{"id":38975,"date":"2018-08-09T21:12:00","date_gmt":"2018-08-09T21:12:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gamasutra.com\/view\/news\/324185"},"modified":"2018-08-09T21:12:00","modified_gmt":"2018-08-09T21:12:00","slug":"publishing-platforms-need-policies-around-not-for-profit-game-devs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/2018\/08\/09\/publishing-platforms-need-policies-around-not-for-profit-game-devs\/","title":{"rendered":"Publishing platforms need policies around not-for-profit game devs"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n \n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

–\u00a0 Glitch executive director Evva Kraikul\u00a0speaking\u00a0to Polygon about their\u00a0not-for-profit ideology.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Not-for-profit game developers creating games with the noble goal of taking earnings\u00a0from their labor and using it\u00a0to grow an\u00a0organization and\u00a0support its mission seems too good to be true– and to big publishing companies, it is.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In an interview\u00a0with Polygon<\/a>,\u00a0Glitch executive director Evva Kraikul\u00a0discusses the hurdles that not-for-profit organizations face when negotiating with platform holders like\u00a0Sony, Nintendo, Valve and Microsoft to publish their games.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Glitch, a Minnesota-based not-for-profit, provides\u00a0residencies, grants and support for emerging game\u00a0developers. Publishing games that are produced from the organization however (and sticking to its not-for-profit ideal), has been a challenge.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Realizing that our [not-for-profit] situation was unique, we reached out to Sony first to ask questions while setting up a developer account,” Kraikul explains.<\/p>\n

“After a bit of email run-around, we were told that they would only accept for-profit organizations as publishers and urged us to create a LLC, LLP, or Inc. We emailed to clarify but stopped receiving responses from their developer relations team shortly after.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kraikul went to seek a solution that would allow\u00a0for not-for-profit publishing, but it’s been difficult. While other entertainment industries have developed policies in place for not-for-profits (legally defined as \u201c501(c)(3)\u201d organizations)\u00a0the games industry doesn’t really have one.<\/p>\n

“It definitely soured our experience when it came to setting up developer accounts on all the platforms,\u201d Kraikul says. \u201cIf we didn\u2019t see 501(c)(3) listed as an option then we figured it would also be an uphill battle similar to our experience with Sony.”<\/p>\n

“Since it was so uncommon to even see publishing as a 501(c)(3) listed, we figured we could either try to change policies and practices amongst all platforms we\u2019re targeting, or develop a solution that would include a for-profit arm within our organization.”<\/p>\n

And the solution? Establish a benefit corporation as a subsidiary organization, which is a for-profit business driven by social impact missions.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The interview\u00a0was part of a longer discussion surrounding the challenges not-for-profits face in the industry, so be sure to read that\u00a0over at Polygon.<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

–\u00a0 Glitch executive director Evva Kraikul\u00a0speaking\u00a0to Polygon about their\u00a0not-for-profit ideology.\u00a0 Not-for-profit game developers creating games with the noble goal of taking earnings\u00a0from their labor and using it\u00a0to grow an\u00a0organization and\u00a0support its mission seems too good to be true– and to big publishing companies, it is.\u00a0 In an interview\u00a0with Polygon,\u00a0Glitch executive director Evva Kraikul\u00a0discusses […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":38976,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38975","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38975","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38975"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38975\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38976"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38975"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38975"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sickgaming.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38975"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}