It's not really a free speech issue. You're using his website, for which he pays from his own pocket, for all of us to use, to take a dump on what he loves doing, and what made it possible in the first place for him to have this site.

It feels a lot to me like the host of an free party kicking out a rude guest from his house.

You know, Temescal, a friend wrote to me about this very thing.  This was my reply to him:

I was not referring to JU, nor to Brad himself, but to to the gaming industry. He might use his company's money (or maybe his own) to provide a discussion forum, but it is hardly altruistic.  He gets to deduct that money from his company's income (or his own) to reduce his tax burden; JU provides advertising for his company's products (the portal is Stardock remember), and his company (or he) benefits from income derived from the Google ads which are everywhere.  Moreover, he provides himself with a forum to spread his ideas and introduce his products to a targeted audience.

Now, it very well may be, in retrospect, that he foots the bill for the forum himself, but I do not agree that having an opinion about the usefuness of a product such as violent wargames, is being rude. This is a forum for discussion of ideas and opinions, not someone's home.

Be well.

I don't do video games but I hardly believe they are "useless." Usually, I have observed, it is when people are at play that they learn something and figure things out on a deeper level.

Disclaimer: I work at Stardock.

In the late 90s, Stardock made software for OS/2. When that market collapsed, a lot of Stardock's partners filed for bankruptcy owing Stardock a lot of money.

Brad, with his wife and new baby, could have just filed for bankrupcty too rather than pay the people they owed money to but now couldn't because of our partners failing to pay us. Instead, he took out a mortgage on the house he had fully paid off in order to pay employee salaries, pay royalties and other companies that Stardock worked on.

If I remember right, Brad also went without a salary, dipping into his retirement but Brad can speak more on that if he wants to make ends meet.

If Stardock had still failed, he would have lost his house and his retirement would have been depleted. But he put his employees and his responsibilities in front of his own personal needs.

To say he would be "first in the bail out line" is both insulting and ignorant. No wonder you were kicked off the site. 

I see Sodaiho returned with an alias and also wrote this:

https://forums.joeuser.com/post.aspx?postid=334414

Let's be clear on a few things:

1. My post is not a complaint about taxes.  The point was to illustrate the actual effect it has on job creation.  

People are certainly free to dismiss what I write. But then again, one might argue that an intelligent person might see it as an opportunity to hear from a business person what taxes affect. 

Similarly, if we were discussing medicine and there was a doctor in the discussion we might consider it an opportunity to hear from them. Or if we were discussing home repair and there was a professional carpenter in the discussion some might consider that an opportunity too.

However, people who tend to fail in life (use whatever definition you want for that) often display a similar feature -- they are only willing to learn from those who already share their particular world view. 

2. Little Whip, who has used illegal recreational drugs her entire adult life (according to her) complains about my conspicuous consumption.   The only conspicuous consumption that I can think of is my sports car.  But the crazy house I'm building? That's an asset that will appreciate over time. It's certainly more than I "need" but then again, who defines the minimum "need"?

Conspicous consumption would, in my mind, be someone who can barely afford life's basics to throw money away on drugs and alcohol. 

3. This discussion has been interesting because of the ire it has raised by those who seek ways to rationalize the shortcomings of their own lives.  

It's the classic "I don't like/want X therefore it is worthless".  One trait of the left I've noticed is that they seem more vocal about saying what things have value and what things do not.

To Sodaiho, games are without redeeming value. Yet, one must wonder, does he listen to music? Does music have value?

What about books?  Does he read fiction books? 

What about plays, operas, and musicals? Are those without value as well?

Outside food, clothing, and shelter, we get to a very slippery slope about what has value or not.

My opinion is that we, as a society, decide what has value and what does not based on our voluntary purchases.  Unlike the government, I can't force people to pay me money. 

But I think any reasonable person would agree that Sodaiho picked games because he thought, wrongly, that that was the primary source of my economic prosperity.  But it's completely irrelevant what the particular source is.

The point is, a business produces products and services that people volunarily choose to buy or not buy. People, being sentient creatures, can decide as individuals what has value and what does not; what is useful and what is not.  

A 61 year old Buhdist poser might say that games have no value while happily listening to eastern chant music he purchased with incents lit around him.

A 45 year old school teacher might say that rap music has no value while being excited about the new diamond neckless her husband just gave her.

And the 20 year old college student might think that fiction books are a waste while being enthralled in Fable 2 on his Xbox 360.

4. For those who are interested in the root topic here the question is: Who spends money better?  If you think the government spends it better then make that case. 

As a company in the Detroit area who wants to hire more people but currently can't because there's not enough physical room in the building and needs to be built out (which, incidentally, can't be written off other than in long-term depreciation because construction is creating assets, it's not a consumable expense contrary to what Sodaiho thought) I would think that most people would agree that the government should be very leery about confiscating our capital -- especially when they're handing it out to business failures.

To quote what I saw someone else write, you are a total poser.

If you held no animosity towards Brad you would not have written the comment about games in the first place because they had nothing to do with what was being discussed.

What Brad does for a living has nothing to do with what was being written. You chose to insult the game industry precisely because you do hold animosity towards him. 

Why would Brad take time out to argue that games or any other luxury item has value? Of course they have value. Why do you think people buy them? You only attacked them because you are an asshole.

I think any value in luxury items is mostly in the eye of the beholder. To stick with one of Brad's examples, the diamond necklace would have no value to me, but given to my girlfriend she might think otherwise Of course it represents a certain value if I take it to a jeweller.

As for the original question: do we trust government to spend wisely.. I can only refer to a lot of money wasted in the netherlands over the years on large infrastructural 'enhancements' that will never be worth the money that went in building them (case in point the goods railconnection they built with Germany that cost at least twice the original budget and is not expected to be earning money for years to come, let alone pay back the investment), IT projects that are constantly rebudgetted and never finished, a chip card project that was hacked before it even got implemented..

The other part of the question is of course do we trust people making money to use it in a benificial way? I'm not so sure about banks these days, but for people who own their own company like Brad I'd expect they'd want to keep it at least as competitive as it is now - to grow it where possible.

I have enjoyed reading this blog...interesting debate.

Seems to me much of the work done in your business could be done from anywhere. I understand allowing non-employees to work on programing could be problematic but subbing out work like character creation and other digital art could work quite well for you. You could even hold contest like you do with the GUI championships to acquire some of the content for your productions. I know other digital content companies like Pixar subcontract some of their character creation.

You'll have to agree there's allot of untapped artistic talent out there that could be harnessed without the extra cost of an employee. Not having to pay for anything you don't use is a big plus too.

On topic, a healthy and stimulating blog site needs it's characters as well and while I agree Sodaiho was wrong and should probably stick to theological and spiritual discussions he is an interesting character and contributes much to the variety of this site. Could you perhaps consider just blacklisting him from your threads to be sufficient to keep him out of your hair?

If this were a democracy I'd vote for that.  

This has got to be the single dumbest analogy ever! How did you manage to come up with something as stupid as this? To compare someone expressing a wish to see a gaming business fail with someone wishing Death on someone, WTF is the comparison? Sheesh talk about reaching>>>>>>>>>

Moderateman:  How is it stupid to point out the obvious - don't piss on the host. That's the whole point. 

This blog site isn't some sort of government service. It's private property. Brad lets us use this site. We don't know his motives for letting us do it but common says not to shit on him.