Superman 64 Discussion Thread

[Benji]

[Lineker]

Marked improvement.

[Skummy]

So your chief complaint is that, in an interview with Chris Roberts, they interviewed Chris Roberts?

[SeanDMan]

So your chief complaint is that, in an interview with Chris Roberts, they interviewed Chris Roberts?

Whereas The Escapist interviewed Chris Roberts and nine other people.

[Skummy]

But you're claiming it's "unethical" in some way? They conducted an interview. When I worked in journalism, I conducted countless interviews - if someone I interviewed said something that contradicted someone else's point, I was never criticised for not having also interviewed that person, because that wasn't the remit of the article. Ethics have nothing to do with it.

If you're going to talk ethics, reporting on anonymous sources as fact is far more dubious than an entirely above-board interview with one man. 

 

Again, agree or disagree with the content of either article, your point is that the Kotaku interview is "unethical", and "propaganda", which is just absurd.

Edited October 5, 2015 by Skummy

[SeanDMan]

Okay so you just proved to me you didn't read the articles. So I assume you're arguing just to be abrasive, cool.

But you're claiming it's "unethical" in some way? They conducted an interview. When I worked in journalism, I conducted countless interviews - if someone I interviewed said something that contradicted someone else's point, I was never criticised for not having also interviewed that person, because that wasn't the remit of the article. Ethics have nothing to do with it.

There's an ethical issue of interviewing the CEO of a company in order to address whistleblower complaints, which is what this essentially is. It's like publishing a report saying "The Truth About Oil Spills: Really Not That Bad" and interviewing the CEO of BP or Shell. There were allegations about how bad the working environment at the company was, so the CEO said to one of his friends "Hey, can I clear my name?" and all of a sudden you are jumping in here saying "The original article is a hit piece! Obviously this glorified press release from the CEO of the company is the definitive article!"

If you're going to talk ethics, reporting on anonymous sources as fact is far more dubious than an entirely above-board interview with one man, particularly when the majority of said "sources" are copied and pasted from an anonymous website with no possibility of verifying identity. 

So this right here is proof you didn't read the articles in question because The Escapist clearly goes into detail about how they verified their sources are who they say they are:

 

• Using the source designations from our story, three sources (CS1, CS4, CS5) initially contacted Lizzy via separate phone calls on Sept. 26 with information they wanted to share after seeing the initial story about CIG on The Escapist. They got her number via a mutual contact. No emails were exchanged. The sources and writer agreed to chat in-depth at a later time. (Note: In the story, the quote on finances reported that "CS1 wrote". This was incorrect as it was part of the phone call and in the reporter's notes. This has been corrected in the story)
• Four other sources (CS2, CS3, CS6, CS7) initially contacted Lizzy via email on or before Sept. 27 The emails, numbering 32 from these four individuals, were forwarded to our EiC and Publisher, who passed that info by our legal department. It was cleared and we pursued individual personal contacts beginning the following day.
• The two emails (CS8-CS9) from current employees came into Lockbin on Sept. 27. in the early morning. Lizzy exchanged at least 5-6 emails each with these sources, but they did not disclose their identity.
• When it came time for followup, three sources (CS1, CS4, CS5) were contacted via phone by Lizzy on Sept. 26. One call started at 5 p.m. and lasted for an hour and 15 minutes. A second was at 6:45 p.m. and lasted for 45 minutes. The final call was at 9 p.m. for an hour an 8 minutes. All three were contacted via Skype as well to verify visual identity.
• Three more sources (CS2, CS6, CS7) were contacted on Sept. 27. One call started at 9 a.m. for 30 minutes and was Skype only. This was the caller who did not give his name, but verified employment with ID and pay stubs. Call #2 was at 2 p.m. for an hour and 52 minutes, while call number 3 was at 5 p.m. for an hour and one minute. Again, all callers were visually verified after the phone call via Skype.
• The last call (CS3) was on Sept. 28 at 7 p.m. for 50 minutes, again visually verified on Skype.
• All sources via Skype had their pictures compared to their LinkedIn profiles or other images of them on the web to verify identities.
• Chris Roberts' response to me was at 9:10 a.m. almost three hours before publication time. Unfortunately, the response ended up in my spam folder, as it came in unformated and the pictures did not load. Since Roberts did not copy Lizzy or the Editor-in-Chief, who were on my original email to CIG PR head David Swofford, they did not get them and there was no back up to ensure someone saw it. Swofford emailed me at 12:40 - after I had sent him a link to the story - asking if I had received Roberts' response. It was then that I checked my spam folder, found the response and forwarded it to Lizzy to integrate into our story, minus any personal attacks on the sources. I called Swofford at 1:02 p.m. to personally apologize for the oversight and let him know how we would be using the response in the story. Roberts' entire response on the official site showed up roughly 10-15 minutes before we updated our story on the site.

So, since you're not reading the articles, let me ask you: where are you getting your talking points from, exactly? 

[Skummy]

Did I ever say it was the "definitive article"? No.

What I did say is that there's nothing unethical about conducting an interview with the CEO of a company. You disagreeing with his points or motivation doesn't make the article "unethical".

You want to talk ethics? They didn't contact Roberts, or anyone else at CIG, for comment or verification while researching this - not looking into the other side of the story makes it seem a lot more like the "attack piece" you're insisting it can't possibly be - and only contacted Roberts once the article was written, then conveniently lost his response that arrived before deadline, so the article was published with no opposite view - the exact thing you seem to find Kotaku's interview reprehensible for, with considerably less justification. In three weeks, they could have approached anyone at CIG to provide a rebuttal to any of these points and they didn't, they were happy to take anonymous sources at face value and publish them as fact. Is it only a problem that an article's biased and one-sided when you disagree with it, then?

[SeanDMan]

Again, more proof you didn't read the articles: The Escapist includes comments from Roberts addressing the allegations. They asked him for comment, he provided it, and they printed it as part of their article.

Edit: Although it wasn't part of the initial article because (as was noted in their follow up piece defending their sources) they did not notice he had replied before the article was printed because it went to their spam folder. They edited his response into the original article.

Look, if you're just going to pull shit out of your ass and not even click links I am providing for you, fuck off, you're not arguing in good faith, you're just trolling, and it's boring. If you want to do some reading and come back then okay but otherwise I'm done replying to you when it's obvious you're parroting opinions instead of actually reading and forming opinions yourself.

Edited October 5, 2015 by SeanDMan

[Skummy]

The comments included in the Escapist article weren't there when it first went to print - one of the links you provided explains that exact point.

[SeanDMan]

Noted.

They still got his comments. So it's still Chris Roberts plus nine sources against Chris Roberts and his journalist buddy Nathan Grayson.

[Pizza]

"Fuck you you clearly didn't read the links I posted"

"The links you posted clearly explain the point I'm making"

"Whatever, I'm still right."

 

[SeanDMan]

If you guys are arguing that the point is, a CEO of a company is a reliable and unbiased primary source for an article about problems with his company, then sure, you guys have proven that point. Congratulations.

[Colly]

That's not what anyone's arguing.

Ben Affleck Ben Affleck Ben Affleck

[SeanDMan]

Well, maybe I'm the only one who finds it ethically dubious to go to the CEO of a company to offer him a chance to spin a response to a report that there are problems in his company. Again, no one goes to the head of BP and asks them to put out a piece about how great oil is when there's an oil spill. But hey, maybe I'm wrong, maybe Chris Roberts is a great guy, totally straight shooter, those whistleblowers who said bad things about his company are a bunch of terrible gamergoober misogynists or whatever. Who is to say?

[Pizza]

Again, no one goes to the head of BP and asks them to put out a piece about how great oil is when there's an oil spill.

You're not seriously trying to argue that nobody tries to get comments from the heads of oil companies when there are oil disasters are you?

[probablyoliver]

It's fun reading an argument between two people when one of those people is on ignore, because it just makes Skummy look like a raving lunatic.

[Avenged Probably]

I wish this thread wouldn't keep changing names. I keep thinking its new and exciting, then I come in and get sad.

[Lineker]

I wish that this thread was shot into the sun but hey, there we go.

[Pizza]

After having read both articles, I don't see any problem with the Kotaku article, and the only issue with the Escapist piece is the "Follow the Money" subheading(of course, I didn't read the original before Robert's quotes were added). The Escapist didn't do a good job seperating their sources important points from their bitter bullshit, as that entire subheading is really bad, and taints an otherwise ok piece of investigative journalism. But after reading the Kotaku piece, it's pretty clear that gamergates issue with it is that Nathan Grayson wrote it, and nothing to do with the content of it.

[peteypirahna]

I am both shocked and appalled that Katamari Damacy isn't a poll choice.