Gamecock Pees On Gravestones, Hijacks Domains For 'Cock The Vote'
July 15, 2008 4:00 AM | Simon Carless
Now, here's an interesting one. Of course, you're expecting Austin-based indie publisher Gamecock to do something 'controversial' - it's E3 time, after all, and they're renowned for extravagantly declaiming E3's death and otherwise making a 'lovable' nuisance of themselves.
Well, this time round, partly hosted on the 'Hail To The Chimp'-promotional website at CockTheVote.us, Gamecock's Mike Wilson has announced that he's running for President of the Entertainment Software Association, the folks who put on E3. Of course, he can't actually do this, because it's not an elected position, but that won't stop him from generally goofing off in some promotional campaign videos.
There are also various other videos popping up on blog sites as E3 week continues - most recently, Destructoid revealing Wilson's running mate - his offspring, apparently, after Gamecock co-founder Harry Miller stumps up support for Mike Gallagher.
So, firstly, it seems that Destructoid commenters aren't really feeling the manufactured drama - sample comment: "Can't stand Gamecock. They need to put out a good game that warrants their cockyness and until then shut up about how they're gong to change the industry. It's easy to talk, but to deliver is a whole different story."
But I have a bigger issue with the original video, around for a few weeks, still hosted on the Cock The Vote homepage, and which seems to feature Wilson faux-peeing on a gravestone (?) throughout the vid. But it's not that - it's that the Gamecock folks list a bunch of URLs at the end of the video that they've registered as part of the campaign - and they're domain squatting on notable industry figures' personal web domains!
Some examples - RobertKotick.com, ToddHollenshead.com, DougLowenstein.com (c'mon, Gamecock-ers, he's not even in the game biz any more!), JohnRiccitiello.com, StraussZelnick.com, SeamusBlackley.com, and TripHawkins.com.
I think this was meant to be part of the gag related to political ads having URLs of supporters at the end - the voiceover says 'Paid for by the Committee To Restore Fun To The Games Industry', or similar. But all of those domains redirect to the Gamecock homepage, and a number of this folks are partly or wholly unrelated to any recent ESA kerfuffle - and probably don't appreciate having their personal domain snaffled by a 'hilarious' indie.
Anyhow, some of you may potentially find this funnier than I - it's actually not a bad concept, even if one might argue that it's more publicity reflected onto Gamecock itself as a 'rebel' publishing unit, and away from its games. But seems like this random attention grabbing (seriously, what has Seamus Blackley got to do with the ESA?) is in danger of backfiring in a similar way to the Spike TV incident.
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7 Comments
I've been seeing people react negatively to Gamecock's PR stunts for a year or two now, I think, and I always sort of feel like people are over-reacting. Unless those industry/ex-industry figures were desperately trying to get those domains for some reason, I feel like this is more of the same. I loved the fact that they seemed to just be either totally into having fun and total irreverance, or at least into faking it.
But at this point, a number of their games have come out, or at least been exposed to hands-on play by journalists, and I haven't seen anything they're associated with get a mostly-positive impression. I love the idea of an in-your-face publisher that will finance anyone with a great idea and the talent to see it through, but it's starting to seem more like an in-your-face publisher that has no quality control, and spends more time pissing off journalists than giving them fun stuff to play with. Gamecock is really disappointing me, at this point. I haven't played anything they've put out, but the impressions I read generally tend towards the negative. I hope that's just because they stepped on toes with their PR-antics, but it seems more likely that they're just putting out shitty games.
If that's the case, then the in-your-face PR seems more sad than cool.
devlocke | July 14, 2008 11:20 PM
Chalk me up as one of the people that find Gamecock tiring. I come from a culture that celebrates irreverence, and I greatly enjoy seeing people crash press conferences to ask questions from Trivial Pursuit. Gamecock's 'antics' are always conducted with one eye on the audience, saying, 'look! look! look how fun we're being!' which is kind of like telling the audience they're supposed to be laughing instead of actually amusing them. To really do it right, you gotta not care about the audience and just do it because it's fun to have done it.
Merus | July 15, 2008 12:26 AM
I'm one of those people who devlocke thinks is always over-reacting. My basic feeling is that I won't support a bunch of people that show no respect for others. The Spike TV thing was what pushed them over the line for me.
Domain squatting is right up there with spamming in my book. It's kind of irrelevant if the named parties don't care; it's like posting a fake phone number to me. People have certain expectations when they type in a URL and when someone deliberately breaks those expectations, it bothers me.
Of course, saying I won't buy their games is kind of like saying I'm boycotting liver. I've yet to feel like its any kind of a sacrifice.
I'll be happy when they implode and fade into history.
Pete S | July 15, 2008 4:46 AM
I was sick of them when they first started.. these guys are like the posterboys of hopeless business types whose only function is schmoozing.
raigan | July 15, 2008 11:23 AM
I'm just sad that I didn't snap up one of those so I could create a Trip Hawkins fansite.
Joel Reed Parker | July 15, 2008 11:30 AM
It's a good thing he didn't pick a running-mate named Richard Hawk, or he'd end up driving a heavily-armed giant robot and destroying most of America...
n.n | July 16, 2008 1:02 AM
I'm in with Pete and raigan. Right since their formation I've been tired of their "OMG EXTREME" poseur posturing, and that shit they pulled crashing Ken Levine's well deserved moment in the spotlight pushed it right over the edge. If they'd actually, you know, made a game that could back up their big egos, then I could get over it, but as it is they're all cock and no balls.
GA | July 20, 2008 10:30 AM