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Famine
Imjin
Member Posts: 366
Famine I just noticed you've posted here.
Want to make some points?
Give this community 1 or 2 good reasons why they should even bother with a game who has people like Lufkin as moderators and does nothing with them.
And "becasue he does a good job" is out the window. He doesnt. A payed or non payed employee acting or talking like that to paying customers is OK?
As I posted somewhere else, that is the nail in the coffin for myself and FC. If you let tools like that represent your company then I have zero respect for said company. Makes things pretty equal since apparently by letting someone like him stay around shows a lack of respect for the customer.
And know I am not expecting you to give a detailed response about the inner working of the mods but all I have to do is go over to your forums and see his name and I know that FC just doesnt care in the least.
Fungerer som det skal
Comments
the rest is silence
In all honest I dont expect a direct response from Famine. But should Famine choose to a simple search of these forums and AOC's it is easy to spot where this particular person doesn not deserve to be in the position they are in.
But once more I dont see anything happening as I am sure there were plenty of PM's about this person and they are still there
Fungerer som det skal
I wouldn't expect an answer before at least a day passes, unless somebody direct him to this particular thread.
Where is is post? I tried searching, but the forum search on MMORPG is clunky.
I want to see his apology post and his firing of the mousketeer mods, and explanation of when AoC is going to go back to its mature rating. Otherwise, I am not impressed
Error: 37. Signature not found. Please connect to my server for signature access.
You can by all rights call me an ageist but after looking at Famine's profile here at MMORPG.com, , I just don't see how any reputable company hires a 25 yrs old kid as their Head Customer Liaison of a multi-million dollar business. In a way it explains a lot about a lot of things.
Costumer Representives don't work that way.
Their job function is to provide the community with an illusion of being listened to. A happy costumer is a paying costumer. They'll say your idea is forwarded, your bug report is filed and they'll confirm stuff the developers might've said but that you have missed.
Unlike popular belief, they do not actually forward your ideas to the developers, if they did they would be bad CRs. The opinions of the forum posters do not represent the majority of the player base, and tend to be quite skewed. Giving in to the forums has in many games lead to the demise of the game when the developers discarded their design sheets and started 'winging it'. These are people that've in most cases taken extensive education to do their job, and they've probably sat countless hours at meetings planning every virtual tidbit of their game. It goes without saying that following the random whims of every Joe and Jane voicing their opinions would be counterproductive to the coordinated development process.
In some games Costumer Representives also hold a Moderator position which means they will make sure forum rules are followed and that content that breaks the EULA or would lead to unfortunate* discussions are censored.
*Unfortunate in many cases being topics that criticise the flaws or the failings of a company/game.
He'd definetily score points for adressing the issue of the rogue mod on the US forums and the fanatical mods on the EU forum, but that could be risky if he fancies keeping his job. Feel free to prove me wrong though.
Honestly I dont think they care. Think of it this way, there are alot of "by popular demand" patches rite? Where else did they get the popular demands from? Forum, petition...etc. Therefore, they read the messages. But is there anything done with the game? Nope, people still complain this and that. Do you think they care? Prob not, since they got a huge box sales, they prob knew this game will not keep up with all the new mmo coming out this fall anyways. Just to name a few, Aion, WAR, new WoW expension...etc.
So what did Failcom did? They hype up the game, release a half done game and try to get a huge amount of sales. Paid off the investors and let the paid subcribers beta their game (for xbox 360).
Is that logical? Yes. Is that moral? Depends of what you think really. Failcom is a marketing company, people THINK (keyword here) they will learn something from the AO failure. In reality, a company like this just want the $$$, they dont care about customer support.
Famine got owned
http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/191/view/forums/thread/192746
Too bad he can't censor the responses like he usually does
deleted
Heya,
Well if only I put my real age in there muhaha. Anyways, the assumption that we don't convey feedback to the developers is of course false. That's really a major point in what the community team does. If we didn't convey the feedback then there would be no real point, in my humble opinion to even have official forums. Although we can still rely on external communities such as this one it simply would not be as direct as simple telling us on our own forums. Yes, majority of the player base does not post on the forums but that is also why we are found in-game as well take in email submissions. In that, that's what I do, I engage communities internally and externally for the idea of conveying information to the developers as well providing information to you as a player or just an onlooker to the community or game.
The ongoing debate on us being marketing or customer support is something the community managers for every company has been talking about for some time now. I think the best answers I've seen is something in between that makes us unique. We are not just a one-way channel (i.e.: publisher/developer -> customer) type of position but instead a two-way channel (i..e: player -> publish/developer).
Overall we do moderate the forums and we do empower the community to help out with being apart of the community. This is why we have the moderation program in place much like MMORPG.COM encourages the community to write blogs, moderate or anything else in between to offer upcoming members to be apart of something bigger with such a great site. Sometimes things happen and sometimes changes need to be made in order to keep moving on the right track. I think we are seeing that with our current moderation policies and of course our guidelines we have followed before the launch of the Age of Conan forums. I think it's perfectly normal myself to have those concerns and it should be up to the community team as a whole to address those concerns to better fit it to the community.
More on moderation, will we ever consider revamping our current moderation policies to better fit the needs and requests of the community? Yes of course. This is something I'm doing right now as you can already see that it's not receiving as great of feedback on the current moderation policies. However, please understand that our intentions are only good. We have had a need for moderation from the community since day 1 and we were set out as one to improve that by empowering the community more than what it was as well following the guidelines more than we have been (note: I never suspended or was as active on moderation because I simply don't like to moderate by any means).
I personally try to handle all moderation issues with respect to the moderator and to the players at hand. So trying to engage personal opinion on anyone, even on a player is something I will not do here nor there. I respect everyone and in that, all issues can be sent to me for investigation on any moderation and or moderator in question. I will do my best to look into it and take approprate action on anything if submitted.
P.S
Sorry for any delay here, I do sleep sometimes.
Glen ''Famine'' Swan
Senior Assistant Community Manager - Funcom
Wow, thanks for the link, that was some good drama
O_o o_O
Lufkin is possibly the worst moderator I have ever seen, but Famine would be a fool to respond to you.
So many hollow words, Famine.
Meanwhile criticism has been getting deleted and locked on the US and EU forums for AOC for the last 2 months.
Face it, you're here doing damage control and it's not working.
Just today there have been dozens of deleted and censored posts on the official AOC boards, some of them posted here before they went invisible, many of them with valid criticisms.
The Funcom policy of PR spin and deletion of all criticism, and zero feedback or communication from developers has put the company's reputation firmly in the gutter.
If you wanted feedback, you got plenty of it on the EU and US forums - too bad it all got deleted and censored by you and the other mods.
Stop censoring your own forums before coming here to continue Erling Ellingson's PR spin
So seen as your proving your listerning, i have a couple of questions.
A majority of the issues with Funcom and AOC has come with promised and features which have been promoted and advertised, then not deliverd.
Even erling`s interview here on mmoprg did apear to many users as nothing but hot air and did not portray the true feelings of many gamers.
The letters on the official forums from the directors have never been acurate, they also promise many things but the dates are never met and still many fetures and problems have not been addressed as they say.
Patch notes have alot of the nerfs missing and its up to your user base to find them.
do you have any comments on these subjects?
also do you feel as a representative of funcom that supposebly feeds back , is this implimented and how is this fed back to users?
Many players feel victimised on your offical forums yet you come and ask for feed back after many bannings,
can you explain to us openly why ex members of your forums were not allowed to discuss the issues there and now you only come to ask for answers now the numbers of subscrittions are falling?
one last thing, to get trust back in a company you have to gain it, its not given through lies, so on that note is FUNCOMS perception of users the same as the expressed ones in the Erling interview?
The game is fun.
Normally, I'd stay out of something like that but in the case of Lufkin, I'd have to agree with you guys. He seems very biased/opinionated and that really isn't what the game needs right now.
I disagree. In many cases, the opinions of the forum posters has more of a majority pull than you might understand. Whiney, crying, pitiful little noobs who cry for nerfs and imbalance have more power than those of us who simply see something wrong and/or see where improvement is needed and post a suggestion. Whiney, crying, pitiful little noob postings gather strength like a storm out at sea...they gather other whiney, crying, pitiful little noob posters until their voice just isn't a headache or inconvenience...it's a loud, unrelenting voice and in most MMOs I've played have listened to what can be heard above the crowd.
Heya,
....Overall we do moderate the forums and we do empower the community to help out with being apart of the community. This is why we have the moderation program in place much like MMORPG.COM encourages the community to write blogs, moderate or anything else in between to offer upcoming members to be apart of something bigger with such a great site. Sometimes things happen and sometimes changes need to be made in order to keep moving on the right track. I think we are seeing that with our current moderation policies and of course our guidelines we have followed before the launch of the Age of Conan forums. I think it's perfectly normal myself to have those concerns and it should be up to the community team as a whole to address those concerns to better fit it to the community.
.....Nice one Famine, I didn't realize that having Lufkin actively troll and condecend to your own customers was "empowering" them.
Is that like "whatever does not kill me makes me stronger"? A sort of Nietzschian approach to community building? Man AoC is even more "innovative" than I realized. Soon the forum will be full of Uber-mensch.
You should be a politician. This was an answer without answers.
You should be a politician. This was an answer without answers.
Considering it's an answer to a question they(any community admin) won't answer ,Id say It's the best you're going to get.What his answer says to me is , they are aware of the complaints about , What ever that mods name is (Lumkin?) . They are reviewing those complaints . But don't expect much more than that , Most of the time even constructive critics fall against the rules, Simply because the issue they are addressing has already been brought up .
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Heya,
Well if only I put my real age in there muhaha. Anyways, the assumption that we don't convey feedback to the developers is of course false. That's really a major point in what the community team does. If we didn't convey the feedback then there would be no real point, in my humble opinion to even have official forums. Although we can still rely on external communities such as this one it simply would not be as direct as simple telling us on our own forums. Yes, majority of the player base does not post on the forums but that is also why we are found in-game as well take in email submissions. In that, that's what I do, I engage communities internally and externally for the idea of conveying information to the developers as well providing information to you as a player or just an onlooker to the community or game.
The ongoing debate on us being marketing or customer support is something the community managers for every company has been talking about for some time now. I think the best answers I've seen is something in between that makes us unique. We are not just a one-way channel (i.e.: publisher/developer -> customer) type of position but instead a two-way channel (i..e: player -> publish/developer).
Overall we do moderate the forums and we do empower the community to help out with being apart of the community. This is why we have the moderation program in place much like MMORPG.COM encourages the community to write blogs, moderate or anything else in between to offer upcoming members to be apart of something bigger with such a great site. Sometimes things happen and sometimes changes need to be made in order to keep moving on the right track. I think we are seeing that with our current moderation policies and of course our guidelines we have followed before the launch of the Age of Conan forums. I think it's perfectly normal myself to have those concerns and it should be up to the community team as a whole to address those concerns to better fit it to the community.
More on moderation, will we ever consider revamping our current moderation policies to better fit the needs and requests of the community? Yes of course. This is something I'm doing right now as you can already see that it's not receiving as great of feedback on the current moderation policies. However, please understand that our intentions are only good. We have had a need for moderation from the community since day 1 and we were set out as one to improve that by empowering the community more than what it was as well following the guidelines more than we have been (note: I never suspended or was as active on moderation because I simply don't like to moderate by any means).
I personally try to handle all moderation issues with respect to the moderator and to the players at hand. So trying to engage personal opinion on anyone, even on a player is something I will not do here nor there. I respect everyone and in that, all issues can be sent to me for investigation on any moderation and or moderator in question. I will do my best to look into it and take approprate action on anything if submitted.
P.S
Sorry for any delay here, I do sleep sometimes.
I think official forums (of any game, not just AOC) are sheep-pens for the players and the Community Representives are the shepherds. The CRs keep the sheep happy by feeding them whatever grass will make them quiet, and they make sure an escaped lamb doesn't take the whole flock with it. If a sheep goes nuts, it's shot so it doesn't infect the flock. Companies like to control what's said about them and their product, and this is the best logical way to do that with the least amount of resources spent. You may not even realise that yourself.
If you do forward alot of the actual ideas on the forum, than thumbs up for you. That's good news as long as it goes through an idiocy filter, and I can only hope it's true. Though there's another problem, because of the constraints of your job it's unreasonable to expect that you'd say the opposite, and as such you actually lose credibility instead of gain it. It's ironic, but that's life.
Still, your reply covered as much as your constraints would allow you to respond to, and I could practically sense you wanted to go further (like John McClane kicking against a window with his bare feet, trying to get through to us) - so cheers to that. I think we all can tell that you are genuinly trying to make the best of it as you can, but you'll still catch flak because the game has some serious core problems which has everyone who's left it on edge. It doesn't help that Erling and Gaute aren't acknowledging these problems in their interviews, and you get to pay for that as the middleman *shrugs*
Anyway. Best of luck man. Show us that your actions can go where your words can't - by doing something about the renegade moderators on your official forums.
If all else fails, you could establish a Ranting Forum where people would be allowed to speak their mind and everything that breaks the rules could be moved to. Like a nuclear dump with a huge radioactive sign on it warning other users to stay clear. I don't remember where, but I've seen this in other forums before.
Why dishonest in such a trivial thing? I assumed that "image" is an all-important thing for a *community* manager.....?
DB
Denial makes one look a lot dumber than he/she actually is.
* Do not post threads questioning moderation. Such threads will be removed
* If a topic is closed or removed do not, under any circumstances, re-post the same topic or material. If you have any questions as to why a thread was closed or removed please contact the moderator via private message.
Regards
Tahi
LOL
How many times have we seen that one on the EU forums, every thread with any criticism has that at the end of it (unless the whole thread just disappears)
And if you ask them anything via PM you either get ignored or get an infraction
XD
LOL
How many times have we seen that one on the EU forums, every thread with any criticism has that at the end of it (unless the whole thread just disappears)
And if you ask them anything via PM you either get ignored or get an infraction
XD
Well that way the troublemakers identify themselves. And who are the troublemakers? Anyone who asks questions. Afterall; Ignorance is Strength and Freedom is Slavery.