Recent Events Discussion (RED) Thread

[jordsta95]

So...anyone wanna talk about how they feel about this? Reddit's response has been pretty hostile, but I'd like to hear your guys's opinions, as I'd like to think we don't jump to conclusions so much.

From what I read on Reddit Curse were completely out of order (looking at the situation as a Briton) assuming the information is correct. Fired straight on the spot, it's just not a good thing to do. I don't care who you are, or what they have done. It's bad for everyone.
Bad for the person you are firing. They don't even get a a few day's notice to start looking for a new job. So now they are potentially going to struggle for money.
Bad for the company. You have just halved the workforce and the workload is going to stay the same, best scenario, or go up, worst scenario. Meaning the remaining workforce is going to struggle.
Bad for the community. Read above. If the people allowing mods/mod packs to become available are struggling to keep up, there will be people who wait hours, if not a day or two, to see the latest version of their mod(pack) become available.

Then there's the slightly more "human" side of it. Slowpoke's response to the situation. I'll agree with him that he didn't know that this was happening, etc. However, the initial comment was a little too corporate. Even if he had mentioned "Goodluck on your future ventures guys" or something, to the people who were affected, then it would have been a little better. However, what he said just extends what @CoolSquid said. Curse have a stranglehold on the (modded) Minecraft community, and trying to make them an equal contender, and get some equal/better competition is going to be hard, but it needs to be done.

 

[sgbros1]

So...anyone wanna talk about how they feel about this? Reddit's response has been pretty hostile, but I'd like to hear your guys's opinions, as I'd like to think we don't jump to conclusions so much.

Before I went to hang out with my friends I totally expected a boycott of Curse to be staged here.

 

[erindalc]

Before I went to hang out with my friends I totally expected a boycott of Curse to be staged here.

Honestly, I'd totally do that, but we don't have enough information as to what actually happened.

 

[Golrith]

and TBH, it's none of our (as in the communities) business. If the persons involved have signed a NDA (which seems indicated), then they can't say what's going on, and the rest is just speculation and rabble raising.

Let's get back to our regularly scheduled show of "Enjoy the Damn Game"

 

[erindalc]

and TBH, it's none of our (as in the communities) business. If the persons involved have signed a NDA (which seems indicated), then they can't say what's going on, and the rest is just speculation and rabble raising.

Let's get back to our regularly scheduled show of "Enjoy the Damn Game"

Are you kidding me? If someone just got fired wrongfully from curse (which may or may not be the case here), the community should absolutely stand up to them, unless you want every corporate entity to walk over you for the rest of your life.

I'm not saying Curse is evil or that anything bad even happened, but Curse hasn't made a statement yet and clearly this was not a planned let go or anything. Something here is wrong.

 

[Golrith]

Are you kidding me? If someone just got fired wrongfully from curse (which may or may not be the case here), the community should absolutely stand up to them, unless you want every corporate entity to walk over you for the rest of your life.

I'm not saying Curse is evil or that anything bad even happened, but Curse hasn't made a statement yet and clearly this was not a planned let go or anything. Something here is wrong.

Of course we will stand up for them, but as it stands, there isn't sufficient information for all this "Drama". As manager of my department at work, I've gone through the heartaches of losing staff and fighting to keep staff. Once the facts are known, and if there ends up being a petition, my name will be on the list.

 

[erindalc]

Of course we will stand up for them, but as it stands, there isn't sufficient information for all this "Drama". As manager of my department at work, I've gone through the heartaches of losing staff and fighting to keep staff. Once the facts are known, and if there ends up being a petition, my name will be on the list.

That's my point. There isn't ANY information from Curse about this, which immediately says to me that this was not handled well.

 

[FyberOptic]

Everyone I've personally talked to from Curse seemed like decent folks, so on a personal level I can't judge. And granted, these folks weren't in executive positions. But then there's all the stories and rumors and accusations, from as far back as when they hired Dinnerbone. Things which likely didn't just come out of nowhere, some of which even with evidence to back them up. It would be naive to get involved with them and completely disregard that aspect. They want to make money (who can blame them), and that doesn't always mean sunshine and rainbows.

So with that being said, we don't know why those three were let go, and probably never will. Curse has no incentive to tell us, because at the end of the day, it really just doesn't matter. They still own Minecraft Forum, Minecraft Wiki, FTB (for all intents and purposes), CurseForge, etc. They employ the top FTB staff, they employ LexManos, and other members from the community (though less so after yesterday). They have plenty of friends in the community, and the majority of modders host their mods there. They're not going anywhere, because the community has essentially spoken.

The way I look at it is, at least they hired these people. They probably paid them a decent wage, they got experience, and they got something to plonk on a resume. That's more than any of them got from FTB, as far as I recall. It has historically paid very few staff, with most of their content creators working for free, with modders coming in even below that, all of which has honestly always felt like a bigger injustice to me than what Curse may have done. Even in the midst of all of this, we were reminded that FTB's concern was more with its own image than the situation at hand. I was glad that Jaded and Eyamaz eventually ended up with a paycheck for what they did, regardless of how it turned out.

tl;dr: If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, don't show it your resume. Ducks can't read.

 

[RedBoss]

FTB saddled the mod community to the horse that is Curse. Don't blame the horse when you ride off the cliff. Blame the rider.

 

[Padfoote]

Jumping in now before things get worse, but remember to follow the rules with this discussion. It's something that I can see getting very heated very fast, and we're already pushing the rules with a couple posts.

​

That being said, I don't think we'll ever find out what happened unless Curse decides to let that information go public, which I doubt they will as it's an internal matter between the company and those impacted, or if one of those that got fired decides to break the NDA.

So...anyone wanna talk about how they feel about this? Reddit's response has been pretty hostile, but I'd like to hear your guys's opinions, as I'd like to think we don't jump to conclusions so much.

Mind dropping the Reddit link? I either missed it or it wasn't in the post you quoted in. And was their response aimed at what happened with Curse, or at the Vazkii incident?

My comment on youtube:

Honestly, what did you expect? You're the creator of one of the most popular mods in minecraft. You've made DOZENS of completely legit and quite useful mods for minecraft. Anyone looking at your brand new upload would immediately assume it's completely legit because you're a trusted creator. If the queen of england is holding a sword, you assume she's performing a knighting, not an execution. If a priest is holding someone underwater, you assume they're baptizing the guy not drowning them. You're a trusted creator, so it's assumed you're uploading something legit, not malware.

That doesn't excuse Curse not actually checking it. Doesn't matter how well you've done writing code for a company, they're still going to make you have code reviews to make sure things like this aren't happening in the real world.

From what I read on Reddit Curse were completely out of order (looking at the situation as a Briton) assuming the information is correct. Fired straight on the spot, it's just not a good thing to do. I don't care who you are, or what they have done. It's bad for everyone.
Bad for the person you are firing. They don't even get a a few day's notice to start looking for a new job. So now they are potentially going to struggle for money.
Bad for the company. You have just halved the workforce and the workload is going to stay the same, best scenario, or go up, worst scenario. Meaning the remaining workforce is going to struggle.
Bad for the community. Read above. If the people allowing mods/mod packs to become available are struggling to keep up, there will be people who wait hours, if not a day or two, to see the latest version of their mod(pack) become available.

This is just a good example of what can happen in the real world, and this time it's having an impact on a game community. Regardless of how bad it is for everyone involved, things like this happen, and in the end everything will get figured out and fixed.

and TBH, it's none of our (as in the communities) business. If the persons involved have signed a NDA (which seems indicated), then they can't say what's going on, and the rest is just speculation and rabble raising.

Let's get back to our regularly scheduled show of "Enjoy the Damn Game"

Quoting this just so everyone gets to read it again, as it's currently the best way to approach this situation. We have no idea what happened, so there's no reason to start raising pitchforks.

That's my point. There isn't ANY information from Curse about this, which immediately says to me that this was not handled well.

Says to me it's a company matter and they think it's not important enough to let the entire world know, regardless of how everything was handled.

A corporation doesn't usually care about overworked employees as long as they get the job done.

This sounds like a generalization based off a few random internet posts with no solid evidence or experience backing it. You overwork your employees, they either quit or stop producing at a high quality and quick manner. It ends up hurting the company, which is why so many of them are starting to implement different policies and provide various bonuses to get employees to relax throughout the workday.

Curse hired popular pack devs and steamers, tied them up in NDA's and exclusivity agreements, and had them move their packs to Curse. After they'd advertised Curse for a while, they weren't needed anymore, and were fired.

Curse wins on every level.

Keep in mind these people had the chance to review their contracts before they signed them and could have declined it at any point before signing on. They were (or at least, should have been) well aware of what they were getting into. Don't act like this whole thing is Curse being evil because they had contracts and NDAs. That's ignoring a vital half of the equation.

Slowpoke's initial response just shows that FTB is just as corporate-ish as Curse.

Or you know, it's a guy trying to not get attacked for saying something about the situation. Regardless of what he says, someone is going to take issue with it and jump in pointing fingers one way or the other. The way slow handled it was most likely the best way to minimize that finger pointing.

 

[RenzosNips]

Mind dropping the Reddit link? I either missed it or it wasn't in the post you quoted in. And was their response aimed at what happened with Curse, or at the Vazkii incident?

First thread
Vazkii thread

 

[Padfoote]

First thread
Vazkii thread

Thanks, that was a fun read. Forgot just how much more toxic that sub is compared to the rest of Reddit. At least they make it clear who they hate and just how paranoid they are.

 

[FyberOptic]

Or you know, it's a guy trying to not get attacked for saying something about the situation. Regardless of what he says, someone is going to take issue with it and jump in pointing fingers one way or the other. The way slow handled it was most likely the best way to minimize that finger pointing.

I would be willing to give him the benefit of the doubt with the initial post assuring us that FTB is all well. But after the discussion began and Vazkii kinda ripped into him, he wanted to take it private, which has about as much grace as a walrus at feeding time if you're trying to convince a community that you're honest and transparent.

I do agree though that there's likely little Slow could have said that wouldn't have still resulted in negative replies. I think part of that is related to the fact that in most of his replies these days he's "Owner of FTB and Curse Partner Slowpoke101" rather than just a guy who posts about Minecraft stuff, so people take anything he says as protecting personal interests. Gamers have generally had reason to distrust corporate types trying to reassure them of anything.

 

[erindalc]

-snip-

Apparently (No source for this unless someone what's to go digging into those 300 Reddit comments) Curse's only response was "we've heard your concerns".

Now, from a PR perspective, this has already caused an outcry in the community. I've seen quite a few posts and projects pop up about moving away from Curse forge (and I am fairly certain a small percentage of those were very serious efforts), and if I worked PR of be trying to get those people calmed down a little, to make a more satisfied customer.

Now, the general response I see is that people want to know what happened. So unless it's something terrible, there's not a reason I can't think to at least make some sort of statement, beyond "we hear you". This almost as badly handled as when Overkill released the weapons skins and safes for Payday 2, and basically didn't respond for about a week if I recall correctly, while people basically rioted on their discussion board, and all their moderators went on strike.

Now I don't think (and don't want) that to happen here, and pretty much everyone here is a little more level-headed than that.

I'm not really sure where I'm going with this, but a guess a TL;DR is Curse didn't handle this too well.

 

[LivingAngryCheese]

Guys. Lower the bloody pitchforks.

 

[keybounce]

The way I look at it is, at least they hired these people. They probably paid them a decent wage, they got experience, and they got something to plonk on a resume. ... I was glad that Jaded and Eyamaz eventually ended up with a paycheck for what they did, regardless of how it turned out.

The big issue, as I understand it, is that apparently Jaded and others were moved to California for some reason involving Curse, and then fired -- now moved away from where they used to be, away from their old support network, with no warning or notice.

 

[FyberOptic]

The big issue, as I understand it, is that apparently Jaded and others were moved to California for some reason involving Curse, and then fired -- now moved away from where they used to be, away from their old support network, with no warning or notice.

I'm not even sure if it's safe to assume that they were fired, or whether it was unforeseen, given the differing reactions. I have a feeling that Curse acquires temporary employees as they migrate into new territories, people familiar with the way things work, at least until they become redundant. It feels like it might have been around this time of the year when they were picked up initially, so perhaps a contractual thing. Who knows, really. It's easy to get swept away with an offer despite any rumors, but one can only hope that you planned a way home if the rumors prove true.

 

[Yusunoha]

I see it like this, if curse wants to keep their mouths shut about what happened, it shouldn't be a surprise that people will speculate about what happened, and knowing how the internet works, the rumors will go from curse being a company that makes profit to curse being the mastermind behind 9/11

personally to me, it looks like curse hired some big names from the minecraft community to boost their minecraft part of the website/program/launcher, and as soon as they reeled in enough of people to make their name in the minecraft community, they started to look for reasons to fire these people.

I'm not saying Curse is good or bad, what I'm saying is that Curse is a company and a company needs to make profit, no matter how they do this. if someone is to blame, it's probably ourselves who we should blame for not wanting to see this.

 

[Padfoote]

Apparently (No source for this unless someone what's to go digging into those 300 Reddit comments) Curse's only response was "we've heard your concerns".

Now, from a PR perspective, this has already caused an outcry in the community. I've seen quite a few posts and projects pop up about moving away from Curse forge (and I am fairly certain a small percentage of those were very serious efforts), and if I worked PR of be trying to get those people calmed down a little, to make a more satisfied customer.

Now, the general response I see is that people want to know what happened. So unless it's something terrible, there's not a reason I can't think to at least make some sort of statement, beyond "we hear you". This almost as badly handled as when Overkill released the weapons skins and safes for Payday 2, and basically didn't respond for about a week if I recall correctly, while people basically rioted on their discussion board, and all their moderators went on strike.

Now I don't think (and don't want) that to happen here, and pretty much everyone here is a little more level-headed than that.

I'm not really sure where I'm going with this, but a guess a TL;DR is Curse didn't handle this too well.

I can see Curse not making a statement because of it being considered an internal matter, and because it's likely they aren't allowed to discuss reasons for firing people due to some legal reasons. I know I've seen that be used as the reasoning for companies not discussing that. With the people who are upset about this, I can promise you that they're a minority of the Curse users, probably somewhere in the range of less than 5%, and out of those people, it's an even smaller amount who are actually going to end up leaving the Curse system for MC. The vast majority of players simply do not care who's working at a company so long as they can still play their game.

The difference between this and the OVERKILL incident is that Curse hasn't (to my knowledge) promised the community anything in terms of keeping certain people hired, whereas OVERKILL promised multiple times they wouldn't add microtransactions. Plus, combine the new microtransactions with the absurd amount of DLC / P2W features of the skins, and you're asking for a riot. This is just a handful of people being fired. People who Curse can replace without too many issues.

Curse can lower the quality of their work quite a lot before it gets any serious consequences, considering they practically control the community. They've acquired a monopoly, who exactly is gonna stop them if they do something bad?

They have this monopoly because the community willingly jumped on board. No one was forced to fully embrace Curse and their distribution system, and even if people wanted to use it, it isn't hard to keep your downloads up in a secondary location in case things happened that they disagreed with.

A contract may sound completely harmless when you sign it, but show out to be a great mistake later on. It's very easy to disguise a dangerous pharagraph as a harmless one, especially when you're dealing with people who don't have any experience with contracts.

The first rule of signing contracts is to have a lawyer review it before you sign anything. It's not a valid excuse to say you didn't know what a paragraph meant because you decided you would be fine without a lawyer. Ignorance isn't an excuse, it's a way to put the blame on everyone but yourself for something stupid you did.

That's not what I said, and I'd prefer if you stopped misrepresenting my words. I said that Curse wins on this (and implied that it was intentional, but that's still very different from saying they're evil because they have contracts and NDAs). They've gained tons of popularity from jadedcat and eyamaz, that's an objective fact.

Yeah, that's not how it came across at all.

If you don't want to be "attacked", you probably shouldn't post about how your business is safe in a thread about how some old friends of you were just fired from their jobs. It'd be far more appropriate to post a comment saying that you feel for your friends, and then talk about your business if anyone actually asked. Doing what he did makes him come off as extremely unfriendly and corporate.

Release a statement saying everything is fine with what you're doing and take a little bit of heat for it, or stay completely silent while the witchhunt starts blaming you for them getting fired. Those are the options that slow had, and saying everything is fine with FTB is the better of the two options. With things like this, you don't get personal with issues between the company you work for and a few people you worked with before. That's a good way to piss everyone off and cause more issues.

 

[jordsta95]

They have this monopoly because the community willingly jumped on board. No one was forced to fully embrace Curse and their distribution system, and even if people wanted to use it, it isn't hard to keep your downloads up in a secondary location in case things happened that they disagreed with.

Many people haven't accepted it with open arms. Some people only use the Curse client so they can play a certain pack, e.g. Agrarian Skies 2.

The first rule of signing contracts is to have a lawyer review it before you sign anything. It's not a valid excuse to say you didn't know what a paragraph meant because you decided you would be fine without a lawyer. Ignorance isn't an excuse, it's a way to put the blame on everyone but yourself for something stupid you did.

That may be an American thing (which I know Curse and the involved parties are), however, as a European, Squid may be under the assumption you sign a contract to work without anyone around. That is how it is in most places in Europe.

Release a statement saying everything is fine with what you're doing and take a little bit of heat for it, or stay completely silent while the witchhunt starts blaming you for them getting fired. Those are the options that slow had, and saying everything is fine with FTB is the better of the two options. With things like this, you don't get personal with issues between the company you work for and a few people you worked with before. That's a good way to piss everyone off and cause more issues.

A statement like "Unfortunately I am as in the dark about the situation as everyone else here is, so I think it's best I don't discuss the matter further" would have sufficed then. As it would have shown people who don't read replies, and replies to replies, before they comment what the situation is like.