t believe the harassment and mismanagement accusations hurt the company’s stock.
He cited delays in shipping Overwatch and Diablo titles, along with Call of Duty’s sales performance.
The original article contains 376 words, the summary contains 128 words. Saved 66%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
So many CEOs stepping down now
What are people’s predictions on what will happen to ABK after he leaves? Personally, I’ve never played COD and the last Blizzard game I played was Diablo 2, so I don’t know what they’ve been doing.
good boss lol
Yewb@lemmy.world 1 year ago
This 1 fucking guy ruined a whole generation of gaming with his greedy dumb fuck business ideas.
Bobert@sh.itjust.works 1 year ago
Ftfy
chaorace@lemmy.sdf.org 1 year ago
Who would win?
Edgelord_Of_Tomorrow@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Dude has ruined multiple generations
SendMePhotos@lemmy.world 1 year ago
It would be ruined if people didn’t buy the stuff, but they do, so it’s a success.
GBU_28@lemm.ee 1 year ago
How? Did he force people to buy and subscribe and endorse something?
No. Idiots bought in, sucking balls purchase after purchase.
Mr_Dr_Oink@lemmy.world 1 year ago
They trick people into buying in. The majority of people buyi g these games are extremely susceptible to the tactics they use to get you to buy their games and when you buy thwm they have more tricks to keep you locked in. The people falling for it arent idiots. They just fall for this stuff a bit easier. Or they havent been shown how it works so they dont know what to look out for.
Things like fomo and gambling mechanics as well as clever pricing tricks are just aome examples. Tbere are conferences and lectures held by industry people for lther industry people where that talk about consumers like they are cattle or other livestock and how we can be manipulated if certain tactics are followed. Games are more like “storefronts” to them. In fact thats literally how the fortnite developers referto fortnite, a storefront. With a game attached.
So, no, bobby didnt force anyone to buy his games, he didnt point a gun at anyones head (well actually we dont know that and i think there was a rumour aomewhere of something like this, couls be wrong tho) but he did remove all choice and boil everything down to a basic game with an inflated shop which fans of activision and later blizzard games fell for, for far too long. CoD was one of the most popular games in the world and fans of the game took some time to realise that the same game was being re released with a new skin for years.
Bobby took away that choice by not releasing other games, he just preyed on the susceptable and knew exactly what he was doing.
So please dont pretend that, for all those people, simply not buying the games or in game purchases was “simple” for the majority of people and that in a round about way, people weren’t forced into buying into it. It just shows a lack of understanding and research into the subject.
stillwater@lemm.ee 1 year ago
I’ve never seen any other industry be bewildered by the idea of caveat emptor as much as gamers. My favourite are the ones that act as if Steam allowing bad quality games on their store is a bad thing because it means they could spend their money on a bad game. The idea of “just don’t buy it” is a mystery to them.
yeather@lemmy.ca 1 year ago
Agreed, don’t buy the battle pass, or better yet, don’t buy the game if all you’re going to do is complain.