Jim Sterling in court.
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Ok, I've been listening to SidAlpha's and Crocosquirrel's video [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKIAPR6D5FQ] and I just need to point this out. DigiHom writes:
"38. Two of the Defendants JANE/JOHN DOE 9 - HGI and JOHN DOE 1 - Demonsword are currently known to be competitors as fact. It is expected most or all individuals anonymously named here are in some way profiting, have profited, or intend to profit from the same market that The Plaintiff is currently active in. The Plaintiff additionally asserts that the term 'competitor' applies to any individuals whom has direct financial interest in the gaming industry. This includes Artists, Youtuber's, Twitch Streamers, Game Developers, Artists, and Internet Journalists/bloggers as all of these individuals have profit motive behind their attacks."
So basically, if you're working in the games industry, they're gonna sue you. Twice if you're an "Artist".
"38. Two of the Defendants JANE/JOHN DOE 9 - HGI and JOHN DOE 1 - Demonsword are currently known to be competitors as fact. It is expected most or all individuals anonymously named here are in some way profiting, have profited, or intend to profit from the same market that The Plaintiff is currently active in. The Plaintiff additionally asserts that the term 'competitor' applies to any individuals whom has direct financial interest in the gaming industry. This includes Artists, Youtuber's, Twitch Streamers, Game Developers, Artists, and Internet Journalists/bloggers as all of these individuals have profit motive behind their attacks."
So basically, if you're working in the games industry, they're gonna sue you. Twice if you're an "Artist".
... I'm half-tempted to donate just to keep this entertaining shitshow going.Fsyco said:
When the dust from the eventual romaimplosion settles, someone is going to make a killing with a mockumentary about this garbage fire.
Saw them say such to Demonsword on a youtube comment back when they were threatening ppl. It's disgusting. Between that and their interview with Jim, it's clear that they don't care about art, the industry or anything other than money.
I don't want to see anyone with a family financially ruined, but it's hard to not want them to go ahead with trying to sue Valve and experience the weight of high-end lawyers come down on them. Maybe then they'd finally fuck off (or God forbid work on improving their craft. Most ppl would be HAPPY to see that, and they'd get more coverage off a good game than a lot of devs who haven't drawn as much negative attention to themselves)
Ffs, they purposely seek out ppl slagging them off on a message board and then cry "stalking and harassment", 'comedic' hyperbole gets taken as a literal death threat and then they blame it all on Sterling (who has spoken out about harassment so many times, both in relation to DH and in general. He can hardly be held accountable). It's like they think that every bad review is harassment, caused by Jim, with a view to financial ruination. They don't seem to think that any of those were ppl just calling out a bad game that might waste customer time and money. Bad games that they don't care about as art, just spamming for money.
It wouldn't have gotten so out of hand if they hadn't done that "review the reviewer" thing full of insults. And of course Jim covered it, it was *funny* and it's his job to entertain.
Sorry for the pointless post, just venting a bit. This whole thing has blown my mind.
I don't want to see anyone with a family financially ruined, but it's hard to not want them to go ahead with trying to sue Valve and experience the weight of high-end lawyers come down on them. Maybe then they'd finally fuck off (or God forbid work on improving their craft. Most ppl would be HAPPY to see that, and they'd get more coverage off a good game than a lot of devs who haven't drawn as much negative attention to themselves)
Ffs, they purposely seek out ppl slagging them off on a message board and then cry "stalking and harassment", 'comedic' hyperbole gets taken as a literal death threat and then they blame it all on Sterling (who has spoken out about harassment so many times, both in relation to DH and in general. He can hardly be held accountable). It's like they think that every bad review is harassment, caused by Jim, with a view to financial ruination. They don't seem to think that any of those were ppl just calling out a bad game that might waste customer time and money. Bad games that they don't care about as art, just spamming for money.
It wouldn't have gotten so out of hand if they hadn't done that "review the reviewer" thing full of insults. And of course Jim covered it, it was *funny* and it's his job to entertain.
Sorry for the pointless post, just venting a bit. This whole thing has blown my mind.
Now I'll say the folks of DigiHom have basically tied the noose around their own necks in a business sense (well their lack of business sense) but I have to disagree on the "comedic hyperbole" comment. There's a line in comedy, and anything involving death threats or "go kill yourself" type "humor" isn't comedy, its straight malicious intent to devalue or otherwise lower self-esteem. Cracking jokes on one hand how DigiHom committed Digital Suicide on their business, that's a joke. Telling them to kill themselves or "I hope you get murdered" or anything of the like, not a joke. Sorry, not satire and not funny.lurkur said:
I don't like the DigiHom guys, they're asset flippers of the worst sort, but nothing in my morality says its ok to "jokingly" tell them to off themselves or hope they get murdered. Same way I feel about the Ann Coulter shots that were taken on Comedy Central's Rob Lowe Roast, it wasn't funny, it was malicious. I'm not a fan of Coulter, but I think it was absolutely wrong of professional actors and comedians to drop that low. Don't know what I mean? Just Google it.
Criticism can be leveled at someone without violent language or promotion of suicide. Its just not funny. Black humor has to be abstract of real people to be funny in any way, not aimed at lowering self-esteem.
Now from what I've seen, DigiHom is blowing the actual threats way out of proportion in terms of quantity, but there are some. Not enough to warrant legal action, civil or criminal, just some stupid sheep who have no critique skills to speak of and think a death threat/suicide promotion is valid criticism. But it doesn't justify, not in any way.
Do I think DigiHom deserves the treatment from Valve? Absolutely. However I feel its the wrong way Valve chose to deal with them. Instead of curating Greenlight and the Steam store in general, they've let the asset flippers run rampant and dump shovelware onto the storefront, completely mishandling the originally stated purpose of Greenlight in what seems to be greed over quality control.
Valve only stepped in when DigiHom decided to start tossing frivolous suits against users, which yes is absolutely wrong, but they shouldn't have gotten that far.
Meh. Its a mess.
TL;DR - Death threats/suicide promotion is not funny, nor satire. Digital Homicide however deserves harsh criticism in terms of people saying "they are a poor developer, boo these people." Valve needs to curate Greenlight better to prevent asset flips from flooding the storefront.
Oh I agree, hence the quotation marks around 'comedic'.
Fwiw the thing I'm referring to is someone on another forum (not directly at DH)which was screenshotted in the court papers saying something to the tune of "I want to murder everyone involved in this" "this" being the greenlighting on one of DH's games (so presumably it could also include anyone who voted for it). I agree that it's bad taste and probably feels shit to read, but I do imagine that *in the mind of the original poster* they thought that they were being comedically hyperbolic. It's hard to make a judgement call, but to my mind this comment on a none DH owned forum, is not as credible a threat as something more directly aimed at an individual, or something that involves doxxing. It's just your standard childish "edgelord" behaviour. I hate seeing ppl type stuff like "drink bleach" or "kys" in youtube comments, but I also don't believe most of them would be happy if it actually happened. The percentages of people that twisted are much lower.
It's like how I gutturally hate rape 'jokes', but I know some people make them & some people find them funny. I've heard them made by people who, whilst they've upset me, I don't think the person who made them was an actual rapist who thinks rape is anything other than a horrific crime.
I hate that it exists and agree that it shouldn't happen, but I think it's been deliberately taken out of proportion/context to try and make money. I also think being on the receiving end of an $18m lawsuit is more intimidating than some edgelord on a forum being upset over there being another shit game greenlit onto Steam.
If Valve had some form of quality control, if DH weren't petulant children who attack critics maybe things wouldn't have sunk so low.
Fwiw the thing I'm referring to is someone on another forum (not directly at DH)which was screenshotted in the court papers saying something to the tune of "I want to murder everyone involved in this" "this" being the greenlighting on one of DH's games (so presumably it could also include anyone who voted for it). I agree that it's bad taste and probably feels shit to read, but I do imagine that *in the mind of the original poster* they thought that they were being comedically hyperbolic. It's hard to make a judgement call, but to my mind this comment on a none DH owned forum, is not as credible a threat as something more directly aimed at an individual, or something that involves doxxing. It's just your standard childish "edgelord" behaviour. I hate seeing ppl type stuff like "drink bleach" or "kys" in youtube comments, but I also don't believe most of them would be happy if it actually happened. The percentages of people that twisted are much lower.
It's like how I gutturally hate rape 'jokes', but I know some people make them & some people find them funny. I've heard them made by people who, whilst they've upset me, I don't think the person who made them was an actual rapist who thinks rape is anything other than a horrific crime.
I hate that it exists and agree that it shouldn't happen, but I think it's been deliberately taken out of proportion/context to try and make money. I also think being on the receiving end of an $18m lawsuit is more intimidating than some edgelord on a forum being upset over there being another shit game greenlit onto Steam.
If Valve had some form of quality control, if DH weren't petulant children who attack critics maybe things wouldn't have sunk so low.
*Walks in whistling and innocently drops in a video*
Completely off-topic. Absolutely NOTHING to do with the topic at hand.
*Wink*
(C'mon, you know I had to.)
Completely off-topic. Absolutely NOTHING to do with the topic at hand.
*Wink*
(C'mon, you know I had to.)
FalloutJack said:
Why would you post something so completely off topic?! Its like wow, bunny with pancake on head random!
Though I don't agree with the action they are taking I do agree with this statement that has been posted on the DH Blog
I would also suggest that if the comments that are posted on their blog are genuine, (that's a whole other issue with DH's reputation) that any reasonable human would admit that they go way way beyond the realms of being acceptable, no matter what the context.
End of the day DH are / were a shitty developer who abused a system run by someone who didn't give a fuck about the QC of the products it's store front sold and couldn't give two shits about the customer base that the store front attracted, as long as the money rolled in then who cares? I've said it before and I'll say it again Valve are responsible for allowing this saga to ever get to this stage.
100% agree, the ironic thing is if Steam veto'd the comments and behaviour of it's users, then in turn they would have to veto the content that their sewage outflow Greenlight has on it the result of this being that this whole thing would be stopped from day one and it certainly wouldn't have gotten anywhere near to this level. So let's not all slap Valve on the back like they are the hero who came riding to the rescue at the last minute. They could have stopped this much much earlier by doing their fucking job.
I would also suggest that if the comments that are posted on their blog are genuine, (that's a whole other issue with DH's reputation) that any reasonable human would admit that they go way way beyond the realms of being acceptable, no matter what the context.
End of the day DH are / were a shitty developer who abused a system run by someone who didn't give a fuck about the QC of the products it's store front sold and couldn't give two shits about the customer base that the store front attracted, as long as the money rolled in then who cares? I've said it before and I'll say it again Valve are responsible for allowing this saga to ever get to this stage.
This has to be something of a shock to the Shady Dev Community.
DigiHom was, not only the King, but the tyrant of the out of control Asset flip/Shovelware kingdom on Steam - the way they excuse their business practice and attempts to reign in on criticism (BOTH on Steam and Youtube) and the alarming history of issuing legal threats to see if they could terrified their critics into silence while believing they could go on unopposed made them something of an example for other Shady Devs to follow. Because of this, games develop by good and honest Devs were pushed down and out of the Main page, and only games would see poor quality products in mass.
In the last year, Steam imposed a refund system, new Review Guidelines, and now DigiHom gets banished.
Which prompts the following question - with the changes that had been brought and the banishment of Digital Homicide from Steam, do you guys think that this would send enough of a message to the Asset Flip/Shovelware community to change their antics?
DigiHom was, not only the King, but the tyrant of the out of control Asset flip/Shovelware kingdom on Steam - the way they excuse their business practice and attempts to reign in on criticism (BOTH on Steam and Youtube) and the alarming history of issuing legal threats to see if they could terrified their critics into silence while believing they could go on unopposed made them something of an example for other Shady Devs to follow. Because of this, games develop by good and honest Devs were pushed down and out of the Main page, and only games would see poor quality products in mass.
In the last year, Steam imposed a refund system, new Review Guidelines, and now DigiHom gets banished.
Which prompts the following question - with the changes that had been brought and the banishment of Digital Homicide from Steam, do you guys think that this would send enough of a message to the Asset Flip/Shovelware community to change their antics?
That might be the case. Anybody want to waste a dollar and find out? Although I've not seen it mentioned in the reviews for their games, so maybe nobody is buying them.Mangod said:
Steam holds a majority of the market, so they might be trying to claim that Valve has a de-facto monopoly (although good luck proving that). I'm not familiar with anti-trust laws (although I suspect Romine isn't either) so I'm not sure if that claim has a leg to stand on.lurkur said:
A naive part of me hopes that this means Valve is gonna start closing the flood gates, but realistically I doubt much will come of this.Laughing Man said:
Even accounting for their belief that they will win the case, why would they launch two others at the same time? Lawsuits are pretty complicated things with a shitload of paperwork and require a considerable amount of knowledge and attention. That's why there's a very lucrative field occupied by tens of thousands of people who often specialize in a very particular fraction of it. Even accounting for arrogance, surely Romney would hesitate before going though all that headache until he at least got the first one out of the way in his favour. Or to spare him more heartache (i.e. a much more reasonable course), avoid launching more complicated cases simultaneously in the event he should fail his first case causing a domino effect with him on the receiving end.
At first I thought he was trolling for attention and money, but now I do think he genuinely is delusional enough to think that he's in the right and that he'd win even if he was. This situation that he has set up for himself has enormous potential to snap back at him quite cruelly and from what I gather he really hasn't benefitted financially from this so far. If he had any sense left in him, he'd drop the cases right now and walk away praying to the almighty Atheismo that nobody countersues while continuing to make whatever he can off his shitty games in obscurity.
At first I thought he was trolling for attention and money, but now I do think he genuinely is delusional enough to think that he's in the right and that he'd win even if he was. This situation that he has set up for himself has enormous potential to snap back at him quite cruelly and from what I gather he really hasn't benefitted financially from this so far. If he had any sense left in him, he'd drop the cases right now and walk away praying to the almighty Atheismo that nobody countersues while continuing to make whatever he can off his shitty games in obscurity.
If you've been paying attention to their behavior, it quickly becomes apparent that the Romine Brothers have a serious case of Narcissistic Personality Disorder. Through the lens of genuine delusions of grandeur, their actions make sense: Of course Romine will win his lawsuits, because he's an unjustly targeted indie dev and justice will prevail. Of course he can handle all those cases at once, because he's so smart and works so hard that he can get it done (alternatively: Of course a lawyer will take his case pro-bono, after seeing how put-upon he and his brother are). And, of course, everything will work out in the end because he will be awarded all the money he asked for, and will never have to worry about anything again. He might even get a book deal when someone decides to write about his life story, and history will prove that he was right, and that big meanie-poo Jim will never make another video again.PainInTheAssInternet said:
The tragic thing is, cognitive dissonance will only strengthen his beliefs. He won't "snap out of it" and start acting rationally once he hits rock bottom; he's gonna dig in his heels, whine, wail, and gnash his teeth until he's no longer physically capable (or he finds some new target, like, say, family members).
I doubt it. A judge can't just declare someone mentally unfit. They have to have a psychological evaluation done that reveals broken mental processes. The most the judge can do under these circumstances is dismiss the case on the grounds that the case lacks merit.Mangod said:
Then they'll sue the judge for not allowing them to sue without merit. I swear, these guys are going to see the Supreme Court before too long...PainInTheAssInternet said:
Did anyone know that there was actually a band called Digital Homicide?
Not a great recording, but they are pretty decent.
Not a great recording, but they are pretty decent.
Giving them probably more credit than they're due? Scatter-shot in the hopes that one or more 'smaller fish' will panic and try to settle out of court, thereby giving Digital Homicide a cash infusion that they can then apply to the case against Sterling. That being said, it's still a losing proposition for them, but that's probably one of the more generous interpretations of the move and the mindset that inspired it.PainInTheAssInternet said: