That's honestly how I see it too. I followed the GG reddit and occasionally the chans and IMO that is exactly how it happened. It's exactly like making Nathan Grayson into the height of gaming corruption for writing three words on Depression Quest in an RPS blog post about greenlit games. The same author who has written five full pieces on Kingdom Come, the game gamergate accused the press of censoring!
#GAMERGATE: The Threadening [Read the OP] -- #StopGamerGate2014
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That's honestly how I see it too. I followed the GG reddit and occasionally the chans and IMO that is exactly how it happened. It's exactly like making Nathan Grayson into the height of gaming corruption for writing three words on Depression Quest in an RPS blog post about greenlit games. The same author who has written five full pieces on Kingdom Come, the game gamergate accused the press of censoring!
outunderthestars
Banned
Steve Youngblood
Member
The point is does this really matter to you? Was this an obvious transgression that resulted in real, measurable harm to readers of her work, or was this something that was dug up by people that don't like Hernandez and were just looking for any dirt on her they could find?
RicoTheMad
Banned
That's the thing though. How big of a deal it is depends entirely on whether you think it's ok for the media to dictate what content succeeds and what content doesn't.
As an indie myself, I am absolutely terrified of the idea that because I'm not best friends with X or Y media person like some of the other indies, my work will be overlooked or perhaps even deliberately hidden away in favor of someone else's.
The Hernandez thing is exactly the kind of situation I mean. Regardless of whether the game is free or not, people talking about you, knowing your name, your games, etc, is EXTREMELY valuable to an indie. Those mentions can often translate into sales, connections, and indeed, very tangible benefits down the line.
So is it a big deal? Like I said, it depends. Do you want to hear about the games you may enjoy, or about the games the developers the media is friends with wants to shove down your throat?
True. Hernandez has done some truly heinous shit in the past and basically all of it went ignored, but THIS is the thing that causes outrage? It's ludicrous.
Gutsy Frog
Banned
Christine Love's VNs aren't free and she literally said "buy them"
Christine Love's VNs aren't free and she literally said "buy them"
I'm so sad to see fellow women rationalize and excuse the harmful oppression and harassment of non-default people in video games.
Yep, this. The relationship should've been disclosed and honestly most websites if they knew about the relationship and wanted to cover the game would've assigned coverage to another writer. If the person is an ex there's a possibility of the coverage being either positive because they were in a relationship, or spiteful for the same reasons. Either way that level of close relationship should be disclosed.
RubberJohnny
Banned
Digital: A Love Story and Don't Take it Personally Babe were free.
FF Seraphim
Member
One: Please do not make this issue about gun laws
Two: This doesn't hinder a criminal who actually really wants to hurt someone, they will find a way to do it anyway.
Three: Everyone has access to guns and Utah is one of the states with the lowest amount of murders related to firearms in the nation....
ST2K
Member
I would say largely both. It's harmful to people who consume games media because the trust has been damaged. Whether they read her stuff or not is not relevant, rather, it's that a major gaming publication employed and still employs her with only a minor correction issued far after the fact. And obviously there are people with an axe to grind against her that likely found out about this because of their vendetta.
D
Deleted member 126221
Unconfirmed Member
Yup. In this specific case, it was done a long time ago.
When Jenny Bharaj said that female plight in the game industry was irrelevant, I literally almost fell out of my chair.
Gutsy Frog
Banned
She ended the article with "buy these two games" and linked the Steam store pages of two of her non-free games c'mon
RubberJohnny
Banned
Link? She only has one paid game.
Imagine if they applied the same rhetoric to game reviews of actual consumer products.
IGN would have to put an editorial note on every review of a WayForward game. "Hey, just so you guys know, the creative director of this company used to be an editor for us, we are all good friends that still hang out!"
Destructoid would have to do the same for Gearbox. "This game, even if not reviewed so positively, was written by one of our ex-staff! Please keep this in mind!"
Think if this was applied to film reviews.
"Even though we gave this film a positive review, it is worth knowing that our writer was flown to LA for the red-carpet premiere as to meet release-date review deadlines"
Or Music.
"Ed note: An engineering assistant once had a brief relationship with the writer of this review."
And now, because of our want to logically dismiss the Hernandez issue, we're having a pages long discussion about her and her friends games instead of the issue of YouTubers getting paid to make videos about how much they love a video game.
Because everyone else cares about actual corruption in games coverage and are seriously discussing that like adults and here in the GamerGate thread we have to talk about indie visual novels getting coverage.
Because everyone else cares about actual corruption in games coverage and are seriously discussing that like adults and here in the GamerGate thread we have to talk about indie visual novels getting coverage.
How familiar are you with the professional world? Do you know stuff like networking? Are you aware of how important dissemination and raising awareness by socializing with other people is?
Because networking and going to events and socializing with other people is really, really, really important for the success of your indie game, especially when you can't afford high-profile marketing.
RicoTheMad
Banned
This is bad, how?
D
Deleted member 126221
Unconfirmed Member
Hmmm... I don't want to be debbie downer, but yes, if you want your game to succeed, you absolutely need connections and exposure. If you just put it out there and hope people will magically learn about it, you're completely wrong. Game writers are not always scouring every corner of the internet to find a new obscure indie game to talk about. There's absolutely nothing "corrupt" about having connections in an industry, and thinking otherwise is pretty weird.
So you don't have a problem if the games were free
yet you got upset over the quinn thing eh
Reviews shouldn't really function as a facet of journalism to be quite honest.
It's clarification that the readers don't really need. Someone shouldn't be required to disclose every aspect of their personal life because of the end product of their job.
That's a good point as well, instead of talking about current issues why are folks digging into years old issues that may have been resolved or at the very least not very relevant? That's a lot of work to go out of the way to talk about current problems.
We're in a thread about women being stalked, harassed, and threatened with death threats and their attackers being allowed to waltz right in with a gun fully legally in the clear because a state is so ass backwards about keeping victims safe that they care more about making more sales for Smith & Wesson than protecting victims. Ass backwards guns laws are relevant to the discussion and the bigger problem of abuse.
A metal detector to get in the door and a search for guns on persons does a good job of prevention.
I'm sure that's consoling to people that have received an explicit threat that someone is going to kill them and write a manifesto in their blood. Stop it with the cold calculative statistics view of the world and gain some empathy, people.
FF Seraphim
Member
I second this: We all agree what Hernandez did was shady. However, that issue has been covered. Maybe we should cover more issues like Gaming Press being given gifts from game publishers or being flown to preview a game, hell look at IGN's exclusive first look pieces
Politics not suitable here, but as a Tea Partier, your summation is gross.
chrominance
Member
"Disclosure: the reviewer of this album follows the band on Twitter, owns their last three albums, and went to several shows in the last two years, during which they purchased two tour t-shirts. One of the shows the reviewer went to was written up in this publication; the publication was given free access to the show for the reviewer, a photographer, and two guests. The album was also given to the publication for free by the record label."
You could change it Occupy Wall Street if you feel so inclined.
When the label you apply to yourself (not you particularly) belongs to a hate group then no, saying "But I'm not like them" means nothing at all. If you don't support such horrible beliefs, then why are you using that label?
Generalizations are wrong when they apply to a broad group of people. In this case, GG has only one clear motivation, and it's not the one you're pretending it has.
Gutsy Frog
Banned
I never said that; I think disclosure should have been required for the RPS article that called it 'powerful' too. I think Robin Arnott featuring it in Night Games above a bunch of other games was a far bigger issue though.
outunderthestars
Banned
Agree . This is exactly how every single industry works. I am at a national conference this week, and almost every major company is sponsoring a social so they can network, make contacts, and raise awareness of their products.
Of course the media is going to cover games they have heard friends playing or talking about. How else are they supposed to find out about a game? That is the entire purpose of having a marketing plan.
Yeah. I mean, I (personally) think it's pretty appalling to advocate purchasing a game your roommate (and possibly someone you dated?) without disclosing that to at least your editor. If Stephen had said "not a big deal"; then fine, he's the one with the actual journalism degree, I'll defer to him.
But at this point? Give everyone on the staff a stern warning about disclosures and move on with life. If someone does it afterward - then you might suspend them / fire them. No point in punishing anyone for something done a while ago by all accounts.
Son of Cervantes
Member
The articles (there are at least two that I remember, fairly lengthy pieces) were on the front page, so I'm guessing people who read Kotaku regularly all read it. I almost bought the fucking games until I researched them a little more, saw that the writing Hernandez had praised didn't seem particularly good (and even noticed several grammatical errors), and ended up deciding against it. But I almost pulled the trigger and bought the fucking things, which is one of the reasons I'm outraged about it.
Obviously I have no clue what goes on behind the scenes at editorial in Kotaku, but I think something like that is a firable offense (full disclosure: I have a bachelor's degree in journalism, though I did my master's in another field).
Translation: Stop using facts!
I think it's pretty easy to work out why the same talking points keep coming up over and over, and more importantly, why these talking points are only applied to a certain type of person.
Where did I say it didnt bother me? It does bother me. The point is, I see them as two separate conversations. You think one completely excludes the other. No matter if they brinig a vaid point, and I can tell your response so clarifying before you do, that its a hipothetical, I already stated that whatever valid point they think they have is not coherent to a point where it deserves real discussion, so no matter how valid the point might be, you will not entertain it, because a part of it does stupid shit like the threats. You talking about the valid points validates the bad shit that some do, so you just dismiss everything.
Please tell me if this is a wrong statement.
I agree with you about the sources. I read all articles about it as well, in favor and against, but I admit that my main source of news is twitter, and that is very hard to keep up.
My comment to Vlade above applies here tho, do you believe that one conversation, the horrible threats to women, should or can completely dismiss any valid points GG brings, or might bring? you dont see them as separate conversations?
outunderthestars
Banned
Why do all of your examples in this thread involve female writers?
Massive Duck. C.M.
Banned
FF Seraphim
Member
First and foremost I am going to be honest and say I am very amoral on my outlook when dealing with people and politics; I generally look for a positive net-gain over a certain length of time and disregard human emotion since it doesn't enter the equation for me.
Second, the potential backlash that USU might receive for bending the rules for one speaker would be quite huge and doesn't pay off in the long run.
You may disagree with the law but the people in Utah do not. Again this is in entirely different argument not really meant for this thread.
Gutsy Frog
Banned
They don't? Robin Arnott isn't female. The RPS guy who covered Zoe's game isn't female.
If you mean 'controversies not involving women' I brought up the Phil Fish shitstorm and DmC and those didn't involve any specific women. If you want I can rant about my issues with indie game coverage in general.
Son of Cervantes
Member
That's...wow. You have no understanding of ethics in journalism at all, huh?
Pimping your girlfriend's game to unsuspecting readers is absolutely harmful to the gamers who read the articles.
RicoTheMad
Banned
That is exactly why I argue against this kind of favoritism. Yes I do network, I am a professional software developer by trade and have been doing it for years. I'm not stranger to the "real world" where people who know each other trade favors. This is exactly the kind of crap I *don't* want to see in the game development field. I am an indie, but I am also a consumer of video games.
I've been to GDC. I've shared a cab with Rami, I've chatted and have deep respect for Adriel Wallick, who is an excellent person and is doing some super brave things like quitting her job to pursue the indie life (which is not something I can bring myself to do until I can prove to myself, and my family, that it can support us).
I've been to gamedev conferences and belong to gamedev skype groups. I know about common strategies to market your game like posting up articles online with controversy to get your game's name out there. I've studied kickstarter and how to succeed and fail at it. I have my own company and manage and employ people, on a project that has been going for over 3 years funded by my own pocket change.
So yes, I know how important all that is, and my point is that the fact that it is important, rather than "is your game any good", is exactly what is wrong with this whole situation and why I am vehemently against people wanting to sweep things under the rug and accepting the status quo.
As a person who loves games, I want to see the industry move forward. That means employment equality for all genders and races, transparency, great games rising to the top rather than whatever garbage someone with an agenda wants to make succeed. Why do you think demographics in the game industry are so skewed? Because buddies hire their buddies who hire their buddies. It actively discourages diversity.
I want consumers not to get screwed over, basically. That is how I run my company, and that is how I want the world to be. Will that ever happen? No idea, I wish. It's unlikely though, but that doesn't mean I'm going to just sit back and let it happen.
I'm a realistic individual. But I don't play games professionally as I feel it is dishonest. I don't do it in my professional career, and I don't do it as part of my hobby either. I will succeed by the labor of my work and not by favoritism. We all need to live with ourselves in this life, and I'll be damned if I know that my success is owed to trading personal favors rather than the fruits of my hard work.
Maybe I'm weird though. That's just my personal ideology.
Yeah I really don't get that either.
There's a massive issue with big corp basically buying their way into positive press and here we are discussing indie games that have been "wrongly" promoted because the media person was friend with the game maker.
Let's totally not talk about how the hype campaign of nearly all blockbuster games is so rotten you can't read a preview without massive amount of salt that they're not misleading you into preordering.
If you followed the industry for more than a year you should clearly know that how good a game is has little to no bearing on the public reception.
It's way less important than everything surrounding marketing.
Seriously you think companies pay marketers for what exactly?
And garbage that made bank because someone with an agenda pushed it?
You have any example?
NoblesseOblige
Banned
No, it doesn't dismiss the points, it dismissed the group. The points on journalistic integrity and ethics is absolutely an important discussion to have, and it has happened, and will continue to happen. GG did not start that discussion nor are they its current major players. They are simply a group spearheaded by sociopaths that want to protect their hobby from the 'enemy' which in this case it's women and their supporters. They hide behind the facade of fighters of journalistic integrity to gain a larger voice.
What should RPS have disclosed?
Gutsy Frog
Banned
"I'm friends with this person" (which was actually true at that specific time).
Massive Duck. C.M.
Banned
The fact that you parroted that phrase shows you don't really understand either.
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