Oh, yeah, I remember now this news about the refunding of Derek Smart.
Thanks =)
A single post attempting to demonstrate the character of someone who has been throwing personal attacks and extremely idiotic accusations your way for months doesnât constitute an obsession. He didnt even research thoroughly enough to represent those dumb twitter arguments in a correct context, he completely misunderstood the relationship to gamergate, for example, and stooped to the level of the author of the article by quoting some of her dumber twitter posts out of context. But none of that even approaches an obsession, some proves the opposite.
The allegations made in the article are all from âindustry expertâ DS, and all the employee stuff is word for word from a public anonymous internet postings that were later picked up by smart. It doesnt seem like escapist independently verified any of this, however if they did contact (and confirm they were) a disgruntled ex-employee its not unheard of for people to lie in such situations. While misguided on some of the twitter stuff robertâs response was pretty solid. Im not one to protect a developer once theyâve fucked up but this is just a case of clickbait trash journalism aimed at people looking to confirm their biases regarding star citizen cough critic cough. I mean seriously, that quote about their hiring practices being suddenly racist are incredibly absurd. If they had any proof at all about that, theyâd be getting sued, but as is itâs just some random thing an anonymous person on the internet wrote being picked up in an article, ridiculous.
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Chris Roberts had to endure a hundred tweets PER DAY on average in addition to endless blog rants from Derek Smart since July. Smart knows no limits in throwing around even the most absurd accusations, without ever offering a single shred of proof. His initial claims included that Roberts has moved all the backer money to secret accounts in Luxembourg, because âsourcesâ told him. All that while we can see dozens of the 261 internal developers plus outside contractors working on the game every week during Star Citizenâs videos and live streams. Chris ignored Smart as long as he could but now he managed to get the Escapist to give him a platform. At some point you have to respond directly or your non-response will be perceived as admitting guilt.
While the Escapist claims Smart was not a source for the last article, he was pretty much the ONLY source for an article a few days earlier introducing Smart as an expert instead of the arch-troll he is. It was click-bait if there ever was one and it worked gracefully. Additionally the article ignored Robertsâ input that arrived 3 hours before the 23 hour deadline ended, first it was claimed Roberts sent it to the wrong person (well, he was replying to the Managing Director who sent him the questions) and later that it landed in the spam folder (unlikely for a direct reply). The Escapist has âadjustedâ an awful lot of its story, including that contacting, vetting and interviewing the alleged 9 sources inside Cloud Imperium Games (CIG) with dozens of Emails and hour-long Skype calls happened on a single day (to deflect the word-by-word similarity with anonymous Glassdoor-postings) by the single author of the story.
No wonder Chris Roberts finally âcrackedâ and wrote that message.
Smart has been the most obnoxious troll for decades and I donât want to jinx it, but he is quite erratic in searching for and attacking Kickstarter space games to fit his narrative that no-one but himself can make a space game which, given that his games are considered to be the worst of their times could not be further from the truth.
Concerning Smartâs accusations of CIG running out of funds: The perpetual funding campaign through ship sales brings in between 1 and 3 million USD per month on average with a juicy special sale looming, plus an unknown amount through direct subscriptions and incentives in the UK. CIG lists more than 60 open positions across 4 offices in 3 countries on their career page and they are moving into a new and larger office in California.
âA lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.â
- attributed to Mark Twain
We canât verify what the anonymous sources of Smart and the Escapist really know but almost everything you actually CAN verify shows that both understand very little about Star Citizenâs development and made no effort towards that. The Escapist never visited CIGs offices (backer groups do that every day) and Smart never even downloaded the game he claims cannot be made. The Escapist denounces waste of funds for celebrity voice actors when exactly that was one of the stated stretch goals, you could go on but thereâs not really a point.
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New update posted on the original RSI Comm Link:
Ortwin Freyermuth has issued a stern letter. Basically itâs saying âexplain yourselves or weâll see you in courtâ.
0___0
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another white knight
Thatâs not obsession.
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then you verified a company an unidentified employee by examining his âcompany ID card with the name blocked out.â You might be interested to know that CIG does not issue any company ID cards at any of its studios!
Lolâd. Basically escapist got trolled into making an article without proper verification, then it got blown up by people eager to see SC drama.
By the way, when they say âwe vetted them with legalâ it doesnt mean âwe had our legal team verify their identityâ it means âour legal team doesnt think we can get sued for publishing thisâ.
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âWhiteââŚ
The author of that article just deleted this tweet: https://tweetsave.com/lizzyf620/status/650619240559546368
She was using a generic, unmarked, blurry HID keycard that she said was âtoo blurry to confirmâ and thought it was an employee ID. There are millions of those HID keycards that look identical with no job related markers present, people have them for getting into their apartments, even.
Theyâve made it so if you read the article and have an account on their site, you get a private message. Escapist trainwreck choo choo.
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There are bigger issues than his ID card, if the guy sat down for an interview, gave his name and posed as a CIG employee.
That is the ID that was too blurry.
Not sure if you are serious but⌠That picture shows Darian Vorlick, Producer at CIG. This picture is currently in circulation to show that CIG does not use any personalized company ID as claimed by the Escapistâs author. The guy is real but the Escapistâs author wasnât exactly sure if she was presented a card like that to verify her source. Either way, her âvetting processâ was obviously flawed.
Thatâs the ID card from the deleted tweet, I have no idea of who the guy is.
You have no idea who is the guy in the above picture?
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Thats not the supposed ex employee. it was just an example image of a CIG person with a keycard. Again, NOT an ID card, itâs a door key. A door key with an identical face to what millions of people have to access their apartment buildings and other jobs, there is literally nothing CIG related on it other than a tiny ID number on the back that would correspond to a CIG door somewhere, but wouldnt be listed anywhere.
Alright, please enlighten me, what is the theory here.
Itâs a conspiracy orchestrated by Derek Smart, involves 8 bogus sources, one of which apparently made a fake ID card and met a journalist in person, a journalist from a somewhat reputable gaming news site and their legal department?
Also this conspiracy is apparently done for no direct financial gain and is so sloppy it crumbles in a day.
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Derek Smart has been agitating people for months and he obviously was in contact with ex-employees. CIGâs lawyer stated in his letter that Smart emailed him hours before the story went live telling him that former employees will now speak out. Furthermore CIGâs lawyer claims that the story was shopped around various gaming sites and the reputable ones refused to bring it. Both of these claims of CIG should be easily proven as they would be documented.
This and the whole timing of the article and the anonymous Glassdoor-reviews sprouting a day after the Escapistâs author allegedly interviewed the sources containing some word-by-word similarities do indeed point to some concerted effort. If the disgruntled ex-employees worked with each other on this they can hardly be treated as independent sources.
Nobody knows what Smart really wants. I would be surprised if Smart knows what he wants. If he wanted people to buy his competing game that hasnât worked. Itâs more likely that he just wants to stir up drama as he is notorious for that for three decades or so.
Dude. Lol.
âvetted by our legal departmentâ doesnt mean the legal department verified it or something. it means âour lawyers dont think we can get sued for publishing thisâ. I think some of the ex-employees are real, but likely some of the more ridiculous, legally dubious claims (racism/ageism) are from the fake ones.
Um, motivation is financial gain/clickbait for the escapist. Derek smart wants publicity for his game and probably legitimately feels morally motivated, even if heâs wrong.
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Purple!
There is no white.
There are a lot of psyc things that would get a person to lie. There needs to be no other reason then that.