dude corporation LMAO

The original Chinese post can be found in here http://bbs.sgamer.com/thread-12879285-1-1.html
As a dota2 fan who knows a bit of the inside story of perfect world (PW), I decide to post this (article) after thinking for a long time. I don't know if this post will eventually be deleted by PW's PR department, writing this makes me feel I have followed my conscience and done what I thought was right.
Chinese teams' performance in this major was disastrous. There have been lots of speculations and discussions. Those are valid points and part of the reason, but from my POV, PW's structural issues and inefficiency in operating the game are the root cause of this disaster.
PW profited from the early boom in the Chinese internet industry. After its Nasdaq IPO and subsequent privatization, PW has realized all of its core value. Similar case is Shanda. After gaining huge amount of money from the stock market, lack of drive becomes common theme for these companies. Employees start to form different groups, thinking how to get bigger shares from the pie. Company mandate shifts from meeting customer demand and improving user experience to flatter your boss and get a bigger bonus. The internal struggle between different parties is crazy.
The dota2 project is PW's CEO Xiao Hong's baby. He decided PW needed to get dota2 distribution rights despite lots of internal opposing voices. Xiao was the head of HR department in PW and because of his oversea exp he was made CEO to help PW's Nasdaq IPO. This appointment pissed off other senior leaders who also wanted the CEO role. One of them is Lan Qi. To compromise, Lan got the CPO role and became decision maker for PW's dota2 team. This put the head of dota2 team Cai Wei into a really awkward situation as Cai was hired by Xiao. Not wanting to piss off anyone, Cai delegated most of his responsibilities to Li Ya Na, who was in Lan's circle. This went on for 1.5 yrs until PW's decision on activation keys
I didn't know who made the call to remove activation key as a pre-requirement to own dota2 in China. With no proper communication with Valve and little preparation on the servers, PW held a press release to tell everyone you don't need an activation key to get dota2. The die hard fans from dota1 had waited for so long and all logged on the server to play. The sheer number of players and their excitement exceeded the server capacity. The server was forced to shut down for 24 hrs and this marketing campaign was a total disaster. Some even estimated a 90% loss of the players. Li was forced to resign.
After some back and forth struggle the PW dota2 team entered an autonomous state. The team became more efficient and made great progress to improve user experience.
However, as I mentioned before the company culture has changed to satisfy your boss's needs. The company was looking to privatize and delist from Nasdaq. Xiao was no longer valuable to PW and ousted from the company. Cai, knowing his days in PW are numbered, decided to hand over the dota2 team to Andersen. This happened right before the dota2 team was preping for DAC.
DAC had lots of obstacles. Mostly resulted from unclear defined roles and responsibilities between Cai and Andersen. Despite all the issues, DAC was held successfully and valve was quite happy.
Andersen truly showed his greediness after becoming the leader. For projects require funding he actively participate, for projects require no money he actively delegate. Examples are the dota2 university league and the shanghai major.
Now let's get to the shanghai major. First of all, valve was clear they would let PW run the show and won't get involve with the daytoday operation. The new COO of PW was a recent hire and not very familiar with dota2. As a result he decided to give Andersen full control of the project
For production company, there wasn't much of a choice. MarsTV did DAC, Frankfurt, and has its own MDL tournament. ImbaTV did TI, rad-dire cup and has its own I-league. You cant fuck up by choosing either of them. But Andersen picked KeyTV. During the bidding process, PW's internal budget estimate for hardwares was 2.8M. MarsTV asked for 4M and ImbaTV asked for 6M. KeyTV asked for the exact same amount as PW's number. Its proposal had the exact same number font as PW's and also included a proposed trophy, which is exactly the same as what Valve sent to PW and was not disclosed to the public at the time.
On site stage construction and third-party service require lots of money. I heard PM paid 7M. Who did they pick? A company without proper license to do construction.
For hotel booking, Andersen told the hotel not to give PW discount. He wanted the original price, and wanted the hotel to put all player and staff attendance under one name, so he could get a platinum card from Marriott. He sent the card to the new COO of PW.
During group stage, there was no coordination between Andersen and his team. PW staff had to ask valve for direction. Since he also chose an incompetent construction company, setups inside the hotel were not finished on time and as a result, casters and productions had no time for testing equipment.
Before main event, we were told another event at the arena was cancelled. We were quite thrilled as the construction team now got an extra 24hrs to prepare the stage. The result? They finished at mid-night just hrs before the game. Again no time for testing, same hardward issues.
The other problem is the air quality inside the booth. The booth was built on top of the stage. The stage was made of wood, nail and glue. The stupid construction company put 4 ACs underneath the stage to circulate air inside of the booth. What kind of air will be circulated to player booth after the stage got heated and glue started to evaporate? The heavy chemical smell made me feel sick the moment I entered the booth. I couldn't imagine how player would feel after being inside of the booth for hours. Valve fixed this problem the next day after digging a hole onto the stage and pulled out the ACs and pumped in fresh air to the booth. I really want to ask Andersen where did you spend your 7M on?
Over these year PW has made so many dumb decisions and caused dota2, a incredibly high quality game to not have a large player base in China. My english is really bad so I can't email directly to Valve or Icefrog. I hope everyone helps us reach out to valve. Let our voice be heard, and stop PW from damaging our beloved game.