CEO
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So we've seen The Future of Paizo videos and Lisa offered to answer any questions we had about where the company is going in that thread. But I wanna know, on this illustrious anniversary, where the company came from. I know bits and pieces, but I wanna hear from Lisa or Vic or someone else who was here at the beginning how and why Paizo came about and how it evolved into being what it is today. Where'd the name come from? Why a golem? Why purple? Why so much win?
Since we are doing a future of Paizo thread, Yoda8myhead asked if we could answer some questions about the past. So that is what this thread is for. I'll do what I can to keep up. :)
Where'd the name come from? When we started Paizo, the owners were myself, Vic and a fellow named Johnny Wilson. Johnny came with an extensive background in magazine publishing, and since we were going to be publishing magazines, that seemed like a skill that would be needed. :) Johnny was actually running the magazines at Wizards, and since Paizo was started to run those magazines outside of Wizards, we just took that entire department and ported them over to become a new company. Johnny also had a background in religion and had a PhD in it. When we were brainstorming names for the new company, he suggested Paizo. It was a name that he had been holding onto for a while and was Greek for "to play, to dance, to sing." I just liked the fact that it wouldn't give any preconceptions to anyone, except for maybe we were a pizza place, and so we could use it like a clean slate and build up our own meaning for the name.
Why a golem? Why purple? The purple golem came from art director Kyle Hunter. Once we had a name, Paizo, we needed a logo, and fast. We gave Kyle two weeks to come up with a number of concepts and all of us fell in love with the golem. You may have noticed, but it is based on the Greek letter Pi. I believe that the golem came in purple when Kyle presented it to us, so we just went with it. I have always been partial to purple myself, so why not?
Why so much win? Well, that is all about company philosophy and culture. My business philosophy is that your customers are your most important asset. Listen to them and they will guide you well, because what is a business but an entity that is making something that a bunch of other people want to buy. If you don't listen to your customers, then you could very well drift away from them and lose them. And that is where businesses fail, IMHO. The second corollary of my business philosophy is that your employees are pretty much as important as your customers to your business success. I have given talks to business schools and when they ask "what is the secret to success" I've always said that it is surrounding yourself with great employees. Great employees will have great ideas and if you are listening to your customers, most often those great ideas will find root and help the company succeed. I really that these two principles are why Paizo is so full of "win."
Why so much win? Well, that is all about company philosophy and culture. My business philosophy is that your customers are your most important asset. Listen to them and they will guide you well, because what is a business but an entity that is making something that a bunch of other people want to buy. If you don't listen to your customers, then you could very well drift away from them and lose them. And that is where businesses fail, IMHO. The second corollary of my business philosophy is that your employees are pretty much as important as your customers to your business success. I have given talks to business schools and when they ask "what is the secret to success" I've always said that it is surrounding yourself with great employees. Great employees will have great ideas and if you are listening to your customers, most often those great ideas will find root and help the company succeed. I really that these two principles are why Paizo is so full of "win."
This is what sets you apart from so many businesses out there, gaming-oriented or otherwise. I hope you never change!
Great thread! Thanks Lisa.
Could you tell us a bit about the site. What was your vision at the time? how did it turn out?
I would also love to hear about the different products you tried and how you endend up with your current lines.
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CEO
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What was your vision of the company when you started ? Did you ever consider the whole "full time game publisher" thing back then ?
I am not 100% sure which company you are talking about. If you are talking about my first company back in 1986, then I would tell you that our vision was to make enough money on our RPG, Ars Magica, to buy a keg and throw a party. :)
If you mean Paizo, then I think I already addressed this to some extent. Vic and I really wanted to make a company that felt like a family, was really creative, and dealt with things that we really enjoyed. When we started Paizo, that was D&D and Star Wars. Now it is Pathfinder.
As for considering the whole "full time game publisher" when I started, I would say "no." We were a bunch of poor college kids/recent grads who loved gaming but didn't have a thin dime in the world. I was working at the University of Minnesota and would get up in the morning at 4am, drive an hour to work, get off around 3pm, drive the hour home, get some dinner, and then work on Lion Rampant (our first game company) until around midnight, get 4 hours of sleep and start the cycle over again. If I get the urge to write a mini-novel, I will tell you about the story of how we went from hobby to full-time publishers. It wasn't pretty.
Maybe next Paizocon, I can have a game industry storytime with Lisa! :)
-Lisa
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CEO
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Could you tell us a bit about the site. What was your vision at the time? how did it turn out?
We started the online retail part of paizo.com literally to make some more money. It was during the dark times at Paizo when we had just lost Star Wars and over 50% of our income. We had to layoff a bunch of employees and it was looking grim. Since we had started to take subscriptions over the internet, it seemed like it wouldn't take too much to extend that to carrying all sorts of gaming products. We were shipping out back issues and silver Boba Fett action figures, so a bunch of gaming stuff seemed lie a no-brainer.
As for the messageboards, they started partially as a way to communicate with our customers, but I also had an idea in the back of my head. I had read this interesting business article about the third place. The idea goes like this: everyone has two places in their lives that are important to them, work and home. However, many people also have a third place, you know where everyone knows your name and their always glad you came. This could be a bar, a church, a gym, a country club, a restaurant, etc. And I thought to myself, wouldn't it be cool if paizo.com could become a third place for our customers? A place where they enjoyed coming, hanging out, talking to us and to each other? I figured that if we could build that third place and people came by, they would shop here too. Turned out that I was right. :)
I would also love to hear about the different products you tried and how you endend up with your current lines.
To see the products that we've tried, you can just look at the Paizo product node. The stuff that didn't work so well ends up being a couple of products in that line and then nothing.
As for how we ended up with our product lines, it was either looking to replace a product or looking to fulfill some needs.
The Adventure Paths were meant to replace Dungeon magazine and Dragon to some extent
The Modules were meant to replace the non-AP adventures that we ran in each Dungeon issue
The Chronicles products were started to allow us to build upon the skeleton of the world
The Companion products were started to try to appeal to more players with a low priced product and also to replace some of what we had in Dragon
The RPG was obviously built to give us an inprint game system to replace 3.5
The map packs and flip mats were started because we love maps and saw how popular they were in our magazines
The item cards came about because we wanted a cool way to keep track of treasure
Planet Stories came about because of Erik's love of old science fiction and pulp novels
Titanic Games started originally to make higher end versions of the Cheap Ass Games
That is pretty much the current lines that we have. If you have questions about something specific, let me know.
-Lisa
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I am not 100% sure which company you are talking about. If you are talking about my first company back in 1986, then I would tell you that our vision was to make enough money on our RPG, Ars Magica, to buy a keg and throw a party. :)
Wait a minute... you worked on Ars Magica ? My most beloved RPG ever ? *checks the interwebs* Holy, it's true ! I'm not worthy ! We're not worthy !
/falls to his knees and begins worshiping Lisa.
On a serious note, ArM is the best game system/setting I ever played. Nothing can hold a candle to it (OK, maybe Call of Cthulhu, but it's an adapted setting so different story). I'll never forget my 8-years long ArM chronicle where we ran a covenant in Stonehenge Tribunal. Thank you, thank you, thank you and if you are in touch with the other ArM creators, please forward my gratitude to them as well.
/weeps tears of nostalgia.
Lisa, I have a question. ~wry smile~ Do you ever sleep? ~GRINS~
I just wanted to say that I appreciate all that you have done. I am glad to be here, despite the complaints of my wallet.
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CEO
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I am not 100% sure which company you are talking about. If you are talking about my first company back in 1986, then I would tell you that our vision was to make enough money on our RPG, Ars Magica, to buy a keg and throw a party. :)Wait a minute... you worked on Ars Magica ? My most beloved RPG ever ? *checks the interwebs* Holy, it's true ! I'm not worthy ! We're not worthy !
/falls to his knees and begins worshiping Lisa.
On a serious note, ArM is the best game system/setting I ever played. Nothing can hold a candle to it (OK, maybe Call of Cthulhu, but it's an adapted setting so different story). I'll never forget my 8-years long ArM chronicle where we ran a covenant in Stonehenge Tribunal. Thank you, thank you, thank you and if you are in touch with the other ArM creators, please forward my gratitude to them as well.
/weeps tears of nostalgia.
I really love ArM also. I remember when Jonathan Tweet and Mark Rein•Hagen came to my D&D group in college and asked us to help them playtest this new fantasy game that they were putting together. I became hooked while the rest went back to D&D. Actually, ArM made it so I didn't play D&D again for around 10 years! I ended up missing out on most of 2nd edition.
My character was Lupus Mortis. If you check through the early books, you will see his name pop up alot. I have most of the old files from back then. They make some interesting reading. I sent most of them over to John Nephew at Atlas Games. I thought he was going to make them available on his website.
There is a really fun article about Lion Rampant and the creation of Ars Magica from rpg.net. It gives some really good insight into my early days in the industry.
In any case, I love ArM quite a bit. Troupe style roleplaying really works for me and the magic system is out of this world!
-Lisa
Lisa, I have a question. ~wry smile~ Do you ever sleep?Nope. I am quite the night owl and love to browse the boards in the evening as a way to wind down the day.
-Lisa
~grins~ Well, wind down some and get some much needed rest! Have a great weekend!
Contributor, RPG Superstar 2012
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Thanks to some colorblindness, I always thought the golem was blue. Now I know better.
Lisa, I'm not sure if you can or will answer this question, but I was wondering how you and Vic bankrolled Paizo in the beginning. Are there any interesting stories of how you got the capital to start up the company?
Thanks to some colorblindness, I always thought the golem was blue. Now I know better.
Lisa, I'm not sure if you can or will answer this question, but I was wondering how you and Vic bankrolled Paizo in the beginning. Are there any interesting stories of how you got the capital to start up the company?
~shakes my head sadly~ You mean you don't KNOW?!?
~sighs~ They morgaged all of Paizo's customers souls away to get Paizo started. So that means that our souls now belong to Paizo!
~GRINS~
Thanks to some colorblindness, I always thought the golem was blue. Now I know better.
Lisa, I'm not sure if you can or will answer this question, but I was wondering how you and Vic bankrolled Paizo in the beginning. Are there any interesting stories of how you got the capital to start up the company?
I'm pretty sure it's been mentioned that Paizo wouldn't exist today if Hasbro hadn't bought WotC. I'm thinking a lot of the capitol came from being bought out.
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CEO
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I'm pretty sure it's been mentioned that Paizo wouldn't exist today if Hasbro hadn't bought WotC. I'm thinking a lot of the capitol came from being bought out.Thanks to some colorblindness, I always thought the golem was blue. Now I know better.
Lisa, I'm not sure if you can or will answer this question, but I was wondering how you and Vic bankrolled Paizo in the beginning. Are there any interesting stories of how you got the capital to start up the company?
Vigil for the win. Vic and I self-financed Paizo from our Pokemoney (that is what we called the money that Hasbro paid to Wizards' shareholders, since most of their interest in the company came from the fact that Pokemon was a HUGE sales force back in 1999. So, sorry, no interesting stories here. Move along. Move along. :)
-Lisa
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Contributor, RPG Superstar 2012
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Vic and I self-financed Paizo from our Pokemoney (that is what we called the money that Hasbro paid to Wizards' shareholders, since most of their interest in the company came from the fact that Pokemon was a HUGE sales force back in 1999. So, sorry, no interesting stories here. Move along. Move along. :)
-Lisa
Thanks for the reply. One more question: How did the "industry's" view of the magazines change with the move out of the WotC offices? For example, did you have people who wanted to work with you who previously didn't want to work with WotC, or vice versa? (Not asking for any names, just curious about the perceptions of others in the industry)
Edit: I've got to say--it's awesome that I can ask the company owner/president questions and get answers directly from her. Where else can you get that? :-)
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CEO
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Thanks for the reply. One more question: How did the "industry's" view of the magazines change with the move out of the WotC offices? For example, did you have people who wanted to work with you who previously didn't want to work with WotC, or vice versa? (Not asking for any names, just curious about the perceptions of others in the industry)
To tell you the truth, I don't think that most people realized that we weren't part of WotC any longer. Since it was the exact same group of people making the magazines (we literally moved on a weekend, so one workday it was at the WotC offices, the next the new Paizo offices), it was pretty seamless. I don't remember hearing about anybody who decided to work with us because we weren't WotC or vice versa. We worked very closely with Wizards and in many ways, they treated us like a satellite office.
-Lisa
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Seamless is good. However, we know the seams came undone when WotC took back the magazine. I know this might be a hardwer question, but were you and the company rattled when WotC took back their magazines and seemingly stripped you of your living? I cannot imagine how cold that must have seemed. I am not looking for anything bitter, but rather the thoughts that everyone was thinking as the ship controls were failing and the the atmosphere was leaking.
You guys had done so well up to that point and it must have been a hard one to swallow. Can't win for losing, etc.
Also, given that moment, did the WotC decision make sense to you? I know you could say "yes" in a business way, but I am asking for a Paizo perspective as your think about your customers and the business relationships that you have fostered through the years.
As I remember, I was that demographic that WotC seemingly went to war against. I was eagerly awaiting the RPGForge from CodeMonekey when they decided to pull their IP. It really was the last thing I needed to bring the game to life without the epic prep time. I was excited at the idea that the mathematics and choices would be available at the push of a button. Now all my books and manuals require me to literally "hand dig" the info out. Codemonkey was the first to give the bad news.
Margaret Weis was next with their losing Dragonalance. Finally you guys went down. I was a very loyal customer to WotC too, and bought just about everything D&D that they made. For some reason, they decided to invalidate me as a customer and literally dump me in a pile of 3.5 rubbish. This was not cool with me.
That being said, I cannot imagine Paizo doing the same. I find it strange that WotC was so out of touch with its most loyal buyers. Do you think that we are obsolete customer hand-me-downs that Paizo is giving a second life to or are we truly the ones that will carry the torch to a new era? I am a little worried that I am holding on to something that has passed its prime. Should I start playing World of Warcraft like the rest of my gaming group? Is that what 4.0 was about. WoW on paper?
You don't need to answer these questions, but I feel your response will unlock some important questions about Paizo history.
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Chief Technical Officer
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Seamless is good. However, we know the seams came undone when WotC took back the magazine. I know this might be a hardwer question, but were you and the company rattled when WotC took back their magazines and seemingly stripped you of your living? I cannot imagine how cold that must have seemed. I am not looking for anything bitter, but rather the thoughts that everyone was thinking as the ship controls were failing and the the atmosphere was leaking.
We've always known that it's unwise for a company to have all of their eggs in one basket, especially when that basket is of another's making.
When we started Paizo, we didn't have that problem, because we'd split our eggs between two different baskets—Star Wars and D&D. When Lucasfilm decided to take the Star Wars Fan Club in-house, we realized that we couldn't allow Paizo's continuing existence to rely solely on our relationship with Wizards of the Coast. That's why we then put a lot of effort into developing the online store, and why we launched our GameMastery line.
Later, when Wizards told us that they had decided not to renew the licenses, it did come as a surprise and a disappointment, but because we'd already been through a very similar situation with Lucasfilm, we weren't exactly unprepared. Now, I'm not saying it wasn't tough for everyone—it was, and especially to the employees who came to Paizo solely because they wanted to work on D&D—but at least at the top level, we knew that we could survive—and eventually thrive—without D&D.
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However, many people also have a third place, you know where everyone knows your name and their always glad you came.
Lisa,
No questions from me. I just wanted to take the chance to thank you, Vic, and all the great folks at Paizo for offering me what has become my "third place".
I know not everyone around here likes me, and there are probably more than a few who dislike me, but it's still nice to know there's a place I can hang with people I consider my friends.
I know not everyone around here likes me, and there are probably more than a few who dislike me, but it's still nice to know there's a place I can hang with people I consider my friends.
Ah reckon so
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Contributor, RPG Superstar 2012
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However, many people also have a third place, you know where everyone knows your name and their always glad you came.Lisa,
No questions from me. I just wanted to take the chance to thank you, Vic, and all the great folks at Paizo for offering me what has become my "third place".
I know not everyone around here likes me, and there are probably more than a few who dislike me, but it's still nice to know there's a place I can hang with people I consider my friends.
Well, I like you, you crazy undead fiend.
Remember, when asked the question "Do you Like or Dislike Aberzombie?", always answer YES!!!.
~GRINS~
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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However, many people also have a third place, you know where everyone knows your name and their always glad you came.Lisa,
No questions from me. I just wanted to take the chance to thank you, Vic, and all the great folks at Paizo for offering me what has become my "third place".
I know not everyone around here likes me, and there are probably more than a few who dislike me, but it's still nice to know there's a place I can hang with people I consider my friends.
So say we all.
And 'Pokemoney' makes me laugh.
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Lisa,
No questions from me. I just wanted to take the chance to thank you, Vic, and all the great folks at Paizo for offering me what has become my "third place".
+1!
I love Paizo, I think I would have dropped out of the hobby if not for this company.
On a side note, what and when is the next Titanic Games release?
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CEO
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Lisa,
No questions from me. I just wanted to take the chance to thank you, Vic, and all the great folks at Paizo for offering me what has become my "third place".
+1!
I love Paizo, I think I would have dropped out of the hobby if not for this company.
On a side note, what and when is the next Titanic Games release?
We will be bringing Kill Doctor Lucky back into print, slightly changed, for Christmas this year. Beyond that, we haven't announced yet. :)
-Lisa
Sadly, I think there are some folks (even on this very thread) who would answer with a resounding "NO!". That's Ok, though, I won't hold it against them. I like to think I'm better than that....Remember, when asked the question "Do you Like or Dislike Aberzombie?", always answer YES!!!.
~GRINS~
Well, what do you think that MY answer would be to that, Aberzombie?
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Contributor, RPG Superstar 2012
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Sadly, I think there are some folks (even on this very thread) who would answer with a resounding "NO!". That's Ok, though, I won't hold it against them. I like to think I'm better than that....Remember, when asked the question "Do you Like or Dislike Aberzombie?", always answer YES!!!.
~GRINS~
Oh, come on! I don't think Lisa dislikes you...that much.
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Oh, come on! I don't think Lisa dislikes you...that much.Sadly, I think there are some folks (even on this very thread) who would answer with a resounding "NO!". That's Ok, though, I won't hold it against them. I like to think I'm better than that....Remember, when asked the question "Do you Like or Dislike Aberzombie?", always answer YES!!!.
~GRINS~
Now Vic on the other hand...
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RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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I love Paizo, I think I would have dropped out of the hobby if not for this company.Same here.
I'd definately be richer, that's for certain. When WotC went 4e, I decided that I'd be done. I had a perfectly functional RPG, and the tone of 4x left a bad taste in my mouth. The 'roll over to Pathfinder AP' option on my subscriptions appealed to me, since I looked at it as money already spent. Then it grew, and snowballed, and now I'm looking at getting another perfectly functional RPG.
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CEO
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I know this might be a hardwer question, but were you and the company rattled when WotC took back their magazines and seemingly stripped you of your living? I cannot imagine how cold that must have seemed. I am not looking for anything bitter, but rather the thoughts that everyone was thinking as the ship controls were failing and the the atmosphere was leaking.
Vic sort of touched on this one already, but when you are running a business that relies 100% on the decisions of another company, you are best served to plan for the worst. I can't say that we started off Paizo thinking like that, but when we lost Star Wars Insider and over 50% of our revenue in one corporate decision, I decided that I couldn't risk Paizo entirely on a decision by Wizards of the Coast to keep the magazines with us or not. We knew that our contract had an expiration date and that there were no guarantees of a renewal, so I started to lay the groundwork for diversifying Paizo so that we could survive if the magazines weren't renewed. We started paizo.com and the e-store, the GameMastery products, and Titanic games, along with launching Amazing Stories and Undefeated magazines, all with the goal to make us less dependent on Dragon and Dungeon should they go away. Not all of those ventures worked and it seemed that our best strategies would be to stay close to what we do best, which is make roleplaying game products. Thankfully, Wizards of the Coast gave us a long notice of their intentions not to renew the license (they contractually only had to give us a much shorter notice), so we had time to hatch our plans for Pathfinder in a well thought out manner. So while it was hard for us to lose the magazines, we had actually been preparing for that potential eventuality for years.
Also, given that moment, did the WotC decision make sense to you? I know you could say "yes" in a business way, but I am asking for a Paizo perspective as your think about your customers and the business relationships that you have fostered through the years.
You say to answer this from a Paizo perspective, and of course, that would be that it doesn't make sense from a Paizo perspective, but then when would it? Wizards doesn't make decisions from a Paizo perspective...they make them from a Wizards perspective. Paizo makes decisions from a Paizo perspective. Anytime somebody doesn't renew a license, it sucks from your perspective, but as I said above, you should be prepared for that eventuality, since it is a LICENSE. I think the decision made a lot of sense from Wizard's perspective. I can't go into the reasons why because of confidentialities that I am under, but it made sense, even if it hurt those of us at Paizo who wished to keep the magazines going.
That being said, I cannot imagine Paizo doing the same. I find it strange that WotC was so out of touch with its most loyal buyers. Do you think that we are obsolete customer hand-me-downs that Paizo is giving a second life to or are we truly the ones that will carry the torch to a new era? I am a little worried that I am holding on to something that has passed its prime. Should I start playing World of Warcraft like the rest of my gaming group? Is that what 4.0 was about. WoW on paper
This is a tough question. Every company needs to decide which consumer base they want to target with their products. Only time and hindsight will let them know whether they were right or wrong in their choice. Paizo obviously feels that there is a still a vibrant way to play this game that we all love and the release of the Pathfinder RPG will show that there are still a lot of people who want to play the way we here at Paizo do. Could we be wrong? Perhaps, but I wouldn't bet on it. :) Bottom line, play games the way you want to play. There is no right or wrong, only what YOU like. I strongly feel that the RPG market would be a MUCH better place if everyone was just happy with playing the games they liked and didn't spend so much time denigrating the games that other people like to play. There is a lot to learn from other games and other gamers.
-Lisa
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CEO
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I am not 100% sure which company you are talking about. If you are talking about my first company back in 1986, then I would tell you that our vision was to make enough money on our RPG, Ars Magica, to buy a keg and throw a party. :)Hah!
I remember reading old issues of White Wolf magazine at my old gaming club, and in one of the earlier ones (5ish), the letters page had one particular letter writing in to praise an earlier article on the business side of running a gaming company that you had apparently written (unfortunately the original article predated my club's subscription). The letter was written by some guy named Peter who was considering starting up his own gaming company. I wonder if anything ever came out of that.
I don't remember that letter. I'll have to have a look at my back issues and see if I can find that. :)
-Lisa
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Now Vic on the other hand...Oh, come on! I don't think Lisa dislikes you...that much.Sadly, I think there are some folks (even on this very thread) who would answer with a resounding "NO!". That's Ok, though, I won't hold it against them. I like to think I'm better than that....Remember, when asked the question "Do you Like or Dislike Aberzombie?", always answer YES!!!.
~GRINS~
Yeah, I'm pretty sure that Wertz guy is behind this guy named Guido who's been trying to have a "talk" with me. So far, I've been able to avoid him.
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RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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Yeah, I'm pretty sure that Wertz guy is behind this guy named Guido who's been trying to have a "talk" with me. So far, I've been able to avoid him.But... Guido has CANDY for you!"Hi. I'm Candy."
"Of course you are..."
Thank the Divine I don't work with anyone named Candy. Because I'd have to try to do that, growl and all.
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Thank you Lisa and Vic for your answers to my questions. I will ponder on them as I visit my WoW friends (who were once paper RPG people) in Minnesota.
I agree very strongly on "It matters what kind of game you like to play". I like physical interaction with people at the table top. Computer games are just a crutch until I get to that moment again.
And, since little post-con celebration should now be history. How was it?
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CEO
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Thank you Lisa and Vic for your answers to my questions. I will ponder on them as I visit my WoW friends (who were once paper RPG people) in Minnesota.
I agree very strongly on "It matters what kind of game you like to play". I like physical interaction with people at the table top. Computer games are just a crutch until I get to that moment again.
And, since little post-con celebration should now be history. How was it?
It was a blast. Much pizza was devoured and much Golarion brew was consumed. And there was much rejoicing. :)
-Lisa
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As a thought, do some parents these days:
1) Lock their children in their rooms
2) with a computer/television?
Because:
1) 'The streets are just too dangerous these days'.
2) and mom and dad are too busy to entertain their children themselves?
Not yet. Although I do keep telling Mrs. Zombie that if we ever have spawn, I plan to lock them away until they are of the appropriate age....
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Lisa, when you retired and got your Pokemon money, did you travel the world or create a gamer chamber like we all dream of? I know you didn't win the lottery, but one has that question, "If I were to win a lot of money, I would..." Curious how this "walk away" money went from dreamy retirement to building a company that would later become Paizo. I do recall you saying you went "batty" with free time.
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Lawyers. Danny Devito said in the film Other People's Money, "Lawyers are like nukes. You keep them around, but you never intend to use them." On the otherhand, it seems their presence prevails over a Messageboard Community in restricting topics of all kinds.
How is it that Paizo seems to have so little contact with lawyer spiderwebs that surround most messageboards. NDAs seem to straight jacket honest answers into vague generic answers. Most companies do not have editors and writers posting their opinions because it is easier to chase down one consensus, with a representative, that is well briefed on what one can say and cannot. I understand that Paizo wishes to have a closer relationship with its customers, but I find it strange that so many boards do not see the disconnect that such a system is creating.
Why is it that Paizo hasn't been gripped with this fear that most companies have about what is spoken of on their boards?
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CEO
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Lisa, when you retired and got your Pokemon money, did you travel the world or create a gamer chamber like we all dream of? I know you didn't win the lottery, but one has that question, "If I were to win a lot of money, I would..." Curious how this "walk away" money went from dreamy retirement to building a company that would later become Paizo. I do recall you saying you went "batty" with free time.
When I got the Pokemoney and later that year the boot from WotC, Vic and I did take the time to do some traveling. I think it was Germany and Hawaii. I do have a game room, but it doesn't have one of those ultimate gaming tables or any sort of projector thing. It does have some ledges around the outside of the room for my minis and a place to plug in my computer.
In many ways, the Pokemoney ended up allowing me to finance the start-up of Paizo. As I have mentioned once or twice, Vic and I started this company to allow us to do something that we love until we retire, and hopefully the company can support the two of us in our retirement once we get to that age (I am about 8 years ahead of Vic in that regard). Money is kind of useless if you don't follow your dreams with it, and thus was Paizo born.
So we should all thank Pikachu for giving us Paizo! :)
-Lisa
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Lawyers. Danny Devito said in the film Other People's Money, "Lawyers are like nukes. You keep them around, but you never intend to use them." On the otherhand, it seems their presence prevails over a Messageboard Community in restricting topics of all kinds.
How is it that Paizo seems to have so little contact with lawyer spiderwebs that surround most messageboards. NDAs seem to straight jacket honest answers into vague generic answers. Most companies do not have editors and writers posting their opinions because it is easier to chase down one consensus, with a representative, that is well briefed on what one can say and cannot. I understand that Paizo wishes to have a closer relationship with its customers, but I find it strange that so many boards do not see the disconnect that such a system is creating.
Why is it that Paizo hasn't been gripped with this fear that most companies have about what is spoken of on their boards?
I'm not sure that I am 100% sure. As you said, we pride ourselves on being close to our customers. I hire great employees who know what to say and when to shut up. We have our armful of NDAs which prohibit us from talking about certain topics, and if you are observant, you will notice when that happens. But I don't need to police my guys—they know what topics are off limits and they are adults, so they can police themselves.
I do have a lawyer that we use here at Paizo. He was the first lawyer we hired at WotC and he left there when it got too corporate for his tastes. Long hair and flip flops don't quite cut it in the corporate world of Hasbro. But he is a really good lawyer who knows how much we value our customers and helps us protect ourselves without sacrificing that.
-Lisa
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So we should all thank Pikachu for giving us Paizo! :)-Lisa
Oh I think this is one of the scariest things I have heard. ;)
Seriously though, having never been a fan of Pokemon, I am overwhelmingly grateful that something that I enjoy as much as the Paizo products I have gotten were made possible by those crazy critters.
Just don't send out my APs in one of those little balls. ;)