Activision's Bobby Kotick: Would The Forefathers Be Proud?

Whenever a politician does something unsavory, critics always ask the same question:  what would the founding fathers think?  It’s a silly thing to propose, since George Washington doesn’t roll over in his grave each time a governor takes bribes or denies care to the elderly, but it does put those actions in greater context while giving Americans a reason to compare the old U.S. with the new super powered version.

We should do the same, of course, with Activision.  Much like a country, the publisher evolved to succeed in a changing world.  This also gave rise to its CEO, Bobby Kotick, a controversial figure who made thousands of enemies with these infamous quotes:

On the subject of video game prices:

“…if it was left to me, I would raise the prices even further." 

And on the subject of creating games:

“The goal that I had in bringing a lot of the packaged goods folks into Activision about 10 years ago was to take all the fun out of making video games."

These are interesting words when you consider Activision’s history.  Of the six people who founded the company in 1979, four of them were programmers.  The reason they did so (thus becoming the first third party video game publisher in history) was to celebrate developers.  At the time, Atari (the biggest video game company in the world) refused to acknowledge programmers for their work.  That led guys like David Crane, creator of Pitfall!, to jump ship.  The result was a revolution of sorts, where developers were celebrated and free to express themselves.  You know, instead of hiding messages inside their games, as Warren Robinett did in his Atari 2600 classic, Adventure.

Obviously, Bobby Kotick’s Activision isn’t that bad.  The company rakes in tons of cash and developers receive a mention in the credits and game booklets; they even go outside sometimes.  But it does make us wonder if the founding fathers would approve.  Let us know what you think.