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[DangerStepp]

Honest question: How did Geoff Keighley become the figurehead that he is?

Who gave him popularity?

I thought he was just a gametrailers dude. Is it his face? It's not that great.

 

[speedpop]

How did I miss this thread? Why am I only seeing it now on my lunch break?? Leaving a post here so I can read it all later tonight.

 

[Quote]

Well, she could've handled it much, much better. You said it yourself, instead of being apologetic/open about the situation and provide more context, she thought she could sneak out the backdoor while at the same time *act* like a victim.

Internet caught her red-handed. I said this earlier but like most things in life, people are willing to listen and forgive...until you try to pull another lie over their eyes and they find out about it. The backlash becomes tenfold.

Even worse was her "accepting Eurogamers apology." You just got a guy fired because of your sketch ass background.

 

[zaxon]

Her biggest problem is her actions after the article, the revelations since and her
They all line up to the narrative that she is a corporate shill.

They all line up if that is what you are already inclined to believe.

Based on what we actually know, I think it's just as likely that her connection to Squeenix is essentially nonexistent -- just a couple of tiny contract jobs her friend who works there threw her while she was unemployed. She gussied that up as "consulting for Square Enix" on her profile because it sounded better, and now that this story blew up she's had to deal with people paying a lot of attention to that embellishment. So she deleted it out of embarrassment, not to "cover her tracks." (Which would be absurd, as that info was already all over the web.)

 

[TheGreatDivide]

People are only calling her a victim because she's female.

 

[TheBaronOfNA]

You can, and should want that, but it's not like the film industry. Movie critics don't impact the film's performance as much, they are tolerated by studios because they're of no issue, and it's expected. On the few occasions a major studio has declined to have press screenings, it is typically indicative of an exceptionally bad film, but critics still review it.

Film criticism still impacts in some extend, even if is not immediately or is often only reflected internally in the industry.

The Studios still needs and want prestige.

 

[HIGH DEF JEFF]

Honest question: How did Geoff Keighley become the figurehead that he is?

Who gave him popularity?

I thought he was just a gametrailers dude. Is it his face? It's not that great.

He was at G4/Tech Tv for a long time. Which is a wash, no one cared about a video game channel found in deep cable. It has to be his Spike awards show and game trailers show. Both of those are the only game coverage found on a channel that gets any ratings..so when you are the only game in town (pun not intended) you will get the good stuff from publishers. If there was a video game show on NBC once a week and they did an awards show no one would give a fuck about Keighly.

 

[Deleted member 17706]

People are only calling her a victim because she's female.

Which, in my opinion, is just as misogynistic/sexist as anyone calling her derogatory names based on her gender.

 

[Rufus]

Even worse was her "accepting Eurogamers apology." You just got a guy fired because of your sketch ass background.

He left as a consequence of his piece being censored by his editors. So she didn't get him fired per se.

 

[AHappyPanda]

Which, in my opinion, is just as misogynistic/sexist as anyone calling her derogatory names based on her gender.

Agree, when people claimed misogyny I laughed. Man or woman, there's a certain creed or code journalists should strive for, any good journalist anyway, and she did not strive for it.

 

[Kinyou]

They all line up if that is what you are already inclined to believe.

Based on what we actually know, I think it's just as likely that her connection to Squeenix is essentially nonexistent -- just a couple of tiny contract jobs her friend who works there threw her while she was unemployed. She gussied that up as "consulting for Square Enix" on her profile because it sounded better, and now that this story blew up she's had to deal with people paying a lot of attention to that embellishment. So she deleted it out of embarrassment, not to "cover her tracks." (Which would be absurd, as that info was already all over the web.)

Though to me it feels like, that someone who has nothing to hide, wouldn't even have felt bothered by the original article.

 

[TheSeks]

So is ShockingAlberto going to come and explain what he said about the MGS4 OT creator getting gifts from Konami? I'd like to know more about that, especially considering the person who created that OT is m0dus who is also a GAF mod.

m0dus did the art, way before he became a mod since he became a mod in 2010, MGS4 was 2008. And besides, the OP/thread creator is BruceLeeRoy, who has been suspected as a viral marketer due to his photoshop ability and other stuff.

In any case, I hope the dude that wrote the article makes a spin-off site kinda like Jeff did with GiantBomb. If he does independent fringe reviews and the like, I'd check it out. But the sad truth is: His days in the industry/"game jouralism" job are numbered since he's rocking the boat and the boat doesn't like to be rocked.

 

[TheBaronOfNA]

They all line up if that is what you are already inclined to believe.

Based on what we actually know, I think it's just as likely that her connection to Squeenix is essentially nonexistent -- just a couple of tiny contract jobs her friend who works there threw her while she was unemployed. She gussied that up as "consulting for Square Enix" on her profile because it sounded better, and now that this story blew up she's had to deal with people paying a lot of attention to that embellishment. So she deleted it out of embarrassment, not to "cover her tracks." (Which would be absurd, as that info was already all over the web.)

She screwed up when she threatened with Libel

 

[Evolved1]

Has something happened besides some rude comments on her steam profile?

I feel like as the day progressed and the hype started to get rolling (fed by her own actions, attempting to scrub profiles/history) that folks got a bit carried away and started connecting dots haphazardly and unfairly. Went too far off the deep end.

I think what she did was wrong. Her responses and attitude were fucking gross. But it just seems like anytime detectivegaf gets rolling they will dig up something with a bit of meat on it, fair enough, but once the blood is in the water it inevitably turns into grasping at straws and projection. Very often of the meanspirited sort. If something is valid, substantiated... hey that's generally fair game. But I think too often it just devolves into gymnastics to keep the hate heated.

So for part of the day we had some interesting dialog that eventually, as it often does, morphed into a bit of a witch-hunt.

As far as the vitriol and hateful comments... the c-word and worse being tossed around in different places. That's the usual disgusting shit from the internet's gutter-fed cesspool. Tragic as always, and unfortunate as ever.


edit: "victim" is probably too strong a word. But I don't know a better one.

 

[Zeliard]

She really should have come out and apologized at some point. She made things infinitely worse for herself by making that original snide comment about Eurogamer's "apology" and then disappearing into the mist afterwards, attempting to erase whatever could be viewed as incriminating.

Nothing can be done about Rab Florence at this point, and it cost him a job, but the least Lauren Wainwright can do is come out and be straight with people. You can't just wave your hands and magically make this sort of thing go away.

 

[AHappyPanda]

I feel like as the day progressed and the hype started to get rolling (fed by her own actions, attempting to scrub profiles/history) that folks got a bit carried away and started connecting dots haphazardly and unfairly. Went too far off the deep end.

I think what she did was wrong. Her responses and attitude were fucking gross. But it just seems like anytime detectivegaf gets rolling they will dig up something with a bit of meat on it, fair enough, but once the blood is in the water it inevitably turns into grasping at straws and projection. Very often of the meanspirited sort. If something is valid, substantiated... hey that's generally fair game. But I think too often it just devolves into gymnastics to keep the hate heated.

So for part of the day we had some interesting dialog that eventually, as it often does, morphed into a bit of a witch-hunt.

As far is the vitriol and hateful comments... the c-word and worse being tossed around in different places. That's the usual disgusting shit from the internet's gutter-fed cesspool. Tragic as always, and unfortunate as ever.

Can you expand on what you believe to be haphazard and unsubstantiated? Genuinely curious. Everything I've seen in this thread, while not 100% proven, really sheds her in a bad light.

Also agree on the personal attacks, but that's the Internet/anonymity for you.

 

[reptilescorpio]

I feel like as the day progressed and the hype started to get rolling (fed by her own actions, attempting to scrub profiles/history) that folks got a bit carried away and started connecting dots haphazardly and unfairly. Went too far off the deep end.

I think what she did was wrong. Her responses and attitude were fucking gross. But it just seems like anytime detectivegaf gets rolling they will dig up something with a bit of meat on it, fair enough, but once the blood is in the water it inevitably turns into grasping at straws and projection. Very often of the meanspirited sort. If something is valid, substantiated... hey that's generally fair game. But I think too often it just devolves into gymnastics to keep the hate heated.

So for part of the day we had some interesting dialog that eventually, as it often does, morphed into a bit of a witch-hunt.

As far as the vitriol and hateful comments... the c-word and worse being tossed around in different places. That's the usual disgusting shit from the internet's gutter-fed cesspool. Tragic as always, and unfortunate as ever.

Comments on Steam certainly haven't been acceptable at all but this thread has been pretty great about not denegrating her, all discussion was based on her actions and public made information. I don't see the issue with detectivegaf.

 

[Evolved1]

Comments on Steam certainly haven't been acceptable at all but this thread has been pretty great about not denegrating her, all discussion was based on her actions and public made information. I don't see the issue with detectivegaf.

That's fine, we don't have to agree.

 

[Rufus]

People are only calling her a victim because she's female.

Not quite and I would say that's too dismissive.
I haven't looked at whatever comments she's gotten outside of this thread, but I assume there were the usual crop of sexist remarks among them. So in a sense, yes, they may be calling her a victim because she's a woman, but only insofar as she's likely the victim of misogynist insults as a result of this debacle. I think that's a fair assessment. Haven't seen anyone excusing her (monumentally stupid and telling) actions with this, only a call to lay it off a bit, perhaps? That has it's own issues (chiefly the sad inevitability of such comments), but I still think people shouldn't get incensed over it.

 

[IC_Champion]

Honest journalists getting the shaft, while the corrupt ones reap the rewards...

 

[Amagon]

Somebody please think of the children!

 

[L00P]

Personally, I think that Keighley pic is harmless yet incredibly hilarious. It's no different from having ads plastered all over a web page, but that picture is like a physical manifestation of said web page. Which I found funny.

With that said, there was a similar pic like this a few years ago I saw on /v/. It's a pic of a Game Trailers web page plastered with KFC ads. The video player on the page is also playing a video of Keighley and behind him looms the image of Colonel Sanders. Anyone know what I'm talking about?

 

[ZanzibarBreeze]

Honest question: How did Geoff Keighley become the figurehead that he is?

It's unclear, but it seems that many of his peers are perpetually lined up waiting to pat him on the back for doing whatever it is that he does.

Having said that, I do like his Final Hours articles. I think he does a great job with those.

 

[davepoobond]

yeah, if anyone thinks that "real" journalism doesnt pander to their advertisers, you're sorely mistaken.

just open a newspaper. right next to that article about the afghanistan war is an ad for Tide laundry detergent

 

[Jake Tower]

yeah, if anyone thinks that "real" journalism doesnt pander to their advertisers, you're sorely mistaken.

just open a newspaper. right next to that article about the afghanistan war is an ad for Tide laundry detergent

How does an article about the war have anything to do with Tide? That is, how does the editorial content about the war possibly affect the newspaper's relationship with Tide or its ability to report on the war?

 

[TheGreatDivide]

Not quite and I would say that's too dismissive.
I haven't looked at whatever comments she's gotten outside of this thread, but I assume there were the usual crop of sexist remarks among them. So in a sense, yes, they may be calling her a victim because she's a woman, but only insofar as she's likely the victim of misogynist insults as a result of this debacle. I think that's a fair assessment. Haven't seen anyone excusing her (monumentally stupid and telling) actions with this, only a call to lay it off a bit, perhaps? That has it's own issues (chiefly the sad inevitability of such comments), but I still think people shouldn't get incensed over it.

The point is nobody would feel sorry for a guy who got a good man sacked if they got a few twitter insults. This woman is undeserving of sympathy.

 

[zaxon]

Though to me it feels like, that someone who has nothing to hide, wouldn't even have felt bothered by the original article.

Not trying to defend her actions here, she's certainly handled the whole thing poorly, but look at it from a different perspective. She's a young, relatively inexperienced writer with a fairly weak resume and she just had her credibility called out on a prominent website for doing what is basically accepted behavior in her industry -- an industry that probably has an unwritten rule that you don't criticize others in the field. In that environment, she might have felt justified to complain about what seemed like an unfair singling out. She was wrong, yes, but why does that have to be due to some sinister underlying motive instead of just a simple human failing?

This thing got massive incredibly fast, and the backlash has been enormous. It's not easy to admit you're wrong under normal circumstances... can you imagine what it's like when you wake up one morning and the entire internet is shitting on your whole professional career?

 

[Neuromancer]

I wish Eurogamer was still doing its podcast. I'd love to hear Tom Bramwell and co. talk about this.

 

[chickdigger802]

In short, if we don't have Geoff...

The 'faces of gaming media' is gonna be the... other guys from gametrailers, or those Xplay people.

urg.

 

[HK-47]

So are we still dickstroking over how deep the Wainwright connections go or have we moved back to actually discussing the things in the article?

 

[phantomspiker]

In short, if we don't have Geoff...

The 'faces of gaming media' is gonna be the... other guys from gametrailers, or those Xplay people.

urg.

I vote for this guy.

 

[PsySal]

Very basic familiarity with someone or even just physical proximity can humanize someone and make them more sympathetic. FFS this even has a name - "Propinquity."

One way or another, internet needs more Propinquity.

 

[davepoobond]

How does an article about the war have anything to do with Tide? That is, how does the editorial content about the war possibly affect the newspaper's relationship with Tide?

idk, use your imagination. any time an advertiser doesn't want to associate itself with a controversial article or news piece they threaten to pull advertising for fear of being associated with it. Maybe Tide is funding terrorists secretly, for example?

there's a lot more gray area when it comes to games journalism because its easier to have a conflict of interest.

But, I don't think the Geoff Keighley picture is all that terrible. Doritos and Mountain Dew essentially do not have anything to do with games, just as Tide does with a war, would you not say? What do they have to do with games other than doing cross-promotions for Halo?

Would Doritos all of a sudden blacklist a web site that gives Halo 4 a 3/10? No. Microsoft would, and they're the ones that pay that same web site for advertising today and in the future. Game sites do not review Doritos.

 

[TheBaronOfNA]

Not trying to defend her actions here, she's certainly handled the whole thing poorly, but look at it from a different perspective. She's a young, relatively inexperienced writer with a fairly weak resume and she just had her credibility called out on a prominent website for doing what is basically accepted behavior in her industry -- an industry that probably has an unwritten rule that you don't criticize others in the field. In that environment, she might have felt justified to complain about what seemed like an unfair singling out. She was wrong, yes, but why does that have to be due to some sinister underlying motive instead of just a simple human failing?

This thing got massive incredibly fast, and the backlash has been enormous. It's not easy to admit you're wrong under normal circumstances... can you imagine what it's like when you wake up one morning and the entire internet is shitting on your whole professional career?

Can you imagine a guy losing his job and some of his credibility because a rookie panicked and threatened his website with the UK press equivalent of an Atomic Bomb?

 

[chickdigger802]

I vote for this guy.

was thinking more of other gaming tv personalities, but I would so watch a weekly show of

"Big Jeffrey's video games"

 

[AHappyPanda]

Not trying to defend her actions here, she's certainly handled the whole thing poorly, but look at it from a different perspective. She's a young, relatively inexperienced writer with a fairly weak resume and she just had her credibility called out on a prominent website for doing what is basically accepted behavior in her industry -- an industry that probably has an unwritten rule that you don't criticize others in the field. In that environment, she might have felt justified to complain about what seemed like an unfair singling out. She was wrong, yes, but why does that have to be due to some sinister underlying motive instead of just a simple human failing?

This thing got massive incredibly fast, and the backlash has been enormous. It's not easy to admit you're wrong under normal circumstances... can you imagine what it's like when you wake up one morning and the entire internet is shitting on your whole professional career?

Agree, everyone makes mistakes. Don't agree that you can't go against the grain in any given industry, in this case games journalism. Countless other journos have tried their best to stay away from the "dark side" of the industry, she seemingly went along with the crowd. Is that wrong? Not necessarily, like you said, she's an up and comer and being relatively inexperienced, you sometimes have to play the game. At the same time, she could've tried to separate herself from the crowd and go the path others have taken that doesn't lead to people questioning your integrity. I'm not saying she didn't try, I have no idea if she did or did not. But, there was a fork in the road for her, she chose the path she's currently on and is facing the consequences.

 

[Jintor]

Can you imagine a guy losing his job and some of his credibility because a rookie panicked and threatened his website with the UK press equivalent of an Atomic Bomb?

It's like the XCOM of games journalism

 

[Rufus]

The point is nobody would feel sorry for a guy who got a good man sacked if they got a few twitter insults.

A guy also wouldn't get gender specific insults thrown at him in quite the way women do. And I'm pretty sure you'd find sympathetic people regardless, however few. Jonah Lehrer must have gotten some for how his career imploded around him as well. Regular human empathy, where you realize someone's being an idiot, while also feeling a bit sorry for them.

This woman is undeserving of sympathy.

Not for doing what this thread is (or has come to be) about, but certainly for whatever misogyny drifts her way as a result. Or do you think she deserves to have her Steam profile spammed with misogynist jokes because she's somewhat of a shill and symptomatic of this industries' blurry lines as far as press and PR are concerned? Call her a moron, sure, but why stoop down to misogyny?

People like this fool here are just embarrassing and even 4chan users piled on him:

 

[BurnOutBrighter]

yeah, if anyone thinks that "real" journalism doesnt pander to their advertisers, you're sorely mistaken.

just open a newspaper. right next to that article about the afghanistan war is an ad for Tide laundry detergent

Not a conflict of interest.

 

[JDSN]

It's like the XCOM of games journalism

Dont you dare to make any Xcom-related posts in non-Xcom threads!! Its suspicious enough to that you have a fanfic thread, an OT, an avatar and got the review code earlier!

Spoiler

Give me some Xcom swag plz, ill shut up

 

[IdreamofHIME]

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/member.php?u=65795

Last Activity: Today

She posts a lot in Tomb Raider threads :/

 

[endresults]

I vote for this guy.

He's our Ebert.

 

[AHappyPanda]

A guy also wouldn't get gender specific insults thrown at him in quite the way women do. And I'm pretty sure you'd find sympathetic people regardless, however few. Jonah Lehrer must have gotten some for how his career imploded around him as well. Regular human empathy, where you realize someone's being an idiot, while also feeling a bit sorry for them.


Not for doing what this thread is (or has come to be) about, but certainly for whatever misogyny drifts her way as a result. Or do you think she deserves to have her Steam profile spammed with misogynist jokes because she's somewhat of a shill and symptomatic of this industries' blurry lines as far as press and PR are concerned? Call her a moron, sure, but why stoop down to misogyny?

People like this fool here are just embarrassing and even 4chan users piled on him:

4Chan defended someone? What is happening...

 

[ElectricBlue187]

She posts a lot in Tomb Raider threads :/

Maybe she just really loves Tomb Raider, a new game from Square Enix, brought to you by Mountian Dew Game Fuel

 

[CambriaRising]

He's our Ebert.

I like where this thread is going.

 

[Jintor]

Dont you dare to make any Xcom-related posts in non-Xcom threads!! Its suspicious enough to that you have a fanfic thread, an OT, an avatar and got the review code earlier!

Spoiler

Give me some Xcom swag plz, ill shut up

Shh, you'll blow my cover!

 

[Dawg]

Can't believe I spent most of my day in this thread...

Spoiler

Worth it

 

[Mama Robotnik]

I've spent the last few hours reading throughout all of this, Twitter links, linked articles, and I'm still digesting it all. Some thoughts.

• A new thread with a proper synopsis of events, links to articles, evidence gathered (links, twitter feeds, etc) and perhaps quotes from some of the best posts from this gargantuan topic is needed. This story is becoming increasingly impenetrable and its too important for that to be allowed to happen.

• I hope Rab Florence continues to write. The original article was a great piece of work. I hope he speaks more about specific people who have directed abuse towards him and have engaged in unsavoury practices.

• Eurogamer have damaged their credibility significantly. They were likely trying to be pragmatic - their profit margins may not have survived the UK's viscous libel laws and litigation costs, and it could be that they had literally no choice other than to fold. The act is done however - they sacked/forced into resignation a genuine journalist based on legal threats from a woman that entirely embodies the corruption he was trying to expose.

• Lauren Wainwright invited scrutiny of her entire journalistic career and internet commentary the moment she used her legal training (as she admitted on Twitter) to set into motion a chain of events that caused a fantastic, researched and passionate writer to end his job/have his job ended at Eurogamer. The research that has followed has evidenced her as a self-described journalist who is corrupt to the core - and has produced reviews designed to sell a game on behalf of her Square Enix paymasters. Through her planned misrepresentation and legal bullying, she is the enemy of gamers and antithesis of Rab and the other few examples of legitimate gaming journalism to exist in the industry. Hopefully her career in this field is utterly finished before it even began.

• The personal attacks are utterly unacceptable and entirely unnecessary. There is more than enough legitimate professional criticism and public evidence to be labelled at her to argue the point. Insults, references to her gender, anything else of this nature is unneeded and completely irrelevant.

• MCV have lost credibility entirely, and effectively circled their wagons around a corrupt journalist as she was one of their own.
  

• I want to know more about this allegation that a NeoGAF OT author was rewarded for their work with gifts from a company associated with the game he advocated.
  

 

[Dead Man Typing]

m0dus did the art, way before he became a mod since he became a mod in 2010, MGS4 was 2008. And besides, the OP/thread creator is BruceLeeRoy, who has been suspected as a viral marketer due to his photoshop ability and other stuff.

In any case, I hope the dude that wrote the article makes a spin-off site kinda like Jeff did with GiantBomb. If he does independent fringe reviews and the like, I'd check it out. But the sad truth is: His days in the industry/"game jouralism" job are numbered since he's rocking the boat and the boat doesn't like to be rocked.

The great thing about the Rab Florence/Eurogamer arrangement was that Rab isn't in the games industry. He never has been, he's a comedy writer with a strong opinion, who loves games.

This gives him a unique freedom to broadcast opinions from the outside which are both well written and designed to provoke reaction. Opinions which are free from PR influence and the games industry buddy system. When Eurogamer gave him a spot to broadcast his opinions to their large audience, I'm sure the appeal to Rab was to speak directly to so many people, not any kind of freelancer pay cheque. I'm surprised it took 19 articles for him to create enough waves to cause what we've seen today.

Shame on Eurogamer for caving. I understand why they did it, and I don't actually blame them because it was probably the right business decision. But by changing one word of Rab's artice they took away his independence and compromised his integrity leaving him no choice but to quit. There's no doubt in my mind that he quit.

 

[ElectricBlue187]

It occours to me that the thread title is missing the delicious taste of the Dew, a taste no gamer should ever be without.