Holding Jason’s Feet to the ‘Schreier’: Debunking Kotaku‘s “Debunking” of Allistar Pinsof’s Allegations
File under: #Gamergate #fullpinsofinterview #pinsofinterview3 #pinsofinterview #indiecorruption
[or whatever the latest hashtag #gamergate is using for trending purposes… i can’t keep up]
- Schreier’s “debunking”: The person accused of being complicit in possible corruption denied making a statement alluding to that fact.
- Schreier’s “debunking”: Another person accused of being complicit in possible corruption refused to address the accusations, and instead insinuated that the outcome of the indie games award show wouldn’t have mattered anyway because the award show in question was small and just for fun. Schreier seems to suggest manipulation of awards show results is somehow not as unethical if the stakes are low.
- Schreier’s “debunking”: A developer allegedly did not want details surrounding his dispute with Phil Fish about Fez to go public, as long as he was credited for Fez in a documentary. The developer was subsequently credited in the documentary, and now denies any of the details surrounding the dispute he allegedly gave to Pinsof. The developer admits Fish used a game mechanic for Fez which the developer first introduced to Fish, but the dev could not remember details surrounding what the dev told Pinsof and was reluctant to say anything negative about Fish.
For the full story, read on. You inquisitive person, you.
Some Quick Background Info…
free pun-filled headline: Corruption ‘Fez’ters in the indie games scene as consumers have had their ‘Phil’ of ‘Fish’y behavior; Allistair ‘Pins’ allegations ‘of’ fear and intimidation to indie games figures. [thank you, i’ll be here all week.]
Note: This is an emerging story and is based on information available as of approximately 5:00pm PST on Feb 5, 2015.
Source: https://imgur.com/a/FnBM6
WHAT ARE the allegations?
A culture of corruption among devs, competition organizers and judges, and games journalists within the indie games scene, specifically:
- Conflicts of interest
- Indie devs using personal relationships with organizers / judges of indie game competitions to gain unfair advantages over similarly and / or better qualified games
- Organizers / judges of indie game competitions having financial interests in certain competition entries, therefore also having a vested interest in these entries winning
- Games journalists covering the indie game scene having knowledge of such conflicts of interest, yet giving favorable coverage to these questionable indie game competitions and its winners regardless; these games journalists often have personal relationships with organizers / judges of indie game competitions and the winning devs alike [do you see a pattern here?]
- Fear, intimidation & blacklisting of anyone speaking out against a small clique with indie game influence
- Certain indie devs, indie games competition organizers / judges, and games journalists operating in cliques
- Negative statements about these cliques resulting in blacklisting for employment, future working relationships (i.e. indie game competition press access) and / or coverage of indie games
- Refusal to investigate “Fez” creator Philippe Poisson, a.k.a. Phil Fish, for basing his game off of others’ work and not crediting them
- At the time, prominent members of the indie games scene favored Phil Fish, and thus did not perform due diligence in investigating these allegations
- Devs did not pursue their claims about Fish due to fear of the blacklisting mentioned above
- Game journalists, who should have fully investigated these claims to either confirm or debunk what would be a large scandal, did not cover this story; again, most of these game journalists had personal relationships with Phil Fish or his clique of friends
Source: http://techraptor.net/content/relationships-indie-gaming-interview-allistair-pinsof-part-2
NOTE: Please read the full article for yourself. If you support alternative games media like TechRaptor, please consider turning off AdBlock.
who made these allegations?
Allistair Pinsof (Twitter: @megaspacepanda), a “writer and editor turned game developer who has previously worked for websites such as Destructoid and the Escapist” [Source: TechRaptor]. Based on his personal experiences, Allistair has acted as a whistle-blower for the corruption within the video games industry.
In 2013, Pinsof was fired from Destructoid for going public with a story about a fraudulent charity campaign, without authorization. Pinsof’s article outed a transgender person, which he calls a “mistake” and feels remorse for, but Pinsof apparently felt that notifying those who donated to the fraudulent charity campaign was more appropriate than completely covering up the story (his superiors appeared to favor the latter option, unsurprisingly). [Source: http://www.cinemablend.com/games/Destructoid-Allistair-Pinsof-Sour-Side-Games-Journalism-68039.html]
However, rather than deal with Pinsof’s termination internally, Destructoid’s then-Editor in Chief Dale North discussed the situation openly with GameJournoPros, a private Google group and mailing list “consisting of top managers, editors and site owners from some of the top tech and major gaming media websites” [Source: CinemaBlend]. The discussion appeared to request that other publications blacklist Pinsof from future employment. Per CinemaBlend: “As noted in some articles covering the situation, attempting to blacklist someone from employment is illegal in many states, including the state where Destructoid is located, Florida, where it’s outlined on the state senate website.” [Source: CinemaBlend]. Shortly afterwards, the same Editor in Chief resigned.
This was in 2013. The allegations at hand were made recently in 2015. But, GameJournoPros will pop up again later, don’t worry. Sit tight.
did any other gaming / news site report on or investigate pinsof’s specific claims prior to techraptor?
Not that I’m aware of. As established above, he has been a whistleblower of sorts since 2013. Unsurprisingly, the games media is largely silent on whatever Pinsof has to say. Since the popularity of #GamerGate, no major, traditional video gaming site seriously covered Pinsof’s allegations like TechRaptor has.
prior to kotaku’s “rebuttal”, did the gaming community and journalists–other than #GamerGate supporters–ADDRESS these allegations?
No. Perhaps sites were using the time to prepare their response, but it appeared traditional games media tried not to cover (i.e. IGNORE) the story in hopes interest would quietly fade. On popular gaming forums and discussion boards, mere mention of Pinsof’s allegations, much less a link to the TechRaptor article, were censored en masse.
Thus, it appears there was an active attempt to suppress the spread of this story, even through simple online discussion.
ask yourself: if these claims were false, why not debunk them immediately and let the story die? why censor discussion completely?
The quickest way to end discussion of false claims is to provide undeniable evidence of their inaccuracy. Once debunked, discussion will naturally die out. Alas, this is not the action most gaming sites took.
Suppressing information only makes the internet suspicious, and also very angry. Perhaps you’ve heard of the Streisand Effect?
Are these sites ALLOWED to censor discussion? Of course. This is America. They can do whatever they want. But that, of course, is a strawman, since we are questioning the reasoning behind the censorship, not whether they are allowed to do so.
Come on, baby, light my ‘Schreier’: Kotaku’s Jason Schreier wrote an article rebutting Pinsof’s allegations
Please read the article for yourself using the archived link provided here:
https://archive.today/LjGN4
does schreier believe in objective reporting?
On Sept 10, 2014, In response to criticism over a highly-biased Kotaku article critical of #GamerGate, Jason Shreier (Twitter: @jasonschreier) said this:
“Nobody at Kotaku has ever claimed or will ever claim to be objective. ‘Objectivity’ is a silly thing to strive for.”
[Source: https://archive.today/TnpxK#selection-3575.0-3667.116]
He further explains his position via Storify [https://storify.com/jasonschreier/gamergate], where, in my humble opinion, he actually makes it worse. After reading the context he provides surrounding his position about objectivity, I cannot help but feel as though he has a fundamentally different worldview than that of myself and those like me. This goes without saying, his approach as a games journalists runs contrary to the ideals of most #GamerGate supporters: asking journalists TO strive FOR objectivity in games journalism, and fully disclose when objectivity is in question. Jason also said this to a critical reader:
“I don’t think you follow. ‘Objectivity’ leads to bad reporting, obfuscations of truth under the guise of ‘telling both sides.'”
As a consumer who would like objective reporting and reviews (or at the very least, a separation from clearly-labeled opinion pieces, editorials and subjective reviews), I am flabbergasted at this statement. For someone writing a rebuttal to Pinsof’s serious allegations, in which he is entrusted to seek out the facts and present the truth, I would seriously question his ability for a fair investigation due to his lack of objectivity. I would like to see the objective facts and make a decision on my own; I do not want my reporters crafting their own version of the truth. Frankly, this is insane to me. I’m sure he believes I’m just a consumer and a reader, not a journalist, and therefore I simply do not understand. To me, that is an excuse and a deflection. There is nothing to understand; this is common sense, and Schreier is currently offending it with this nonsense.
could schreier have a bias against pinsof?
As Former Gov. Jesse “The Body” Ventura would say, “I DON’T KNOW. I’M JUST ASKING QUESTIONS.” [don’t worry, i’m not going to talk about jet fuel and steel beams; i’ll be discussing known associations. no triangles here.]
Here is an archived version of Shreier’s tweet in which he shares the Storify mentioned above to his followers:
https://archive.today/SI3Xh
An aside: There is an interesting link to a rebuttal of Schreier’s stance on objectivity by The Escapist’s Alexander Macris (Twitter: @archon) in the thread. This is rejected and scoffed at by Schreier and friends. Naturally.
As you scroll down the thread, an interesting name pops up: Kyle Orland.
https://archive.today/SI3Xh#selection-7657.0-7746.0
Isn’t Kyle Orland the editor from Ars Technica who apparently made the aforementioned GameJournoPros list? Yes.
http://www.breitbart.com/london/2014/09/17/exposed-the-secret-mailing-list-of-the-gaming-journalism-elite/
[NOTE: Raw dumps of the GameJournoPros members and leaked conversations can be easily obtained via a Google search, if for some reason Breitbart is an unacceptable source for you; since apparently being a conservative site somehow precludes you from reporting facts in all instances (according to some with the maturity of a child).]
Within the text of the GameJournoPros leaks, Kyle Orland appears extremely defensive of the corrupt practices perpetrated by the current mainstream games media (of which he is a part of), and shows clear bias favoring certain subjects instead of treating them with objectivity, as is expected of an ethical journalist.
Who else might be on GameJournoPros and expresses sentiments similar to Orland, you may ask? If you guessed Jason Schreier, I want to high-five you, bro (or should I say, GameJournoBRO–AM I RIGHT OR AM I RIGHT?). In fact, Schreier defends a fellow games journalist who gave favorable COVERAGE to a game developer the journalist was in a sexual relationship with (most likely at the time of the article’s release; at the very least they had a personal relationship at that same time).
(Aside: It is FACT that this journalist, Nathan Grayson, gave favorable coverage to this game, in one instance highlighting it above 49 other games featured in the article. Yes, ONE game highlighted more prominently than the 49 other games on the list. Yes, that is an undisclosed conflict of interest. Nobody claims he reviewed the game in question anymore, so please stop with that strawman argument. Grayson is also in the game’s credits, if for some reason this was not all enough for you. Source: https://archive.today/TVRhp)
in summary: schreier is on a private games industry / tech mailing list & group, gamejournopros, in which he and his colleagues openly show bias against #gamerGate and anyone who would even talk to its supporters (i.e. pinsof); apparently collude to not report on certain subjects and people whom many members were in personal relationships with; and was aware of an editor’s requests to blacklist pinsof on the same mailing list in 2013 (mentioned above), but according to pinsof did not allow pinsof the courtesy of giving his side of the story (more on that below)?
You tell me. I didn’t accuse anyone of anything. I’M JUST ASKING THE QUESTIONS. NOTE: As Pinsof states himself (see below), he is open to speaking with #GamerGate supporters but does not encourage people to use the hashtag. However, the fact that he would talk to any site sympathetic to #GamerGate (i.e. TechRaptor), is enough association for those outspoken on GameJournoPros to brand him as a #GamerGate supporter. If you ask me, this is cult-like mentality, but that’s another story…
Now back to Schreier’s Kotaku article: Allistair Pinsof addresses much of Schreier’s inaccurate reporting himself in a TwitLonger (probably much better than I could):
http://www.twitlonger.com/show/n_1skget9
If the above information were not enough to color Schreier as someone who would be biased in anything Pinsof-related, Pinsof states:
Scheier has his own vendetta against me, as do anyone on the Gamejourno Pros list who I’ve called out by name or in general in recent months. He was pretty clear about this in a lengthy, private conversation the other night. Nothing hostile. Just him lecturing me on going public with these interviews and not getting both sides of a story, because you know he totally did that with every gamergate story or when my employer came to him via GameJourno Pros with some bullshit stories and he shut me out when I asked if he would give me a minute to merely hear my side.
Source: TwitLonger
This response, posted in Kotaku’s comments section, was of course, deleted. Color me surprised.Update (as of Feb 6, 2015 1:00 am PST):
Pinsof confirmed via Twitter that the comment was posted on Kotaku, then automatically marked as “Pending”; the comment apparently was not deleted. However, had Pinsof not publicly asked about the whereabouts of his comment, we can only speculate as to whether anyone over at Kotaku would have actually moved it out of “Pending” status of their own volition. I vote for “probably not”.
Source: https://twitter.com/megaspacepanda/status/563445835266945024
[Thanks to Twitter user @Chriss_m for this information]
even if schreier may have a bias against pinsof, does he successfully rebut pinsof’s allegations in his kotaku article?
Bias aside, however, I will quickly break-down Schreier’s main points:
- Pinsof claimed a “former game journalist… flippantly bragged that her boyfriend is friends with Brandon so he’ll win… Next day, sure enough, he won Best in Show…” [Source: Kotaku (Archived)] Schreier challenged this claim by asking the aforementioned “former game journalist” whether this was true, and the person said, “I definitely did not say that.” [Source: Kotaku (Archived)].
- Schreier’s “debunking”: The person accused of being complicit in possible corruption denied making a statement alluding to that fact.
- As mentioned above, Pinsof claimed the aforementioned game won Best in Show at an indie games awards show allegedly due to personal relationships with the show’s organizers, rather than merit. Schreier asked the show’s organizer for comment, but the show’s organizer declined to address Pinsof’s allegations; instead, the show’s organizer minimized the importance and seriousness of the awards show. [Source: Kotaku (Archived)]
- Schreier’s “debunking”: Another person accused of being complicit in possible corruption refused to address the accusations, and instead insinuated that the outcome of the indie games award show wouldn’t have mattered anyway because the award show in question was small and just for fun. Schreier seems to suggest manipulation of awards show results is somehow not as unethical if the stakes are low.
- Pinsof claimed two developers who originally worked on Fez would go public with details about Fish’s alleged unauthorized usage of the developers’ original game design and mechanics (which Fish used to make Fez), UNLESS they were credited in “Indie Game: The Movie” documentary. The filmmakers of documentary subsequently and abruptly added the developers to the credits. Per Pinsof, one of the developers no longer wanted the story to go public once he was credited in the documentary. Pinsof seems to contend that the developer either didn’t want any trouble, or feared repercussions to speaking out against indie darling Fish (since the dev still wanted to succeed within the indie games scene) and perhaps did not want to admit it. [Source: TwitLonger].
Schreier reached out to this developer, and the developer admitted he spoke to Pinsof once in 2012 but was not sure exactly what he said to Pinsof. The dev denied any dispute with Fish and seemed reluctant to say anything remotely negative about him. The dev stated he himself did in fact come up a game mechanic, which Fish then also used for Fez. [Source: Kotaku (Archived)].- Schreier’s “debunking”: A developer allegedly did not want details surrounding his dispute with Phil Fish about Fez to go public, as long as he was credited for Fez in a documentary. The developer was subsequently credited in the documentary, and now denies any of the details surrounding the dispute he allegedly gave to Pinsof. The developer admits Fish used a game mechanic for Fez which the developer first introduced to Fish, but the dev could not remember details surrounding what the dev told Pinsof and was reluctant to say anything negative about Fish.
Other gripes:
- Article Title: “GamerGate’s Latest Conspiracy Theory Doesn’t Hold Up”
- Sensationalist headline, but it’s Kotaku, so that is to be expected. Although, Schreier valiantly tried to stand up for his site’s value to the modern video game consumer on the Co-Optional Podcast this week; I simply lol’ed. [Source: http://youtu.be/tZBj40rCgxU] I’m sorry, but that ship has sailed. Kotaku is a laughing stock within the core gaming community, and is a mockery of games journalism. The fact that I even analyzed a Kotaku article this much makes me question my own sanity.
- I thought this was about Pinsof, but apparently it’s about #GamerGate. You know, that topic he is so clearly biased against. But I guess we can see right away that Pinsof, #GamerGate and allegations of indie games corruption are going to be conflated into one entity. Too bad we already know what Schreier thinks about GamerGate in public AND behind-the-scenes, where he thought nobody else could see his candid comments. Too late. Obvious bias is obvious.
- Not a point, but a quick note on his condescending, smug tone: We are an intelligent, educated, tech-savvy audience. Don’t patronize us.
- “Despite my distaste for almost everything GamerGaters have said and done over the past few months, a story is a story, and these seemed like allegations worth investigating…” – Oh, don’t let us twist your arm then. Nobody asked for Kotaku’s half-assed response; we asked for a full investigation into the field you’re supposed to be covering.
- “… so I’ve spent the past day looking into Pinsof’s claims. They’re… well, let’s take this one at a time.” – Are you a blogger or a journalist? You’re really blurring the line between smug tumblr post and actual journalism. See this right here? This is a blog. I can write whatever I want because I Googled my own brain and came up with this result. You, on the other hand, are beholden to the ethical standards of journalism… which you apparently don’t respect. “They’re… well” — I don’t need your pretentious casual speaking tone in what I’d imagine is a serious article for you. If it wasn’t serious, then why should I even listen to anything you have to say about it? You’re the one commanding credibility, yet you undermine it with your unprofessional demeanor. This is why most gamers hate your site. You only survive off of clickbait and the support of your tiny group of industry friends. That’s why in a few more years YouTubers will send your site to the lonely corner of the internet inhabited by Channel Awesome.
That Was Long… So What’s Your Point?
- Jason Schreier has a contentious (at best) history with Allistair Pinsof, and is extremely biased against anyone who even speaks with #GamerGate supporters (as Pinsof has)
- Schreier’s “debunking” consisted of: “This person said X to Pinsof. When I asked them if that was true, they denied it, didn’t answer, or seemed to backtrack.”
- Kotaku and the string of hit pieces from other games and mainstream media (which may or may not have already released by the time of this article), will not not actually debunk any of Pinsof’s allegations; they will be more in the vein of weak “so-and-so said that’s not true!”
- Meanwhile, expect continued censorship of discussion of this topic across most online forums of discussion
- No site will seriously investigate these claims to uncover the extent of the corruption or ACTUALLY debunk the claims with hard evidence (which is what games journalists are supposed to do, but instead are willfully neglecting to cover this story)
- It’s up to consumers to force the media to cover this story and investigate the corruption; meanwhile, we must do our own digging and investigation since the games media is largely impotent
for more information on what you can do to help, here’s my original video on this topic
who am i?
I’m just some guy. Who types too many words.
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corrections? omissions? comments? questions?
I am but a human, and I do not claim to get everything right the first time. However, I am willing to admit when I am wrong and am open to criticism (even non-constructive criticism–I’ve been called an “emo fag” enough times in my life to grow a thick skin… I can handle it… BRING IT ON).
Reply below or contact me via Twitter @sportzpunz (don’t ask… it’s an old account I re-purposed for #GamerGate, but sports puns–excuse me–sportz punz, are definitely still on the table). I am very busy but I will try my best to address all correspondence I receive in a timely manner. I will not censor comments on this site.
If you’d like to speak privately, please let me know and we’ll work something out. You weirdo.
p.s.
Hashtags can’t melt steel beams. GooberGate/11 was an inside job.
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