Death Threat Regret

[Imp_Emissary]

What you say in your own living room usually stays in your own living room...

What you say on twitter however the whole world gets to see...

Choose wisely where to rant and say things you dont really mean...

On the internet... everyone hears you scream.

Yeah, pretty much this. Screaming; "Newell you'll die for this you monster that lives off my tears!", while just in your home playing games is a private matter. Screaming it on Twitter, literally sends a message.

It's kind of a bummer that this cost him his position in the video games industry, but I find it hard to sympathies with him.

I do feel bad for the person who worked on the game with him who now is out on his/her ass because their partner didn't know how to keep it to himself. xp

 

[Something Amyss]

Not gonna lie...someone threatens me, in jest or seriously, I'm probably not stocking their product in my store.

 

[Slegiar Dryke]

Disclosure up front, I have no idea what the game is like nor a solid grasp what it's about:

however, from what I've been hearing the past year or two, the team has faced a lot of hardships with trying to get the game on steam even after having a publisher, and trying to push through the slog of greenlight as well....to equally slow or nonexistent progress. And given what I have heard has said the game is not bad, frankly, this sounds like it was the straw that broke the camels back. Was it a stupid move? duh. twitter is a plague at this point, convincing people to blab their thoughts to the world and then being source to ruin their lives as a result. But given everything else, the frustration seems a bit justified. again, the action wasn't smart, but I'd say both sides are at fault here.

 

[RaikuFA]

First: Does the [look at a YouTube comment section to understand my level of bile and disgust for this person] kinda look like Bieber(its the hair).

Second: Erin's rage face is hilarious.

Third: You should actually be cursing IceFrog. He's the guy who made the Warcraft 3 map/mod.

Fourth: Keep up the good work, or we'll receive it poorly.

I was gonna say the first one. Guy looks like Bieber.

 

[Steve the Pocket]

Explain to me how banning any DOTA 2 player who says terrible things in chat wouldn't be a good thing. Besides, you know, leaving Valve with almost nobody to play what's become their flagship game.

 

[Rose and Thorn]

"I shouldn't have done that. You're not supposed to tell a guy you're gonna kill him no more. I got to tiptoe through the tulips with these assholes. Taking all the fun out of the job."

 

[TallanKhan]

On the internet... everyone hears you scream.

I might just have found my quote of the week. I am seriously considering having this printed on T-shirts given the ammount of people who are making asses out of themselves and saying things they will later regret online at the moment.

OT: I liked todays CM but am I the only one who thinks these have been rather on the short side lately?

 

[Ishigami]

I'm disappointed that the discussion is only about death threats. Seems like everyone is ignoring the fact that Steam being a shitty service lead to the situation.
Another free pass on being shitty for Steam I guess?

 

[Skratt]

I love the "obviously the tweet wasn't serious" part of the article. Not gonna lie, I LOL'd at that. I love the comics, keep up the good work!

Kudos to Valve for not putting up with inappropriate behavior. To the indie dev that got the boot:

 

[Ticklefist]

Another day, another bedroom game dev exhibits their shaky grasp on reality.

 

[Olas]

What you say in your own living room usually stays in your own living room...

What you say on twitter however the whole world gets to see...

Choose wisely where to rant and say things you dont really mean...

On the internet... everyone hears you scream.

Pretty much this. What you say in the privacy of your own living room is your business. What you say on Twatter, Facebook, etc. is everyone's business.

Ya, but it's worse when the person you're saying it about owns the platform you're trying to sell a game on. Those of us not depending on Valve for our livelihood probably don't need to be as worried. Although I guess Gabe could always delete my steam account or something. That's actually a pretty horrific prospect now that I think about it.

 

[Sergey Sund]

Steam being a "shitty platform" isn't really the concern here. Another addage applies here: "Mo people, mo problems."
Overcrowding of Devs on Steam, hiring more people to deal with that - the company structure gets more and more elaborate and thus ..... shit happens.
Now, the real issue I see here is that this one Dev seems to have trouble sepparating private and professional life. At least, he does so on social media.
He voiced his private opinion and private rage on a twitter account associated with his company. That is unprofessional, at least, and legal suicide at worst. No wonder his business partner reacted to the unprofessionalism.
And, the "oh it wasn't serious" card - I'm not so sure. Clearly, death threats over the internet are just badly translated sarcasm most of the time. The percentage of people who would really get on a flight to go murder someone for an advertisement delay is probably pretty small. And it would be stupid to announce a murder beforehand, anyways.

 

[Haru17]

Fuck Valve and Steam, no one deserves to die obviously (and no one would ever have in this instance), but fuck Valve all the same. They can take all their meme-based popularity and shove it up their ass. They have too much power over too many PC games.

 

[Sergey Sund]

Does anyone remember the times when you could go to a pay phone and call in a bomb threat to your school and no-one would find out it was you?
Like, when technology wasn't far enough that there was a recording of every call somewhere.
Yeah.
I can't help but sense a connection to online death threats - that have to be met with the same serious response as back in the 90s. Sure, it could be some kid trying to get out of a vocabulary test, but when the school really does blow up - what then?

 

[Something Amyss]

Yeah.
I can't help but sense a connection to online death threats - that have to be met with the same serious response as back in the 90s. Sure, it could be some kid trying to get out of a vocabulary test, but when the school really does blow up - what then?

That's the thing. New York police were criticised for responding to bomb threats before 9-11, and then when 9-11 hit, people asked why they didn't respond faster.

Compare and contrast responses to the Lite-Brite incident and the Boston Marathon bombing, too.

When there's no threat, people are pissed at a waste of time. When something bad happens, they want everyone to take it more seriously.

I think it's not unreasonable to err on the side of caution. I mean, not "kick the doors down and wreck some teenager's shit" erring onthe side of caution, but take each threat seriously. Because we can't tell a geek from a gunman in a vacuum.

 

[Canadamus Prime]

What you say in your own living room usually stays in your own living room...

What you say on twitter however the whole world gets to see...

Choose wisely where to rant and say things you dont really mean...

On the internet... everyone hears you scream.

Pretty much this. What you say in the privacy of your own living room is your business. What you say on Twatter, Facebook, etc. is everyone's business.

Ya, but it's worse when the person you're saying it about owns the platform you're trying to sell a game on. Those of us not depending on Valve for our livelihood probably don't need to be as worried. Although I guess Gabe could always delete my steam account or something. That's actually a pretty horrific prospect now that I think about it.

You should probably still avoid running your mouth (fingers?) off on Twatter, as any of the people who've gotten fired from their jobs for things they've said on Facebook will tell you.

 

[Something Amyss]

You should probably still avoid running your mouth (fingers?) off on Twatter, as any of the people who've gotten fired from their jobs for things they've said on Facebook will tell you.

Pretty good rule of thumb, TBH.

 

[Kiyeri]

Grey... if you're like this over dying to techies... oh god help you when they put Arc Warden in... god help you and god have mercy on who ever has to manage the forums after that... for they are beyond help.

Thing is...while it wasn't serious...it's a sad little thing when a dev would rather quit than say apologize for saying something they shouldn't have said in the first place. I have a feeling nothing is keeping him from going to Valve with an apology and getting the bridges rebuilt... except maybe stupid pride.

Just so you know, he did apologize. He wrote a post on the website of his (now former) company's website apologizing. He quit so the other developer on his team might have a chance in the future instead of being dragged down by him. I still think he was an idiot, but he's not as much of an asshole to not apologize at all.

 

[Kiyeri]

Grey... if you're like this over dying to techies... oh god help you when they put Arc Warden in... god help you and god have mercy on who ever has to manage the forums after that... for they are beyond help.

Thing is...while it wasn't serious...it's a sad little thing when a dev would rather quit than say apologize for saying something they shouldn't have said in the first place. I have a feeling nothing is keeping him from going to Valve with an apology and getting the bridges rebuilt... except maybe stupid pride.

Just so you know, he did apologize. He wrote a post on the website of his (now former) company's website apologizing. He quit so the other developer on his team might have a chance in the future instead of being dragged down by him. I still think he was an idiot, but he's not as much of an asshole to not apologize at all.

Question is.. did he send a copy of that Apology letter to the folks at Valve? An apology isn't much if the folks who need to hear it don't hear it.

I would imagine so. He probably feels like shit that he fucked over his former partner by being an idiot in public. I'd be surprised if he didn't do anything he could to try to fix it (since leaving the company to try to make things right is a much more drastic step than apologizing to Valve).

 

[Varis]

To be fair, death threats as a headsman of a firm deserve to be punished severely, isn't this basically what's happening at Ferguson at the moment? Authority figures acting like twelve year olds and thinking it's alright?

Valve made the right call. And a big sack of shit to such foul-mouths.