GW 2 Devs/Playerbase Twitter Discussion

[Leo G.4501]

@Dengar.1785 said:I... Feel bad for Peter Fries. Did he deserve some sort of disciplinary measure? Sure. Did he deserve the same thing as Jessica Price? I don't think so.

For that matter, my mind is in all sorts of places about the firing. I understand this was a really hard decision to make, and I accept that being let go is a logical consequence to JP's behavior. Still, something about this doesn't feel quite right.

Consequences of white knighting.

If you ever have to white knight, ask if its worth it in the end. Save your kid? Worth it. Defend your dignity? If you value pride or self esteem more. Win an internet shouting match? Never.

[why.8760]

@Nabuko Darayon.9645 said:I will be closely watching the aftermath of this decision MO.

If ANet decides to turn their company into a more totalitarian way to accommodate the new rising spirit in the world I will be leaving this game as well.

By aftermath, I mean you just created a new precedent on how to get a dev fired so start expecting major provocations by trolls towards your devs that are active on twitter. And trust me they will abuse it.

I just have to say this is the dumbest thing I've ever read, the precedent was set over a decade ago, Anet encourages their community to interact with them at every turn, in every way, on every platform, all the time. If you label your social media account with the fact you work at Anet, Anet fans will follow you and interact with you. If you insult and belittle fans for doing what ANet has literally always asked of its community, you'll be punished. Not sure why any of this is complicated in any manner.

[Ardaius.8439]

@Mike O Brien.4613 said:Recently two of our employees failed to uphold our standards of communicating with players. Their attacks on the community were unacceptable. As a result, they’re no longer with the company.

I want to be clear that the statements they made do not reflect the views of ArenaNet at all. As a company we always strive to have a collaborative relationship with the Guild Wars community. We value your input. We make this game for you.

Mo

Thank you, I am not going to name the employees in question but thank you so much for valuing us. As a human being, I know all to well that it sucks to not have a job and a steady income to make ends meet, but at the same time it's not acceptable to be rude to others and with things now a days. It's a wonderful sight to see a company actually favor and treasure their customers and community rather then...You know.

Wish some companies would follow the example you have set, Mike. I won't name said companies but just know this, We appreciate the justice you have served and grateful that you actually care for us, the community as a whole. From the bottom of my heart, Thank you and you have my respect. I always have recommend Guild Wars 2 to friends who never played it, and I shall continue to do so. Especially after this, this is a good example for all business's to follow!

-Dessi

[LucianDK.8615]

@Bloodstealer.5978 said:

@"LucianDK.8615" said:I do not defend her actions, but its the sheer disgusting behavior of the community that I stand against. Theres absolutely nothing to be proud of here, even if she deserved it.

There ya go.. your agreeing with many others in this post, this community who also feel she deserved it. No one said anything about being proud of the actions taken, but good riddance to a bad egg is imo quite apt.Why do you feel that a community voicing their absolute disdain for JP over her inexcusable bad mouthing of players, disgusting behaviour???..

At the end of the day people can disagree on pretty much anything, but people like JP prefer to take disagreement to a whole different level.She chose to use a personal account and opened the floor for critique, which she handled terabad.. ..when challenged with opposing views or offered opinion she played to form and went off on one ... it was JP that was demonstrating quite clearly what" utterly disgusting behaviour" looks like imo.

As for PF.. I think it wouldn't do any harm for ANET to revisit this and maybe re-consider their action unless of course there are other things that we don't know about that swung the pendulum the way it did.

The community went way over the rails in witch hunting and baying for blood. That is what i find utterly deplorable. Plenty of angsty edgelord coments that is disgusting to read.

[Vagrant.7206]

@Balsa.3951 said:

@"Mike O Brien.4613" said:Recently two of our employees failed to uphold our standards of communicating with players. Their attacks on the community were unacceptable. As a result, they’re no longer with the company.

I want to be clear that the statements they made do not reflect the views of ArenaNet at all. As a company we always strive to have a collaborative relationship with the Guild Wars community. We value your input. We make this game for you.

Mo

Sad person looses job over a tweet... I just wonder how many people here would still have their jobs if that standard was applied to themselves.

Words and actions outside of the context of your job do matter in real life -- this is evident in many ways.

The trick is to keep your "less than pleasant" words and actions in the private sphere, not a public venue like Twitter. Her account was visible to everyone, and directly tied her with ArenaNet. It was the equivalent of shouting racist ideologies in a crowded street. Somebody's likely going to notice and get you in trouble.

Should we take joy or glee in them getting fired? Absolutely not, I wish that on nobody. But in this case, it's not surprising and is one of the potentially valid responses to this incident.

[Gaile Gray.6029]

Hey folks,

We want to make it clear that we do not intend to host comments that are disrespectful towards current or former employees (or other forum members), that attempt to rehash the matter ad infinitum, or that in any way are a breach of the Forums Code of Conduct. We have a policy that supports valid, constructive posts, and we are dedicated to keeping the tone of the forums reasonable and productive. Please post with wisdom and thoughtfulness.

Thank you.

[ShontivaFeva.2916]

A very unexpected decision, but a decisive one that puts the community first. Thank you for making hard decisions Mo

I design medical software for a living, a bit different from narrative design, but I believe design principles apply across the board. One must be married to the customer's problems. If I ever told a hospital that I don't need their feedback because they haven't ever designed medical software before I would look like an utter fool. The customer has more insight into what their needs are than anyone else, whether those needs are more diverse dialogue options or a way to run numbers from their databases without having to deal with SQL. My job is to figure out a solution that works for the broadest swath of customers and I can only do that by speaking with those customers, iterating on prototypes, and usability testing. You could of course do iterative narratives to see what, out of a sample size makes people the most satisfied, but I'm sure that gets super weird and it could potentially ignore whatever ANet's vision for the story is.

I don't have my place of work posted in my social media feed, nor would I ever engage my customers outside of work, but the amount of times I deal with complaints meant for another development team, criticism about how a workflow isn't what a certain customer does, or just inane unrelated things is basically every time I meet with a customer.

I don't know what narrative design is like, and I'm no story teller, but empathy is a key ingredient in being a good designer. Technical stuff doesn't matter if you can't hear what your customer's needs are. You're one part customer service and one part developer as near as I can tell.

[Dengar.1785]

@LucianDK.8615 said:

@Bloodstealer.5978 said:

@LucianDK.8615 said:I do not defend her actions, but its the sheer disgusting behavior of the community that I stand against. Theres absolutely nothing to be proud of here, even if she deserved it.

There ya go.. your agreeing with many others in this post, this community who also feel she deserved it. No one said anything about being proud of the actions taken, but good riddance to a bad egg is imo quite apt.Why do you feel that a community voicing their absolute disdain for JP over her inexcusable bad mouthing of players, disgusting behaviour???..

At the end of the day people can disagree on pretty much anything, but people like JP prefer to take disagreement to a whole different level.She chose to use a personal account and opened the floor for critique, which she handled terabad.. ..when challenged with opposing views or offered opinion she played to form and went off on one ... it was JP that was demonstrating quite clearly what" utterly disgusting behaviour" looks like imo.

As for PF.. I think it wouldn't do any harm for ANET to revisit this and maybe re-consider their action unless of course there are other things that we don't know about that swung the pendulum the way it did.

The community went way over the rails in witch hunting and baying for blood. That is what i find utterly deplorable. Plenty of angsty edgelord coments that is disgusting to read.

I've seen people express a little too much glee over her being let go, but I don't understand what you mean by witch hunt. Who's burning innocent people at the stake?

[Dreadshow.9320]

@ReV.6097 said:If only Disney and Lucas Film had ANets guts and foresight.

Disney did in one occasion, unfortunately Disney being Disney the matter I'm referring to cost a whole studio to loose their jobs and a game to be shutdown prematurely RIP Marvel Heroes.

[Mikemaker.1493]

Just wanted to come on to say I'm happy for the very swift and quick action to remove such toxicity from a work environment and help the playerbase. I'll get Path of Fire for that!

[lunartaxi.2987]

Pretty disappointed in you bowing that mob.

[Azrielvon.7836]

While I believe many applaud Anet's movement, I feel that firing Fries might be overboard. I mean, the only crime he kinda did was to White Knight. Maybe a warning would have suffice. I disagree with what he did but I still choked up when I heard that he is gone as well..

[Kitta.3657]

@Oneiroid.9245 said:I have to say I do not agree with the firing of Peter Fries and I feel anet has caved TOO far to community demands, as what Peter did didn't warrant such a severe reaction. He has been a long-standing employee at your company who has been nothing but nice and may have made a singular foolish choice. Surely he may have needed to be reprimanded but to go so far as to fire him is extremely rash and giving in to the 'bandwagon' of anger, and in my eyes is shameful. I'm not going to touch the topic of Jessica Price-- for Peter alone, I feel this was too severe and I feel you did not make the right decision in his case. This whole incident is already such a disaster on BOTH sides of the topic and this just makes things worse. I suppose if this is anet's choice, it cannot be undone, but to any employees reading this who have had a say in this manner, I hope that in the future you consider these things way more carefully as whatever crowd was crying for Peter to be fired really did not actually represent your whole community and was merely the loudest, not the most rational. There were better and less extreme solutions for his behavior.

Listen, none of us know the full details of what happened behind the scenes. You're putting forth some assumptions about Anet's decision. For all we know, he could've decided to leave out of his own will or he could've stood by his first position and thus encountered a disagreement with the bosses. We just don't know that stuff. Maybe they had a talk with Jessica as well and this wasn't the first course of action either. I'm more inclined to believe, especially in Peter's case, that a senior employee like him doesn't get the boot instantly like that for an offense like his.

As for the general subject, it's not something I would rejoice to see someone lose their job but the actions taken were out of bounds (quite extreme attitude from the individual herself) and disciplinary actions were in order so I am glad to see Anet is not afraid to act when their employees cross the line.Twitter is a public social media and when you're discussing your work, presenting yourself as an employee of a company, etc. you do have to be careful with your words and no matter how loud you shout that it's your personal social media account... you've simply crossed the line. If you believe your account to be your private matter and not regard your employer, then make your account actually private. 2 birds 1 stone. No more engagement in criticism you cannot handle and no harm done to your career. I hope the lesson is taken if not now, later down the road. I prefer redemption stories.

[Zaklex.6308]

Actually, I'm disappointed in ArenaNet...and the vast majority of the GW community as well...this is 2018, we all need to move into the now and start learning to separate a persons freedom of speech on PERSONAL social media from what they say on BUSINESS related social media. This actually extends beyond social media and includes sports personal conduct clauses...what you or anyone does on their own PERSONAL time does not reflect on how well they perform a job. I'm going to be quite unpopular with the following, but all of this really started with the Ray Rice thing(look it up if you don't know about that) and the NFL. Now, before you think I condone any type of abuse against another person you'd be so far from the truth it would make me laugh, but having said that, even though what he did to his girlfriend in an elevator during the off-season was atrocious, I do not think it was anyone's business but his and hers alone. If you're going to hold someone else up as a role model, society has a serious issue, the only role models should be your parents(if you have them of course).

The only way society is going to advance is this way: what you do at work or while representing your employer is directly related to that employer; what you do or say on your own PERSONAL time has nothing to do with your employer and until the rest of the world learns this we're all screwed(that even includes if you reference your employer on your own PERSONAL social media handles). I DO NOT CARE what someone does on their own time, nor should anyone else but that person, even the employer should not care what that person does on their own PERSONAL time, but we as a society have forgotten how to separate work from personal time...that is what work hours are for, so those people unable to tell the difference can.

Wake up world, this is 2018, not 1984 or 1950 or anyone other year...time to evolve or die out.

[Ivan the Slayer.7534]

While I do dislike people loosing jobs over, well, speech. And It seems to me that this is the best decision ANet could have come to. I'll come back to the game after a while because of this. And if I manage to get some spare cash, ANet, it all yours. Saved some money avoiding a lot of other entertainment anyway. I'm (not)looking at you Star Wars.

[why.8760]

@LucianDK.8615 said:

@Bloodstealer.5978 said:

@LucianDK.8615 said:I do not defend her actions, but its the sheer disgusting behavior of the community that I stand against. Theres absolutely nothing to be proud of here, even if she deserved it.

There ya go.. your agreeing with many others in this post, this community who also feel she deserved it. No one said anything about being proud of the actions taken, but good riddance to a bad egg is imo quite apt.Why do you feel that a community voicing their absolute disdain for JP over her inexcusable bad mouthing of players, disgusting behaviour???..

At the end of the day people can disagree on pretty much anything, but people like JP prefer to take disagreement to a whole different level.She chose to use a personal account and opened the floor for critique, which she handled terabad.. ..when challenged with opposing views or offered opinion she played to form and went off on one ... it was JP that was demonstrating quite clearly what" utterly disgusting behaviour" looks like imo.

As for PF.. I think it wouldn't do any harm for ANET to revisit this and maybe re-consider their action unless of course there are other things that we don't know about that swung the pendulum the way it did.

The community went way over the rails in witch hunting and baying for blood. That is what i find utterly deplorable. Plenty of angsty edgelord coments that is disgusting to read.

I'm sorry but that is just false. The community reacted exactly like it should have. An employee of Anet attacked a community member that has added a ton for absolutely no reason. Anet has always asked the entire community to opine,interact, criticise, discuss on every platform, everywhere, all the time, in game and out. You cannot tell a community you will always be open to them then allow an employee to insult and degrade.

[Dengar.1785]

@Zaklex.6308 said:Actually, I'm disappointed in ArenaNet...and the vast majority of the GW community as well...this is 2018, we all need to move into the now and start learning to separate a persons freedom of speech on PERSONAL social media from what they say on BUSINESS related social media. This actually extends beyond social media and includes sports personal conduct clauses...what you or anyone does on their own PERSONAL time does not reflect on how well they perform a job. I'm going to be quite unpopular with the following, but all of this really started with the Ray Rice thing(look it up if you don't know about that) and the NFL. Now, before you think I condone any type of abuse against another person you'd be so far from the truth it would make me laugh, but having said that, even though what he did to his girlfriend in an elevator during the off-season was atrocious, I do not think it was anyone's business but his and hers alone. If you're going to hold someone else up as a role model, society has a serious issue, the only role models should be your parents(if you have them of course).

The only way society is going to advance is this way: what you do at work or while representing your employer is directly related to that employer; what you do or say on your own PERSONAL time has nothing to do with your employer and until the rest of the world learns this we're all screwed(that even includes if you reference your employer on your own PERSONAL social media handles). I DO NOT CARE what someone does on their own time, nor should anyone else but that person, even the employer should not care what that person does on their own PERSONAL time, but we as a society have forgotten how to separate work from personal time...that is what work hours are for, so those people unable to tell the difference can.

Wake up world, this is 2018, not 1984 or 1950 or anyone other year...time to evolve or die out.

Whether the media is personal or public becomes rather irrelevant when the people you're mistreating are the people who buy and promote your company's product.

[Mikemaker.1493]

@will de grijze jager.6594 said:

@Ephemiel.5694 said:

@Mel.8734 said:

@"Mike O Brien.4613" said:Recently two of our employees failed to uphold our standards of communicating with players. Their attacks on the community were unacceptable. As a result, they’re no longer with the company.

I want to be clear that the statements they made do not reflect the views of ArenaNet at all. As a company we always strive to have a collaborative relationship with the Guild Wars community. We value your input. We make this game for you.

Mo

Please also take a good look at this employe:

https://i.imgur.com/vXbH8BN.png

Oh so there's MORE of these kinds of people in Anet's employment. Starting to think the company of full of them.

You mean kitten types?

Kitten types? What would those be?

[Noviere.7309]

Wow. The angry mob wins.

[kmdziak.1076]

@Zaklex.6308 said:Actually, I'm disappointed in ArenaNet...and the vast majority of the GW community as well...this is 2018, we all need to move into the now and start learning to separate a persons freedom of speech on PERSONAL social media from what they say on BUSINESS related social media. This actually extends beyond social media and includes sports personal conduct clauses...what you or anyone does on their own PERSONAL time does not reflect on how well they perform a job. I'm going to be quite unpopular with the following, but all of this really started with the Ray Rice thing(look it up if you don't know about that) and the NFL. Now, before you think I condone any type of abuse against another person you'd be so far from the truth it would make me laugh, but having said that, even though what he did to his girlfriend in an elevator during the off-season was atrocious, I do not think it was anyone's business but his and hers alone. If you're going to hold someone else up as a role model, society has a serious issue, the only role models should be your parents(if you have them of course).

The only way society is going to advance is this way: what you do at work or while representing your employer is directly related to that employer; what you do or say on your own PERSONAL time has nothing to do with your employer and until the rest of the world learns this we're all screwed(that even includes if you reference your employer on your own PERSONAL social media handles). I DO NOT CARE what someone does on their own time, nor should anyone else but that person, even the employer should not care what that person does on their own PERSONAL time, but we as a society have forgotten how to separate work from personal time...that is what work hours are for, so those people unable to tell the difference can.

Wake up world, this is 2018, not 1984 or 1950 or anyone other year...time to evolve or die out.

Do u even realize what the problem was about ? because from what u've just wrote, it seems like u have no idea. She publicly bashed a CUSTOMER of the company she works for while talking about a topic regarding this game, she disregarded the feedback of the customer, something a developer should never do, because her job is to create a product that people will want to buy, what she did showed that she doesn't give a fuck about your/mine or any other customer's feedback, it doesn't matter if she did that in her PERSONAL time, off work, because the topic involved her job she was at that moment representing the company.

[why.8760]

@"Gaile Gray.6029" said:Hey folks,

We want to make it clear that we do not intend to host comments that are disrespectful towards current or former employees (or other forum members), that attempt to rehash the matter ad infinitum, or that in any way are a breach of the Forums Code of Conduct. We have a policy that supports valid, constructive posts, and we are dedicated to keeping the tone of the forums reasonable and productive. Please post with wisdom and thoughtfulness.

Thank you.

because it can never be said enough,

"We love you Gaile!"

[LucianDK.8615]

@why.8760 said:

@LucianDK.8615 said:

@Bloodstealer.5978 said:

@LucianDK.8615 said:I do not defend her actions, but its the sheer disgusting behavior of the community that I stand against. Theres absolutely nothing to be proud of here, even if she deserved it.

There ya go.. your agreeing with many others in this post, this community who also feel she deserved it. No one said anything about being proud of the actions taken, but good riddance to a bad egg is imo quite apt.Why do you feel that a community voicing their absolute disdain for JP over her inexcusable bad mouthing of players, disgusting behaviour???..

At the end of the day people can disagree on pretty much anything, but people like JP prefer to take disagreement to a whole different level.She chose to use a personal account and opened the floor for critique, which she handled terabad.. ..when challenged with opposing views or offered opinion she played to form and went off on one ... it was JP that was demonstrating quite clearly what" utterly disgusting behaviour" looks like imo.

As for PF.. I think it wouldn't do any harm for ANET to revisit this and maybe re-consider their action unless of course there are other things that we don't know about that swung the pendulum the way it did.

The community went way over the rails in witch hunting and baying for blood. That is what i find utterly deplorable. Plenty of angsty edgelord coments that is disgusting to read.

I'm sorry but that is just false. The community reacted exactly like it should have. An employee of Anet attacked a community member that has added a ton for absolutely no reason. Anet has always asked the entire community to opine,interact, criticise, discuss on every platform, everywhere, all the time, in game and out. You cannot tell a community you will always be open to them then allow an employee to insult and degrade.

Call it what you want, nothing was presented as reasonable discourse with a very large amount of spammed threads to clog the forum. Plenty of posters declared for throwing anet under the bus and comming up with all sorts of ridiculous things such as asking if they were racist or had a whole culture of it. Simply unable to wait for a response from Anet on the matter.

[Ashen.2907]

@Zaklex.6308 said:Actually, I'm disappointed in ArenaNet...and the vast majority of the GW community as well...this is 2018, we all need to move into the now and start learning to separate a persons freedom of speech on PERSONAL social media from what they say on BUSINESS related social media. This actually extends beyond social media and includes sports personal conduct clauses...what you or anyone does on their own PERSONAL time does not reflect on how well they perform a job. I'm going to be quite unpopular with the following, but all of this really started with the Ray Rice thing(look it up if you don't know about that) and the NFL. Now, before you think I condone any type of abuse against another person you'd be so far from the truth it would make me laugh, but having said that, even though what he did to his girlfriend in an elevator during the off-season was atrocious, I do not think it was anyone's business but his and hers alone. If you're going to hold someone else up as a role model, society has a serious issue, the only role models should be your parents(if you have them of course).

The only way society is going to advance is this way: what you do at work or while representing your employer is directly related to that employer; what you do or say on your own PERSONAL time has nothing to do with your employer and until the rest of the world learns this we're all screwed(that even includes if you reference your employer on your own PERSONAL social media handles). I DO NOT CARE what someone does on their own time, nor should anyone else but that person, even the employer should not care what that person does on their own PERSONAL time, but we as a society have forgotten how to separate work from personal time...that is what work hours are for, so those people unable to tell the difference can.

Wake up world, this is 2018, not 1984 or 1950 or anyone other year...time to evolve or die out.

If the person, on their own time and personal social media accounts, is actively promoting themself as a company representative then they have decided to erase the line between personal and professional.

[Dengar.1785]

@LucianDK.8615 said:

@why.8760 said:

@LucianDK.8615 said:

@Bloodstealer.5978 said:

@LucianDK.8615 said:I do not defend her actions, but its the sheer disgusting behavior of the community that I stand against. Theres absolutely nothing to be proud of here, even if she deserved it.

There ya go.. your agreeing with many others in this post, this community who also feel she deserved it. No one said anything about being proud of the actions taken, but good riddance to a bad egg is imo quite apt.Why do you feel that a community voicing their absolute disdain for JP over her inexcusable bad mouthing of players, disgusting behaviour???..

At the end of the day people can disagree on pretty much anything, but people like JP prefer to take disagreement to a whole different level.She chose to use a personal account and opened the floor for critique, which she handled terabad.. ..when challenged with opposing views or offered opinion she played to form and went off on one ... it was JP that was demonstrating quite clearly what" utterly disgusting behaviour" looks like imo.

As for PF.. I think it wouldn't do any harm for ANET to revisit this and maybe re-consider their action unless of course there are other things that we don't know about that swung the pendulum the way it did.

The community went way over the rails in witch hunting and baying for blood. That is what i find utterly deplorable. Plenty of angsty edgelord coments that is disgusting to read.

I'm sorry but that is just false. The community reacted exactly like it should have. An employee of Anet attacked a community member that has added a ton for absolutely no reason. Anet has always asked the entire community to opine,interact, criticise, discuss on every platform, everywhere, all the time, in game and out. You cannot tell a community you will always be open to them then allow an employee to insult and degrade.

Call it what you want, nothing was presented as reasonable discourse with a very large amount of spammed threads to clog the forum. Plenty of posters declared for throwing anet under the bus and comming up with all sorts of ridiculous things such as asking if they were racist or had a whole culture of it. Simply unable to wait for a response from Anet on the matter.

I do not see how this is relevant to the matter at hand. The important part here is her unacceptable behavior towards the community that keeps this game running. This, and ONLY this, is the reason she was let go. Mob rules or witch hunts have nothing to do with this.

[Leo G.4501]

@Noviere.7309 said:Wow. The angry mob wins.

You can thank Twitter ^_^

Are we ready to burn down mass social media yet?