Usdk wrote:
Activision isn't the only problem here. Blizzard owners who sold to activision are just as bad. Hey I poured my blood sweat and tears into this company for years and I love what I do....oh how many millions?
I think the truth is actually more sinister.
The story of how Kotick and Morhaime met is interesting:
Quote:
When Mike Morhaime first met Kotick, he was looking for a low-key setting to avoid sparking the sort of chatter that often emerges when high-profile business leaders meet in public.
Morhaime, then the chief executive of Blizzard, chose a steakhouse near his company's Irvine, Calif., headquarters. But he ended up booking a large banquet room by mistake, leaving the two alone and rather conspicuous for the nearly four hours during which they contemplated the potential of a merger creating a new leader in the video-game business -- a combination that would rival Electronic Arts in size and market position.
"We wanted to keep it low-key, which was pretty hard to do in this huge room with just the two of us there," Morhaime recalled with a laugh...
According to Morhaime, that first meeting sold him on the idea of the merger and on Kotick, who wound up running the combined company when the deal was consummated in July of this year.
"Bobby is a pretty unique guy when it comes to business strategy," Morhaime said. "He's exceptionally quick. Very smart. He's always open to listening and learning. And he asks a lot of really good questions."
That is a common technique used by marketing people and other con artists to influence people - quickly force them into a strange environment and work them over aggressively. It is, for example, why shopping malls and Wal-Marts are simultaneously agoraphobic and claustrophobic. The surreality of the setting helps overcome inhibition.
I think the truth is that Kotick changed the reservation for just this purpose, wanting to get Morhaime off guard then impress him by asking a lot of rapid-fire questions and telling him what he thought he wanted to hear.
The story goes on, though: After the merger, in which Kotick became head of the combined company, he created a level of management (COO Tom Tipple) between himself and Morhaime, so he doesn't have to deal with Morhaime directly and can pull his strings more easily. This is another common tactic used by executives: flatter someone to get them in the door, under the pretense they will be treated as an equal, then establish institutional barriers so that Kotick can call Morhaime whenever he wants, but not vice versa.
Recently, Morhaime delivered an apology for perceived insults at the 2011 Blizzcon. So what it seems is, he's been basically brought on board as the fall guy.
Morhaime thought he would be establishing an equal partnership with Kotick, but he was too much still the start-up business culture noob going up against a pro con artist. In reality, he should have known better. Not to be blamed though; most people fall for those kinds of tactics at least once. With experience, one can easily identify those patterns of pathological behavior that are common to businesspeople.
