Hah, I deleted my post (to @charmtrap’s earlier post) as you were quoting it. Fair enough though, I don’t mind you responding to it, I did post it.
Well he got defensive… his reaction was at first defensive.He said that. He is also here prepared and discussing something with people he mostly knows and not as the expense of his career nor is the expectation so high that he could be fired for it… it’s also not just the general public.
Oh sorry. I didnt’ realize you deleted it.
I think the issue with this is largely how we all probably misuse twitter to some degree as well.
Like, I don’t know how you go on social media and don’t expect people to chime in with your discussion. It is social media, people are supposed to engage with you on it. Not to be all save it for the blog post, but it is funny how people now have to say like “Don’t @ me” or “not looking for feedback, just gonna rant” why are we doing that publicly then? What is the point of twitter? Twitter was a mistake, because all it is used for is a factory for hot takes. Maybe I am jaded but I would never use social media to discuss something I wasn’t looking for feedback on, because I just would expect it. And maybe that is wrong too, but it is how twitter just is.
That is one thing I like about QT3, we can all post her and certainly not agree with eachother on everything, but we at least have a semi-private place to have a discussion about this in more than 280 characters at a time. (@ArmandoPenblade) :)
I would also like to think that large companies would understand people using their personal social media in responsible ways, and maybe understanding when things get heated to not insta-fire people for minor name calling.
Well this took a weird turn!
It’s a testament to this crowd how many “replying” icons discourse shows (and for how long) vs how many replies we actually get. Pretty thoughtful responses all around I think.
Sorry man, I’m just a silly person.
Apologies…apologies all around. /GeorgeBluth
Too late, no take-backs. Welcome to your new outlook on life! Go ahead and begin familiarizing yourself with your position on some other recent topics in the media:
- Rogue One is a bad movie
- The Last Jedi had some structural flaws but was an enjoyable film, a net positive for the direction it took the characters, both new and old
- God of War (2018) was really good, but definitely overrated by the press
- Co-op board games can be a lot of fun, while trying to play multiple roles in a co-op game as a solitaire experience is the wrong way to play
- Season five of Arrested Development is a step back in the right direction after season four, but still doesn’t quite work the way the original three did
Dammit I nearly made it through! Point 4 got me in the end! :)
I wasn’t really replying directly to you, even though it followed your post. It was more meant to be threadwide light-hearted snark.
But since we’re here, I don’t really think this incident was a great example of “mansplaining”, though I’m sure that played a role, since it usually does. It felt like more of an example of “here, let me, a non-expert, explain a very basic concept about your job to you, person employed in the field”.
I’m not surprised she bristled…I’m more surprised that it doesn’t happen more often, given the unfortunate social media situation in which we find ourselves.
And this is why you should stay off Facebook etc.
Especially if your account is linked to a company account in some way.
Yeah, no worries. I was just on a posting spree and after thinking a little more about it, decided I didn’t need to defend against your post so I deleted mine, but it’s all good.
I’m pretty sure this isn’t that infrequent of a thing. We don’t know about it because it doesn’t gain traction. And by frequent I don’t mean most devs respond in annoyance… but responding negatively towards fans… yeah that happens, usually without any sort of headline.
This is the attitude I’m most bothered by in this whole affair. I’ve never met a true expert that “bristled” at an amateur’s attempt to contribute unless that contribution was an attempt to influence policy (i.e. anti-vaxxers). If “true experts” want to start banging out AMA’s on twitter, they’ll benefit from taking the pretense down a few notches.
Posting on twitter where you have 11000 followers and not expecting replies is like posting new thread on QT3 and not expecting replies. Completely, utterly nonsensical.
Muahahahaha now he’ll never know I called him a crabby bastard in paragraph 8, subsection A-II
Good comment under gameindustry.biz article, particularly last two paragraphs
I realize in the current social climate, this communication strategy might actually work in her favor, at least in the short term. Creating elaborate alternative narratives and throwing dirt in all directions seems to be working splendidly for the current US government, so why wouldn’t it work for her. But in a sane world, it seems like someone should try to tell her she’s really not doing herself any favors with the whole follow-up on this and give her a chance to stop digging in a spiral, take a breath, think it over and move forward.
I don’t know Price, I’m sure she can be a nice person offline and wish her all the best getting a fresh start, but everything she’s said on twitter and in the following interviews gives off the impression of someone who is completely incapable of engaging in some self-reflection, realizing when she screwed up, taking responsibility for it and have the decency to apologize. It’s ok, we all screw up sometimes (the way american corporate culture is so quick to fire people when mistakes happen is quite ugly). But when you then go on to explain how you were only doing The Right Thing, try to portray being mean and sexist as heroics and suggest every man’s interaction with her is secretly motivated by sexism, it just becomes sad and hurts the feminism that she’s abusing as a tool to cover for her apparently deficient social skills.
I’m pessimistic anything good will come of the way this is being handled. There were some opinions about how ArenaNet was sending a fatal signal to the troll brigades and emboldening them. I would agree that those guys are going to come out of this all emboldened, but it will have been the subpar reporting on the issue that actually will have sent the most fatal signal to those people and, more importantly, to decent people.
That signal is: “We’re all in tribes now, and protecting our tribe matters more than having a good hard look at facts, employing some critical thinking and accepting the possibility one of our own may have screwed up.”
It’s always the reporters or someone that isn’t the gamers. That’s for sure.
Two things can be simultaneously true - there are some shitty people who happen to play videogames, and journalists sometimes put their agendas before the facts.
I guess after years of this, and knowing some of these people, that it’s hard for me to imagine some manner of actual agenda involved. I can promise you that most of the people writing these stories are deeply involved and care about games. I don’t know of any previous ArenaNet drama that would make some sort of crusade or attack by a group of journalists that would make any sense. This was already a big story on twitter and Price was willing to talk.
As a personal anecdote, I wrote news stories for GigaOm for a while, years back. The daily grind of being a news writer involves finding stuff people want to read. Stuff like this is very juicy to the public - one side hates her and reads the article and links it to all their friends. One side loves her and reads the article and links it to all their friends. (as a side note, it reminds me of Howard Stern - the people that hated him listened to him longer to find things to complain about) To that end, it’s business.
I guess what I’m saying is I don’t think there’s some weird left-leaning media conspiracy at work here. It’s like ArenaNet took a bad, but manageable situation and poured gas on it, and that is going to be interesting to people.
It doesn’t help that Jessica Price isn’t the easiest sale in the emotional identification circle. Personally, I think she over-reacted. I also kind of understand. I have a few friends who LOVE to debate game reviews with me. I don’t particularly like it because it always goes to this place where they tell me how I think about games is wrong. If I don’t think the game they like is the best, it goes to “YOU AREN’T BEING OBJECTIVE!” After about a dozen or so occasions of this happening, I snapped. Now, this is just with a couple of personal friends. In her case, I imagine it’s like this a lot, lot more. I get shit from people on twitter and I only have 800 followers, for Christ’s sake. I can’t imagine 11k.
Anyway, just wanted to clarify a bit and not just drop a one-liner. Though, as you all happen to know, I do love a one-liner.