A thank you to mr. Tito

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Aug 31, 2014
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I just want to quickly add my voice to choir. Thank you Mr. Tito!

"Freiheit ist immer die Freiheit der Andersdenkenden" Rosa Luxemburg

(Freedom is always the freedom of dissenters.)
 

AlouetteSK

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Sep 4, 2014
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Chiming in as a newcomer, thanks for standing up for the thread, even if you don't agree with it. Read the logs. Props to you. A bit of a wonder that this place has more room for discussion on this than 4chan.
 

Malbourne

Ari!
Sep 4, 2013
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For the most part, I stayed on the sidelines of this whole thingamabob, but the Escapist has been chugging along, business as usual as far as I'm concerned (outside of said thingamabob). I appreciate all the effort the Escapist staff, writers, creators, moderators, and everyone else has put forth to ensure this remains a place of civilized discussion and humor.
 
Sep 13, 2014
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Thank you Greg and Archon *nods respectfully towards you*. I will subscribe to the Escapist and invite all you people to do the same:
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/subscription/
 

TheDrunkNinja

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Jun 12, 2009
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I'd just like to give the guy credit for how he's been dealing with all the pressure the community has been putting on him since this whole mess started. Not a lot of people would have stood steadfast in the wake of this shit storm. I know it was mainly his role as editor-in-chief that stayed his voice most of the time, but I won't deny the difficulty of keeping to your integrity in this situation.

Mr. Tito, I'm sorry you had to deal with "Gamergate" at all.
 

chadachada123

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Jan 17, 2011
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crystalflash said:
Like I said in the GG thread, it takes a lot of courage to allow your opposition the right to speak their mind as opposed to censoring and abolishing any and all dissent. The fact that Greg Tito right now values the freedom of speech even more so than 4chan's Moot is highly admirable and a show of good character. So thanks for allowing the discussion when others tried to tell you otherwise; you've shown yourself to be the better person in all of this chaotic mess.
This is what surprised me the most, since moot has been on record multiple times saying that perhaps the greatest thing about 4chan, and what he valued greatly, was the near-complete freedom of expression (and anonymity) on his site. I'm trying to find the example pics right now but I'm not having any luck.

OT: Now that I have migrated to 8chan and will also consider here as my other home, and start posting once again, I would also like to give a heartfelt thanks to Tito.

As for 4chan's opinion after the mass deletion of all GG threads and outright lie by moot on /v/'s sticky...while I hope this doesn't get me a warning, this is what 4chan thinks:

 

Random Gamer

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Sep 8, 2014
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Velventian said:
i would like to know his reasons for letting us keep the discussion.
If its because of a deep founded believe in free speech?
There are some dark parts of the net where he's said to others his reasons. Thus, this thread.

It takes a brave man to put his principles before some of his deepest opinions and his dislikes, and do his duty with honour. Thanks.

Hopefully, things will be a bit calmer here and the moderation can get some rest. Everyone should be, or stay, civil when discussing issues and when addressing others.
 

Ent

Red Button Pusher
Feb 18, 2011
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I've lurked for about three weeks, I tried to reward The Escapist for the stance they've taken in all this. After seeing the chat I can further appreciate the way this site is being led.

This site/forum has helped me understand what is going on better than Twitter could, plus, you have Yahtzee. Bye Eurogamer, Hi Escapist~

Thank you Mr Tito!
 

Thanatos2k

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Aug 12, 2013
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Velventian said:
Ok while we are all thanking mr tito can anyone clarify his twitter for me? I thanked him too and right now im kinda thinking about taking that back :/

This is pretty much the greatest http://t.co/efwf9CsGPX [https://twitter.com/cracked]

? Greg Tito (@Gregtito) September 16, 2014 [https://twitter.com/Gregtito/status/511886874822975488]
5 Things You Didn't Know about the Gamergate Controversy @TheEscapistMag [http://t.co/hGweqXHXBA]

? Greg Tito (@Gregtito) September 18, 2014 [https://twitter.com/Gregtito/status/512663406877212674]
There's no comparing male and female harassment online: @TIMEIdeas [http://t.co/TpikDXuFym]

? Greg Tito (@Gregtito) September 10, 2014 [https://twitter.com/Gregtito/status/509818992916041728]
Brave words from http://t.co/x1EzyJxjFf [https://twitter.com/JillScharr]

? Greg Tito (@Gregtito) September 16, 2014 [https://twitter.com/Gregtito/status/511965454340878336]

I mean fuck, according to his twitter he´s pretty much as anti-gg as it gets, so can someone please tell me i have the wrong twitter or i am missing some big joke here...
He is, and I think his views are absolutely stupid, but what he also has is integrity. He may disagree with us, but he refused to censor us when his journalist brethren did and tried to bully him into doing so as well.

He also seems to have realized that one-sided opinion hit pieces have no place in game journalism anymore, regardless of his personal views on an issue. As it should be.
 

lowtech redneck

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Sep 19, 2014
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I salute you, Mr. Tito, for sticking with higher principles at the risk of your reputation among peers you like and respect, even to the benefit of a cause you despised and with tempting rationalizations to do otherwise.....that kind of integrity is very rare, and I'm sorry for the personal pain it must have caused you.

That difficult act of courage is what motivated me to join a video game forum for the first time since Skyrim came out and offer what small support I can (besides, this place looks highly entertaining). FWIW, I'm pretty agnostic on the Gamergate issue, with a lot of disgust for many apparent actions and comments by people on either side.
 

Thanatos2k

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Aug 12, 2013
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Judging by some newly leaked mails (if they're accurate) Kuchera has gone berserk and is blaming Tito for the leaks.

I find this laughable.
 

Werekettle

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Apr 17, 2010
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+1

It takes a great deal of courage to stand up to ones enemies, it takes even more to stand up to ones friends.
 

TheBigOne0305

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Sep 19, 2014
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I have been visiting the Escapist since late 2007/early 2008 when I was introduced to Yahtzee by a friend. Ever since I have been a regular visitor, mainly for the different video series, but I usually check out the most recent forum threads when visiting. I never bothered to actually create an account, since I'm already wasting too much time posting online as is and I didn't want to add yet another forum to the list of time sinks. Not even the 800+ pages mega thread on GamerGate made me create an account, although I have closely followed that discussion since page 30 or so. But this, this finally convinced me to sign up.

Dear Mr. Tito,
When initially reading your comments [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/18.858347-Zoe-Quinn-and-the-surrounding-controversy?page=31#21285187] in the original GamerGate thread I was less than pleased. Not only did I find the little fig-leaf disclaimer on the original WC article to be somewhat lacking (usually factual changes to old articles, especially if they involve allegations of wrongdoing that turn out to not be true, are addressed with a redaction that is published in a way that is visible to regular viewers, not only those searching in the archive) but I also deeply disagreed with your "We will always default towards helping out people who are the subject of harassment on the internet" line. As understandable as it might be from an emotional point of view, I don't think such clear bias has any place in factual reporting. Allegations of harassment are not enough for me turn around at the alleged harasser and call them out. The consequences of this are to severe, as we saw in the WC case. Innocent people actually became the victims of very real harassment, only because someone pointed their finger at them (I'm not saying there never was any harassment in the first place, this is the internet after all, but calling out a perceived perpetrator without any substantiating evidence seems somewhat unbefitting of a true journalist for me).
I also attributed the fact that the thread remained open more to the influence of Mr. Macris, since he expressed far more sympathy to our cause. Seeing the recent release of your conversation with Mr. Kuchera I now realize, that my assumption was false. I hereby would like to apologize for assuming that the thread was kept open against your preferences and not in fact because of your active contribution to keep alive a civil discussion, even though you seemingly agreed with very little of what was expressed in it.
Thank you very much for putting the principles of open discussion and the right to express dissenting opinions above your personal opinions on the matter and even actively defending our right to have this discussion against Mr. Kuchera (and others). You have my deepest respect, not because our opinions on this matter agree, but precisely because they don't but you never choose to abuse your powers on this site to make a point.

Regards,
a long-time visitor from Germany

Velventian said:
I mean fuck, according to his twitter he´s pretty much as anti-gg as it gets, so can someone please tell me i have the wrong twitter or i am missing some big joke here...
That's the point. If he would agree with out position(s), leaving the thread open would not be much of a sign of integrity. He would simply let us present a point of view he himself supports anyway. But seeing that he actually doesn't agree with us very much makes his decision to keep the thread open -while facing harsh criticism for doing so from his "peers"- all the more important. He put his principles about free speech above his personal opinion on the matter despite being influenced to not do so. He didn't choose the easier way, but the right way, even though it was harder. For that we rightfully applaud him.

Velventian said:
Well thats the question for me, if he was as strongly opposed to gg as his twitter would indicate i would like to know his reasons for letting us keep the discussion.
If its because of a deep founded believe in free speech? Fucking awesome, in that case even more kudos since that takes actual integrity.
What if its just for clicks and money?
Seeing his posts on the mailing list, I strongly tend to believe that this decision was not made for clicks, but because of a fundamental believe in free speech:
If there is harassment, I would shut it down immediately. And we?ve banned/warned on posts in those threads that are even close to that line.
I?m talking about the discussion. If I followed your logic, we should also shut down Twitter and the rest of the internet for being a platform for discussion.
[...]
There?s also many people in both the threads who are working to educate the OP and others about these things. That?s a dialogue. That?s how change happens, I think. Or I hope, at least.
[...]
I don?t think factual errors in a forum post on the internet, however, are a huge area of concern for me.
The conversation may be distasteful to some of us, but I don?t know if the answer is to delete the thread. The Escapist is not giving harassment a home, but allowing civil discussion on a matter that people are emotional about. As long as it stays within our rules of conduct, and yeah James I don?t think anything stated has violated the rules you posted, then pushing this down would only serve my own tastes and opinions. That?s not what a public forum is designed to be, in my opinion.
[...]
The Escapist is set up a bit differently than some other outlets in that we have a large forum community which operates separately from the editorial side of things, although I do have oversight. I agree there are statements and opinions in that thread which I disagree with, but that?s true of a lot of the world. I could be easily justified in shutting it down, however, I think removing the ability for public discourse is the opposite of creating an environment for growth and learning. I don?t feel that keeping a thread open constitutes endorsing the opinions within, and allowing people to discuss the issues might actually do some good and change some minds.
 

Velventian

Left here for the world to see
May 17, 2013
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TheBigOne0305 said:
Yeah thanks for the education, haven´t gone though the logs so far, gotta find that link again. So apparently Mr. Tito has even journalistic integrity than i previouls thought.
So Thanks again Mr.Tito

To clarify, if he would have agreed with us it would still have meant facing pressure maybe even financially from the other sites/organizations and that alone would have deserved respect in my opinion cause many people choose the money over their opinion. Of course some can´t afford it, we´ve seen boogie being forced into silence and he should be pretty much independent from the whole thing so they shouldn´t have an angle on him. But apparently he stood to loose something here so he went silent.
 

visiblenoise

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Jul 2, 2014
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I was quite disinterested in the whole debacle, but even I appreciated that it was handled quite nicely on this site in general.
 

TheBigOne0305

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Sep 19, 2014
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Velventian said:
TheBigOne0305 said:
Yeah thanks for the education, haven´t gone though the logs so far, gotta find that link again. So apparently Mr. Tito has even journalistic integrity than i previouls thought.
So Thanks again Mr.Tito
http://pastebin.com/Vuwcgdvu [http://pastebin.com/Vuwcgdvu] <- That is the redacted version without the personal information, not sure what exactly was left in there before (I read something mentioning phone numbers), but that one was specifically advertised as being "clean".
 

Frission

Until I get thrown out.
May 16, 2011
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I read up the e-mails between Kuchera and Tito and I have to give props to Mr. Tito for not bowing to pressure.

That the site then got hit by a DDOS attack is worrisome.
 

Guffe

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Jul 12, 2009
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I have to confess that I know very little about the happenings in this cencorship thing going on (if someone knows how to give a short version, then quote or inbox e if you like)

But I agree with this opening post!
Good that someone stands their ground for what they believe in.
 

totheendofsin

some asshole made me set this up
Jul 31, 2009
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insaninater said:
What's this thread about? Someone tell me what happened.
I'm sure by now you've heard of Gamergate, well pretty much every site (including freaking 4chan) has disallowed discussion on it based on it's perceived origin (though I personally believe this shitstorm would have happened eventually anyway) The Escapist is one of the only sites to allow discussion, and it's come to light that in the early days Ben Kuchera tried to convince Tito to ban discussion on Gamergate, but Tito didn't feel like it was right to disallow a civil discussion (and the threads regarding the topic on this site have been very civil, I cannot speak for the rest of the internet) This thread is meant to thank him for allowing discussion.