Felicia Day on having Microsoft as a Guildmate
by Krystalle Voecks 
Dec 17th 2008 at 8:30PM
In this day and age, you have to applaud geeks who take their ideas and make good on them. Take, for example, Felicia Day. Talented, beautiful, and geeky to boot, Felicia recognized that all the drama we know and love as part of MMO culture would make for one hell of a sitcom. She could have quit after networks repeatedly turned her down or told her they didn't get it, but she stuck to her guns. Producing the show herself and releasing it to YouTube, she's become a pretty epic Internet celebrity in her own right. Since then, The Guild has built up enough buzz that when it came time to distribute Season 2, she apparently had several offers to choose from. (No real shocker there!)Why choose to sign up with Microsoft, then? Well, okay, beyond being able to send your video out on Xbox Live - which is pretty geeky from where I'm at - Microsoft isn't generally known as a heavy player in the sitcom business. According to Felicia in an interview with the Los Angeles Times, Microsoft is not only is willing to distribute The Guild on Xbox Live, for Zune, and on MSN Video in high-definition, but they're also allowing her to keep full creative control and ownership of all of the work. The deal lets Microsoft have it exclusively for four weeks up to the end of the season, but after that period, she's free to post it to YouTube (or wherever she wants, really) so anyone who doesn't own a Zune, isn't on Live, or willing to surf over to MSN Video can still enjoy the second season of The Guild.
I just hope that Felicia and crew will keep us laughing with their geeky hijinks for a long time to come. Short of letting a baby nom on a powerstrip (and if you've seen that in real life, I don't envy you) there's quite a bit of The Guild that rings home with MMO geeks. Much like Jell-O, there's always room for more geeky humor - and more of the awesome cast of The Guild!
Filed under: Guilds, News items, Humor
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Ty Dec 17th 2008 9:03PM
When's episode 4 coming out?
Naix Dec 18th 2008 10:11AM
"turned her town or told her they didn't get it"
How does one get turned into a town?
Xtyle Dec 18th 2008 3:20PM
It all started when she was just a small village!
Ty Dec 18th 2008 4:34PM
What do these have to do with my question? Why are you replying to something when what you have to say is completely irrelevant to what I originally asked? Stop replying to stuff just so your comment is at the top of the page.
Meliadoul Dec 18th 2008 4:36PM
never heard of this show till it was posted
laughed my ass off - watched 6 episodes in a row without even noticing.
kinda has a feeling like the office
great show
Arashikou Dec 17th 2008 9:19PM
I really hate to toot Microsoft's horn and all, but...
That actually is really cool, the deal they gave her. It's harder than pulling hen's teeth to get someone to distributing video without demanding the artistic rights to it. I'm not sure if it's because they're actually trying to respect the artists they work with or because they just don't have enough experience in video to realize how badly they could screw her over, but kudos to MS for giving The Guild the kind of fair deal more artists deserve!
Spoonmaster Dec 17th 2008 9:26PM
Sounds like a great balance between hording the video for themselves as well as letting it be open to the public.
offday Dec 17th 2008 9:48PM
Man, WoWInsider really is obsessed with this girl, huh?
Keyra Dec 17th 2008 9:59PM
Why not? She's hot! :-)
Lemons Dec 17th 2008 10:02PM
Yup, this is your #1 stop for news about "The Guild." With a few articles about wow sprinkeled in between...
Chris Anthony Dec 17th 2008 10:03PM
Offday, you obviously don't *like* to read WOW Insider. You have nothing but bad things to say about it, judging from your recent comments. Why not just stop reading? It's as easy as removing the site from your bookmarks.
offday Dec 17th 2008 10:16PM
Calm down. No one else took offense to it. You'll be ok.
Chris Anthony Dec 17th 2008 11:09PM
Who's offended? I'm certainly not. Reading the site seems to make you unhappy; I'm suggesting that you do something else. It's not "love it or gtfo", I just genuinely don't understand why you'd keep coming back if you only have (or at least are only voicing) negative opinions about the site. Wouldn't you rather be doing something that actively made you happy?
offday Dec 18th 2008 1:17AM
I just don't understand the obbession with this girl?
WoWInsider posts a lot of good informative articles. This isn't one of them. I don't even technically consider it to have anything to do with WoW.
BladeeR Dec 18th 2008 1:49AM
Hot? Not really..
I guess she is hot enough for wowinsider crew, she is a girl, and we all know about girls in wow, how rare they are. They have to take what they can, therefore the obsession.
Falcio Dec 18th 2008 9:21AM
I don't think it's because she's a pretty girl, but mostly because she's a pretty girl who's an actress that openly geeks it out. She plays WoW, she's gone to conventions, Tycho from Penny Arcade GROOMED her...I mean, what's not to like for the geeks around here? Oh, and she was also in Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog...so...come on.
That, and the Guild is a webseries mostly derived from a lot of WoW culture. Considering she's one of the brains behind the operation, I'd assume that's also a reason WoWinsider covers her. This story was more about the Guild than about Felicia Day.
Really, I've only seen a few articles over her alone. It's definitely not thrown off the WoW-related stories, so there's not really much to complain about.
Lemons Dec 17th 2008 10:09PM
It's what we call a dry joke, my good Christopher.
See? You learn something new every day.
I just don't care for the guild, I like 98% of the other articles.
Gorgzy Dec 17th 2008 11:03PM
is this show any good? i read about it all the time on wow insider (mostly coz it involves pics of Felicia) i'm at work right now, but i just downloaded the first few eps and watched the first one at least on my Phone, it kinda confused me :p
also, kodo's to MS for a FAIR deal
BladeeR Dec 18th 2008 4:22AM
I would not say any good, but it proves that there are girls in WoW, that's why all nerds are so upset about it.
In before fanboy rage.
Prof.Xomox Dec 18th 2008 7:50AM
I enjoy the show. It is definitely a tongue in cheek view on the guildies and the dangers of being a local guild. I get a real kick out of it.