That’s what happens when you got bought by a major corporation. I can’t even say they shouldn’t have done it, since I’d imagine the money was really good. But they should have, at the very least, negotiated with the person buy them so that they could still keep up their brand of comedy.
For anyone interested, the person who I listened to speak about the core values thing was Dave Tate, founder of EliteFTS, and their three core values are "Focus", "Trust", and "Strength", hence the name.
That's the crucial part of a business's core values: they have to be so core to you, all the other founders, and the employees that nothing could make you willingly compromise them. Not even a big corpo coming and offering you 5 million dollars to do something that would make you compromise one of the core values. Because no quick buyout will truly compare to a well-run successful, respected business. And respect and trust take a long time to build but a very short time to lose.
Maybe if you're getting so much of a payout that you're just going to quit and live off the interest of the massive payday you've been given, it could be worth it, but if you're ever looking to continue doing business, or start a different business, you're fucked.
Look at RT. When they had trust, they were able to convince multiple higher level content creators on youtube to come under their umbrella (InsideGaming=>Funhaus, SugarPineSeven, The Creatures=>CowChop), but they managed to piss away all the trust, and now AH can't even convince Jeremy to stay, and they're bringing on literal nobodies. By selling out their core, they've bled talent, bled money, lost any trust or marketshare they once held, and are in an objectively worse place than if they had just stuck to some core values. By selling out, what did they actually gain, on the big scale? GenLock to try to bust into the mainstream media market? It was a total flop. RoosterTeeth was doing online video content long before almost anyone else. They fostered so much of their core audience through forums, and eventually Youtube. That's a core value, "Being internet-first". So, when they sold out everything to try to make GenLock sell to TV and big media, it was an utter failure. Because they lost sight of (what was at least once) a core value of the company.
Same thing with them getting celeb voice actors for GenLock. One of the original appeals of RT was that all the content was closely linked. Someone would start watching AH, and then if they started watching RvB or RWBY, they'd hear the crossover, and vise-versa. To their main audience, the fact it was (as fucking gay as it sounds) "one big family" in their core media output was a core aspect of the company. And I'm sure it helped keep the costs down, and also meant that you had a lot of overlap for any of the cons or events. By hiring celeb voice actors (that nobody within the core RT fanbase really would give a shit about), they spent a shit ton of money they would never re-coup, and made it that any promotional work or events with the voice actors would come at an enormous expense (or just not happen at all), whereas when they just used RT people to voice stuff it was easy/free, since the employee will be around anyway. So, they sacrificed a core aspect of their company once again, and it was ultimately a very expensive failure.
Ultimately, RT is a business. But the only times businesses can actually get away with being grubby scum-suckers are when circumstances prevent any competition from seriously opposing their market share (like telecom companies) or they're extremely good at being grubby scum-suckers and it generates a profit for shareholders. RT is nothing. They've failed their employees, they've failed their audience. That's why their content now seems so confused and boring. They don't know what they're doing or where they're going. They're adrift in the sea of mediocrity.
