Category: Community Management (Page 1 of 2)

What GamerGate Can Learn From the NFL and Ray Rice

October 15, 2014 / Damion Schubert

GamerGate should be in PR crisis mode. It’s not. It can’t be. And it doesn’t know how.

Gamergate is, right now, a hashtag that is ABOUT harassment. That’s not what it’s better angels want. There’s a large contingent of people that are in there that are deeply committed to improving the games industry press, and care about that. They think that’s what they’ve signed up for. I don’t agree with their principles, their priorities or their view of how the industry actually works, but the better angels clearly want to clean up what they see as a fucked up enterprise.

But all of that is buried now, under a daily drumbeat of harassment, harassment, HARASSMENT. What are the news stories for the last few days? Let’s look at my current twitter feed and KiA, reddit’s central source for the latest Gamergate goings on. Briana Wu being harassed. Briana Wu going on MSNBC and getting her twitter hacked. Briana Wu is an awful person (multiple times) USU cancelling Anita’s speaking gig because of a shooter threat. Boogie is being harassed. Zoe Quinn freaking out about being on MSNBC facing her harasser. Just endless news on harassment of anti-gg AND gg personalities, defenses against harassment, denials against harassment, and spiteful, hateful bile thrown at people who accuse them of harassment.

Oh, and #Gamergate is finally hitting the mainstream press. MSNBC: harassment. CNN: harassment. HuffPost: harassment. Mentions of ethics are an afterthought. The harassment infighting is so fierce that when an actual Ethics issue pops up, it doesn’t get nearly the attention as, say, a blow-by-blow detail of what happened in Zoe Quinn’s restraining order hearing.

Our Growing Fuckwad Culture Problem

August 28, 2014 / Damion Schubert

I am not a perfect ally of the progressive/feminist forces inside the game community. I started to list out examples at the start of this post, and then realized I had a wall of text that would undoubtedly derail the conversation that needs to happen (on the bright side, I apparently have quite a backlog of good blog material). However, there are some clear examples.

First, I think that Penny Arcade and PAX have generally gotten a raw deal. Second, I think that costumes and armor in comic books and video games are not meant to protect the character or be functional or realistic, but to create a strong, unique, marketable character and aspirational fantasy, and I love Bayonetta equally as much as the new Batgirl. Third, I think that describing our video game culture as a ‘rape culture’ is incendiary, inaccurate, and ultimately counterproductive. There is scant evidence that our mass media and video games cause more real life sexual violence towards women – in fact, sexual assault rates have decreased steadily since 1993 (you know, the year Doom came out) and are currently at 20 year lows.

Now that we’ve established that I’m not your typical social justice warrior, I feel nevertheless compelled to point out that our Fuckwad Culture is currently off the rails.

Patch Time

June 22, 2008 / Damion Schubert

Conan is currently on quite an insane patch cycle – twice, sometimes three times a week. Which can be seen a couple of ways – either they’re really devoted to the game and really want it to work, or the game is a broken pile of hooey that needs to fix Assassins now or player X is quitting and taking his whole guild with him. As it was in MMO patchdom, so it ever shall be.

Some people on various boards have commented that Conan’s patch cycle, as insane as it is, is vastly superior to WoW’s current model, which is roughly ‘do a patch every 2 months, and then follow it up with a really little patch that fixes all the things we broke and can’t wait 2 months to fix’. To which I can only counter with two quick and dirty points. Continue reading

Blizzard to Canucks: No Looking Over Your Neighbor’s Shoulder

April 3, 2008 / Damion Schubert

My Canadian coworkers got a kick out of this: our gaming neighbors to the north do not have to pay an entry fee to enter Blizzard’s arena tournament. However, they do have to sharpen their number two pencils.

Canadian residents are not required to pay an Entry Fee in order to enter. Instead, Canadian residents may enter by submitting a 250 word typewritten essay comparing the video gaming culture in Canada to the video gaming culture in the United States on 8 ½ x 11 inch paper and mailing their essay to Essay Entry for The North American Blizzard Entertainment Arena Tournament, P.O Box 18979, Irvine, CA 92623. Essay entries must be received no later than March 31, 2008 in order to be eligible. Essay entrants represent and warrant that the essay is their original work and does not infringe the rights of any third party. By entering, essay entrants hereby grant, without further consideration, all right, title and interest in and to their essay to Sponsor.

Also, it is not an acceptable excuse that your sled dog ate your homework. I kid! I kid! Anyway, it’s nice to see a new growth industry for gold farmers.

Great Moments in Community Management

February 13, 2008 / Damion Schubert

3rd Place: “Shut up and give me my ten bucks per month, little man. My Porsche needs some performance upgrades.”
2nd Place: “It’s not a mirror.”
1st Place: “I disagree with what you said.”

Other nominations?

Original comments thread is here.

Orc Shrinkage and Heroic Asses

August 16, 2007 / Damion Schubert

There exists now in WoW a bug so insidious, so horrifying, that hundreds are threatening to quit, due largely to feelings of emasculation. Long threads debate whether the bug is a bug at all, and whether or not this is an insidious stealth nerf of the highest order, further cementing the notion that Blizzard hates the Horde.

I am, of course, referring to the great shoulderpocalypse. Continue reading

Fun With Communities

January 18, 2007 / Damion Schubert

It’s easy to build an adversarial relationship with your community. It’s hard to recognize and encourage really cool things in the community. One of the things that’s really cool in communities is when they go meta. Continue reading

Crucifying Your Playerbase

March 25, 2006 / Damion Schubert

I get press releases from time to time. Normally, I don’t put them up, as I’m not really in the news business, but this one struck me as a particularly bad idea. Here’s the link from Roma Victor. Continue reading