Arec Balrin said:
His mother would have been the one that had to bare the brunt of the fallout. Sleepless nights, a child unable to eat, stimming excessively and unable to employ any of his basic self-care skills.
Whilst many people here are giving Microsoft and the shoddy LIVE infrastructure the benefit of doubt; they're not being as even-handed towards the mother or the boy. We can not see what Microsoft knows, but we can't see what she and her son went through regardless of the validity of the punishment.
Helps if people didn't cite Encyclopedia Dramatica as an authority on Autism.
I can imagine the circumstances on both sides of the argument, with Microsoft obviously touting that they have evidence that finds the child in question guilty but cannot be disclosed for privacy reasons. However, right out of the gate I was considering the mother and child's side and the personal situation that none of us know about either, as Arec Balrin has pointed out. I cannot say that I can trust Microsoft without question for countless reasons which are beyond the point, but unless the mother decides to release the claims by Microsoft, I feel that it would be inane to try and hand out subjective judgments on either party. Autism does not change whether or not the child cheated, but if there was some fluke of an error and the Gamertag/Score actually
meant something to him, then obviously holding a false accusation would be dubious on Microsoft's part. Taking the claims by Microsoft alone that
they are sure could just as easily be concieved as giving
them the benefit of the doubt as well. The key factor is that Microsoft is not releasing any clear-cut evidence either, so a reasonable outside viewer should take into account that this falls upon the mother to reveal much more that could either aid or outright kill her plea.
Microsoft's general stance regarding Gamerscore seems a tad melodramatic considering the points in question have no sway, influence, or monetary value and are meritorious only to those who honestly think the number besides another player's name actually
means Jack-Spit. Throwing the tar and feathers with the "Cheater" label seems equally childish as cheating in the first place for the aforementioned "useless" points. I also consider that since Microsoft has the cherries to charge ten dollars just to
change one's drunken misspelling, the act seems even sillier[footnote]In order to match the silliness of charging so much for a stupid screen name without at least one "freebie," even if it was just for Gold Members...[/footnote].
CAPTCHA: Government Sucide
I think you're missing another "i" there, and two words (one a typo of course) does NOT COUNT AS READING BOOKS.
...
Blue Flamingo. There, you just read a segment from Chaucer[footnote]Segment not really from Chaucer.[/footnote]. Now aren't you proud?