S01E02: Brian & Felix (and other news)

It seems like every conversation these days starts and ends with COVID-19 – at least if your job is related to legal or business aspects of the games industry.

Will Gamescom happen in August in Cologne?

Probably unlikely, but could run as a limited local event if Germany succeeds in its “identify, isolate and treat” policy. Though the idea of tens of thousands of people congregating in one exhibition center sounds like the case of game zero, thought to be responsible for Bergamo being hit the hardest.

Are our industry friends the UK all right?

Hopefully, yes – at least the country is finally in a lockdown (after toying with the idea of building a herd immunity and refusing to close pubs, very much a case of GOBI, the government now shifted the gears and succeeded in shifting the blame to its own citizens).

And how’s CCP Games doing over there in Iceland?

Definitely better than the rest of us (except for Korea, of course), as the country plans to test every single citizen.

If you like numbers, worldometer has a very convenient dashboard updated 24/7 that allows you to review and compare each country’s numbers in real time.

And if you want to give your brain more food for thought on the subject, I definitely recommend Luca Dellanna’s daily newsletter (he’s based in Singapore and wrote a number of books that deal with predictability and probability, and he certainly knows the difference between lagging and leading indicators of a process).

Whether we talk about it or not, COVID-19 is going to be the background of 2020, already leading to the term “generation C” (if you haven’t read Ed Yong’s How the Pandemic Will End, it’s where it comes from).

Here’s hoping that we come through the pandemics as better people: a bit smarter, a bit kinder, and a bit more appreciative of all the luxuries that we enjoyed before the world held its breath.

The community podcast continues! In the second episode, we chat with Brian Taehyun Chung, a partner at Seoul-based Kim & Chang for over 20 years, and Felix Hilgert, a partner at Cologne-based Osborne Clarke for over 15 years.

We start with the discussion of German and Korean efforts in addressing COVID-19, and the difference in legal approach to privacy in the pursuit of tracing the discovered cases, and then progress to such topics as the life of a Korean lawyer (is a lifetime commitment to one firm still common?) and to whether or not you, as a law firm, can work for both Google and Apple without breaking any rules on conflict of interest.

You can listen to the episode on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or directly at Anchor (via web site or through their mobile app). Thanks to your feedback, the background music got toned down and the voice tracks have better compression.

If you’re like me, then you’re subscribed to a number of newsletters from regional law firms – and these days, there’s updates almost every other day. Which is all good, but not super interactive. So how about a Zoom call for about a dozen of in-house counsels that would be focused on a specific territory?

I’ve raised the idea with a number of in-house people, and everyone’s pretty interested. Over the next week, I’ll approach a few law firm lawyers with the possibility of testing this format, and then will post here the suggested time for the first such group call (I hope that everyone wears pyjamas and brings a cat or a dog).

Let me know if you’d like to be in the first group!

COVID-19 continues to reveal hidden reserves of different countries, and communities. Czech Republic, for example, is doing a great job with face masks (thanks to Petr Ludwig’s campaign).

I like this photograph that shows the individual approach –

And here’s the Solvak government, in style –

To my friends at Valve, Epic and other studios: please consider adding face masks as cosmetic items to your games, which will help to normalise the custom across a broader audience.

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With this, I give you one last story for today, and sign off until next week: