"Ethics and Journalistic Integrity"

[Nachimir]

http://dangolding.tumblr.com/post/101639865598/some-things-i-shouldve-said

 

We also need structures in place to ensure that disenfranchised young men in Video game culture do not turn to opportunistic conservatives with open arms and bared teeth. I worry that that horse has bolted, though.

 

The ubiquitous straight white male gamer is a bedtime story that Video game culture has told for far too long. It is now time to dismantle it at its base. That’s what I’ll be doing, anyway. The only response to such rampant misogyny is more equality, more feminism, more diversity in the most visible elements of Video game culture, more championing of marginalised voices. More, more, more.

[syntheticgerbil]

Well that about sums it up, really.

[Synnah]

Judging by the fact that he's using it as his Twitter avatar, I'm guessing Sargon_of_Akkad is the shitty wizard from the GG fanart. Also it looks he's only now realising that the Clickhole article about GamerGate is satire.

[Denial]

Oh man, Sargon of Akkad doing oldmanshoutsatclouds.jpg at Clickhole is amazing. Perhaps his superior manbrain is just too highly evolved...

 

On a tangent, this has reminded me that there is a page collecting MP3s of every DOTA 2 character saying "shitty wizard", which is inordinately cheering.

[JonCole]

Gamergate can't tell two Asian guys apart - https://storify.com/turnoffthenews/gamergate-can-t-tell-two-asian-men-apart?utm_source=t.co&utm_campaign=&utm_content=storify-pingback&utm_medium=sfy.co-twitter&awesm=sfy.co_rmYp

[James]

Also it looks he's only now realising that the Clickhole article about GamerGate is satire.

My favourite part is the reply where he accuses CliclHole of being a poor imitation of the Onion.

On a tangent, this has reminded me that there is a page collecting MP3s of every DOTA 2 character saying "shitty wizard", which is inordinately cheering.

Wait, is that a coincidence, or is the Thumbs Shitty Wizard a reference to this? Or this to that?

Gamergate can't tell two Asian guys apart - https://storify.com/turnoffthenews/gamergate-can-t-tell-two-asian-men-apart?utm_source=t.co&utm_campaign=&utm_content=storify-pingback&utm_medium=sfy.co-twitter&awesm=sfy.co_rmYp

Hahahaha, wow. Smooth.

[twmac]

Okay, this was all for jokes:

 

http://www.arcadianrhythms.com/2014/11/stupid-comment-of-the-month-6-totally-not-about-gamergate/

 

 

But it entertained me to talk to the guy and then write about it.

[Twig]

Wait, is that a coincidence, or is the Thumbs Shitty Wizard a reference to this? Or this to that?

Idle Thumbs Shitty Wizard is a reference to Diablo 3. This is up in the air. They've never made an official comment on it, but, yeah, every hero has a line for it.

[James]

I meant the use of the exact same phrase, not the object of that phrase. Mysterious!

[Twig]

Oh, no, Thumbs' version existed prior to Dota's.

[Bjorn]

Judging by the fact that he's using it as his Twitter avatar, I'm guessing Sargon_of_Akkad is the shitty wizard from the GG fanart. Also it looks he's only now realising that the Clickhole article about GamerGate is satire.

 

That whole thread of replies is fucking priceless.

[Bjorn]

Oh yeah, don't know if this got linked before, but On The Media had a couple of gaming things on last week's show.  Chris Grant came on and talked about gg.  Then Leah Reich spoke about her experience a decade ago writing an advice column for IGN that often covered dating and sex. It's hard to imagine that column being able to exist today. The two gaming pieces are linked at the bottom of the list of segments if you don't want to listen to the whole show.

[osmosisch]

Idle Thumbs Shitty Wizard is a reference to Diablo 3. This is up in the air. They've never made an official comment on it, but, yeah, every hero has a line for it.

I thought it was Torchlight

[Twig]

I thought it was Torchlight

Uhhh you might be right? I could've sworn it was the D3 wizard reveal trailer but my memory sucks so I can't say for sure!

[osmosisch]

I have a memory of a discussion about Torchlight's enchanter who has a chance to just straight up remove all enchantments when he works on your items. The D3 version might predate that though.

[brkl]

Torchlight is earlier than D3, isn't it?

[Synnah]

The song 'The Wizard' was written in response to the announcement of the Wizard as a class in Diablo III, back in episode 5. The 'Shitty Wizard' was coined in episode 50, when Chris was talking about the wizard in Torchlight who enchants your stuff, but occasionally just breaks it.

[SecretAsianMan]

The joke was also that he is a failed adventurer who instead of saving the world just stands in the town and enchants your items but occasionally fails because he's so shitty.

[Twig]

Clarification! Hurray!

 

(I'm pretty sure it still predates Dota's shitty wizards, though. At the very least, I'm 100% positive no one on the 'cast knew about Dota's shitty wizards until after it was coined. Someone probably emailed in about it at some point.)

[Denial]

Apparently GG is terribly excited today because KingofPol received PROOF! that Nick Denton of Gawker has been paying people to infiltrate Gamergate and sow dissent in the ranks. Furthermore, 8chan's Hotwheels says it checks out and is totally legit!

That evidence is:

This is remarkable.

[JonCole]

I'm only about a half hour in, but Total Biscuit invited Stephen Totilo onto his show to talk about ethics (lol) and Totilo frankly makes him sound like a dumbass - 

 

 

Notable Points -

• TB asks if a public apology is warranted for Patricia Hernandez's disclosure faux pas, to which Totilo says that having corrections issued to your article is shameful enough and he feels that demanding a public apology of her is simply a means of wringing more shame out of her. TB says that he thinks apologies are just a sign of good faith, which is pretty silly in context.
• TB goes into somewhat exhaustive detail about some of the "worst" points of the GameJournosPro thing and almost every incident he mentions leads Stephen Totilo to basically ask - this is a candid email discussion, the reporters were often crafting their stories as they got input from others in the press, so why would we hold them to the highest standards of journalistic integrity when this kind of interaction doesn't dictate their final decisions? Does an EIC saying "don't give this journalist any work" necessarily mean that every other EIC will follow in lockstep? At this point in the interview, Totilo seems a bit exasperated because every one of TB's questions seems to be assuming the absolute worst from everyone involved while Totilo feels that a vast majority of reporters are simply acting in good faith and make mistakes like any person.
• In a discussion of Bayonetta 2's review on Polygon where TB says he agrees with the "sex-positive feminist view" that Bayonetta is a strong female character, Totilo says, "Do you (TB) consider yourself a sex-positive feminist?" TB response, "I consider myself a sex-positive egalitarian." What a fucking twat.

[Twig]

This is remarkable.

Agreed. I am in love.

 

I mean, let's just throw all logic out the window and look at both possibilities:

 

1) It's real. Awesome!

2) It's fake. They believe it's real anyway. It does the job he's accused of already having done. Awesome!

 

There is no universe in which they don't believe it because they're all about these wacky conspiracy theories. Perfect. Beautiful.

[Synnah]

Apparently GG is terribly excited today because KingofPol received PROOF! that Nick Denton of Gawker has been paying people to infiltrate Gamergate and sow dissent in the ranks. Furthermore, 8chan's Hotwheels says it checks out and is totally legit!

That evidence is:

This is remarkable.

 

Well I'm convinced!

 

GamerGate plans to move its 'theatre of war' from Twitter to Tumblr. Because everything's a military campaign to them. Some choice quotes:

 

As a group we've done a horrible job at reaching out to others and spreading our message. That's a problem.

 

Considering what their message is, I'd say they're done a surprisingly good job of spreading it.

 

Most users on Tumblr are teenagers between 12 and 20, and most of them are girls. They are very interested in fandoms, anime, and other memes. Tumblr has a "reblog culture" meaning that posts should be short, snappy and to the point, and the campaign should focus on creating memes and photos to share. A good idea would be to use popular anime characters and pokemon to get the #Gamergate message out.

 

"Hey, Pikachu thinks GamerGate is cool, so it must be!"

 

This operation is akin in scale to D-Day. We're storming the beaches of Normandy and going into enemy territory. They’re heavily fortified, but we can do this. Just getting a few people on board isn't enough. We need to actually make Tumblr a "front".

 

Sorry, can't say any more, I've just died from barfing too much.

[Gormongous]

I'm only about a half hour in, but Total Biscuit invited Stephen Totilo onto his show to talk about ethics (lol) and Totilo frankly makes him sound like a dumbass - 

 

I hope you continue to listen and post notable moments, because I had to duck out after about twenty minutes. Just listening to Totilo carefully explain all the ways in which the relationship between journalists and their sources is complicated and sometimes fraught, then having TotalBiscuit try to catch him in a contradiction with sometime he wrote almost three months ago or force him to make a black-and-white statement on aforementioned complex issues, is exhausting to the point of pain for me. If the new online journalism is explaining basic questions of professional conduct to naive but militant onlookers, I don't blame anyone for wanting to get out of the business.

 

Sorry, can't say any more, I've just died from barfing too much.

 

I love the D-Day comparison. Do they even have an idea of the physical and logistical commitment of that operation? To them, it seems more as though Allied high command was like, "Shit, North Africa and Italy are going a little slow, aren't they? Who knows when Russia's going to pay off. Hey, why don't we just cross the Channel, that'll knock those Nazis out quick!" Again and again, the Reddit and 8chan segments of #GamerGate show an obsession with racking up tactical victories even though they have no connection to any actual strategic plan beyond "winning."

[Bjorn]

...strategic plan beyond "winning."

 

gamergate is the Charlie Sheen of video game culture.