Committing fraud (scamming) is already a crime, that's the worst that can happen, and there are laws to protect against it. Hence all the hoopla right now CR and crew are facing.. So what more regulation is needed?
Oh I don't know... mandatory quarterly financial reports for any KS project over 100K? Too much to ask for?
Aside from the fact that I'm not a fan of over regulation on what is essentially a private affair between donor and recipient. What good would that really do? Most wouldn't know what they're looking at, secondly most wouldn't understand half the expenses in relation to a Dev studio, that would cause more confusion than we see now IMO.
Being a private business is a choice companies make, a funding source is a funding source like any other. Be it private donation private investor or public investment. You're essentially stripping a company of choice on how to do business. One that is afforded to any other company in the US as far as I am aware..
So "over regulation" is a bad thing? No shit, Sherlock. Otherwise it wouldn't be called "over." What about "under regulation?" Are you equally not a fan of that?
Apparently you buy into the corporate narrative that everything would be just hunky-dory if those evil regulators would just leave us the fuck alone. Can't blame you though since that's the core message fed to you by corporations, government and the media in your brave new manipulated world.
And please, "most wouldn't understand"? You're saying a lot there about your education system but whatever... there are enough who would understand it and could explain it in tiny twitter bite-sized language to their dimmer cousins.
Transparency is a good thing... or has your confidence about that basic fact been undermined as well?
OK, so we don't want to release financials. What about being held accountable for work milestones? They should at least be able to show some solid progress in advancing the project.
OK, so we don't want to release financials. What about being held accountable for work milestones? They should at least be able to show some solid progress in advancing the project.
Anything would be better than "it's none of your fucking business" which together with "Hey! Don't look over there (Derek Smart, Derek Smart) look over here! Isn't this shiny?" is their current approach.
"Social media gives legions of idiots the right to speak when they once only spoke at a bar after a glass of wine, without harming the community ... but now they have the same right to speak as a Nobel Prize winner. It's the invasion of the idiots”
― Umberto Eco
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?” ― CD PROJEKT RED
@laseritThat is the million dollar question, what happens once funds start to dry up?
Another question should be, once you start a KS should you be able to leave with the money and start another way to raise funds?
Both of these should be dealt with over on KS! Add a monthly report to show where the money is going (to backers) and KS could end up better in the long run for all party's.
"Of course, getting a clear picture of the inner workings of a company is very difficult so the other side of the story is hard to come by as well. If all these bad practices are occurring, we can’t very well expect management to expose them for us. And of course, we have no clear picture of the budget situation. Star Citizen has crowd-funded over $90 million and counting, but we don’t know how that money is being spent, how much is left, and so forth."
And there it is again... THE PROBLEM that keeps giving this drama legs.
"Social media gives legions of idiots the right to speak when they once only spoke at a bar after a glass of wine, without harming the community ... but now they have the same right to speak as a Nobel Prize winner. It's the invasion of the idiots”
― Umberto Eco
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?” ― CD PROJEKT RED
Got a proper source on the "shipped a game in over 80% of cases"? Do games that released as alpha count as shipped?
To be specific, do they count Godus as being released or not?
Yes, me. I've manually verified the state of each of the games myself. The spreadsheet was originally produced by evil as a hobby, attempting to support the idea that only 1/3 of games from KS ship. Feel free to have a peek.
Yes, Godus is considered to be released. It's a game. It's not the vision, but it's a game. Same way that SC will likely not be as full-featured as promised. Probably how ED didn't have all the features promised. Probably how plenty of games, outside crowdfunding, pull features. The real question is whether or not a game is delivered.
Do Alpha and Beta count? In some cases, yes. I've commented most of them, but haven't spent the time to go back and update ones already marked as delivered, either. Also, I should note that I lied, it's projects up until the end of 2013, not 2014. Also, I haven't finished updating the 2013 ones either. If I had to dig for an answer, I moved on.
I admire your dedication, the one I had seen before only mentioned games that had funds above $75k.
I disagree on the "its all about whether a game is delivered or not" since by that definition you could say that Pathfinder online was released. However, I agree that its better to go for macro instead of micro and on a macro level kickstarter is positive for gaming.
For every godus there is a gem like Undertale.
Iselin: And the next person who says "but it's a business, they need to make money" can just go fuck yourself.
Seems to me Erin and Chris together are a good team.
Have fun
Yeah not really though... back in Origin Systems days it was really Richard Garriott and Warren Spector it seems that are the project managers, and they delivers.
Erin was another creative guys, that's why Digital Anvil seems to suffer similar sort of problems when they were making Freelancer and Starlancer.
Hmm, looking at Erin Roberts profiles (LinkedIn, MobyGames and IMDB) i find very little evidence that he was "another of the creative guys". Yes, in his early career you see him working a bit on art.
But at least for the last 10 years he almost exclusively worked in project/programme management (usually at Director level). Quite successfully it seems, as his games seem to have been quite profitable.
And referring to the topic of our thread - personally i think that Erin is pushing his employees hard, but treats them well.
That is all fine and great, but CR needs to be removed and records need to be shown if he did embezzle any funds. Heck Maybe he didn't but his wife did. It is time to put up or shut up CR. Let your brother run the show and get it all worked out.
Got a proper source on the "shipped a game in over 80% of cases"? Do games that released as alpha count as shipped?
To be specific, do they count Godus as being released or not?
Yes, me. I've manually verified the state of each of the games myself. The spreadsheet was originally produced by evil as a hobby, attempting to support the idea that only 1/3 of games from KS ship. Feel free to have a peek.
Yes, Godus is considered to be released. It's a game. It's not the vision, but it's a game. Same way that SC will likely not be as full-featured as promised. Probably how ED didn't have all the features promised. Probably how plenty of games, outside crowdfunding, pull features. The real question is whether or not a game is delivered.
Do Alpha and Beta count? In some cases, yes. I've commented most of them, but haven't spent the time to go back and update ones already marked as delivered, either. Also, I should note that I lied, it's projects up until the end of 2013, not 2014. Also, I haven't finished updating the 2013 ones either. If I had to dig for an answer, I moved on.
I admire your dedication, the one I had seen before only mentioned games that had funds above $75k.
I disagree on the "its all about whether a game is delivered or not" since by that definition you could say that Pathfinder online was released. However, I agree that its better to go for macro instead of micro and on a macro level kickstarter is positive for gaming.
For every godus there is a gem like Undertale.
Thanks! My updates have tapered off a little. I'm still working on 2013 items.
Yeah, I agree that the macro level is a must. There may be exceptions, but I'll definitely accept that games will ship without certain features. Also, you might not get your t-shirt, but I don't care about that at this level. Godus is a little grey-area since they had a super-high level tier that was never delivered (Some mystery box thing). I mean that could have been anything.
Either way, Godus went on and actually had some critical acclaim, on iOS anyway. As far as user reviews, it always goes back to broken promises for features.
Honestly, the people who bring a lack of features into a conversation re: the viability of KS or crowdfunding are the worst. Are they wrong? No and yes. If you were the PM of that project, it would never be delivered. If you were the PM of that project, you'd likely have more than one developer kick you in the balls.
I can understand the disappointment, but at some point, did you get a game out of it? Even if it's not everytihng you thought it could be. Oh, also, it should be noted that if we were to hold KS to these standards, then, probably, the same number of released, published, games would count as failures, too. Especially anything from EA, it seems. They are just impossible standards, unfortunately.
PFO was definitely released, because that's what they said
That is all fine and great, but CR needs to be removed and records need to be shown if he did embezzle any funds. Heck Maybe he didn't but his wife did. It is time to put up or shut up CR. Let your brother run the show and get it all worked out.
But people still need to follow the money.
I disagree with ya on this one. We don't have any evidence that Roberts has done anything wrong at this point in time. Aside from missing deadlines, which is incredibly common in both game and tech development, what has CIG done that warrants Roberts stepping down that we have evidence for?
At this point all we have is hearsay and assumption, and the one source that has been constant in all of this (Derek Smart) is a competing developer who has not shown any proof of his claims either.
This is the biggest issue at current; all of this is just pointless noise until someone actually brings something tangible to the table.
But it has been fucking hilarious to watch it all go down, I'll grant you that.
Committing fraud (scamming) is already a crime, that's the worst that can happen, and there are laws to protect against it. Hence all the hoopla right now CR and crew are facing.. So what more regulation is needed?
Oh I don't know... mandatory quarterly financial reports for any KS project over 100K? Too much to ask for?
Aside from the fact that I'm not a fan of over regulation on what is essentially a private affair between donor and recipient. What good would that really do? Most wouldn't know what they're looking at, secondly most wouldn't understand half the expenses in relation to a Dev studio, that would cause more confusion than we see now IMO.
Being a private business is a choice companies make, a funding source is a funding source like any other. Be it private donation private investor or public investment. You're essentially stripping a company of choice on how to do business. One that is afforded to any other company in the US as far as I am aware..
I don't think there is a need for regulation. This is already covered with standard charity donations. If the recipient uses the funds for anything else than what the donors gave it for then they will be accountable for it and possibly go to jail.
With CIG it is also covered by standard federal commerce laws because people are not donating they are buying ships in an online store. So a product is sold and if that product is not delivered then it is fraud.
They have a separate section for "pledges" a.k.a. donations. The Shop is just that, an online shop where you buy virtual items not a donation.
Of cause this would go to court and the outcome is unknown but the facts are that ship sales, merchandise and other digital items are not donations.
How is asking a business to provide financial reports considered regulation? Nothing is being regulated. You even state that if charitable funds are used for something other than their expressed purposed then they will be accountable for it . . . how? How can someone be accountable for something if they're not required to, at minimum, provide regular reports on how funds are being allocated?
This doesn't have to come from the government, Kickstarter could easily add a clause that states any project funded at X number of dollars must inform donors how money is being used.
I don't think simply explaining to people that crowdfunding is a donation and not an investment will change anything. I'm pretty sure most understand that. What they don't understand is how much game/product development costs. That's where the issue is and transparent accounting would greatly help people to realize when something is underfunded or unrealistic.
Right now, someone slaps up a crowdfunding project and says, "We need X money to make this amazing idea!" And people throw money at it without any idea of whether or not the requested amount will be enough. Even the best developers can't pull magic out of their butts, running any business is expensive. There is no way to educate everyone on all matters regarding operating a business, so the next best thing is asking large projects to share their financials. They should be producing those reports anyway, so there wouldn't be additional effort on their part beyond uploading a pdf to their site and saying, "Here you go" - and if they're not creating these reports, then you can pretty much guarantee they have no clue what they're doing.
Despite this request having nothing to do with regulation, people really need to get over the idea that "regulations are bad" - some regulations are bad, others are good. Regulations are neutral, they're a tool and sometimes they function to benefit business and sometimes not, and sometimes they serve to benefit the consumer, something people rarely appreciate until they live in a place in which those regulations don't exist - like, elevators must have XYZ safety mechanism, or, children's toys are not allowed to have lead in them and if you include malware on your USB devices you will be fined and possibly shut down.
I agree with you. I think you misunderstood what i was saying. There is no need for additional regulation because it is already covered. It has just not been tried in court. No one has ever enforced the existing regulations.
I think the regulations need to come from the government not from Kickstarter. You can't leave this in the hands of one Crowd funding platform because that would only cover Kickstarter. There needs to be a general ruling for any kind of crowdfunding/donation based project.
One could be to produce quarterly or yearly financial reports.
"It's pretty simple, really. If your only intention in posting about a particular game or topic is to be negative, then yes, you should probably move on. Voicing a negative opinion is fine, continually doing so on the same game is basically just trolling." - Michael Bitton Community Manager, MMORPG.com
"As an online discussion about Star Citizen grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Derek Smart approaches 1" - MrSnuffles's law
"I am jumping in here a bit without knowing exactly what you all or talking about." - SEANMCAD
That is all fine and great, but CR needs to be removed and records need to be shown if he did embezzle any funds. Heck Maybe he didn't but his wife did. It is time to put up or shut up CR. Let your brother run the show and get it all worked out.
But people still need to follow the money.
I disagree with ya on this one. We don't have any evidence that Roberts has done anything wrong at this point in time. Aside from missing deadlines, which is incredibly common in both game and tech development, what has CIG done that warrants Roberts stepping down that we have evidence for?
At this point all we have is hearsay and assumption, and the one source that has been constant in all of this (Derek Smart) is a competing developer who has not shown any proof of his claims either.
This is the biggest issue at current; all of this is just pointless noise until someone actually brings something tangible to the table.
But it has been fucking hilarious to watch it all go down, I'll grant you that.
One thing from the first game he worked on everyone agrees with he is a great visionary, but sucks at running a company and needs someone to tell him what works and don't work. I can just imagine what he has done with all the cash and put it in places it should never have gone.
That is all fine and great, but CR needs to be removed and records need to be shown if he did embezzle any funds. Heck Maybe he didn't but his wife did. It is time to put up or shut up CR. Let your brother run the show and get it all worked out.
But people still need to follow the money.
An anonymous source told me you have not been paying your taxes. We are going to freeze your bank account and all assets until an investigation into your finances is completed to see if this is the case. Let your mom run the show until we get it all worked out.
Of course just an example. Are you ok with this course of action?
laserit said: Nice too read some logical arguments.
So.... an honest question:
What should a company that is honestly trying to complete a crowdfunded project ethically do when the funds start to dry up?
To start with, an official announcement to all backers explaining the situation, include some information about how they intend to attract more funding, perhaps an apology for the delay that the lack of funds will create, and finish with a statement that they will do everything they possibly can to fulfil any and all obligations they have to existing backers.
That might be a good way to go.
A creative person is motivated by the desire to achieve, not the desire to beat others.
laserit said: Nice too read some logical arguments.
So.... an honest question:
What should a company that is honestly trying to complete a crowdfunded project ethically do when the funds start to dry up?
To start with, an official announcement to all backers explaining the situation, include some information about how they intend to attract more funding, perhaps an apology for the delay that the lack of funds will create, and finish with a statement that they will do everything they possibly can to fulfil any and all obligations they have to existing backers.
That is all fine and great, but CR needs to be removed and records need to be shown if he did embezzle any funds. Heck Maybe he didn't but his wife did. It is time to put up or shut up CR. Let your brother run the show and get it all worked out.
But people still need to follow the money.
An anonymous source told me you have not been paying your taxes. We are going to freeze your bank account and all assets until an investigation into your finances is completed to see if this is the case. Let your mom run the show until we get it all worked out.
Of course just an example. Are you ok with this course of action?
You are confusing anonymous source with "anonymized". The sources of The Escapist are not anonymous. They are known and confirmed ex-employees that asked not to be named in person.
There is a HUGE difference between that and what you used as an example.
If the IRS has a confirmed source with possible access to your financial information saying you falsified your tax records they will investigate and then freeze your assets. Nothing crazy about that.
"It's pretty simple, really. If your only intention in posting about a particular game or topic is to be negative, then yes, you should probably move on. Voicing a negative opinion is fine, continually doing so on the same game is basically just trolling." - Michael Bitton Community Manager, MMORPG.com
"As an online discussion about Star Citizen grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Derek Smart approaches 1" - MrSnuffles's law
"I am jumping in here a bit without knowing exactly what you all or talking about." - SEANMCAD
Do the sources the Escapist used have access to CIG's financial information? That would certainly change things if they did but I haven't seen an indication that is the case, which makes Saxx0n's analogy valid whereas yours is not.
This ^ CIG could have made a solid argument in both the Rebuttal and C&D letters that no vetting was done to verify the people making the allegations were in position to actually see the relevant info. Unfortunately they took a different tack
We are speaking about CIG employees here in this thread. Administratively they are now reporting to Erin Roberts. Erin Roberts qualifications were called questionable. I listed his qualifications. Based on the information presented personally i consider Erin Roberts to be qualified to lead these employees. In a professional manner and not in the way described by disgruntled ex employees with an axe to grind.
Someone else may have a different opinion based on the information i presented.
We are speaking about CIG employees here in this thread. Administratively they are now reporting to Erin Roberts. Erin Roberts qualifications were called questionable. I listed his qualifications. Based on the information presented personally i consider Erin Roberts to be qualified to lead these employees. In a professional manner and not in the way described by disgruntled ex employees with an axe to grind.
Someone else may have a different opinion based on the information i presented.
Have fun
You can write it in one post not in 3 posts marked with big letters and is practically just verbatim copy from imdb. Yes I call it obnoxious.
Do the sources the Escapist used have access to CIG's financial information? That would certainly change things if they did but I haven't seen an indication that is the case, which makes Saxx0n's analogy valid whereas yours is not.
This ^ CIG could have made a solid argument in both the Rebuttal and C&D letters that no vetting was done to verify the people making the allegations were in position to actually see the relevant info. Unfortunately they took a different tack
Except they didn't with makes everyone suspicious as to why they didn't just address the claims. For all we know it could be someone higher up who has a pretty good idea of where the financials stand, opposite could also be true of a night cleaner who would have no idea lol.
Comments
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
@laserit That is the million dollar question, what happens once funds start to dry up?
Another question should be, once you start a KS should you be able to leave with the money and start another way to raise funds?
Both of these should be dealt with over on KS! Add a monthly report to show where the money is going (to backers) and KS could end up better in the long run for all party's.
Star Citizen – The Extinction Level Event
4/13/15 > ELE has been updated look for 16-04-13.
http://www.dereksmart.org/2016/04/star-citizen-the-ele/
Enjoy and know the truth always comes to light!
"Of course, getting a clear picture of the inner workings of a company is very difficult so the other side of the story is hard to come by as well. If all these bad practices are occurring, we can’t very well expect management to expose them for us. And of course, we have no clear picture of the budget situation. Star Citizen has crowd-funded over $90 million and counting, but we don’t know how that money is being spent, how much is left, and so forth."
And there it is again... THE PROBLEM that keeps giving this drama legs.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED
One of three things will eventually happen.
1) The game will release and people will be able to judge it for ourselves on its own merits..........
or…
2) CIG runs out of money, the project dies in the cradle, and we discover that some of the accusations may have had teeth after all................
or…
3) Some hard evidence will come out to back up or refute accusations that goes well beyond what we’ve seen so far..........
So all he does is recap what everyone already knows and titles it under the heading "Calm Down" But offers almost no new reassuring evidence.
Nice!
That's just Forbes doing a flip-flop.
I disagree on the "its all about whether a game is delivered or not" since by that definition you could say that Pathfinder online was released. However, I agree that its better to go for macro instead of micro and on a macro level kickstarter is positive for gaming.
For every godus there is a gem like Undertale.
But at least for the last 10 years he almost exclusively worked in project/programme management (usually at Director level). Quite successfully it seems, as his games seem to have been quite profitable.
And referring to the topic of our thread - personally i think that Erin is pushing his employees hard, but treats them well.
Have fun
Erin Roberts
Studio Director
Foundry42 Limited
Foundry 42 is A Cloud Imperium Games company working on Star Citizen and Squadron 42.
Studio Director
TT-Fusion
Group Program Manager
Digital Anvil (Microsoft Game Studios)
Producer
Digital Anvil
Producer
Electronic Arts
Associate Producer
Origin Systems
**************************************************************************************
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0731086/
****************************************************************************************
Have fun
************************************************************************************************
Have fun
That is all fine and great, but CR needs to be removed and records need to be shown if he did embezzle any funds. Heck Maybe he didn't but his wife did. It is time to put up or shut up CR. Let your brother run the show and get it all worked out.
But people still need to follow the money.
Star Citizen – The Extinction Level Event
4/13/15 > ELE has been updated look for 16-04-13.
http://www.dereksmart.org/2016/04/star-citizen-the-ele/
Enjoy and know the truth always comes to light!
Thanks! My updates have tapered off a little. I'm still working on 2013 items.
Yeah, I agree that the macro level is a must. There may be exceptions, but I'll definitely accept that games will ship without certain features. Also, you might not get your t-shirt, but I don't care about that at this level. Godus is a little grey-area since they had a super-high level tier that was never delivered (Some mystery box thing). I mean that could have been anything.
Either way, Godus went on and actually had some critical acclaim, on iOS anyway. As far as user reviews, it always goes back to broken promises for features.
Honestly, the people who bring a lack of features into a conversation re: the viability of KS or crowdfunding are the worst. Are they wrong? No and yes. If you were the PM of that project, it would never be delivered. If you were the PM of that project, you'd likely have more than one developer kick you in the balls.
I can understand the disappointment, but at some point, did you get a game out of it? Even if it's not everytihng you thought it could be. Oh, also, it should be noted that if we were to hold KS to these standards, then, probably, the same number of released, published, games would count as failures, too. Especially anything from EA, it seems. They are just impossible standards, unfortunately.
PFO was definitely released, because that's what they said
Crazkanuk
----------------
Azarelos - 90 Hunter - Emerald
Durnzig - 90 Paladin - Emerald
Demonicron - 90 Death Knight - Emerald Dream - US
Tankinpain - 90 Monk - Azjol-Nerub - US
Brindell - 90 Warrior - Emerald Dream - US
----------------
At this point all we have is hearsay and assumption, and the one source that has been constant in all of this (Derek Smart) is a competing developer who has not shown any proof of his claims either.
This is the biggest issue at current; all of this is just pointless noise until someone actually brings something tangible to the table.
But it has been fucking hilarious to watch it all go down, I'll grant you that.
I think the regulations need to come from the government not from Kickstarter. You can't leave this in the hands of one Crowd funding platform because that would only cover Kickstarter. There needs to be a general ruling for any kind of crowdfunding/donation based project.
One could be to produce quarterly or yearly financial reports.
"It's pretty simple, really. If your only intention in posting about a particular game or topic is to be negative, then yes, you should probably move on. Voicing a negative opinion is fine, continually doing so on the same game is basically just trolling."
- Michael Bitton
Community Manager, MMORPG.com
"As an online discussion about Star Citizen grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Derek Smart approaches 1" - MrSnuffles's law
"I am jumping in here a bit without knowing exactly what you all or talking about."
- SEANMCAD
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬
One thing from the first game he worked on everyone agrees with he is a great visionary, but sucks at running a company and needs someone to tell him what works and don't work. I can just imagine what he has done with all the cash and put it in places it should never have gone.
Star Citizen – The Extinction Level Event
4/13/15 > ELE has been updated look for 16-04-13.
http://www.dereksmart.org/2016/04/star-citizen-the-ele/
Enjoy and know the truth always comes to light!
Of course just an example. Are you ok with this course of action?
Life IS Feudal
That might be a good way to go.
A creative person is motivated by the desire to achieve, not the desire to beat others.
There is a HUGE difference between that and what you used as an example.
If the IRS has a confirmed source with possible access to your financial information saying you falsified your tax records they will investigate and then freeze your assets. Nothing crazy about that.
"It's pretty simple, really. If your only intention in posting about a particular game or topic is to be negative, then yes, you should probably move on. Voicing a negative opinion is fine, continually doing so on the same game is basically just trolling."
- Michael Bitton
Community Manager, MMORPG.com
"As an online discussion about Star Citizen grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Derek Smart approaches 1" - MrSnuffles's law
"I am jumping in here a bit without knowing exactly what you all or talking about."
- SEANMCAD
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬
Imho you can respond with a link or at least in one post.
We are speaking about CIG employees here in this thread. Administratively they are now reporting to Erin Roberts. Erin Roberts qualifications were called questionable. I listed his qualifications. Based on the information presented personally i consider Erin Roberts to be qualified to lead these employees. In a professional manner and not in the way described by disgruntled ex employees with an axe to grind.
Someone else may have a different opinion based on the information i presented.
Have fun
Due to the new rather restrictive post length limits the information had to be split into three parts
Have fun
You can write it in one post not in 3 posts marked with big letters and is practically just verbatim copy from imdb. Yes I call it obnoxious.