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About LinkBacksFair enough if it's not related to the hashtag and we're limiting discussion to that.Originally Posted by directhex
Fair enough if it's not related to the hashtag and we're limiting discussion to that.
There we go. 3 weeks of IRC logs, where #gamergate was planned as a means to destroy "SJWs", summarized.
https://storify.com/strictmachine/gameovergate
All the "ethics" and "integrity" stuff is fabricated. It's just about kicking women out of gaming.
Replies like that don't get anyone anywhere. Yes some of the indie devs in question have been doxxed (not the same as hacked), including zoe quinn and phil fish. Yep, it sucks and they should prosecute those people if they acted outside the law. That does not mean that we should not talk about it.
It's not just about a few people exchanging sex for favors nor is it about nepotism in general within the gaming media. It stretches further than that;
- with games getting awards on festivals from people that have funded them and have a vested interest in making them successful
- other indie devs not being allowed to speak out otherwise they'd be shunned by the others and their careers as devs will likely be destroyed
- forums censoring everything around it (search for gamergate on giantbomb and you'll find literally nothing)
People want more clarity with what kind of bias a gaming journalist/jury has. Instead of focusing on insulting the doxxers who probably will never read this, I'd prefer to talk about this gigantic problem in gaming 'journalism'.
Last edited by Waswat; 08-09-2014 at 05:12 PM.
It is not an investment where financial success makes the slightest bit of difference.
People on panels at gaming things are gamers, and they are just as interested in games as anyone else. Does it surprise you that they might equally be interested in games as non-judges?
People who grew up on point-and-click games might fund a kickstarter to see another game of that type, because they want to play such a thing? Fancy that!
Wait, who's controlling who again?- other indie devs not being allowed to speak out otherwise they'd be shunned by the others and their careers as devs will likely be destroyed
Forums are private property of the sites running them. You can't say what you want here on Hexus either.- forums censoring everything around it (search for gamergate on giantbomb and you'll find literally nothing: http://www.giantbomb.com/search/?q=gamergate )
The idea that indie games is some evil cabal controlling the media is so ****ing laughable as to be absurd. The guys with the huge full-page adverts, those are the ones you need to be concerned about - see Gerstmanngate. But do the "gamergate" people see a problem with EA paying the bills on a gaming site? No, they see allies - "Operation Disrespectful Nod" is about getting EA etc to exert editorial control over "corrupt" sites by getting them to threaten to pull advertising money unless they fire the journalists being singled out for punishment by the court of #gamergate.People want more clarity with what kind of bias a gaming journalist/jury has. Instead of focusing on insulting the doxxers who probably will never read this, I'd prefer to talk about this gigantic problem in gaming 'journalism'.
http://i.imgur.com/jbp3XKj.jpg
I wouldn't call 20k or 10k a mere kickstarter investment, especially since it wasn't via kickstarter at all. Furthermore, via kickstarter you don't get any revenue back from investing.
http://i.imgur.com/34RwPcn.pngWait, who's controlling who again?
Right, that's true and i'm quite happy about it. At least here we CAN talk about it.Forums are private property of the sites running them. You can't say what you want here on Hexus either.
First of all, they're not all the same people. You're very much overgeneralizing. But yes, there's a reason why the phrase "can't spell ignorant without IGN" exists. The big hype sites that hype up all the triple A games have lost a lot of respect over time. And yes, Gerstmanngate was a huge problem just as well; it opened up a can of worms which lead to a lot of things including the formation of GiantBomb. However, back then the outrage wasn't centralized. Reddit was still in kids shoes for example.But do the "gamergate" people see a problem with EA paying the bills on a gaming site?
I agree, the whole problem isn't just indies. What do you say we do about it? Just stay quiet and ignore it? Because I don't know if I can...
Edited a bit for clarification
Last edited by Waswat; 08-09-2014 at 05:41 PM.
The outrage is that Indie Fund funded an indie? Heavens!
Regardless of what it is now to a number of participants, #GamerGate started, 100%, as a harassment & purging campaign. Maybe people who jumped on board subsequently really believe the ethics dog-whistle was the only motivation. Maybe you do too. Maybe he did. But a good way to lose friends in a relatively tight knit community is to leap in and say "zomg the corruption is true" when your peers are being chased out of their homes with murder-rape threats or doxxing. Perhaps a tiny bit uncouth?
As for supporting your point? https://twitter.com/phubans/status/507641703910477824 - he specifically refutes it.
How can I not overgeneralize, when the only unifying factor is the self-assigned hashtag? #GamerGate belongs to 4chan just as much as it belongs to the concerned gamer - which makes them part of the same self-assigned group.First of all, they're not all the same people. You're very much overgeneralizing.
It's Enthusiast press. If you want decent writing, you pay for decent writing. Who writes those cheques, you or advertisers? And regardless of who pays, can you trust people to have the integrity to be objective, regardless of professional relationships? Can HEXUS be honest about, say, a QNAP product review when there's an advert to the right of this edit box right now for their products? (The answer is yes, by the way - and it was "yes" for most of the targeted games journalists too when the mob tried and convicted them)But yes, there's a reason why the phrase "can't spell ignorant without IGN" exists. The big hype sites that hype up all the triple A games have lost a lot of respect over time. And yes, Gerstmanngate was a huge problem just as well; it opened up a can of worms which lead to a lot of things including the formation of GiantBomb. However, back then the outrage wasn't centralized. Reddit was still in kids shoes for example.
I agree, the whole problem isn't just indies. What do you say we do about it? Just stay quiet and ignore it? Because I don't know if I can...
No, it's about judges of IGF investing in the indies they later on 'judged'. You probably didn't see the video that I edited in (while you were responding I guess).
Please just ditch the snarkiness though, it's rather tough to take you seriously if you're gonna act like that.
Fair enough! I'm glad he did not get "run out of the game industry". At least I can cross that from the list of problems. He did add that there is a group of people/clique that doesn't like him just because he is worried about corruption.As for supporting your point? https://twitter.com/phubans/status/507641703910477824 - he specifically refutes it.
Here is i guess where the lines get blurred. Enthusiast press is a bit of a broad term and covers quite a lot of murky territory. I wouldn't mind paying for a good newspaper as much as i wouldn't mind paying for good game journalism. Of course I am in the minority here. Can I however trust people to have the integrity to be objectives regardless of their relationships or should I take their opinions with a pinch of salt? I don't know. For you the answer may be yes, but for me it could very well be a resounding "No" and it means that I'd have to look for more sources elsewhere.It's Enthusiast press. If you want decent writing, you pay for decent writing. Who writes those cheques, you or advertisers? And regardless of who pays, can you trust people to have the integrity to be objective, regardless of professional relationships? Can HEXUS be honest about, say, a QNAP product review when there's an advert to the right of this edit box right now for their products? (The answer is yes, by the way - and it was "yes" for most of the targeted games journalists too when the mob tried and convicted them)
Hype articles, "previews" and other sensationalism aside though... I probably would not trust a site/journalist to be objective about a product review when that product is being splattered all over it. Yes it is possible, but why 'risk' it?
The IGF judges are people who are big in the indie scene - the people who've been successful enough in their fields of endeavour to be regarded as "experts". Which means, yes, a lot of crossover with the people who also have enough money to contribute to Indie Fund (which is an absolutely essential resource for indie developers)
Because that's how you keep the lights on. Most game journos are getting paid a pittance for their work - minimum wage at best. I believe $50 an article is the norm. How much time does it take to make an article to earn $50? Plenty of time, if it's a review.Hype articles, "previews" and other sensationalism aside though... I probably would not trust a site/journalist to be objective about a product review when that product is being splattered all over it. Yes it is possible, but why 'risk' it?
It's a vicious cycle. Most content on games sites is marketing - review copies of games come from the marketing budget, "news" is digested from press releases (and adds hype for the requisite products). Ads are bought in advance by the companies who want to target the demographic the site represents - which means people interested in the products the site talks about, which means most ads are for games or products of interest to gamers like peripherals or services or stores. The only way to get the bigger ad buys is by offering a steadily increasing number of eyeballs, through more and more content - opinion pieces, roundups, analyses, etc.
You don't want objectivity. Try reading http://www.objectivegamereviews.com/titanfall-review/ - is that meaningful? Does it say anything which would convince you more or less to buy the game than reading the back of the box? No. Your thirst for news (regurgitated press releases) and reviews (marketing) from reviewers you trust (whose biases align with yours, as demonstrated over time) is sated by finding sources you can get on with. I don't read IGN reviews either - but they often have decent walkthroughs I read on there. I don't agree with everything Leigh Alexander writes, but she always writes things that are interesting regardless of whether I agree or not, and ultimately that's what I want - interesting games being made, and interesting things being written, by interesting people.
That's the great conspiracy. Gamers finding each others' work interesting. Sometimes interesting enough to draw attention to, sometimes interesting enough to support financially. It doesn't change whether they still share enough likes and dislikes with you that they can tell you what you want to know - i.e. whether product X is worth your time or not.
The last question is from a consumer/viewer/reader point of view, not the journalists. It's not hard to figure out why they'd do it.
My wording is a bit off (English is not my native language), so excuse me for that. I do understand I don't want 100% objectivity in game reviews. However, I also don't want to read a game review; see it seems great, buy the game and find out that it's not nearly as great as the review author promised. As I said at the start of the discussion, people (or at least, I personally) want clarity. I want to know if a review has been specifically paid for and preferably I want to know if the reviewer was put a gag order on negativity. (This seems to happen a lot, especially on youtube.) Just as much as I want to know if the link I'm about to click in my google search is a sponsored ad or not.
Last edited by Waswat; 08-09-2014 at 07:30 PM.
Assume, as the default position, that the firewall between advertising and editorial that Saracen mentioned is strictly enforced. It is, in most cases. Correlation between "X knows Y" or "X funded Y's Patreon" don't necessarily mean their reviews won't meet the same conclusions #~~~
Next, work out the reviewers whose opinions you trust, based on their past correlation.
Finally, be super-suspicious of any review which isn't posted until on or after the release date of a game (this only happens when the publisher knows the game is bad, and doesn't want negative reviews to affect day-1 sales). Usually review copies are handed out weeks in advance, with an embargo date agreed upon by all sites receiving the review code as a condition of receiving that code (again, be suspicious if your favourite site is missing a review on embargo day, It probably means there was a minimum score attached to the embargo date). If IGN posts a review in advance but Polygon doesn't have anything up until release day, that usually means the scores won't line up. Oh, and on this point, note that most sites would prefer to post a negative review late than a lie of a review on embargo day.
I made a blog post from all this. http://apebox.org/wordpress/gaming/635/
If you're accepting any criticism: That was just one huge rant and way too painful to read through due to the writing style. But I'm probably not the target audience considering you're using some of the same arguments I disagreed with.
As far as your previous post goes, easier said then done when there is no transparency. At least the escapist took a huge step in the right direction!
Last edited by Waswat; 11-09-2014 at 01:55 AM.
I'm amused by how the 'leaked' photos of Zoe Quinn were merely the ones already publicly hosted on the likes of the Suicide Girls website anyway...
Interesting take on it by super bunnyhop:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLNZFWR0Q8M#t=160
The most relevant stuff was probably the interview imo. It shows how much of a very fine line all this is from a journalism standpoint.
"Would you say funding a sources creative projects crosses that line?
- Absolutely, no doubt in my mind whatsoever. If you're the writer and I'm the inventor or creator and somehow we have a monetary relationship that we hope will result in my success, then for you to write [about me or my projects would be] unethical."
He goes on to say that roommates would be even worse and sexual relationships would be crossing that line as well.
They would apply DOUBLY to the editorial writing because it is an opinion and "why should i trust your opinion if i don't believe it is objective?"
It shows that it really is a disclosure issue.
The full unedited review is here:
http://youtu.be/4-7RLxrsJ04
Furthermore he asked mitch keller (a somewhat recently retired author for the new york times) about this as well, and here are his thoughts:
http://i.imgur.com/rTXvx00.jpg
To quote:
"[developing a closer relationship with the source] shouldn't happen but it does. And when it does, the reporter has a responsibility to inform his editor and remove himself from the beat and not do any more writings related to that beat or that source."
See, there lies the issue.
Last edited by Waswat; 12-09-2014 at 01:16 AM.
Just adding my two cents to this discussion:
The following video is a discussion between the co-founder of The Escapist and a Twitter user. They talk about how much more profitable it is for a website to run a rage inducing article. http://youtu.be/rdDDIIL-mdk
Hope you will have learned something new by the end of it.
Last edited by sidsapcewalker; 30-09-2014 at 03:29 PM.
So pretty much standard "Twitter court of public opinion" then. Still, never let the truth (whatever it is) get in the way of a good flame war. On a similar
(but unrelated topic) interesting to se that a Twitter keyboard warrior was jailed for 18 weeks for stalking an MP with death threats. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-29411031
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