Bloodstealer Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 And actually understands that the forums are where new news goes, and not Twitter. Maybe he was being stiffled as much as the server populations... I bet he wanted to say alot more but had to play the corporate game first and foremost Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GhostDrone Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 (edited) maybe the next communiy manager will actually come on the forums and talk to the community... Wanna know a good CM? Ubisoft surprisingly has a very nice and friendly Community Manager for the Assassin's Creed games. Gabe Graziani. Upon launch of Assassin's Creed Brotherhood on the PC he actually came to the Steam forums (Steam! Not Ubisoft! Steam! That's how awesome he is) and addressed a lot of questions about the release date that was tossed around back and forth. On topic though; yeah, guess i'll miss the tweets. It'll be... different. Edited May 23, 2012 by GhostDrone Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Berezo Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Maybe we will get a rep. that actually comes to the OFFICIAL forums this time. That man spent so much time on twitter and not giving information to this site it was sickening. Maybe if he had been on here more and communicated through this vessel, he would still have his job. Seems like a humble guy but as a community manager, he was non-existent in my mind. Now get us a good community manager bioware. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DarthTHC Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Yet he ignored the official forums, which with most MMOs to date is the goto place for game information, not Twitter. http://www.swtor.com/community/devtracker.php As a "Manager", one wonders if he might have had a team that could have posted to the official forums... Unfortunately dev tracker doesn't go far enough back to show all his posts before he had a decent-sized forum management team. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Elhanan Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 So many folks here seemingly believe they know exactly what the job entails, perhaps they should apply.. nevermind; requires people skills and apparently, they ain't qualified..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LeonBraun Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Mr. Reid seems like a great guy and I believe his heart is in the right place. However, as Sr. Community Manager, I would think his job was to ensure two-way communication between the developers and the community. I can't say he did his job well. He could have been blocked by factors beyond his control or it could have been him. Regardless, like I said, he seems like a really good guy and I'm sure he'll land on his feet somewhere soon. Hopefully the person that fills the spot really is able to catch the pulse of the community, is someone who is confident, engages the community, and someone who the community can depend on... Hell, I'd take the job for the right price =) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hellyeah_Rook Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Exactly. The same goes for Facebook. I come to these forums for news on this game. I should not have to go elsewhere for it. For all his good intentions, Reid either forgot that, or never understood it to begn with. It would have been alright if he posted it here too. That would have actually been exceptional of him to handle multiple social mediums, not just the ones that were easy to handle... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nakazia Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 (edited) Exactly. The same goes for Facebook. I come to these forums for news on this game. I should not have to go elsewhere for it. For all his good intentions, Reid either forgot that, or never understood it to begn with. While I agree information on SWTOR should be given on this site before any other (It's simply irritating and unprofessional). I'd like to say good job, you tried SR. This is an angry lynch mob of a community and some of the issues that arose had nothing to do with what SR was suppose to do. Less people working at the headquarters is a bad thing any way you slice it when so many improvements are desperately needed. Who else did/are they going to let go when the development of features and content are already at a crucial state? Is this simply the five fingers saying slap for a poor performance so far? A move that may even compound the problem? We'll see. Edited May 23, 2012 by Nakazia Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spellegren Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 It's EA's standard operating procedure for MMOs: Hype an MMO beyond all possibility of reasonable expectations. Pressure the studio to release the game before it is ready. Sell as many boxes and initial subscriptions as possible. Declare the game a success and ride the initial sub revenues for a few months. As problems develop, declare them to be "expected". After ~6 months strip down to vital resources only and let the game dwindle to extinction. They wrote the book on it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dazednconfuzed Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 On the whole, I'd actually support keeping him on, if he could figure out posting on here as well as tweeting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Benfynyn Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 I followed SR on twitter because it quickly became apparent that if you wanted information first that was the place to go. I didn't agree with that practice but I went along with it. I'll admit to being guilty of tweeting negative comments to him regarding the lack of communication (at least my perception of it) and frustrations over how patches/self-induced bugs were handled. Having said that, I've never disliked him personally and I hope he lands on his feet. Moving forward; Who's our new community manager? Did EA/BW fire the old one without a replacement lined up? Where's the announcement telling us about the new CM and, more importantly, what's going to be different? I certainly hope that when they decided to let SR go they had a plan for the future. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kthx Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 (edited) However, as Sr. Community Manager, I would think his job was to ensure two-way communication between the developers and the community. I can't say he did his job well. He could have been blocked by factors beyond his control or it could have been him. The latter. He was blocked by the community's failure to remain civil and show a willingness to engage in a constructive, two-way communication. Edited May 23, 2012 by Kthx Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kindara Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 This is really nothing new...Community Managers get swapped out alot in the MMO universe. He seemed like an OK guy but the fact he made us rely on fraking twitter was always annoying. Although they didnt' say who got let go I wouldn't be surprised if they let go not only Community people but alot of CS people (alot of who were fraking terrible), temp hires that were brought in to get the game released and get it through launch. If it was devs that got layed off it wouldn't of been done as quietly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lurchy Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 On the whole, I'd actually support keeping him on, if he could figure out posting on here as well as tweeting. Actually he did used to post here all the time, unfortunately the Moderators deleted his threads before we could see them Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jandi Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 It's irrelevant who holds the job. As long as BW is determined to view and treat people here like they are nothing more than a number in a folder, the community will always be vile. No amount of management will help when you treat people like complete morons and hand out infractions for disagreeing, ignoring things they currently don't want to hype, continue to lie and be coy and evasive about issues and continue to simply give out press releases. BioWare. Start treating gamers as people instead of numbers and you might get the people on your side. But, we all know that will never happen. The company is run by suits who have no clue whatsoever about games, gamers or people for that matter, they live their life in a boardroom with a tie so tight they can barely breath. /rant off All the best for Reid, no hate from me. There is only so much you can do when your job is dictated by people without a clue as how to do it, then get blamed for failing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dazednconfuzed Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 It's irrelevant who holds the job. As long as BW is determined to view and treat people here like they are nothing more than a number in a folder, the community will always be vile. No amount of management will help when you treat people like complete morons and hand out infractions for disagreeing, ignoring things they currently don't want to hype, continue to lie and be coy and evasive about issues and continue to simply give out press releases. BioWare. Start treating gamers as people instead of numbers and you might get the people on your side. But, we all know that will never happen. The company is run by suits who have no clue whatsoever about games, gamers or people for that matter, they live their life in a boardroom with a tie so tight they can barely breath. /rant off All the best for Reid, no hate from me. There is only so much you can do when your job is dictated by people without a clue as how to do it, then get blamed for failing. This is true. Shame, but it is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fhrosty Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 However, as Sr. Community Manager, I would think his job was to ensure two-way communication between the developers and the community. I can't say he did his job well. He could have been blocked by factors beyond his control or it could have been him. It's hard to have two-way communication with people who just refuse to listen. Many people here get a negative thought in their head and no amount of logic or support can shake that away. I've seen FAR too many posts where people ignore facts, spin facts, or even make up facts to support unconstructive rants. For the first time in all of this doom and gloom, with this sad news I am FINALLY getting my own first real sense of dismay. I hope his next job is one that is actually appreciated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meldwyn Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 The latter. He was blocked by the community's failure to remain civil and show a willingness to engage in a constructive, two-way communication. So, from your perspective, as community manager, he couldn't manage the community because they just wouldn't let him? I believe his job was to do just that, manage the community. If the community is out of control or "not civil" it would appear that he wasn't doing his job very well. I have only ever seen people asking for clarifications, more communications, post first on official forums, etc... He did none of that. His favorite word was "soon". I was less than impressed by his job performance from a consumer's perspective. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kelenan Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 maybe the next communiy manager will actually come on the forums and talk to the community... How could he when BioWare's policy is to close all threads that are the Dark side of the force Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fhrosty Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 I have only ever seen people asking for clarifications, more communications, post first on official forums, etc... He did none of that. His favorite word was "soon". I was less than impressed by his job performance from a consumer's perspective. Funny, I saw some of that, but I saw much, much more blind hate, vicious and unconstructive rants, and vicious rants about the vicious and unconstructive rants getting closed... which is funny considering closing them WAS part of the attempt to keep the community under control. "Soon" is all he said because "soon" is all he was given... especially after the fallout from giving specific dates then reniging on them because of technical delays. Poor guy was fed to the lions with a raw steak as his only means of defense. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tenceriker Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 More excuses made for Stephen Reid, check. Was he the worst commumity manager ever, nope. Did ht not properly do his job by avoiding the forums like the plague, correct. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meldwyn Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Funny, I saw some of that, but I saw much, much more blind hate, vicious and unconstructive rants, and vicious rants about the vicious and unconstructive rants getting closed... which is funny considering closing them WAS part of the attempt to keep the community under control. "Soon" is all he said because "soon" is all he was given... especially after the fallout from giving specific dates then reniging on them because of technical delays. Poor guy was fed to the lions with a raw steak as his only means of defense. I would submit that some of the "blind hate, vicious and non-constructive rants, and vicious rants(which seems somewhat redundant, btw)" were of his own making. If you don't communicate, leave too much to conjecture, ignore the feedback that is constructive, people start to lose their patience and turn up their volume to try and get your attention. Some certainly do it because they are just immature or mean spirited, but not all. He could have done so much more to help the community understand what was going on behind the curtain or engage in more dialogue with the official community here on the forums. My guess is that BW or EA or both, felt the same way. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kelenan Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 Quote: SWTOR shall not die! But we will force you to say only good things or we block your opinions and close your threads. SWTOR shall not die! But we will force several people to be laid-off due to poor management and ignoring the community, our bad policies shall be enforced. We will however be keeping the very people who's poor decisions has placed this game into it's current state. Future lay-offs imminent. SWTOR shall not die! But we will force you to not be able to play your level 50 characters while we do nothing to solve key in game problems. SWTOR shall not die! But we will force you to listen to our denials that there is anything is wrong and that we are fine and the population is strong. Please make all comments and feedback positive and relevant, we do not allow topics from the Dark side of the force to be disused. This thread will be closed due to the fact it is strong with the Dark side of the Force. All the best, STAR WARS: The Old Republic Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AeSaar Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 The latter. He was blocked by the community's failure to remain civil and show a willingness to engage in a constructive, two-way communication. Blaming the customer is always the incorrect answer. No one would hire you, if you openly thought otherwise. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kthx Posted May 23, 2012 Share Posted May 23, 2012 (edited) If the community is out of control or "not civil" it would appear that he wasn't doing his job very well. In any meaningful discourse, you need two partners who are willing to talk and listen. It is possible he could have "managed" the community better, but I think you are reading his job title too literally. We can argue to what extent he has responsibility to control and pacify the community, if the community decides to behave like a mob. I clearly don't think the responsibility is entirely his. The community must do its part to, and it did not and does not. I see fifth graders behave more civil than many members in this group do. I have only ever seen people asking for clarifications, more communications, post first on official forums, etc... I would suggest you have very rose-tinted glasses on if that is how you see the community's interaction to the devs. Edited May 23, 2012 by Kthx Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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