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Tibbsy wrote:

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:


Are you kidding... Dakka is totally the "People's Court"

People's court of Dakka? I'm glad that's not a thing, that would be a lot of victims getting unfairly imprisoned and/or executed!

Well, there'd be a lot of Victim Blaming, as well as needless thanking Obama... So I think it'd even out somehow



Back on topic, Anyone know approximately, how long Valve/Steam takes to "return" correspondence when you send anything?

 Frazzled wrote:
Well you said you were sure they knew he wasn't a threat. Not meaning to belabor that, just that internet threats are still threats, by people you don't know. Never take any threat lightly.

We weren't the ones threatened; it is up to them and local law enforcement to determine what to do with it, and they have. No one, myself included, has said that people shouldn't take threats seriously. I can be fairly sure that they didn't take it as a actual threat to cause injury since they didn't have him arrested, which they could have, but just bounced him from Steam instead for being stupid and unprofessional. Since you don't know what Steam is just believe me and others when we say it isn't something an indie developer wants to happen.

EDIT: ayah, I'm just more sensitive on this subject for personal reasons. I'll drop that point.
Not only do I not know what Steam is, I don't even know what an indie developer is.


Aren't they all?

Indie developers are video game developers (often one man or small teams) who usually create video games without the financial support of a video game publisher.

It reminds me of a conversation I've had with a friend awhile back about the naivete of indie developers, and the whole perception of what indie developing is. You have people without developed business and social skills (but gifted game makers) thrown into situations where they have to act like a business with no clue how.

A lot of times they aren't 'thrown into' it but jump in without regard for anything beyond the development side.

All the more reason not to bite the hand that feeds you.

True enough, poor wording on my end, but yeah. They are poorly equipped (if they are equipped at all) to deal with anything beyond the development side of things, leading to these kinds of outbursts and a huge amount of unprofessional and poor behavior.

 Ensis Ferrae wrote:

 SilverMK2 wrote:
I would expect most people to be able to distinguish between genuine threats and someone just mouthing off.

While true, I don't think that anyone can really afford to legitimately act as though an online threat is anything but genuine.

Oh, I think you definitely can. I'm absolutely not condoning it, it's beyond stupid and unprofessional and I think this guy got what he deserved, but to be completely honest, if some random person told me they wanted to kill me on the internet, without some kind of further evidence or information I would be very unlikely to take it seriously. There would be pretty close to a 0% chance that it would change anything about my day to day life. If it was somebody I knew, I would take it seriously or not based on my prior experience with them and my estimation of their personality based on what I knew (or didn't know).

Of course, I already take precautions in order to make myself more difficult to kill anyway, so YMMV.

Again, absolutely not condoning it, but the vast majority of these kind of threats are either someone inappropriately blowing off steam or attempting to exercise some kind of fear tactics, and in either case I'm not going to give them the satisfaction of caring. In the incredibly small chance that it's legitimate, well, that's why I take certain precautions.


Bottom line: Good on Valve for dropping this idiot.

If it was Phil Fish it probably would have been okay

Smart move indie developer back to flippin burgers?

Let's face it this guy acted in such an unprofessional manner it is for the better he is out of the industry. Art (movies, TV, VG, etc.) Is a thing that requires compromise and social skills, something this man obviously lacks.