Steve Bannon sunk $60M of Goldman Sachs' money into a failed World of Warcraft goldfarming scheme - Polidicks

[QUOTE]Before he became CEO of the Donald Trump campaign, and before he took over the alt-right media outlet Breitbart.com, Steve Bannon made his living selling virtual gold on the Internet.Today, an [URL="http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/08/stephen-bannon-world-warcraft-gold-farming-donald-trump"]article[/URL] in Mother Jones reminded us that back in 2008 we here at WIRED [URL="https://www.wired.com/2008/11/ff-ige/"]wrote[/URL] about it. The story focuses on the World of Warcraft marketplace called Internet Gaming Entertainment, where players could pay real money for virtual goods, like gold, in the game. The company was founded by former child star Brock Pierce, and Bannon was an investor. Bannon managed to convince Goldman Sachs to plow $60 million into a company that sold imaginary goods in an imaginary world. Surely there’s a metaphor in there somewhere. Here’s a bit of the original article: Goldman Sachs started making visits, inspecting the Asian operations and talking with Bannon and others about terms. Finally, on February 7, 2006, the deal was inked: Goldman Sachs, together with a consortium of private funds, made a reported $60 million investment in the company. Part of the money was used to buy Pierce, Salyer, and IGE’s general counsel, Randy Maslow, out of some of their stock in the company. Pierce walked away with $20 million and still retained the controlling share of a company that was doing more than a quarter of a billion dollars in sales a year.[/QUOTE] [QUOTE]In 2007, following a major lawsuit by one World of Warcraft player, who accused IGE of “substantially impairing” players’ enjoyment of the game, the company took a nosedive. It rebranded to Affinity Media, and Bannon took over as CEO. He stayed in that role until 2012, when he joined Breitbart, which, coincidentally, also peddles [URL="https://www.wired.com/2016/08/trump-hates-media-now-media-execs-running-campaign/"]imaginary stuff[/URL] on the Internet.[/QUOTE] [URL]https://www.wired.com/2016/09/trumps-campaign-ceos-little-known-world-warcraft-career/[/URL] [URL]https://www.wired.com/2008/11/ff-ige/[/URL] [URL]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IGE[/URL] [url]http://www.bloomberg.com/research/stocks/private/person.asp?personId=772098&privcapId=10184476[/url] [video=youtube;fHZOc6gK_pY]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fHZOc6gK_pY[/video]

Hahaha, that's hilarious. Or it would be if this guy wasn't a de facto government official.

He should have gone with RuneScape.

[QUOTE=A B.A. Survivor;51801296]He should have gone with RuneScape.[/QUOTE] Implying that he wouldn't have been run out by massive merchant clans.

Is this the same guy that people were calling a weaboo? He went to some con or something?

I swear Trump picks people to turn the US government even more of the most wretched hive of scum and villainy than it was before.

[QUOTE=A B.A. Survivor;51801296]He should have gone with RuneScape.[/QUOTE] Maybe he could've bought another gf to abuse.

[QUOTE=A B.A. Survivor;51801296]He should have gone with RuneScape.[/QUOTE] "type ur password backward jagex blocks it lol!!"

[QUOTE=Dantz Bolrew;51801323]Is this the same guy that people were calling a weaboo? He went to some con or something?[/QUOTE] That was Sean Spicer, the press secretary. He also has a beef with Dippin Dots.

Every day I say to myself "it won't be getting any better than this" and yet it keeping happening!!!

Holy shit Steve Bannon's old business model was strikingly similar to my current one Fuck

I'm surprised he managed to secure that kind of investment, that requires some real negotiation. Sounds like he made off okay with it too even though the company sputtered and died. This is weird as fuck.

[QUOTE=nox;51801373]"type ur password backward jagex blocks it lol!!"[/QUOTE] Y'know this old phishing attempt is funny, but Blizzard actually would block out your password in Battle.Net in Diablo 2 if you posted in a chat room. It made things interesting for me because my old password was 'assassin', which was one of the classes added in the expansion. True story: I got phished because a friend on that account got their account stolen and lost two high-end items on a necro I was running. Ultimately I lost basically nothing of value and learned a valuable lesson.

[QUOTE=A B.A. Survivor;51801296]He should have gone with RuneScape.[/QUOTE] "Buying GOP"

that's cyberpunk as fuck tbh

[Quote]He stayed in that role until 2012, when he joined Breitbart, which, coincidentally, also peddles imaginary stuff on the Internet.[/Quote] Fuckin burn, I love it.

so he's getting into politics to topple the Chinese' monopoly on MMO goldfarming, genius

It does look like America is being run by people that nobody would be able to take seriously under any other circumstances, doesn't it.

[QUOTE=thepwnwar;51801316]Implying that he wouldn't have been run out by massive merchant clans.[/QUOTE] Is this a thing?

[QUOTE=goluffy;51802298]Is this a thing?[/QUOTE] They're basically price manipulation rings. [url]http://runescapeclans.wikia.com/wiki/Merchanting_Clan[/url]

[QUOTE=Aldawolf;51802446]They're basically price manipulation rings. [url]http://runescapeclans.wikia.com/wiki/Merchanting_Clan[/url][/QUOTE] i once forced the price of magic logs down on the G.E by cutting literally millions of them over the span of several months and selling them in groups of thousands all in the same day. watching the price drop every time i sold more was hilarious until it sank in that i was losing money by doing this :v:

[QUOTE=geel9;51801411]Holy shit Steve Bannon's old business model was strikingly similar to my current one Fuck[/QUOTE] Update it to us when you make a news platform, and become a close aide to a future president.

Goldman Sachs invests $60 million into a company that's primarily designed to violate the TOS of another commercial product and harm its business for their own profit. One of the central figures of that operation is now President Cheeto Grande's right-hand man. Take me back to the Berenstein timeline. What next, Spicer is behind Vinh'll fix it? Miller is the head of lulzsec? Pence ran Kazaa? Actually, I'm afraid to find out what's next.

litterally worse than hitler. chinese gold farmers were a cancer on WoW for years, they only now stopped because blizz has just played around with inflation and the WoW tokens to allow you to get a good chunk of gold cheaper than these guys [editline]10th February 2017[/editline] shit he could probably have built an MMO with that amount of cash.

Shame he didn't manage to talk them into investing even more. Goldman Sachs wasting money can only be a good thing.

Moving up in the world! From selling gold to basically being under the President of the United States. [editline]11th February 2017[/editline] Fuck that this guy has anything to do with politics in the world.

I think it's even more amusing that he started this with a former child actor who's now big in the Bitcoin scene.