Stuff Worth Knowing for the Week of January 30, 2023

The live service bubble pops in gaming, everybody's gaga for AI, and DC Studios actually has a plan.

Welcome back to Stuff Worth Knowing! Each week, I'll round up news related to tech, video games, film, television, anime, and more. At the end of each newsletter, there will be a section called On The Calendar, which will include some of those notable dates that are near-term. Oh, and I also launched my Patreon, SavePhile, where my more thoughtful musings on any topic will go.

New section this week! No, it’s not about layoffs this time. Still potentially terrible though.

Video Games 🎮

Companies Shutter Games As The Live Service Bubble Pops 

It's financial earnings season, meaning it's the right time for companies to make drastic shifts like layoffs or shutting down projects. This week saw a number of live service games being shuttered for various reasons. Everyone pivoted to making forever games years ago, but the reality is most consumers only have time for one or two of these games. If you're not one of the market leaders, the seas are rough indeed.

The first one to get shuttered this week was Konami Digital's Crimesight, a social deduction game released on Steam last year. This was followed by Epic Games' Rumbleverse on Tuesday. The melee battle royale has only been live for six months, but it will cease operation on February 28. At the same time, Ready at Dawn announced that Echo VR, its virtual reality sports title and one of the better games on Meta's platform, would be shuttering on August 1, 2023. 

The next day, Electronic Arts canceled both Apex Legends Mobile and Battlefield Mobile. The former game released last May, but "following a strong start, the content pipeline for Apex Legends Mobile has begun to fall short of that bar for quality, quantity, and cadence." Battlefield Mobile was still in development, but EA has refocused on the main franchise, given its uneven success there. EA also closed down Industrial Toys, the studio that had been working on Battlefield Mobile.

The final live service execution was Crossfire X, Smilegate's latest attempt to expand the popularity of its Crossfire series to Western markets. The Korean publisher announced that the game would be closing down on May 18, 2023, with all sales of the game being halted immediately. 

Why It's Worth Knowing: Everyone was on the live service bandwagon a few years ago. Everyone wanted to have the lifestyle game that players would enjoy forever. But again, players can only enjoy a few of those titles and they'll generally be the ones they already play, like Fortnite or Destiny 2. Their friends, progress, and skins are already attached to these games and getting over that is a steep, steep wall.

So the space is littered with those that tried and failed. Hell, some publishers are still trying; Ubisoft actually recommitted to making live service games out of its biggest franchises. I'd argue there's more space to release smaller experiences, or at least ones that players can enjoy for a while and then leave behind. I mean, God of War: Ragnarok has sold 11 million copies to date. That's good money! It's not the infinite money of FIFA Ultimate Team, but not every game can be that!

For example, take Titanfall Legends, a single-player game in the shared Apex Legends and Titanfall universe. This single-player game would've been the sequel folks have been waiting for since the release of Titanfall 2. Sadly, that game was also canceled this week. Seems like the right fit for what I'm talking about. Alas.

343 Industries Plots A New Direction With Halo

343 Industries was one of the studios involved in the extensive Microsoft layoffs last month. Now a report from Bloomberg shines a light on what's happening inside of the studio and potentially where the Halo franchise might be going in the future. According to the report, at least 95 employees lost their jobs during the layoffs. With the departures of additional executives, it marked a sea change at the studio.

There were rumors that 343 Industries was losing the Halo franchise, but that's apparently not the case. Instead, the studio is thinking of switching the franchise over to Unreal Engine, instead of the internal Slipspace Engine. A new project code-named Tatanka is being developed in collaboration with Certain Affinity. 

Halo Infinite was meant to be the beginning of the next ten years of Halo, but it seems that its time is significantly more finite. 343 Industries will continue to support the game on the multiplayer side of things, but the single-player action will come from future titles instead. 

Why It's Worth Knowing: Halo is a keystone Microsoft franchise. The company has other games like Forza Motorsport — which was seemingly delayed last week — but a great number of its franchises lie fallow at the moment. Its big titles for 2023, including the recently-released Hi-Fi Rush, Redfall, and Starfield, are all games from studios it acquired in the Bethesda Softworks purchase. The rest need to get back on track, especially if the Activision-Blizzard deal goes through. 

Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony Are Skipping E3 Proper

The Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) is returning to the Los Angeles Convention Center in 2023, but it seems to have lost some of its shine. According to a report by IGN, Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft are all declining to have a presence on the E3 showfloor. Sony hasn't been on the showfloor since 2019, but Microsoft and Nintendo have maintained booths there. That's apparently not going to be the case this year. 

The major issue with E3 is it's no longer the only game in town. Multiple PAX events have sprung up around the world and Gamescom in Germany continues to grow. On top of competition, the pandemic shifted publishers and developers more towards doing their own events online. In terms of promotion, there's really no difference. If you're trying to reach consumers, PAX or Summer Game Fest are better shots. If you're trying to reach the press or content creators, you can simply invite them to your own event. 

Also, attending E3 is a dicey proposition financially. As Larian Studios director of publishing Michael Cromwell told me on Twitter: "It’s propositionally difficult to parse. Schrodinger’s event. Nobody knows if the press will be there til the lid is open. So how can you commit to [$300,000]? The pandemic forced folks like us to figure out how to do a show. Costs a lot less, and hits a more engaged audience."

Why It's Worth Knowing: It's hard to know if we need E3 as a touchpoint for most of the industry in June, or if the event is just shuffling along zombie-like because of nostalgia. There are just so many events now and so many ways to reach different audiences that E3 itself is kind of the odd man out. It can't just be an also-ran, it has to find its own reason to exist. 

The EU Drops An Antitrust Warning Against Microsoft's Activision Acquisition

As rumored two weeks ago, the European Commission has issued an antitrust warning to Microsoft over its planned acquisition of Activision-Blizzard. Politico reports that the EU has served Microsoft with a statement of objections to the acquisition. With the statement in hand, Microsoft can begin to offer concessions to the EU to let the deal go through.

Of course, even if that works out, Microsoft still has to deal with opposition from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and UK Competition & Markets Authority (CMA). 

Tech ⌨️

Samsung Also Thinks Extended Reality Is The Future

This week, Samsung announced its new Galaxy S23 smartphones: the S23, S23 Plus, and S23 Ultra. They're all spec bumps over the last year's models, nothing really to write home about.

The most interesting news from the announcement event was Samsung's belief that mixed reality is the future. Meta, Apple, and HTC are already heading in that direction and it seems like Samsung is joining the party. 

"So we have also been making similar preparations, no less than any others," Samsung's head of mobile experience told The Washington Post. "For the chipset, it is going to be a strategic collaboration with Qualcomm. The hardware will be us. For the ecosystem, we were trying to determine which platform to work with. And in the end, we decided that it was going to be Google."

Of course, part of the problem is that Google doesn't really have an extended reality platform yet. Meta is just now starting to pivot its virtual reality platform towards XR, while Apple is also developing its own mixed reality headset and software platform, rumored to be called xrOS. Those are closed platforms. One wonders how difficult it's going to be creating devices and a platform in collaboration between multiple companies. 

Why It's Worth Knowing: Mixed reality is the next platform of the future… maybe. At the very least, a lot of companies think mixed reality is the successor to the smartphone. Apple seems to have the best chance of pulling it off, but it's still very early days. If Samsung and Google can stay together on the same page, they can compete, but Google also has an eye on AI at the moment. 

This Week in Twitter: The Reason Behind The API Changes Is Revealed

Twitter's week began with light nonsense and trended into heavy nonsense by the end. The week started with Musk making his account private to test out if doing so would generate more views. One would think he has engineers and analytics that could confirm this fact for him, but I guess he does have to perform like a dutiful concierge to the conservative thought leaders he's trying to keep on his side.

The real news dropped at the end of the week, when the TwitterDev account revealed that the company would be closing off access to the standard Twitter API on February 9. Instead, users and organizations would have to rely on a paid basic tier instead. This is why third-party client access to Twitter's API was closed off in the first place: Musk is doing everything he can to make any sort of money.

While the tweets did not touch on how much API access would cost, folks found the pricing on Twitter's developer site. For the premium plan, which seems aimed at smaller professional organizations, up to 500 requests costs $149. At the top-end, up to 10,000 requests is $2,499. There are also undisclosed (likely bespoke) Enterprise packages. 

That's not the only attempt by Twitter to make some money. Social media consultant Matt Navarra reported that organizations can also now pay for the gold checkmark for a fee of $1,000 per month, plus another $50 for affiliated handles. 

Finally, Musk himself stated on Friday that Twitter will begin sharing ad revenue with users. This program will give creators a cut based on ads served in the reply threads of their tweets. The catch is you can only access this program if you pay $8 per month for Twitter Blue, making the service a money loss for all but the largest of creators. 

Why It's Worth Knowing: Perhaps these will be the spins that help Twitter make money, but I doubt it. I think Musk is cutting off Twitter's reach with the API nonsense. Not only do I think people won't pay for it, but many will build their own tools to scrape Twitter's information if they care that much. That's also not counting many people's favorite Twitter accounts, which just post images or quotes daily. These are largely automated with access to the Twitter API and it's unlikely most of these hobbyist bots will pay the piper. 

The other attempts at a business model seem equally fraught. What are organizations gaining by spending $1,000 per month for a service anyone can sign up for? How many creators are going to make money on Twitter ads when ad spending on the platform fell by 70% in December? There are ways for some of these ideas to work, but Musk isn't going in those directions because he doesn't seem to understand the value of the platform. 

AI 🤖

No layoffs section this week, but there are a ton of stories about AI-generated content this week. So, new section!

Google Is Preparing To Go All-In On AI 

Google is pretty steamed about missing out on the AI revolution. According to the New York Times a few weeks ago, founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin returned to the fold to kickstart the company's focus on AI. Google CEO Sundar Pichai also signaled a strong shift toward AI during this week's investors call for the fourth quarter 2022 financial report. 

"First, the AI opportunity ahead. AI is the most profound technology we are working on today. Our talented researchers, infrastructure and technology make us extremely well-positioned as AI reaches an inflection point," said Pichai. "More than six years ago, I first spoke about Google being an AI-first company. Since then, we’ve been a leader in developing AI. In fact, our Transformers research project and our field-defining paper in 2017, as well as our path-breaking work in diffusion models, are now the basis of many of the generative AI applications you're starting to see today."

Google does have a number of AI projects in the works, like the creative writing tool Wordcraft. That's without even going into relatively-standard Google apps that use some sort of AI, like Google Photos, Google Assistant, or Google Translate. What Google is actually lacking is mindshare. ChatGPT and Stable Diffusion are the names that are trending on social media. Google wants to recapture that, because that's how you make money. (More on that in the next news item.)

Google wants to be able to say, "We can do that too!" According to a report from CNBC, Google is testing its own ChatGPT competitor called Apprentice Bard. This report also mentioned a new search engine that would respond in question-and-answer form. Both of these projects would be based on Google's existing LaMDA conversational AI technology, similar to Wordcraft. (The CNBC article is well worth the read as it also goes into some of the comparison tests Google has done against ChatGPT.)

All of that brings us to Friday, when Google announced a livestream event happening on February 8, 2023. "We're reimagining how people search for, explore and interact with information, making it more natural and intuitive than ever before to find what you need. Join us to learn how we're opening up greater access to information for people everywhere, through Search, Maps and beyond," says the event description. It's likely that this event is where Google will be unveiling one or more of these AI projects, or at least highlighting all of the existing generative tech in Google's current services.

Why It's Worth Knowing: Google might not have immediate mindshare, but like Apple, it has an existing base of consistent users already. If it integrates Apprentice Bard into the standard Google search page of the Google Search app, that's going to reach far more people than ChatGPT. For Google, it's about getting the right features into the right apps and then shouting from the rooftops about it. Of course, they also have to worry about the legality of it all. 

OpenAI Announces ChatGPT Plus For $20 Per Month

OpenAI is finally ready to charge folks for its popular AI-generated text service. On Wednesday the company announced ChatGPT Plus, the premier tier of its service offering. The free tier of the service isn't going away, but people can pay for "faster response times and reliability during peak hours." Basically, you pay to cut the line when things get crowded. 

Right now, there's still a waitlist to sign up to ChatGPT Plus. Similarly, there's a waitlist to sign up for access to the ChatGPT API. Open AI is ready to expand big time, even if it hasn't entirely worked out the kinks in how AI-generation is affecting the world. It does understand that there are some problems though, which is why it's launched a free tool to identify AI-generated text. 

The Shout Out: Wired has a great article about how ChatGPT is making universities tackle firm definitions of plagiarism in a world where AI is mashing together thousands of articles into one.

Microsoft Integrates ChatGPT Into Microsoft Teams And Bing Is Next

Remember a few weeks ago when I mentioned that Microsoft was in talks to invest $10 billion into ChatGPT? Remember a few minutes ago when I mentioned Google can leverage AI technology in existing applications and services? Well Microsoft is barreling down that path as well.

On Wednesday, Microsoft announced Teams Premium, a new tier of its Microsoft Teams service. Premium will add new features powered by OpenAI GPT-3.5. These features include intelligent recap, which automatically generates notes, task lists, and full transcripts from video meetings. The AI will also break up the meetings into chapters automatically and mark when speakers were talking. Teams Premium will cost $10 per person per month after June 30, but costs $7 per person monthly if folks sign up today.

At the beginning of January, The Information reported that Microsoft and OpenAI were working on a new version of Bing powered by ChatGPT. According to Semafor this week, this new Bing will be powered by GPT-4, the latest iteration of the language model behind ChatGPT. Does anyone use Bing? No. Will adding ChatGPT help? Probably not. Microsoft is hoping to have the service live before the end of March, which might be behind Google adding AI chat to its own search. 

The Shout Out: As I was finalizing the newsletter, a random user noticed what seems to be the new Bing. The header image for this section is theirs.

ElevenLabs Says It Will Implement Better Safeguards For Voice AI After Deepfakes

Hey, quick question. If people could, with some voice samples and text, get anyone to say anything, what do you think they would do? Apparently, ElevenLabs didn't ask itself this question. Over the weekend, it launched the beta for its Vocal AI system, allowing users to clone voices and make them say whatever they wanted. 

Apparently, it didn't go well! "While we see our tech being overwhelmingly applied to positive use, we also see an increasing number of voice cloning misuse cases," said the company in a tweet. According to Vice Motherboard, there were clips of actress Emma Watson reading Mein Kampf of Rick from Rick & Morty threatening domestic abuse. Everything is terrible!

The company says it has a few ideas on how to prevent its technology from being used like this, including requiring account verification to use voice cloning, verifying copyright, or manually verifying every time a user wants to clone a voice. It doesn't know which methods it'll eventually use, however. And in the meantime, that's just one company with access to the technology. At least they think it's a problem. The next company might not. 

AI-Generated Seinfeld Takes Over Twitch

Seinfeld is famously a show about nothing, but what happens when you take out even the slightest amount of comedic timing and wit? Well, you're left with Nothing, Forever. This digital show is streaming 24/7 on Twitch, starring a cadre of thinly-veiled Seinfeld characters doing whatever their AI-generated script tells them to. 

It's bad and terrible, but has risen in popularity based purely on meme energy. Part of the fun is just vibing with the community in chat and enjoying the odd situations the AI comes up with. Sadly, it seems the creators really do think it is the future.

“As generative media gets better, we have this notion that at any point, you're gonna be able to turn on the future equivalent of Netflix and watch a show perpetually, nonstop as much as you want. You don't just have seven seasons of a show, you have seven hundred, or infinite seasons of a show that has fresh content whenever you want it. And so that became one of our grounding pillars," one of the creators told Vice Motherboard. 

"Our grounding principle was, can we create a show that can generate entertaining content forever? Because that's truly where we see the future emerging towards. Our goal with the next iterations or next shows that we release is to actually trade a show that is like Netflix-level quality.”

Honestly? Sounds terrible. Look, there's something to AI content, but this certainly isn't it, and I definitely don't want a forever show. 

Film, Television, and Streaming 🎞️

Netflix Pump-Fakes On Anti-Password Sharing

On Tuesday, The Streamable found some changes in the Netflix Help Center aimed at limiting account sharing. The changes included making Netflix accounts shared only within a single household, forcing viewers to connect to Netflix at the primary location every 31 days. For folks who travel, Netflix had a temporary fix as well: requesting a temporary code that will work for seven days.

The internet lost its mind over the potential changes. Not only would this hit folks who shared accounts with friends and family, but also folks who use their accounts regularly at different locations. It was a very brief, but very powerful internet firestorm.

One day later, Netflix sent The Streamable a statement saying that the new policy was posted in error. “For a brief time yesterday, a help center article containing information that is only applicable to Chile, Costa Rica, and Peru, went live in other countries. We have since updated it," the Netflix spokesperson told The Streamable. The spokesperson further said that when Netflix is going to release its anti-password sharing policy, it would communicate that policy to its users first.

The policy is coming, mind you. Netflix is going to enact some sort of anti-password sharing system. It's just a matter of finding the right system that won't cause a customer revolt.

Disney Thinking About Licensing Films and Shows to Other Companies

Bob Iger retook the reins at Disney in November, but it's not entirely clear where he plans to steer the company in the future. That news will likely come when Disney announces its financial earnings report on February 8. In a report from Bloomberg, one apparent direction is selling some movies and television shows in the content library. 

There's no word on what shows or films could be licensed out to rivals. It's doubtful that many of the key pillars of the Disney+ service — Marvel, Lucasfilm, Pixar — would be licensed, but there's a ton of back catalog that's not being used. Films from Touchstone Pictures and 20th Century Studios, or any number of shows on Hulu could easily make the jump to other streaming services.

The issue is that Disney+ content is pretty expensive; the operating income of the Media and Entertainment division was down 42% year-over-year in the most recent financial earnings report. On top of that, Disney is on the hook to purchase the rest of Hulu in 2024 and Comcast is certainly waiting for a big check. That means if it can make some money on something like Only Murders in The Building, then Disney might weigh the option.

Why It's Worth Knowing: All of the major streamers are now getting into the same few modes of operation: An adoption of ad-supported tiers, licensing off lower-performing content,

and even potentially free ad-supported streaming television (FAST). Disney already has the ad-supported tier on Disney+, so adding one of the other modes makes sense. (The last mode of operation would be layoffs, which Disney has already done, including instituting a hiring freeze.)

The CW Finally Dumps All of Its Primary Scripted Executives

The CW is going through hard times under the control of Nexstar. Most of the shows that defined what "The CW" was for years have been canceled. And now a few of the major executives behind scripted programming are gone. 

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Executive Vice President of Current Programming Michael Roberts and Executive Vice President of Development Gaye Hirsch have both left the company. The CW will continue making some scripted content, but the pair have been in charge of that side of the network since 2006. 

Nexstar is looking for cheaper programming overall and that means pivoting to unscripted shows. To that end, The CW hired former NBCUniversal executive Heather Olander as its new head of unscripted programming. There are currently only a few scripted shows remaining on the network, including Superman & Lois and All American, but you can expect next season to be full of brand-new reality and competition shows.

Superhero Watch: DC Studios Reveals Its Slate of Projects For "Chapter 1"

Director James Gunn and producer Peter Safran took over Warner Bros. Discovery's DC Films in October of last year. Now three months later, the pair have outlined a rough roadmap for the future of the renamed DC Studios. Well, technically, it's a very clear roadmap for the future, but the edges of the rough are pretty fuzzy. Let's get into it.

There are a total of ten new projects announced in what Gunn and Safran are calling, "Chapter 1: Gods and Monsters." This looks to be new branding, similar to the Phases of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Only two projects are fully dated, and one of those exists outside of this new DC Universe.

James Gunn @JamesGunn

Here are just a few of our plans. Up, up, and away! #DCStudios #DCU @DCComics

Superman Legacy (Film, July 11, 2025): This is the real beginning of the DC Universe, featuring a new, younger Superman as the foundation. "Superman is for everyone. That’s a four quadrant film that should speak to everyone in the world," said Gunn, according to Variety. 

The Authority (Film): This is a surprise choice by Gunn. The Authority is a Justice League-style team originally from the Wildstorm universe. The team is composed of thinly-veiled versions of heroes from other properties, all of whom have banded together to bring justice by any means possible. Think of an entire team of superpowered folks that operate like the Punisher. 

The Brave and The Bold (Film): Gunn isn't touching Matt Reeves' The Batman, which will remain in its own universe. Instead, the DC Universe will have a new Batman film that will act as a vector for the larger Bat Family from the comics. The film will feature Batman and Robin, the latter being Damian Wayne, the biological son of Bruce Wayne and a young assassin in training. Based on Grant Morrison's comic run, the film will be about Batman trying to rein in his murderous preteen son. 

Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow (Film): This is a film based on the comic of the same name. The comic was about a jaded Supergirl heading into outer space to unwind, only to get mired in cosmic shenanigans. There's no word yet on whether this film will involve Sasha Calle, the Supergirl that will appear in the upcoming The Flash film. 

Swamp Thing (Film): This has been pitched as a horror-focused film. Swamp Thing is a man who finds himself turned into a planet-like being, with a connection to the Earth itself. Apparently the movie will be based on Alan Moore's run on the title. 

Creature Commandos (Animated Series): This is an animated property which has already been written by Gunn, seemingly spinning out of his work on The Suicide Squad. That makes sense as this team is literally the Suicide Squad combined with monsters. This is already in production and came complete with early art showing the team: Rick Flag, Sr., Dr. Nina Mazursky, Doctor Phosphorus, Frankenstein, The Bride of Frankenstein, G.I. Robot, and Weasel. 

Waller (Series): Viola Davis returns as Amanda Waller in this series about the secretive taskmaster. Like Creature Commandos, this will air prior to Superman Legacy, acting as an "aperitif" for the new DC Universe. 

Lanterns (Series): The previously-planned Green Lanterns television series from Greg Berlanti has been canceled. Instead, this is a new series starring Hal Jordan and John Stewart as a pair of space cops assigned to Earth. According to Gunn, the events of this series play "a really big role leading us into the main story that we’re telling across our film and television." I do wonder if the lack of "Green" in the title means this will involve Lanterns from the other Corps.

Paradise Lost (Series): While we don't know what's happening with Wonder Woman proper in the DC Universe, this series will focus on the island of Themyscira before Diana's birth. The story will involve the origins of the island and the political intrigue of different factions. 

Booster Gold (Series): This is the full comedy series of the new DC Universe. The series is about Mike Carter, a schlub from the future who takes technology from the future and travels back to the past to become the superhero he believes he truly is. "Basically, Booster Gold is imposter syndrome as a superhero," said Gunn. 

Also, it's not a part of the new DC Universe, but The Batman Part II was given a release date: October 3, 2025. 

On My Mind 🧠

Tiny Consequences For Big Companies Are Happening At Least: This week there were a bunch of stories about major companies getting fined or found liable for bad actions. 

• The National Labor Relations Board found that Apple violated federal law by preventing employees from even talking about unionizing. 

• In another NLRB-related case, a judge found that Amazon illegally withheld wage and benefit increases from employees if they tried to unionize. 

• The FTC fined GoodRx $1.5 million for sharing the private health data of its customers with third-parties like Google and Facebook.

• Finally, Activision has to pay $35 million in a settlement agreement with the Securities and Exchange Commission. According to the SEC, Activision violated the whistleblower protection rule and generally has few processes to handle workplace misconduct allegations. 

None of these are major setbacks for the companies involved, but at least someone is hitting them with a ruler.

Netflix Made a Reality Show Based on Squid Game. It Went Poorly: The hit show Squid Game was about a bunch of poor people risking their lives to make money. It was, in part, a commentary about inequality. So when Netflix announced that it would make a Squid Game reality series with a cash prize, it felt like a strong case of missing the point of the original. 

Variety has a story about the filming of the reality show, including rigged games and poor filming conditions.

“This is not a Bear Grylls survival show,” says John. “If they had told us it was going to be that cold, no one would have gone through with it.”

“I’m infuriated by the narrative that Netflix is putting out there, that only [a few] people were injured…we were all injured just by going through that experience. I’ve never been that cold for that long a period in my life. We couldn’t feel our feet or our toes. It was ridiculous,” she says. Jenny also claims that while the game was in production, restroom or water breaks weren’t allowed.

James Gunn Loves Tweeting: For many executives and high-profile folks, the mantra “Don’t tweet,” is a smart one. It’s better to continue to get your paycheck and not step in something online.

New co-boss of DC Studios James Gunn even got in trouble for tweeting before: his past tweets are what got him fired from Marvel Studios in the first place. Despite that, Gunn is still very active on Twitter, talking about all things DC. According to THR’s Heat Vision, he even fielded a question related to his social media activity at the DC Studios press event:

Gunn and Safran are not corporate. They are moviemakers. One of them spends a lot of time on Twitter debunking rumors and stoking fan excitement. When one reporter asked Gunn, “Are you going to keep having to swat down rumors on Twitter when stuff leaks out?” Gunn replied, “Have to? That’s my joy!”

Other execs either toe the company line, express generic and genial statements, or retweet praise. Gunn jumps in and lets his flag fly. He’s already conducted a fun Twitter poll on whether Superman should have trunks. Will their tenure see them smooth out those rough edges or will the inmates run the asylum?

Hope it works out for him.