G4 Response (Score 2, Informative)

I am the "boss" Wil Wheaton refers to in his 1-7-03 posting on Slashdot.com and am responsible for Arena as well as all the other programming on G4. I read Wil's posting and it reminded me why I wanted Wil to work for G4 when we launched the network. He's articulate, smart and clever.

As you can tell from Wil's posting, he and the producer of Arena did not get along. It was too bad because when Wil, Travis and Jim worked well together, Arena was very good. Now that Wil and Travis have left the show we are doing our best to create a different version of Arena with different writers and hosts.

When Wil was a writer on the show, it was my job to oversee his work. Although he's left I still feel I need to address some inaccuracies in his posting:

1) Regarding the HALO National Finals, the show was always scheduled to be a half-hour special. It was never at any time slated to be a one-hour show.

2) Regarding competitions, to the best of my knowledge, no participants were treated badly or with disrespect and never treated as though they were lucky to be competing on the show or to be getting free pizza.

3) No game on Arena was ever "fixed." There was one occasion when a team scheduled to compete did not show up and producers did have to scramble to assemble a team with people who were available. That said, the results of each and every "Arena" show were real.

Over 100 talented people work very hard every day to produce the only 24/7 television channel devoted to video games and the people who play them. I know it is not Wil's desire to disparage them. Although we have lots of room for improvement, I am proud of the effort we make and continue to make.

I appreciate all the good work Wil did while at G4 and wish him the best in all future endeavors.

Vinnie Longobardo