It’s not a question of if; only of why, how, and when.
CEO Chance Ravinne, the visionary founder of the famous munitions delivery corporation, WINGSPAN Delivery Services (http://www.torpedodelivery.com/), left the corporation in the hands of experienced directors to focus on deliveries of another sort. He nonetheless remained active, and the imitable icon of the corporation for many months. Sadly, having accepted delivery of a second clone, Chance has failed to deliver a satisfying loss to zKillboard for nearly nine months. This blow to the psyche of WINGSPAN agents, previously encouraged by Chance’s example to take huge risks and shrug off embarrassing losses, put the corporation on unstable footing.
The ability to opt out of wardecs set up WINGSPAN for the final(?) blow. For years, WINGSPAN pilots were forced to the J-Space side of B274 wormholes by war declarations. Some even speculate that trillionaire Reed Icculus sponsored these war declarations to accomplish exactly that effect. Sadly, with WINGSPAN now free to roam High Security space by virtue of owning no structures, and despite encouragement from the directorship, as from Grimm Horizon:
Why did you want to join WINGSPAN in the first place?
Was it to:
- Fly cloaky ships in WORMHOLE SPACE?
- Actively hunt in WORMHOLE SPACE in search of content?
- Deliver munitions and Drone Parties to unsuspecting customers in scary WORMHOLE SPACE?
- Have fun with a cheeky humorous way of dealing with the aftermath of said PvP?
- if yes, WINGSPAN is the place for you to be.
- if no, why are you here?
Despite these words of wisdom, and clear expression of the WINGSPAN philosophy, WINGSP pilots began to engage in HS Ganking, LS PvP, Mission Running, and even…mining. Low Class J-Space pilots unsubscribed, overwhelmed by having to manage their own munition deliveries, and unsatisfied by exotic dancers without a drone party to establish the right ambiance.
News of Chewbacca’s demise sent the corporation into what may well be its death spiral. Han Solo and Chewbacca Long were long admired as a, perhaps the, preeminent pair of “Delivery Agents.” The two made delivery of munitions and robots to far away corners of the galactic cluster, using wormholes to facilitate a Kessel run in under 12 parsecs, and doing everything in a garbage scow of a ship. Flying completely without caution, utterly committed to delivering precious cargo, and yet finding plenty of time to be well known in every cantina in the galaxy, the pair represented all that a WINGSPAN Delivery Agent aspired to become.
Grief stricken, veteran Director Reed Icculus stepped down and out with a few words of thanks and an inspirational reminder he died 4 times in “Going South.” With Reed no longer leading the “Clean up New Eden” MTU-removal project, and Chance no longer losing blingy ships, to what standard can agents aspire? With Chewbacca’s passing, to whom will Delivery Agents look for inspiration when deciding whether to tear off someone’s arms? gigx?.
The numbers speak for themselves.
WINGSPAN is flatlined.
Clearly, an EVE Online corporation cannot survive on tropes, memes, or a philosophy. Clearly, it is high profile CEOs, stable leadership, and injected Rorquals that are key to survival in today’s EVE. The era where lighthearted and countercultural corporations such as WINGSPAN, Signal Cartel (likewise utterly gutted after CEO Mynxee stepped down), and CODE. is ended. Give up, inject another Rorqual pilot, and find a new show on Netflix.
