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CliffyB Responds to Adam Orth Situation/NeoGAF "I find it disgusting"+Always Online

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Trike

Member
It started to derail the EDGE thread, plus I thought more people should see this. Didn't see another thread on it. Sorry for being another "CliffyB says something" thread.

“Deal With It”

Yesterday reports that Adam Orth, the guy who somehow caused this shitstorm, is no longer at Microsoft.

Let’s pay attention to the wording here. Resigned. Not fired.

Now, beyond all of the use of the impact font and the “Haha let’s make an internet meme out of this guy we’ve never met” let’s also remember that what happened between Adam and his employer is now between the two of them. His comments may have exploded on the internet, but it’s actually quite possible that he was eyeing a departure, or he was getting bad reviews, or was tired of the perpetual overcast nature of the Pacific Northwest and timing may have been right for him to move on.

I’m going to let you in on a little secret. When someone leaves a company there’s what publicly is stated and there’s what really happened.

And you’re likely to never, ever know it.

I have never met Adam, but I have friends who know him and have told me first hand that he’s a good guy. Maybe he’s got a mortgage. Maybe he has kids. Bills to pay, just like you and I.

It’s awfully easy to sit on an anonymous forum or venue and sling mud at someone who has put themselves out there. Show me a person who hasn’t said something dumb or incorrect or yes, even cocky on the internet and he should cast the first stone.

We’ve all been there.

Let’s also keep in mind that Adam was not an official spokesperson for Microsoft.

But, Cliff, as an employee of a large company you should know better?

Sure.

But if I departed from Epic every time I said something dumb I wouldn’t have made it the last 10 years there. (P.S. Mike Capps was right…the Wii was a virus after all.)People make mistakes and sometimes it’s hard to actually convey a proper emotion, intent or meaning in 140 characters. (Hell if I had a nickel for every email that was misinterpreted when I was at Epic.)


Now, I don’t know as much as you’d think I know about Microsoft’s future plans. Even if I did I wouldn’t go blogging about it like some sort of fool.

My gut is telling me that an always online future is probably coming. It’s coming fast, and possibly to the majority of the devices you enjoy. Adam’s analogies weren’t that far off; although the vacuum one was kind of weird. Sim City, with all of its’ troubles on launch, seems to be selling briskly. Diablo 3, the poster child of a messy launch, is estimated to be at 12 million units. (Remember the internet rage over the art style shift? I barely do. But it seemed so important at the time!) I would bet money that without the always online elements of Diablo 3 that it would have sold half of that.

“I’m so angry about this game treating me like a thief!” ::alt tabs over to bit torrent::

Remember when Microsoft made the decision to only allow broadband on Xbox Live? It was a bold move back then; broadband penetration wasn’t anywhere near what it is now. And yet the march of progress continued. Sooner or later our government, or Google, or any number of providers are going to get their shit together and we’ll have universally fast internet for the majority of the first world.

Or at least the ability to stream Dawson’s Creek on fucking Netflix at decent quality.

And here’s the thing. I’d be willing to say that any early adopter for any new piece of technology is probably going to have some sort of solid internet connection. Also, and I’ve stated this before, keeping that umbilical cord connected might not always require some sort of insane fat pipe. Sometimes just 3G might be enough.

Even then, it doesn’t matter. If you’re on a forum raging about Adam’s comments there’s a whole new generation of kids who are growing up always online who won’t really give a shit. And all that anger, all of that vitrol, all of that lynch mobbing that the internet seems to love to do lately will be for naught and forgotten.

My wife and I were discussing these issues this afternoon and she mentioned the example of “Hey what if I’m a gamer who wants to go to a cabin in the woods for a week and I don’t have online access there?” My response was “Unplugging entirely sometimes isn’t always a bad thing. And that’s the edge case…the week-long vacation to the cabin is only 30 hours of not playing a game or a device that’s built for much more.

Technology doesn’t advance by worrying about the edge case.

If a service is good then people don’t mind paying for it. My Ipad is always connected because I love browsing Reddit, Twitter, and Facebook. I love the ecosystem of Itunes and the App store. If the ecosystem of an always connected device is fantastic then suddenly people don’t really seem to notice any more. When electricity came along and people had to have meters attached to their house they didn’t mind because they loved the idea of light bulbs, electric ranges, and refrigeration.

If we don’t have devices that aren’t fully always online you can bet your ass that we’ll have devices that encourage you to return to the online ecosystem in order to “check in” and make sure everything on the system is legit. Could you hack/jailbreak such a device? Sure, but that crowd will almost always be the die hard/enthusiast crowd that’s not the average user and makes up a small percentage of the potential sales.

“Well that escalated quickly.”

I find it disgusting that an online community would revel in the fact that they may have potentially contributed to a person losing their job. Even then, if they didn’t have anything to do with it at the end of the day, that they have the collective ego to think that they could do that. In a world of Indie-go-go and Kickstarter, where we can do great things in numbers, we should know better.

I’d rather live in a world where someone can slip up, say something that the world doesn’t agree with, and not have the collective internet lynch mob up their ass.

Well behaved people rarely make history.

Deal with it.

I don't think Adam Orth should have resigned or have been fired over what he said on twitter, but what he did was still dumb. Even within his 140 character limit constraint the message was pretty obvious. He doesn't mention Neogaf specifically, but it is safe to say that Clifford wasn't browsing the IGN boards or GameFAQs. Also apparently if you have a bad internet connection then you just need to wait for your country to get some badass internet.

Edit: I am an idiot. Here is the link to the blogpost.
 

orznge

Banned
Deal with it but only when it's you dealing with a thing that's shitty to you not when it's a thing that's shitty to me - that's bullying and you're wrong and horrible!!!!!!!!!!
 

hawk2025

Member
He got fired.

Deal with it.



This whole rant is a nonstarter, because its conclusion is in itself justification for what happened.
 
Revelling in someones life going down the shitter is never something to look at favourably. A very public slap on the wrist, a suspension heck even a demotion and two weeks on a PR training course would have been better. People would have the satisfaction knowing he's being taught a lesson.

Not laughing at it.
 

hayguyz

Banned
who cares what he has to say

Don't turn neogaf into cliffyb's soapbox. He made one good game: Jazz Jackrabbit

Deal with it
 

TheNatural

My Member!
It’s awfully easy to sit on an anonymous forum or venue and sling mud at someone who has put themselves out there. Show me a person who hasn’t said something dumb or incorrect or yes, even cocky on the internet and he should cast the first stone.

I'll say it to your face CliffyB, if that helps. Both you and the Microsoft guy aren't in any touch with reality and support anti consumer bullshit.
 

Izick

Member
He's right that it's sick that people shcadenfreude it up in those always-on threads involving him. To be fair though, it's not just Neogaf. Most online communities, here included, consists of a lot of sadist dicks that like to jump on the hate bandwagon and start making dumb jokes, memes, etc.
 
What is with people today not wanting people to take responsibility for their own actions?

Taken from a previous post I made but: If I was an exec at Microsoft and one of my employees seemingly confirmed a controversial feature of one of my products before we announced it, antagonized my customers and overall caused a whole PR mess for the product...I know I wouldn't be very happy with him. He didn't have to tweet what he did.

It's sad that he lost his job - really, it is. I wasn't one of the people sitting there and going "lul fire him!!1!!" but he lost his job because of his own actions, not "the internet."
 

Data West

coaches in the WNBA
“I’m so angry about this game treating me like a thief!” ::alt tabs over to bit torrent::
tumblr_m989wx2sVI1qhttm2o1_500.jpg
 

noobasuar

Banned
Who the hell was responsible for Gear's of war?

It surely can't be this idiot.


Also Cliffy, how well is gears: judgement selling with all that nickel and dimming?

you sure know how to run franchises into the ground.
 

neptunes

Member
The Internet really made it a bigger deal than it should have. Should he have posted that comment? No, but he should have been able to delete it, by the time he probably realized his mistake it was already to late.

The infamous tweet was to a friend of his right?
 
Guy didn't just make a silly mistake, or even a dumb comment. It was persistent and from his responses seemed like he was trying to piss people off.
 

antonz

Member
CliffyB lost me when he went the piracy route. Fuck off with that shit.

People who pirate weren't going to buy the product in the first place.
 

Paskil

Member
Hey, I didn't revel in the loss of his job or the whole always on thing. I do think that most people understand that words have consequences. I am in a position and have friends on my facebook feed that are subordinates or above me. You better believe I filter my online presence on Facebook. I guaranfuckingtee that just about anyone that has ever had an email account has laughed or at least smirked at the chainmail picture of someone posting some status update about their boss, or doing something at work they shouldn't and then losing their job.

I don't talk about my job in my personal life. Don't fucking post stupid shit and people won't revel in your misery. Sorry for being human etc.
 

i-Lo

Member
Clearly then it seems the internet, GAF especially, overreacted to Adam's message of always online wrapped in condescension because of the new generation of gamers wouldn't know any better if one of they were deprived of something we today enjoy.

CliffyB it seems knows the issues better than the two primary points raised on the net:

  • What will happen once the servers go down?
  • Why should we be punished for losing connection?

And all because these issues have been relegated to a cabin visit.
 
Who the hell was responsible for Gear's of war?

It surely can't be this idiot.


Also Cliffy, how well is gears: judgement selling with all that nickel and dimming?

you sure know how to run franchises into the ground.

Now that's just out of line. Name calling serves absolutely no purpose here. Cliffy has a right to an opinion, and that certainly doesn't make him "an idiot."



But I will have to respectfully disagree with Mr. CliffyB. The employee should have known the consequences of his words given his position at Microsoft. Even if it's meant as a joke, he's the one who screwed up and he needs to pay the price.
 
The idea that some people on a forum got this guy fired is fucking absurd. He got fired because he spoke up about things he wasn't authorized to discuss publicly, and he did so in a rude and obnoxious way.
 

PopeReal

Member
The Internet really made it a bigger deal than it should have. Should he have posted that comment? No, but he should have been able to delete it, by the time he probably realized his mistake it was already to late.

The infamous tweet was to a friend of his right?

The internet. Ruining careers and killing kittens since (insert year when Gore invented internet here).
 

Meia

Member
I'm all for free speech, but if you're not mentally fit to be able to control yourself when you post/tweet, you probably shouldn't have access to those things.


Tempers raise, sure, but EVERYONE has that little thing in the back of their mind that goes "Is it a good idea to continue this?" You're telling me this guy didn't have it in the back of his mind that his job could be at stake if he continued as he was? Maybe he's someone that has that little voice, but it's weak. Those people probably shouldn't be on a service that then allows them to post something to the rest of the world in a second, and it'll be out there permanently, then.



No, I don't think he should be fired, but this is a "Fired, so fired" situation if there ever was one.
 
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