Agreed. I'm more than happy to have the minority opinion here and have the community grab their torches and march on me, but I don't take any bit of that personally and don't in any way want to slow down our comments commenting as they please.
Abram's and I had our exchange and decided he had a fair point about a couple of things, and so I addressed it w/a mea culpa, because he was right.
He still is, in my view, missing my actual point, but c'est la vie :)
"Valve could've offered their users free hugs and it still wouldn't have made an iota of difference."
You seem to keep missing that I mostly agree with this, which is why Valve's decision to be more charged in their statement than they needed to be is so clearly an attempt to fuel the fire.
"I have to ask, what do you believe would have been an appropriate response from Valve which wouldn't have "fanned the flames"?"
First, and I suppose I have to say this primarily because everyone seems to think I'm in the tank for Epic for some reason: I did NOT say Valve's statement was "inappropriate." What I said is that it is very obvious to me that Valve knew and likely intended to generate anger with its statement, specifically by stating, even rightly so, that Metro's move was "unfair" to Steam users.
That moves beyond the mere statement of fact to one of opinion, lobbed into an already charged situation. If what many of the comments suggest, that this flaming would have happened regardless of whether Steam took the care to decry Metro's move as "unfair" or not...then why bother doing so?
Again, Valve CAN do this. I'm not saying it was wrong to do so. But I am most certainly saying that claiming the statement wasn't charged to fan the flames is unbelievable to me.
Here's a statement that I would NOT be saying all of this about:
"Valve has been made aware that Metro Exodus has entered into an exclusive arrangement with the Epic Store. Pre-ordered copies of Metro Exodus will be refunded in full, as the game will no longer be available at launch as originally planned. We're sorry for any inconvenience this causes our customers, who we greatly appreciate."
That is a statement of fact that carries no charged language whatsoever.
Again, to be clear, Valve doesn't HAVE to make my suggested statement. They aren't WRONG for making their version. But their suggestion that they had just no idea anyone would react negatively to the game publisher due to their statement, something THEY'VE ACKNOWLEDGED has happened, is not believable.
"As I said in two other comments, calling me a “Valve Fan” is patently silly as I’ve started to buy PC games on GOG and itch.io now and the only way I’m adding new games to Steam is"
Look, let's just put this to bed, shall we? I read your comment as being fairly pro-Valve and mentioned it ONLY to say that was fine. I'm happy to take your response at face value and say I made that assessment in error. I was wrong when I said that, full stop.
None of which changes the fact that this article is NOT about whether Valve told the truth in its comment on the product page, is NOT about whether Epic's exclusive deals are fine and dandy or not, and is NOT about whether there would have been outrage without Valve's comment.
The article is about whether Valve's claim that it didn't intend any backlash to be created or spurred on with its comment was believable. It. Is. NOT.
"My opinion on the matter is even more strongly reinforced when he then calls you a 'Valve-fan' because you called him out."
Eyeroll. I didn't "call him out" as a Valve fan in a way that carried a negative connotation. I specifically said that was fine. And I'll let you in on a little secret, too: I'm a big Steam/Valve fan myself!
This whole "even if Valve were silent" and "Whether I believe Valve or not is irrelevant" stance is perfectly appropriate everywhere EXCEPT in response to this article, which was explicitly about whether Valve was believable, which it obviously wasn't....
"I don't hate you, Dark Helmet. I just can't fathom why you're treating Epic with kid gloves whilst excoriating Nintendo with a hot poker. Sometimes, Nintendo truly does deserve it (especially in regards to their legal bullying), but Epic has proven that they deserve it far more with their anti-consumer tactics."
First, no worries at all. This is Techdirt, where comments are meant to be posted, read by the authors, and responded to when possible. I'm glad you felt passionate enough about something I wrote to respond in the way you did.
That said: I suggest you take a breath and re-read the post. This post was not about the validity of what Epic is doing with its store. I'd say I've traveled down a fairly middle road in commenting on the exclusivity project, and you'll notice my posts are teeming with headlines about the "platform wars", which isn't exactly a positive connotation.
The subject of this post was instead about Valve's comments as to what it was or was not trying to do with its public comments on the game's store page. As any good war correspondent -- :) -- , I'm interested in the machinations of both sides. Given that this is primarily thus far a PR war, commenting on the public statements by one party in that battle that seem fairly unbelievable seems perfectly appropriate.
Your a Valve fan; got it. There's no problem with that at all. If you're going to allow that to influence whether you believe an unbelievable statement coming out of Valve, well THAT I have a problem with.
In addition to the entirety of the post, you may want to specifically note the tone in the culminating line:
"There is plenty of room for disagreement on what Epic's entry into the marketplace, and its specific tactics, means for the gaming industry as a whole. That being said, this claim by Valve doesn't ring true."
As I"ve said to you in the past, this is a quote from Barack Obama's book. It came in a long list of quotes I was responding to you with, because of your inane nonsense. I might as well have said, "A rose by any other name is still a rose."
Appreciate the comment and the thought you put into it. Every writer has his or her style, and not every post requires that same style, in my opinion.
While I've read your series of comments and have let them roll around in my head for half a day or so, I will suggest that part of my intent in this piece was to express that, while there is nuance in everything, some issues and stances are binary enough to be worth putting down a flat marker. I think this is one of those situations, which is why I wrote the post in the way I did.
I'm not blind to the concerns about bad speech on platforms. I do however think that the cure is more good speech, rather than attempts at moderation that will simply fail at scale.
Again, sincerely appreciate your comments. If this one didn't land for you, I can only wish it had. If it didn't land for large swaths of people, which I'm not sure is the case, then that's worth knowing as well.
Re: Why go after 35 US cents per illegal viewer? When DON'T WANT
"This is an academic "study". Encouraging piracy has NEVER been shown to work in reality. They're persons whose only identity is FREE-LOADERS: the least rich and most difficult sell of all. Not going to get a cent out of them."
Let's say I agreed with you, which I don't: if what you say above is true......why worry about them at all?!?!?
"Nobody looks at LEDs on sidelines or names on clothing. No matter how much MORE is thrown up, it doesn't equate to proportionally more sales. That's just the key LYING assertion by pro-pirate academic and pro-pirate re-writer."
This must be why current major sports leagues are bucking tradition in a way that is a PR hit just to put up more ads and LEDs, signage, etc. Surely those people are all idiots and you're the smart one. Surely Adam Silver is fighting hard to put logos on NBA jerseys for no reason, since you say it's of no value. Surely the fight the Ricketts' had to put up more signage on iconic Wrigley Field, for which they were lambasted by baseball purists, was pure masochism since there's no value there.
Or you're just wrong. It's definitely one of those two things....
Thank you for reminding me. I'm going to try not to go even a week without reminding everyone in some post or another that the fact that SDCC not only won its case AND legal fees, but still has its idiotic trademark, is the stupidest fucking thing ever.....
The analogy doesn't work entirely because of the nature of each product. Keep in mind, the photog wasn't upset at the sharing of his photo by fans, just its use on tshirts...but that use on tshirts is SPECIFICALLY going to result in exposure of the photo and the photog.
A single person downloading an album for free and then announcing there has been "exposure" doesn't do any of the work for the band that a tshirt being worn publicly with a photo on it does. Now, album downloads CAN result in exposure, as fans share them with each other, or play them in groups, etc.
But it's really not the same thing, and that isn't what the snark-masters in this case had in mind with their comments.
On the post: The Best People: White House Emailed Talking Points Meant For Surrogates To Dems, Tried To Recall Email Afterwards
Re:
"All we have is a partial transcript of a single phone call released by the White House."
Mmm, no, we also have Herr Trump's own admissions....
On the post: RomUniverse To Attempt To Crowdfund Legal Defense, Which Isn't Going Well At All
Re:
Um, do you have a link on that?
On the post: Tales From The Platform Wars: Steam Dev Says Calling 'Metro Exodus' Epic Exclusive Unfair Wasn't Intended To Incite
Re: Re:
Agreed. I'm more than happy to have the minority opinion here and have the community grab their torches and march on me, but I don't take any bit of that personally and don't in any way want to slow down our comments commenting as they please.
Abram's and I had our exchange and decided he had a fair point about a couple of things, and so I addressed it w/a mea culpa, because he was right.
He still is, in my view, missing my actual point, but c'est la vie :)
On the post: Tales From The Platform Wars: Steam Dev Says Calling 'Metro Exodus' Epic Exclusive Unfair Wasn't Intended To Incite
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: For the record
:)
On the post: Tales From The Platform Wars: Steam Dev Says Calling 'Metro Exodus' Epic Exclusive Unfair Wasn't Intended To Incite
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: For the record
"Valve could've offered their users free hugs and it still wouldn't have made an iota of difference."
You seem to keep missing that I mostly agree with this, which is why Valve's decision to be more charged in their statement than they needed to be is so clearly an attempt to fuel the fire.
On the post: Tales From The Platform Wars: Steam Dev Says Calling 'Metro Exodus' Epic Exclusive Unfair Wasn't Intended To Incite
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: For the record
"I have to ask, what do you believe would have been an appropriate response from Valve which wouldn't have "fanned the flames"?"
First, and I suppose I have to say this primarily because everyone seems to think I'm in the tank for Epic for some reason: I did NOT say Valve's statement was "inappropriate." What I said is that it is very obvious to me that Valve knew and likely intended to generate anger with its statement, specifically by stating, even rightly so, that Metro's move was "unfair" to Steam users.
That moves beyond the mere statement of fact to one of opinion, lobbed into an already charged situation. If what many of the comments suggest, that this flaming would have happened regardless of whether Steam took the care to decry Metro's move as "unfair" or not...then why bother doing so?
Again, Valve CAN do this. I'm not saying it was wrong to do so. But I am most certainly saying that claiming the statement wasn't charged to fan the flames is unbelievable to me.
Here's a statement that I would NOT be saying all of this about:
"Valve has been made aware that Metro Exodus has entered into an exclusive arrangement with the Epic Store. Pre-ordered copies of Metro Exodus will be refunded in full, as the game will no longer be available at launch as originally planned. We're sorry for any inconvenience this causes our customers, who we greatly appreciate."
That is a statement of fact that carries no charged language whatsoever.
Again, to be clear, Valve doesn't HAVE to make my suggested statement. They aren't WRONG for making their version. But their suggestion that they had just no idea anyone would react negatively to the game publisher due to their statement, something THEY'VE ACKNOWLEDGED has happened, is not believable.
On the post: Tales From The Platform Wars: Steam Dev Says Calling 'Metro Exodus' Epic Exclusive Unfair Wasn't Intended To Incite
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: True Statement by Valve
Scroll past my posts since they set your heart aflutter?
On the post: Tales From The Platform Wars: Steam Dev Says Calling 'Metro Exodus' Epic Exclusive Unfair Wasn't Intended To Incite
Re: Re: True Statement by Valve
Good point. If only there was a way for our site to not auto-force you to read the posts I write, which are clearly marked as being written by me....
On the post: Tales From The Platform Wars: Steam Dev Says Calling 'Metro Exodus' Epic Exclusive Unfair Wasn't Intended To Incite
Re: Not to mention
"As I said in two other comments, calling me a “Valve Fan” is patently silly as I’ve started to buy PC games on GOG and itch.io now and the only way I’m adding new games to Steam is"
Look, let's just put this to bed, shall we? I read your comment as being fairly pro-Valve and mentioned it ONLY to say that was fine. I'm happy to take your response at face value and say I made that assessment in error. I was wrong when I said that, full stop.
None of which changes the fact that this article is NOT about whether Valve told the truth in its comment on the product page, is NOT about whether Epic's exclusive deals are fine and dandy or not, and is NOT about whether there would have been outrage without Valve's comment.
The article is about whether Valve's claim that it didn't intend any backlash to be created or spurred on with its comment was believable. It. Is. NOT.
On the post: Tales From The Platform Wars: Steam Dev Says Calling 'Metro Exodus' Epic Exclusive Unfair Wasn't Intended To Incite
Re: Re: Re: Re: For the record
"My opinion on the matter is even more strongly reinforced when he then calls you a 'Valve-fan' because you called him out."
Eyeroll. I didn't "call him out" as a Valve fan in a way that carried a negative connotation. I specifically said that was fine. And I'll let you in on a little secret, too: I'm a big Steam/Valve fan myself!
This whole "even if Valve were silent" and "Whether I believe Valve or not is irrelevant" stance is perfectly appropriate everywhere EXCEPT in response to this article, which was explicitly about whether Valve was believable, which it obviously wasn't....
On the post: Tales From The Platform Wars: Steam Dev Says Calling 'Metro Exodus' Epic Exclusive Unfair Wasn't Intended To Incite
Re: For the record
"I don't hate you, Dark Helmet. I just can't fathom why you're treating Epic with kid gloves whilst excoriating Nintendo with a hot poker. Sometimes, Nintendo truly does deserve it (especially in regards to their legal bullying), but Epic has proven that they deserve it far more with their anti-consumer tactics."
First, no worries at all. This is Techdirt, where comments are meant to be posted, read by the authors, and responded to when possible. I'm glad you felt passionate enough about something I wrote to respond in the way you did.
That said: I suggest you take a breath and re-read the post. This post was not about the validity of what Epic is doing with its store. I'd say I've traveled down a fairly middle road in commenting on the exclusivity project, and you'll notice my posts are teeming with headlines about the "platform wars", which isn't exactly a positive connotation.
The subject of this post was instead about Valve's comments as to what it was or was not trying to do with its public comments on the game's store page. As any good war correspondent -- :) -- , I'm interested in the machinations of both sides. Given that this is primarily thus far a PR war, commenting on the public statements by one party in that battle that seem fairly unbelievable seems perfectly appropriate.
Your a Valve fan; got it. There's no problem with that at all. If you're going to allow that to influence whether you believe an unbelievable statement coming out of Valve, well THAT I have a problem with.
In addition to the entirety of the post, you may want to specifically note the tone in the culminating line:
"There is plenty of room for disagreement on what Epic's entry into the marketplace, and its specific tactics, means for the gaming industry as a whole. That being said, this claim by Valve doesn't ring true."
On the post: Cracks Showing In Epic Store's PR War As Developers Have To Plead With Public To Not Harass Them
Re: Say, speaking of toxic overreaction...
As I"ve said to you in the past, this is a quote from Barack Obama's book. It came in a long list of quotes I was responding to you with, because of your inane nonsense. I might as well have said, "A rose by any other name is still a rose."
On the post: Embrace Fans: How One Mystery Modder Has Kept System Shock 2 Playable
Re: Since don't know is "fan" far more likely prior programmer.
"French Thief fan forum" is at least honest. Why don't you here at Techdirt just admit that piracy is theft?"
I.......but......wait, do you REALLY not understand that "Thief" is the title of a game, and this is a forum for fans of that game?!??!?
On the post: Gizmodo: Why Can't YouTube Do 'Good' Content Moderation? Answer: Because It's Fucking Impossible
Re: That's "Mr. Abram" to you
Mr. Abram:
Appreciate the comment and the thought you put into it. Every writer has his or her style, and not every post requires that same style, in my opinion.
While I've read your series of comments and have let them roll around in my head for half a day or so, I will suggest that part of my intent in this piece was to express that, while there is nuance in everything, some issues and stances are binary enough to be worth putting down a flat marker. I think this is one of those situations, which is why I wrote the post in the way I did.
I'm not blind to the concerns about bad speech on platforms. I do however think that the cure is more good speech, rather than attempts at moderation that will simply fail at scale.
Again, sincerely appreciate your comments. If this one didn't land for you, I can only wish it had. If it didn't land for large swaths of people, which I'm not sure is the case, then that's worth knowing as well.
Cheers!
On the post: New Study Points Out What A Boon Sports Streaming Piracy Could Be To Leagues
Re: Why go after 35 US cents per illegal viewer? When DON'T WANT
"This is an academic "study". Encouraging piracy has NEVER been shown to work in reality. They're persons whose only identity is FREE-LOADERS: the least rich and most difficult sell of all. Not going to get a cent out of them."
Let's say I agreed with you, which I don't: if what you say above is true......why worry about them at all?!?!?
"Nobody looks at LEDs on sidelines or names on clothing. No matter how much MORE is thrown up, it doesn't equate to proportionally more sales. That's just the key LYING assertion by pro-pirate academic and pro-pirate re-writer."
This must be why current major sports leagues are bucking tradition in a way that is a PR hit just to put up more ads and LEDs, signage, etc. Surely those people are all idiots and you're the smart one. Surely Adam Silver is fighting hard to put logos on NBA jerseys for no reason, since you say it's of no value. Surely the fight the Ricketts' had to put up more signage on iconic Wrigley Field, for which they were lambasted by baseball purists, was pure masochism since there's no value there.
Or you're just wrong. It's definitely one of those two things....
On the post: Sturgis Motorcycle Rally Inc. Keeps Telling Licensees Its Trademarks Are Valid While Courts Keep Insisting They Are Not
Re: Re: Playing chicken with the courts
Thank you for reminding me. I'm going to try not to go even a week without reminding everyone in some post or another that the fact that SDCC not only won its case AND legal fees, but still has its idiotic trademark, is the stupidest fucking thing ever.....
On the post: Supporters Of Article 13, After Denying It's About Filters, Now Say It's About Regulating Filters Which They Admit Don't Work
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Your Cabbage Law
This has been sooooooo much fun to watch. OOTB cracked the code on me.......by finding my Cousin Gary?
Definitely a Beautiful Mind we're working with here....
On the post: Good Luck, Japan: Government About To Make All Copyright Infringement A Criminal Offense
Re:
You're.......not far off.
On the post: Techdirt 2018: The Stats.
Re: Re:
On the post: Everybody Loses After Metal Band And Photographer Get Pissy Over Photographer's Copyright Threat
Re: Analogy doesn't work?
A single person downloading an album for free and then announcing there has been "exposure" doesn't do any of the work for the band that a tshirt being worn publicly with a photo on it does. Now, album downloads CAN result in exposure, as fans share them with each other, or play them in groups, etc.
But it's really not the same thing, and that isn't what the snark-masters in this case had in mind with their comments.
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