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Confirmation of CME exodus, Studio head leaves!
Agricola1
Member UncommonPosts: 4,977
Dan Elggrens, studio head at CME has left confirmed on this site click, his wifes blog. She confirms he wasn't being paid and over 100 employees have left CME since october. For those who can't be bothered to click,
" The last 8-9 months have been really rough at Dan's work and we've been trying so hard to make it work. Over 100 employees have left since October, so Dan felt he was as loyal as he possibly could be considering that he was basically volunteering for work and not getting paid! It's such a shame, because the game he's been working on for over 3 years was within several months of being ready to ship! I've admired how hard Dan has fought for his coworkers and for this game. He had been interviewing all over the country when he found this job with Gazillion in Louisville, Colorado. A few of his former coworkers are there now, so that's been a fun connection. We decided that he'd take the job just over a week ago and he begins work there June 1st."
This is the crux of it, it seems CME "employees" or should I say volunteers are spending their time job hunting rather than working hard on SGW! This explains the media blackout that the FanOri keep refering to, infact they're all so busy job hunting (the few left) that they have no time to do volunteer work for CME anymore!
Thanks for sending me the link to the person that found it.
"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience"
CS Lewis
Comments
This is indeed bad news, deep down I think we all had a feeling that something like this might happen. Seems now that stargate worlds is now lookimg like it will end. It has being at the back of many fans minds including myself.I say bare a miracle SGW seems to be going down ( a shame really looked so good) maybe there is a slim chance that annother company will take it but I ind of doubt it. A well
Dan's departure is bad news, he was a great guy. But it sounds like he struggled as Studio Head - never could quite keep the game on schedule or keep the troops rallied. He clearly took care of his people, but he acted more like a producer than a studio head. Having Rod Nakamoto a more seasoned veteran take his place is probably a good thing.
Do we know for sure he quit or was he let go because the game didn't get done?
No doubt about Dan quit - but if the company wasn't having serious financial problems he may have been let go. Stargate is not letting anyone go when they can't pay the ones they've got. A lot of the employees continue to bust their butts for the company and to get the game, but many others are spending time looking for other jobs - still expecting or hoping to get paid by Stargate - but not working on the game
By the way, this is ludicrous - CME barely had 100 people to begin with and most of them are still there - yes - Dan is gone - but most of the dev team is fighting to stay with the company and get the game done.
I can confirm that - Stargate has not lost 100 employees - if they did they would have been gone long ago - most of the devs want to stick it out and build the game - but getting paid has been a problem - the economy sucks.
If you read her blog she is obviously very emotional about what's happened, and no doubt from her perspective it seemed that hundreds of people were leaving. Obviously there never were enough staff at CME for this to be true, however she does clearly state that he was working unpaid and left CME after finding a paying job in another state. It seems clear to me the reason for leaving is that he wasn't being paid a salary and he has a family to support. You don't get fired and already have a new job ready, usually you find a new job then quit. Unless he did get fired as his volunteer work just wasn't good enough for team Whiting and some EX CME employees hooked him up with the company they're now working at quickly.
Either way it seems the EX CME staff must've liked him and he and his wife got sick of him doing volunteer work for team Whiting with nothing but an MMOGULs membership to show for it!
"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience"
CS Lewis
[QUOTE=Gren;630327]Hey all,
I thought I would just give you the scoop directly from me. So, yes, I am leaving and this was not an easy decision to make. The development team on Stargate was one of the best dev teams I have had the pleasure to work on. I won't go into all the reasons I am leaving but wanted to talk about what is happening at SGW.
Over the last few months the dev team has made some amazing progress on the game. We went through and did a polish pass on a few of the worlds in the game and it looks beautiful. We added more customization to the character creation pages, polished the visuals and sound for the soldier and commando and completed an iteration pass on a couple newbie zones which now feel amazing.
So yes, I do believe that SGW still has a chance to ship just like any other game under development at any studio. They still have some amazing developers at the studio and I had the pleasure of bringing in some other good friends in the industry to help out over the past couple of months. We also just hired some amazingly talented interns, designers and a new artist.
CME will continue to make decisions based on what they think is best for the project and the company. They have always stated that they will ship the game when it is ready and have always made decisions with this in mind. That means they will ship the game based on a quality product.
My wife is just sick about those that saw her blog. This was not meant to cause problems and is usually only read by close friends and family. We certainly hold no ill feelings towards CME. The number of 100 employees leaving is not accurate. When you have good friends leave, it is always a bigger deal and is hard to see that happen. Now that we have made the decision to move, my wife and kids now have to leave a lot of friends and family in the area of Gilbert and Mesa, Arizona as well as those we will miss at the office. It's always difficult to start over and I am just glad she is now looking forward to the new opportunity.
I wanted to thank those that provided the well wishes. Don't give up hope! We have a worthwhile and exciting product at CME.
Thanks for being an amazing community.
Take care,
Dan[/QUOTE]
In short,
"Got sick of volunteering at CME so looked for a real job and when I found it handed in my notice. I'm pissed that someone other than friends or family read the blog but shit happens and now we're getting the hell out of dodge,
Dan"
Funny how in that statement he has mentioned more about the alleged development of SGW than the entire company (what's left of it) has in six months! Coincidence?
"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience"
CS Lewis
The payroll at CME was once about 120 some odd employees, 150'ish if you counted the knowledge relay teams (which were never coutned on official employee counts but had to be supported by HR, IT and Finance anyway).
If you subtract out Firesky (publishing), admin staff, IT, superstition studios and hand cranked games, you ended up with almost 75 employees dedicated strictly to SGW. So correct, 100's never left stargate. However, SGW has only around 20-30 folks left (depending on if you count QA or not). This can be confirmed by any investor who wants to take a tour, they can do a count of empty seats if nothing else. There might be 4-5 engineers (actual coders) left on a team of once 18. Every team has been hit hard.
Dan told select individuals to get their resumes out as early as November of last year (when payroll was first missed). Dan himself had been interviewing since December at least along with other SGW leaders (some who no longer work there). It takes far longer for senior leadership to find new jobs than it does the 'grunts' mainly because their are fewer jobs. That said it'd be wrong for anyone to think Dan is evil here. Obviously he has a family that depends on him and frankly, that requires a paycheck.
Fortuitous timing for him, as this interview process had to be going on since before the pay stopped again. Would've been a much harder decision if CME had found a pile of funding and then he got this offer.
Well, that was mighty swell of Dan to only tell a select few.
What absolutely sucks if CME officially folds, is that in Arizona the unemployment is very low, one of the lowest in the nation (@ ; $240 a week), but it then, takes nearly 6 weeks to get your first check. Looking at a standpoint if payroll is 2 months behind, then add another 1.5 months on top of that -- that's almost 4 months without any income. The poor devs are already in a big, deep hole -- not like getting a fresh layoff.
Stargate is dead!! Gary Whiting once again has shown his true colors & jeopardised Stargate because of his scam with Mmoguls. My friends tell me Mmoguls has been shut down by there credit card processor because of high charge backs. They also tell me the investor group from Stargate will soon bring a powerful lawsuit against Gary Whiting for misuse of investor funds. Studio exec. & design engineers have departed & not been paid for several weeks. I wonder how much of the investor money has gone into Gary Whitings pockets. I believe this game could have been completed & launched over a year ago but the money raised for the game has mysteriously vanished. I hope Whiting faces judgement day soon!! He seems not to care about his employees or people who have invested in Mmoguls & Stargate!!
MMOGULs credit cards are off because the man who promised to invest 8 million in Stargate was tied to the company, Vision Bankcard, that processes MMOGULS cards and he was upset that Gary would not give him control of th company for the 8 million. So after signing a letter of intent he pulled the money, which is what caused payroll to be missed and screwed Gary in the process.
Gary has taken money from SGW no question. There's all kinds of discrepancies in the books, like a certain missing 4 million dollars from 2 years ago. But all that said, Gary did in fact hand over nearly 40 million to CME in raised funds over 3-4 years. CME had 40 million to build stargate and nearly 80 people and 4 years, and they failed. Gary's a crook but so are the people who blew that money and have nothing to show for it.
Guess Gary wasnt too upset that the 8 Million guy wanted control, because didnt he turn around and jump right back into bed with him arranging another deal?
Part of me says who the hells cares, the poor company is dead. But part of me also says CME didn’t have a full 40 million to build Stargate Worlds. Nearly half of the funds raised went to departments like publishing, marketing, Tim bonuses, other fake companies and a bunch of websites that never went live.
The biggest fall short was leadership's failure to complete one playable piece of the game, that was fun. Design was allowed to run amuck, there was no accountability to missed milestones, and the place was populated with the Mormon pal of the month. Heck even in Dan’s goodbye post he mentioned bringing his ‘pals’ onboard. Hit linked in and read Alex Reed’s duties (guessing a Dan pal). In his less than 30 day stay at CME, he claims to have been running EVERYTHING. With shit like that, there’s your fail.
Here is Alex's profile. I confirmed with my CME insider that Alex was only there maybe 30 days and is gone:
Stargate Worlds is an MMORPG currently under development by Cheyenne Mountain Entertainment in association with the film and television media company MGM. The game is designed to allow players to interact in an online universe, based around Stargate SG-1. It is currently undergoing closed beta testing.
• Currently leading a staff of about 80 people internal and several smaller external teams.
• I handle all personnel and staff on the Art, Design, Publishing and Marketing branches of the company.
• I handle all staffing and day to day HR management of the Stargate staff, and work with the GM on all contract and business negotiations.
• I am the creative lead for all new work involving level design, art and cinematics.
• I handle the community and web development personnel.
/rant on
This sounds like your usual blerb a senior management would spout, he knows he is sort of in charge of the people below him making the decisions he lists as his own.
He may be the boss for the creative lead, he scribbles that down as his responsibility, when in fact he knows nothing about it, and has no real input at all into that role. I have seen it in the past many times, usually positions like this are filled by 'friends' of the owners or majority share holders, to try and justify a stupidly paid position in the company.
I find it amazing that one sole person could do so many jobs, mind you it would explain why nothing has been done, either this guy is spouting who he is in charge of, and not what he is doing, or he is actually personally taking on these roles, and failing in all of them.
/rant off
Dan Elggren has gone to a better more stable job now behind developing jumpgate evolution. In my opinion I doubt that much more will be heard about SGW until it either folds or someone takes it over.
Tigam, I believe you have your facts incorrect. I am going to investigate and try to locate some of the investors in Arizona & then call the Vision Bankcard people & see what REALLY happened! It is ludicrious on your part to say that anyone screwed Gary Whiting especially as far as I can tell Whiting has SCREWED everyone who has invested with him. By the way did you see the Letter of Intent or are you just quoting someone from Whitings Stable? I hope to get in touch with Nedra Roney who gave Gary Whiting almost 3 million to start Mmoguls & help Stargate Worlds. I understand Whiting is now in default on her loan & I would anticipate she will step in the long line of investors who will soon have Gary Whiting wearing wide pin stripes! I will be back soon with additional information. I hope we are all interested in finding out what has actual taken place in the saga of Gary Whiting & Stargate Worlds & not muddle with the pigs in the POOP & state half truths!
Tigam is saying Whiting screwed this guy first, Whiting had promised him financial control of MMOGULs at some point in the future. I think the guy was angry that Whiting wasn't handing the books over to him and then $8,000,000 went *poof*. He wanted to see the money back as he couldn't pay the pozi/pyramid scheme members their weekly cheque. The cheques were paid late with upper managments money, he then in turn burnt Whiting as his company was controling MMOGULs credit card transactions (I believe). He pulled his support to start a similar scam and Whiting was lrft with his dick in his hand, causing his house of cards to collapse.
That's what I believe happened but if wrong would appreciate being corrected.
"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience"
CS Lewis
I'm not trying to defend whitng, other than my usual "You can't blame him for everything" because he did in fact raise over 40 million for CME to which CME executives and leaders, including those on SGW, then mispent and failed to get a real playable beta. Most of Nedra's money nevery made it to SGW, let alone CME. You can claim Gary stole it, or you can claim Nedra didn't actually pay all of it, I don't really care. Fact is, Gary went to so many people for money and there's so much ambiguity in who paid what when it's kind of crazy. Gary likes to claim he raised $40 million, in reality a team of fund raisers raised that money, each doing their part. Many of Gary's would be or past investors like tos ay they gave $2 million, in reality they only ever cut checks for $250k, they represented a potential to put in $2 mil. but never did.
In this case Agricola has the most accurate answer. The back and forth between Whiting and Vision bank card is ludicrous and mostly associated with MMOGULs, not SGW. However Jeff Knowles, who represented to the entire company that he was putting in $8 million, essentially walked away from everything because of his lack of faith in MMOGULS (he only ever wanted to invest in SGW because of SGW's potential profit for MMOGULs). Short answer is, Jeff K stood in front of the whole company and told them he was going to help, then didn't. Much of that is because Gary refused to give Jeff K full control of SGW and MMOGULs. Now Jeff K is just trying to walk away though his actions to stop MMOGULS also cut off any revenue Gary had to pay SGW (MMOGULs investments were paying CME payroll for most of this year, with mmoguls dead, no CME payroll.. for the past 8 weeks. No one likes it, no one wanted it to be that way, but that's just the sorry truth).
Gary has made many mistakes and in his own way contributed to CME's current problems. But for everyone to think getting rid of him solves the problem? Wrong answer. The CEO (Tim J) allowed $40 million to be spent and no game to show for it, the production team of SGW had over half that to get some kind of viable product and have nothing even marketable. The details of what went on internally at CME are too numerous to talk about here even if I had all the facts, and I'm not sure anyone here really does. We're all talking about what we know in the hopes that some how, some way, this whole sordid mess can help someone, somewhere.
I told you all a few days ago I would get the REAL facts on what actually took place for the demise of Stargate Worlds. This information that follows were provided by members of the investor groups in Arizona & Utah who have been involved over the past 4 years with Stargate Worlds & Gary Whiting:
1. Gary Whiting was in control. The most prevalent mistake in every enterprise that Gary Whiting is associated in!
2. Vision Bankcard had nothing to do with Mmoguls except to be there credit card processor. I found out that with out Vision Bankcard & there credit rating, Gary Whiting would have never been able to go international with Mmoguls. I was even told that Gary Whiting's credit is so bad that Vision Bankcard had to put up the reserve to start the company. The owner was hesitant to be involved but was convinced by some of the investors in CMG/CME to help Whiting. I'm sure Vision Bankcard has great regrets for there past involvement at this time.
3. Nedra Roney & her husband, Rob McKell, were the ones who were the master distributors for Mmoguls & loaned Gary Whiting about 3 Million to help jump start Mmoguls. In addition, they received CMG/CME shares for there loan & a further gurantee that there loan could be paid back by some type of financial instrument thru Gary Whiting.
4. Vision Bankcard/Jeff Knowles signed a Letter of Intent with Gary Whiting to help bank roll Stargate Worlds Game. However, this was just a LOI and not a firm contract. Jeff Knowles did attend a meeting at CME studios were he commited that the funding of 8 Million would happen as long as Gary Whiting would sign the finished documents. Knowles made 2 payroll payments, without the signed document, & was later told by Gary Whiting that he didn't need Jeff Knowles or Rob McKell & could easily replace them with other SUCKER investors! Did the employee's ever know & get all the facts about Whitings agreement with Vision Bankcard? Not even Whiting's CEO, Tim, has received even half of Whiting's secret dealings. Let me tell you about this document, it was a convertible loan that was to be paid back by Gary Whiting in funds, or convert to CMG shares, if the game went public. Gary Whiting killed this first deal and no one else! I would like to remind all of you that this money was Vision Bankcard funds & never did Gary Whiting step up & do the payroll out of the money he "borrowed from CME/CMG & Garvick" over the past 4 years! Everyone who can even think that it was the fault of Vision Bankcard, which in Gary's case it is always someone besides himself, only knows about 20% of the facts. Whiting has always had a fall guy, Fred Gagon, Ira Gaon, CEO Tim, Shane Rudman, Wendy, & now Don. The fact is that Vision Bankcard is out several hundred thousand & should sue Whiting immediately.
5. Revnue from Mmoguls went to Gary Whiting personally & then to paying commissions for there associates. The demise of Mmoguls was because the enire professional management staff resigned because Gary Whiting couldn't pay the commissions during the first pay period because Whiting had used the funds without even telling his CEO! Who ever told you guys that Mmoguls kept Stargate a float is a total liar or misinformed!
6. The investor group from Phoenix, about 80 people, contacted Vision Bankcard to see if they could help get the Stargate Game completed by co-investing in the Convertible Loan that could be increased to 17 Million, from the original 8 Million, that would now finish the game & also pay for the distribution. This investor group would only participate, if Jeff Knowles was able to have Gary Whiting sign the necessary documents, to have there investment protected by being administered thru the convertable loan documents. If this couldn't take place the investors would litigate Gary Whiting. Out of this meeting, 2 documents were later formulated for the 17 Million Convertable Loan, that needed to be signed by Gary Whiting. The first document was for the terms of the 17 Million, which included a 5 person development board, which 3 persons were picked by the investor/Vision group & 2 persons picked by Gary Whiting. This board was to have complete power over the 17 Million budget & administer the money until the game was launched & then the group was paid back in full the 17 Million out of the first proceeds to CMG/CME. As you can deduct, the investor group would be protected because they had a majority on the development board. The second document was were the trouble began with Gary Whiting. This document was a wrap around loan from Nedra Roney & Rob McKell that would put aside the default by Whiting on there original note, & then increase the amount overall to be loaned to Gary Whiting. Nedra & Rob had secured there original investment/loan, as stated above, with additional shares of CMG/CME. This new loan would increase there shares in CMG/CME by having a percentage of the proceeds go into the Convertable Loan to finish the game. In addition, deliquent IRS or other deliquencies in Gary Whitings name, or his entities, would receive a major cash payment, and Rob/Nedra could run Mmoguls until this loan was paid back in full by Gary Whiting. Apparently Gary Whiting agreed to all of these terms, but instead of allowing the development board mentioned above, Whiting decided there needed to be a new board with 6 members. This was the major sticking point! Why would Whiting agree to the original board & then need an additional board for this loan that would only be stalemated because he could pick 3 members & Nedra/Rob would pick 3 members. The additional loan terms was that Nedra/Rob had adminstrative control, until there portion of the loan was paid back, then everything converted back to Whiting. Whiting would not sign this second loan document because he wanted the board to be 3 & 3. Everyone who real knows what happened is blown away. Apparently Whiting is only concerned about himself & not the numerous employees & investors who have really done the yeoman work to get the game to this point. THINK ABOUT IT!!!!! Why would Whiting sign the first document & not the second document??? Whiting could have stepped away & raised funds for his precious Mmoguls & have a income stream until Stargate Worlds was launched & distributed!! In addition, Whiting could have stopped the lawsuit that will surely come from Nedra/Rob, because of the default on his first loan of about 3 Million. This second document loan, was including this original 3 Million, & putting another several Million into his current multitude of problems, and hopefully help bring Stargate to fruition in 2009. I'm shocked, but not really when it comes to the saga of Gary Whiting & his life style. This has nothing to do with him being a ex-mormon & I'm a little insulted when anyone brings up religious affiliaitions to justify behavior unless you are talking about the Taliban!
7. Gary Whiting has been in control from day one! He has restricted his CEO, Tim, beyond his abilties to get the game completed since a lot of the investment funds raised were allocated some where else other then the GAME. Tim has been forced to deal with the federal gov't/IRS, state of Arizona-back taxes, workmans compensation, outside vendors, and who know's what else, with all of them in major deliquency and litigation hovering over CME/CMG.
8. To suggest that a company like Vision Bankcard, that derived out of the past sale of AUTHORIZED.NET, would stand in the way of Gary Whiting's ability to go forward is purely ludicrious! Vision Bankcard & it's management, in fact, were the ones who could have saved CME/CMG. They know how to run a successful business, something Whiting has never accomplished! Vision Bankcards main emphasis was not Mmoguls, which they never put any investment dollars into, but Stargate was there real interest, as shown by the original 8 Million Convertable Loan document. Whiting is the one who walked away, leaving behind faithful employees & several hundred duped investors, not to mention numerous outside companies who did a lot of work on Stargate. Vision Bankcard was never going to run CMG/CME, but instead, a group of professionals made up of current studio mgt., investor group representatives, & auditors were being assembled to finish the game in a timely manner!
In conclusion, If I was picking my partners to be in business with, I would certainly chose reputable companies like Vision Bankcard & Nedra/Rob Roney, who have had great financial success in there space, over Gary Whiting & his multitude of abuses, over the past 4 years. I personally believe an extensive audit of all of Gary Whitings enterprises associated with Stargate Worlds, would uncover potential abuse & misuse of investor funds that could be catastrophic. I wonder about the potential of security violations that may have incurred? Thanks to all of you, who provided me with clear & concise information, to help clear the multitude of innocent parties who have taken major reputable hits because of one major skunk, who believes he doesn't stink, one GARY WHITING!!!!
This explains in detail the CME press release concerning their waiting on "Angel investors" to bail them out. It seems that Garys galloping meglomania has gotten in the way again? That $16 million loan would've been throwing good money after bad in my opinion even if Gary did hand over control to them. Most of the staff have gone to greener pastures, the reputation of CME is very tarnished and Whiting is unfit to run any company.
Thanks for that information, I think that Vision Bankcard has had a lucky escape!
"Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience"
CS Lewis
I'd say the worst thing would be being an ex Dev and watching (3?) years of work go down the drain. Truely a sad day.
MMO wish list:
-Changeable worlds
-Solid non level based game
-Sharks with lasers attached to their heads
In my opinion I think this shows that the people at the top are not interested solely in CME or SGW, if there prime concern was to produce the game then this money is literally falling into there lap, and they should do everything in there power to make it happen.
This falling through seems to prove without a shadow of a doubt that the guys at the top are not interested in finishing the game, but trying to attach this to other companies to try and rape as much out of the ability of controlling CME and SGW.
Really I cant see any other investor dare stepping forward with any money now this has fallen through. Really these people are nearly putting in 50% of the money already spent within 4 years, and asking for a controlling majority is more than acceptable, GW hasn't taken money out of his own pocket, he has taken it out of others and in my opinion is treating it as if it was his.
He should be doing what is in the best interest of the investors not his personal plan of tying things into SGW.
/rant off
This news is very disheartening. How ironic , greed put everyone into this situation, and greed will eventually kill SGW/CME while slowly eroding the family finances of those who continue to work without any pay.
If Gary cared about the game, the investors, and the families of people that work at CME, he would and should jump at the chance to be rescued from his endangered boat…. A boat that is about to go over Niagara Falls. Rather than take the lifeline, it looks like he will take complete financial ruin of his personal life. I know plenty of folks that would love to get a piece of the Whiting farm, and they just might get their chance now.
Mr. Gameboy, what you shared is very near spot-on information. It closely matches a communication forwarded to me. Of course, yours has much more detail and makes more sense.
I predict that SGW will slowly die off as more developers leave, and it will be months before the investors start their litigation to oust Whiting and maybe recover some of their investment, if only through the selling of furniture, software and Stargate artwork in the lobby.
I'd be lying if I said that posting a "I told you so" isn't quite satisfying, but really I do feel bad for many people in all of this. There were some ardent fans waiting for the game, and some good people working on the team. That they got so misguided, and so vicious in their denial of what's been going on, probably isn't entirely their fault, and I'll always try to forgive them for it.