So there’s been recent drama over the Eve Fanfest Alliance Panel. Most of the early threads decrying the Alliance Panel were aimed at gratuitous f-bombs and public drunkenness, but Mittens particular outburst slipped under the radar for the most part. At some point people decided that Internet Spaceships is Serious Business and these threads started to take on a decidedly political tone – people began to shit post in earnest. From the tone of the complaints I expected sex with barnyard animals and The Mittani to have personally lead a public verbal beat down of someone physically present at Fanfest. Imagine my disappointment when I actually watched the video stream last night. This is what was in the stream – a slide with Mittens mockingly reading the following:
So now it looks like you still gank me and I work hard to keep going in this game. Sorry I am very mad that was more plexs for my guys. Yes I can make that back easily mining if I could mine. Now I will just get popped by you guys no matter what, and 400mil is nothing. That is like 3 maybe 4 hours mining for me. Sorry it is hard when I have had own alliance members send people out to gank me. Now I fell I have been suckered into giving away 1.3 bil isks.
Since my divorce all I want to do is die, and I have been doing tha tallot in this game.
I am sorry I did not understand. I am just sick and tired of sitting here allone and having to play with myself. Everyone that I have helped out in this game and in real life just takes what you have and that is it. Never to hear from them again. l I am getting tired of everything. It was nice mining ice while it lasted took my mind off everything. Even though some people may say I am a bot I am not. I run all 22 accounts myself it is not easy but it keeps me sane.
Sorry for making you mad at me. I will leave you allone now and never enter your space again. I will be off looking for a nice quiet corner somewhere.
Sitting through the presentations was pretty painful aside from the two wormhole presentations, but I did eventually make it to Mittens presentation. Overall, I’d say it was just about classic Mittens and overall his presentation was pretty good for having 3-??? Jager bombs in rapid succession and being stumbling drunk. By his own admission [twitter], he was so drunk that he couldn’t even remember what was said. The Q&A is where all the interesting parts are anyway (@1:11:30):
Questioneer: Just something about the guy with 22 accounts. I think he moved to the Drone Regions and now he’s got kicked out of there as well.
The Mittani: Incidentally, if you want to make the guy kill himself, his name is The Wiz. Its “T-H-E SPACE W-I-S”. He has his own corp. Find him.
It wasn’t until I really sat down and watched the video that I came to my own conclusions. My initial reaction was that Mittens crossed a line when saying what he said – and I stand by that. At some point, Eurogamer and Massively picked up the article and Eve-O suddenly was filled with pastors, popes, and lawyers as the noise to signal rose to well over 200 pages of shit posting. Of course, the overwhelming majority of it was The Usual Suspects posting to attack or defend Mittens – and while I’m a massive forum whore my guns were mostly silent.
However, there’s a huge amount of misinformation floating around. First off, let me just say that the rumors about the guy killing himself or being put in the hospital are just plain wrong – someone reached out to the miner in question who jokes about the situation himself (conversation follows). Second, let me point out that US cyber bullying laws [cyberbullying.us] really haven’t been broken because those laws are almost uniformly directed at the bullying of school children that do not have a choice but to face their bullies physically at school.
[21:10:18] Xeross155 > Heya
[21:10:22] The Wis > Hello
[21:10:29] Xeross155 > Getting swarmed with interviews I can imagine
[21:10:50] The Wis > No why?
[21:11:57] Xeross155 > With this BS and all http://massively.joystiq.com/2012/03/26/ccp-investigates-player-panel-that-encouraged-cyber-bullying/
[21:12:21] Xeross155 > Pretty sure the name Mittani called out was “The Wis”
[21:12:31] The Wis > Oh I will have to check that out.. What is going on?
[21:12:58] Xeross155 > You sent him a mail when you got scammed and your Mackinaws destroyed or smth
[21:13:41] Xeross155 > Or at least one of his alliance mates
[21:14:13] The Wis > Could have.. been a long time. Might have been when they had the safe mining offer when you guys were doing your anti ice thing.
[21:15:08] The Wis > I did have someone ask me if I was ok.. Becouse he said that I had killed myself afterwards and he thought it was funny.. I did not see it so I have no clue what was said.
[21:15:52] Xeross155 > Basically some idiots are all butthurt and are calling for him to step down from CSM and shit
[21:16:51] Xeross155 > Basically, enjoy your 5 minutes of fame, multiple gaming press websites are putting the story up
[21:16:58] Xeross155 > Leaving out your name though
[21:16:59] Xeross155 > one sec
[21:19:54] The Wis > Well I am not sure what is going on.. I know I have had some people say I should put a pentition in. Witch I have not. Since I have not seen the video or anything. But that would also explain why the goons are moving into my system now and starting
[21:19:57] The Wis > ganking here.
[21:24:54] Xeross155 > http://youtu.be/E7Ki91U-mBE?t=1h11m55s
[21:26:17] Xeross155 > That’s basically the snippet that people are upset about for some reason
[21:29:34] Xeross155 > Anyway, CCP is doing an internal audit and shit about it, 3 game news websites have reported it so far, basically tagging it cyber-bullying
[21:30:50] The Wis > Ok.. Well that is nice. Hmm.. wait.. If i do kill my self they might arrest him and prosicute him since he is in the US.. That would really be bad for him.
[21:31:01] The Wis > Just kidding of course but a thought.
[21:31:20] The Wis > Fly safe. I have real life stuff to do now.. ANd to watch for goons in system.. Fun Fun.
At this point, I feel like I would be remiss in my duties as a blogger if I didn’t point out my personal biases. So let me start off by saying that The Mittani is an asshole and I don’t like him. And I hate Goons. And BOB and MC and Tri – you know, those ~elite PVPers~ were all cool brosefs. And did I mention that I hate Goons? However my voice, where I’ve given it, has mostly been a voice of moderation – yes Mittens said something incredibly stupid. Yes, it was over the line. However, we all say really stupid things all the time – especially when drunk so bad we can’t even remember what we said. When The Mittani got off the plane from Iceland, he had this to say on Twitter:
- Just landed. Step one, apologize profusely. Step two, resign. Step three, send all my isk to the victim. Entirely my fault and unacceptable.
- Sadly, due to my failings, I was so drunk at the time that I didn’t remember what I said until I saw this article. Shameful.
- However, being drunk was no excuse – I got myself there, after all.
- I’ll be posting a more detailed annd thorough apology on the forums as soon as I get to a laptop, on my droid atm.
- I’m not sure about the article as brendan drain has a well known grudge against me, but I hate when people use alcohol as an excuse
- So I’m just going to own up and fall on my sword, regardless of quibbling about it
- @theiggep I didn’t remember what id said, so assumed people were just mad about slides. P horrified now that I see how bad I actually was
- @NorthernGoblin not to the public, but to the dude I said that shit about, its the least I can do. In addition to apology, actions > words
- I’ve gotten stable internet and have now posted my apology to the community: https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&find=unread&t=86980 #tweetfleet #eveonline
My initial reaction was that he was joking, but as time goes on it appears he may not be. And issue an apology he did:
This has been hanging over my head since Thursday when I stumbled away from the Alliance Panel with a vague sense that I had done something horrible. I didn’t know the extent of how much of a shitheel I had been until today, when footage of the presentation went up. As many of you now know, I gave out the in-game character name of a Mackinaw miner if anyone had wanted to blow him up – except that I was so smashed that I didn’t recall exactly what I said (as anyone who was there can tell you). When I came to the forums the other day and saw threads complaining about my behavior – not remembering what I’d said – I assumed that I was enduring the usual anti-Goonswarm trolls, and posted something like “deal with it~” in my usual “The Mittani” way.
Then I landed, and saw the article listing my actual quote.
Christ.
I feel absolutely ashamed of my behavior at the Alliance Panel. It’s one thing to play a villain in an online roleplaying game – when I post on these forums or on twitter, I usually do so as ‘The Mittani’, and do my level best to convince everyone that I’m an unrepentant space villain, as that kind of facade provides an in-game advantage to me and my alliance. But I am not that character in real life, as anyone who has met me can attest. I went way, way, /way/ past the line on Thursday night by mocking the Mackinaw miner at a real-life event. I, as a person, am not the entity that I play in EVE; I am not actually a sociopath or a sadist, and I certainly don’t want people to kill themselves in real life over an internet spaceship game, no matter what I may say or do within the game itself. CCP may say ‘EVE is Real’, but EVE is not real – and the line between the game and reality should not be overstepped.
I’m relieved to discover that the Mackinaw miner is doing fine and mining away, despite being blown up by Goonswarm in-game. He deserves, and he has, my heartfelt apologies – here in public as well as a private apology. There’s no excuse for what I did – while some might try to use my inebriation as a mitigating factor, I put myself in that compromised mental state, and the guilt of that is entirely mine.
If I could go back in time and not have included the slide mentioning the miner, I would do so. While the Eve Online character “The Mittani” would never apologize for any sort of villany in game, I myself, as Alex Gianturco, feel utterly ashamed and sickened by my behavior.
At this point, I am inclined to accept his apology and move on. We all say and do stupid things while drunk and I do not believe Mittens should be banned or resign from the CSM despite my personal bias (above stated) against him and Goons in general. However, whatever you or I or even Mittens may be thinking, the final result is up to CCP. Even if that weren’t true, the fact that the controversy has been picked by gaming media might force the issue. Mittens’ offer to step down may even offer CCP a much needed legal out – and so once again Mittens shows his willingness to work towards the good of CCP and the player base in general.
As I wrote this, Eminem’s “Without Me” came on Pandora and I was reminded that Mittens is Eve Online’s very own King of Controversy. What would a post-Mittens CSM – or even Eve Online – look like? If he steps down, will that make him a martyr and hero? Why do you people make me have to cast Mittens in such a light?
Update 3/26/2012 8:59 Pacific: The Mittani has apparently followed up on “Item 1” by issuing both a public and personal apology as well as “Item 3” by giving The Wis all his ISK. He’s come to his senses a bit with “Item 2” and is asking CCP and the CSM before just out and out resigning. Source [Eve-O]
One is done, both here and to the miner. Three is done. Two takes a post, and I should probably discuss it with the CSM before I mash butan.
I think Two Step would make a fine Chairman, though.
Failing In So Many Ways 
[…] said something outrageous (at about the 1hr 2 m 55s mark – now censored but Liang’s got you covered) and the gaming media picked up the story and people are arguing about […]
I really don’t see why the internet is so wound up over this.
Yes what was said was a little bad, but people seem to be missing the point that playing EVE and expecting to -not- be trolled an picked on in various ways is akin to walking into a hungry Lion’s Den wearing a meat suit and expecting to come out unscathed.
Plus, it’s Mittens, he says and does stupid things, acting all outraged when he says or does something like that is as pointless as being mad at the sun for rising.
To be honest I think this whole thing is a result of the gaming press picking up a story and going into feigned moral outrage mode for the sake of a story.
It’s not the internet that is upset, its the anti mittani crowd. They are against him because he’s the leader of an evil 0.0 alliance. Mocking of other people goes on all the time and suicidal people rarely top themselves as 90% of time they are calls for help.
The fact that The Mittani took over Alexander Gianturco i this Alliance summit speaks either for a mental problem of Mr. Gianturco or that he is simply lying.
If he is honest., he should add a step 4: Delete “The Mittani”. He seems to got some steps to far in his roleplaying, reaching dangerous levels.
Really? You talk about mental problems but then you act like deleting a bunch of pixels is some kind of digital capital punishment – but i guess you internet-spaceships-is-serious-bisnes crowd always did have a problem separating real life from a game.
The guy isn’t going to kill himself, and if he did, who really cares? A guy so unstable that he would kill himself over a video game shouldn’t be playing – he should be the one deleting his account and going outside.
This is not about The Mittani because the cat is already out of the bag for him. This is for you when you decide to run for CSM next year.
At the end of the day Alchohol just tends to bring out the inner you. You say things you are thinking without thinking about what you are saying. So I guess this guy is really like this deep down and should quit.
I can’t say I agree with this – its much more accurate to say that alcohol acts as an inhibition remover. What you’re saying is that people who get drunk and sleep around are in effect sluts “deep down inside” – while they may actually hate themselves for the things they did/said while drunk.
Furthermore, even if he is “like this” deep down inside… he *is* the leader of Goonswarm. You know, the biggest bunch of dicks on the internet. He fits right in.
That’s right, alcohol tends to minimize inhibitions, so when those fears of external reaction to the things you would really like to do or say are removed, you’ll do and say what you really want. So, yeah, people who get drunk and fuck anything with a heartbeat are doing it because they want to get fucked. Regardless of the spin to make money on all kinds of excuses and fancy mental conditions, liquor is a great window to the true person. It always has been and always will. Mittens is only a very small step away from the asshole he pretends to RP in Eve, and the liquor he drank caused him to let the fake face he portrays, slip. Nicepeople are still nice people, even when shitfaced. The ones that aren’t nice when they’re shitfaced, are the ones that are hiding who they really are.
I politely and very firmly disagree with you on that. The “inner self” thing seems largely a folk saying and you are taking it literally.
Furthermore, I SWEAR there is something about Jäger… I mean, specifically.
In vino veritas.
That wisdom has been around a LONG time.
In vino veritas. there is often allot of truth to that.
but in this case i think it has more to do whit his real life persona getting corrupted by his in game character,
That is roughly as ignorant as saying the Earth is flat ;o
Just because it’s been said for centuries, doesn’t make it true.
Alcohol not only takes away your inhibitions, it also removes your ability to think rationally, and often, lines of thought will lead to conclusions that you wouldn’t normally come to, which you blurt out. Has nothing to do with the “inner you”.
Removal of inhibitions ≠ revealing ones true person.
If alcohol was the magical portal to revealing the true person one is, we would all be soiling ourselves, would be unaware of even the most basic of informations regarding our own person, if we really delved into the bottle to find our true selves.
Society glorifies alcohol, bestows numerous beneficial traits upon it, and sadly, “truth” is one of them.
Ask any drunk person how much they’ve had to drink, It’s perhaps the best indication of how “truthful”, “coherent” and “rational” people are while drunk.
But of course, i might be biased, being an alcoholic. But if nothing else, that should only help clarify that i’ve looked into the consequences of alcohol, and been through the whole philosophical question of “Alcohol = truth”, many times over. And i’ve been on both sides of the fence, casual drinking and destructive drinking.
The conclusion? No, alcohol does not bring out your true you. It manipulates and twists your mind, and with ones inhibitions removed, makes you blurt out conclusions you’ve only made because of being intoxicated, or do things because the twisted sense of logic of the intoxicated mind deemed it a good idea.
Awesome explanation.
Cyber bullying is NOT only about kids. It applies to everyone. Mittens is a liar and a sociopath, in-game and out. I have been gaming for over three decades and assholes in games are assholes in life. Nice people are nice people, regardless of where they are. Mittens is an arrogant ass and while claiming he was drunk, he still had to set up the whole presentation, including premeditatively collecting the message from the other player. He intended to deride the miner. Blaming drunkenness, even while pretending to be accountable, is bullshit. Eve doesn’t need an asshole like Mittens representing the player community, because he doesn’t represent the player community. His last little public ego masturbation happened out in the real world, and out there, in THAT sandbox, there ARE adult laws that deal with assholes. Let’s see if Mittens really mans-up.
What you seem to not understand is that the slide itself was FINE – despite being in what I would call poor taste. He did not provide the man’s IN GAME name during the presentation itself (despite it being relatively well known beforehand).
And truthfully, even providing his name wouldn’t have been so far out of line – it was purely the verbiage “if you want him to kill himself”. Which IS BAD. – no argument. No question.
But this is something he acknowledges as having been wrong – and he has taken the effort to attempt to rectify the situation. Frankly, you seem to be trying to claim there is a legitimate case of cyber bullying – which is patently ridiculous for several reasons:
– Cyber bullying laws are primarily aimed at school children (48/50 states IIRC)
– Even SUCCESSFUL prosecutions for cyber bullying have relied illegal access to the victim’s computer and an actual suicide. And even then most of those have been overturned.
So: it was wrong. But was it bad enough to ban? No. Bad enough to ask him to step down? No. Bad enough to ask for an apology? Absolutely.
If you are actually concerned about the player who made those comments the slide is not fine.
He would not know that mittani did not give his in game name out to others.
So every time I get ganked or griefed I can go attack someone for cyber bullying? He made comments in an open forum at a conference. If there was a trail of abusive in-game mails I could possibly see cyber bullying being the case. I would like to ask your opinion on this topic them: If I gank a miner and get an eve mail reading “DIAF” or “I will rape your mother/children/cat/dog” can I print screen and report this person for cyber bullying? Have my local Police contact CCP to turn over account information and the whole bit?
If you consider this cyber bullying you are opening a door that will destroy online gaming. All of a sudden “Loot Whoring” and saying “L2P Noob” will be considered cyber bullying.
Is it cyber bullying when I tell you remove your “Pointy Sticks” from your ass?
Please….Pointy please.
This. Is. Not. Cyber. Bullying.
What is The Wis’ real life name (rhetorical question)? Do you know it? I don’t. I don’t think Liang does. I don’t think the Mittani/Alex does.
The Wis has a huge layer of anonymity here. As he should. As such, the idea that he is being bullied is just to true.
However, the Mittani is well known and we do know who he is IRL. And here you are calling him a sociopath. On a public forum.
Good work there.
[…] Mittani’s apology Liang Nuren’s summary Poetic Discourse’s blog Serpentine’s EVE Jester’s Trek Share […]
[…] Someone actually took the effort and contacted the guy the Mittani was talking about. His responses clearly indicate he didn’t think it was that big of a deal. In point of fact, you can read what Liang discovered here: https://liangnuren.wordpress.com/2012/03/26/the-mittani-hero/. […]
@grombeck: Cyberbullying entails making a personal attack upon a person in order to further damage their psyche. Griefing is just an in-game method of making gameplay more challenging or difficult for someone. Once it starts with personal attacks it enters the realm of bullying. It specifically was his rant, while drunk at a conference about pushing a guy to actually attempt real life suicide that crossed the line. Get a clue and learn to read a post and understand the concept.
Thank you, you made my point for me. It was his rant of spoken words at a discussion. NOT in a virtual setting. I was just making the point to Pointy Sticks that this was not cyber bullying.
@Mad Russian,
If you read cases where people actually have committed suicide this instance doesn’t even come close. The victims real life identity is known and the bullying is directed at that entity. What Mittani was advocating in his drunken state was essentially griefing the poor guy.
Now if the Mittani said, “Here is his real name, address and phone number, go destroy his real life,” I’d be with you. But. That. Has. Not. Happened.
The Mittani was a colossal in-game asshole. That’s it. Now, if that means he has to resign from the CSM that is a loss for all of us because Mittens, as much as it pains me to say something nice about The Mittani, he is an excellent player advocate (and that would include The Wis). His main focus has been FiS which has sadly been getting the short end of the development stick in this game up until the last year or so.
To be quite clear, I not a fan of the Mittani. I don’t like his play style. I don’t like scamming. I don’t like griefing. I don’t like making other people’s game less fun. However, these are all allowed in Eve Online. And I’m fine with it.
I LOVE HOW ALL OF THESE INTERVIEWS START WITH “OH GOD YOU MUST BE SWAMPED BY SCRUBS WANTING TO INTERVIEW YOU SO HERE I AM ANNOYING YOU AND ASKING IDIOTIC QUESTIONS ABOUT SOMETHING NOBODY CARES ABOUT AND OH LOL OFC I AM NO SCRUB”
[…] The following day, he claimed (credibly) that he was so drunk on stage that he didn’t remember what he had done, and issued an apology personally to the man and to the player community on the official forum (at 191 pages of commentary, that is a “threadnaught,” and way too big a data corpus for analysis), with the issue of his resignation pending discussions with EVE‘s corporate owners and the rest of the CSM. Here’s a full analysis and transcript. […]
[…] saw two new developments in the ongoing (but likely concluded) Mittani scandal. The first was the announcement [eve-o] made by The Mittani with approval from the CSM (and […]
[…] head of the player council of stellar management) dicking around during a live presentation and telling his corps mates to go grief some guy who claimed to have been suicidal, using the phrase “If you want to make this guy go and kill […]
Never been a big fan of “The Mittani” Never really understood the “Goon Culture” Many Contradictions.
They tell us that they come from SimplyAwful .com. One of the most heavily censored forums of this planet. I would rank them third behind The Vatican, and the Heritage Foundation.
Yet they venture out in public games and make raving lunatics out of themselves? I would like just one Goon to explain how this happens?
Was he also drunk when he put that slide in his presentation? Was he drunk the entire time from when he created the presentation to the time he actually delivered it?
Sorry it doesn’t wash.
No. The slide in question was pretty terrible taste but it certainly wasn’t against the TOS/EULA and had been vetted by CCP.
So all his talk about doing this because he was drunk is a lie.
It seems that he got some backlash from the gaming media folks which he does care about. So he decided to publish this apology and claim to be concerned about this person who he was going to lambast when he was perfectly sober.
Yeah right he says it took a few days and he had to see the video. BS he had to guage the reaction from other people in the gaming industry. That is where this is coming from. Anyone who doesn’t see that is a fool.
To be fair, the video hadn’t been up for very long and his claim of being hammered is pretty believable given his stumbling on stage in the presentation.
I tend not to attribute things to malice which are adequately explained by incompetence and stupidity – both attributes gained while drunk.
That isn’t to say you are wrong – for all I know you are right. But neither one of us really KNOW. You claiming otherwise is… Well, foolish.
I think your being a bit more than fair to Andrew.
He wasn’t hammered when he put the slide in. Surely he would know including the slide with the player’s verbatim comments would upset the player. So alcohol had nothing to do with his lack of concern for this player.
The alcohol excuse is out. What are we left with? Well I suppose Andrew had a sudden change of heart and all of a sudden does care about other players.
You can beleive that or,
Or he got backlash from the gaming media and had concerns about his own image.
I’m going to reply to both comments here.
The comments made in the slide were in extremely poor taste but didn’t break any rules of the game. Again, the step over the line into real life was in the Q&A where he encouraged people to harass him in order to cause his out of game harm. Thus, the slide was “fine” – at least as far as rules and consequences go.
But you aren’t really talking about what is and what isn’t against the rules: you’re talking about enforcing your real life morality inside the game and on everyone else playing the game. My own morality isn’t terribly dissimilar to yours (from what I can see, anyway), but ultimately I have come to realize that people say absolutely anything in tearmail and hatemail.
Furthermore, I’ve resigned myself to the fact that anyone who harms themselves over a video game was already in an unbalanced position and ready to tip from almost any stimulus. It would be most unfair to attribute all blame to the straw that broke the camel’s back.
Also, the player’s in game name was already relatively well known and had been posted in several places as the scam was discussed. I believe that was actually in The Mittani’s presentation, but I may have gotten that from other places. Operating purely from memory here.
As to whether or not his “change of heart” was caused purely by the out of game reaction: again, I tend not to attribute to malice what is adequately explained by incompetence and stupidity. He was obviously very drunk (and you can see this from the fanfest feed) and the comments weren’t even available online for the first few days. His version of the “truth” is entirely plausible.
But, you will never be convinced that he’s not The Devil simply because he’s a Goon, so I’m not going to continue to try. I’m not going to block further posts if you Absolutely Must Get The Last Word though, so feel free. If you’d like to continue discussing the abstract application of out of game morality to in game behavior, lets do that in a more appropriate venue – perhaps the Social Contracts [blog] blog post.
Liang I think you are splitting hairs that are irrelevant.
If Mittani actually had a concern about this player he would not have put up a slide of this guys evemail with the intent to ridicule him in front of a large audience and others watching on a video stream. He made this decision when he was sober and not inebriated and likely had a few days to think about it before he did it.
You try to defend his apology by saying it was revealing his in game name and telling others to attack him that was some sort of technical foul.
Well first I don’t really know how that is a technical violation of the Eula. We have merc corps, scam corps and all sorts of mechanics that we can use to do this in game. There is no violation of the EULA to give the name of someone who sent and eve mail to me afaik. CCP was pretty vague about what exactly the issue was with the EULA. So I wonder what exactly the issue was.
But whatever there is another reason why if Mittani was concerned about the actual player your distinction of giving his in game name doesn’t matter:
You say it yourself:
“Also, the player’s in game name was already relatively well known and had been posted in several places as the scam was discussed.”
So the evemail went to mittani so *he* already distributed this guys name. But whether he did or didn’t, I think this guy when he saw the evemail knew Mittani likely gave his in game name out. It is no violation of the EULA to give the ingame name of someone who sent an evemail to you. So *from that players perspective* it makes no difference. Mittani is not dumb he would know this when he was preparing the slide.
Now you talk about whether people should take things in the game seriously or not. I agree with you but it’s irrelevant to my point. My point is not that what mittani did at the fanfest was so horrible. My point is Mittani is *claiming* he is apologizing *because* he feels horrible about what he did to the guy. He is blaming drunkenness and some sort of sibyl defense that he can’t tell if he is Andrew or “the mittani.” (AKA The multiple hats defense)
He is apparently claiming he thought he was “the mittani” up there giving the presentation but then when he saw the video he saw “Andrew” and not “the mittani.” Well this defense is on its face but coming from mittani who always claimed it’s easy to separate real life from the game it’s a howler. But whatever everyone just skips over that desperate grasping at straws. I suppose some people think Harrison Ford sometimes really thinks he is Han Solo.
Why is he desperately grasping at straws to separate himself from these comments?
Well it’s *possible* he just coincidentally had change of heart about his morality of ridiculing players in those two or three days. Now that would be an amazing coincidence wouldn’t it. I mean he had posted about in game versus out of game morality for years defending what he did. And just now all of a sudden he changes his mind. And the industry backlash had nothing to do with it?
Yeah you can believe that if you want. Perhaps your admitted bias of always looking at others through rose colored glasses is the reason you will buy that. That is no longer what I do. Dealing with people who are indeed narcissists/sociopaths (one in particular, who murdered my 3 year old niece) has taught me a very hard lesson. I no longer wear the rose colored glasses I look at the facts of people’s behavior.
BTW I am *not* saying Andrew is a narcissist. I am saying that dealing with a narcissist has taught me to not constantly make excuses for people. It has taught me that narcissists do in fact exist in the real world and people like that are not like the rest of us. Andrew does indeed exhibit some qualities that make him suspect in my mind, but I am not claiming to know this for sure.
I am just looking at the facts and timing of this apology and finding the reason he gave for it very hard to swallow. If you want to insist on wearing rose colored glasses that is your choice. But I think there is enough rationality in you to see that those glasses are the only reason you can buy into his claimed reason for this apology.
Oh man, I promised to have you have the last word… but could you at least check your facts first? A few comments:
– I’ve never claimed The Mittani to be a lovable caring individual, and frankly it just doesn’t matter how many times you say “he doesn’t care about the player”. You keep claiming that what he did was “so horrible”, and you attribute this to the slide itself AS WELL AS the Q&A section. But frankly, that just does not matter. The simple facts of the matter are that CCP vetted the slide and has historically and consistently enforced a boundary that was crossed only in the unscripted Q&A section.
– Just to be clear, the offense wasn’t to give the guy’s in game name. Nobody cares about in game names. No, I said it before: the offense was encouraging people to harass him simply to cause out of game harm.
– The Mittani didn’t actually execute the scam against the guy in question and he wasn’t the one that posted the details of the scam. He had almost literally nothing to do with it.
– The Mittani isn’t defending himself or his actions at all. He has repeatedly said this, and frankly your single minded devotion to attacking him for things you are effectively making up as you go is simply mind boggling.
Also: I’m sorry that someone murdered your 3 year old niece. That’s inexcusable behavior and .. its really really sad. But frankly you’re taking things a couple of steps too far here – to the point that you’re really bordering on enforcing your own morality on the entire rest of the world and obsessively seeing malice where there just isn’t any meant. I honestly encourage you to see a therapist.
What the Mittani did was wrong. The Bot victim was wrong. CCP releasing the video with censuring the brainfart was wrong. CCP throwing The Mittani under the bus was wrong. 70% of the comments here are wrong.
Take it from somebody that has done things 5 times worse and was banned. I was never drunk and chose to violate TOS/EULA. I swore I would never come back to the game because of the hypocrisy with respect to botting.
Forgive me if I applaud The Mitani and Riverini efforts to bring the botting problem to center stage. Action by CCP has been long overdue.
Does the end justify the means? Hardly!!!
I may just reactivate my two accounts now. Yes
I don’t think anyone actually thinks mittani was actually encouraging people to literally drive this guy to suicide.
But like I said there was no specific EULA provision ever quoted so its hard to know what you are talking about. Do you have a specific EULA provision that you keep thinking was clearly violated?
Beyond that you are still caught up in ccp EULA rules as if the EVE EULA defines morality. It seems you think the only reason anyone should ever apologize to another is if they break ccps EULA. OK thats pretty misguided thinking, but I don’t think I will be able to disabuse you of that line of thought here.
Finally you claim i am saying things like what he did was horrible when I specifically said that is not what I am saying. So I can only assume you didn’t read the post. Thats fine you of course don’t have to read it. But you should if you are going to respond to it.
Fuck the Mittani, his mother, his cat and everything he stands for.
CUNT