
Six Months at Riot Games - nostalgeek
http://meagan-marie.tumblr.com/post/176788011970/six-months-at-riot-games
======
lsmarigo
Interesting that this one is doing well compared to the longer in-depth kotaku
article a few days ago
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17710188](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17710188)
\- fwiw that piece has since been corroborated by a ton of former riot
employees on twitter.

At the risk of sounding overly cynical, this is all true and everyone knows
about it, people feign disgust at these articles but we're all complicit and
understanding that this is way things are. If people are truly shocked by this
I would contend they are either young and inexperienced or incredibly naive.
This article will get some discussion going for a few days then we'll quietly
return to the status quo. Nothing will change.

~~~
eksemplar
This is not the way things are though. I’m a manager, and I wouldn’t tolerate
any of the painted stories for a second. In fact, none of the people in my
network, which includes numerous large Scandinavian tech companies would
tolerate anything of the sort.

You do see that stuff, of course, but you see it mainly in children aged
10-15, and otherwise only in private, because anyone who keeps it up after
that will be unemployable.

If this is commonplace in America workplace, then you truely are an odd
country.

~~~
stickfigure
_If this is commonplace in America workplace, then you truely are an odd
country._

This statement seems odd in this context. While Riot may be headquartered in
the US, all of the events in the article took place in Ireland.

~~~
tinco
It would indeed be very nice to assume this is somehow unique to the US.
Europe has many countries that are notorious for their machismo, or their
adherence to religious beliefs that are condescending towards women. I would
say Scandinavian attitude is more likely to be unique in the world than vice
versa.

------
tebruno99
I know my interview with Riot was more like a freshman college hazing. At the
end they setup a 2nd call and I was like wtf. They said they were just testing
me to see if I could handle the culture and that I passed so I can move on to
the next interview. I told him to diaf and never contact me again.

I'm male, I can't even imagine what its like for Women.

~~~
sleepybrett
"It's not that I can't, it's that I wont."

------
time0ut
I have never played league of legends, but one of the things I've heard
repeatedly is that there is an extremely toxic culture around the game. If
true, it isn't surprising to see that the company has a toxic culture as well.

I feel for the author. It is sad that her dream job turned into a nightmare. I
just hope some positive change comes from this at Riot and other companies.

~~~
shawn
Uhh, that logic doesn’t folllow. Heh. I’m a former S2 dev (heroes of newerth,
a pretty similar game). The player base is uncontrollable. It’s a bunch of
testosterone fueled teens.

Granted, we didn’t have any women in leadership positions either, but I’d like
to think that was more because we were relatively small and it was Kalamazoo.

~~~
pjc50
> uncontrollable

It's not uncontrollable, you'd just rather have their money than ban them.

~~~
shawn
No, I assure you it’s uncontrollable. There are millions of games played per
day on Dota. How do you propose to fairly evaluate each of them?

~~~
TillE
You seriously can't think of a single idea for how to ban toxic players at
scale?

Start with crowd-sourcing via reports, then pass it over to customer service
once a critical mass has been achieved. Make sure one person can't easily
create a new account after being banned. This really isn't a new problem, tons
of companies of all sizes have tackled it with varying success.

~~~
shawn
Spoken like someone who’s never played the game. Get ready to be banned for no
fault of your own, just because your three teammates decided to report you for
the lulz. There are people who post on /r/dota2 complaining that they get
banned from the game for nothing but picking techies each game. They don’t
even say anything. People just report them immediately.

By the way, streamers are one of the most high impact users of the game. They
are also one of the most unfairly targeted by report systems. This problem is
extensively studied and very tricky.

~~~
ethbro
Just because there are false positives or one company has a bad implementation
doesn't make it an unsolveable problem.

As parent mentioned, ml sentiment analysis + logging + peer reporting + final
human analysis = problem effectively combated

It's the final human analysis that companies are loathe to fund (e.g.
Facebook), as costs scale with user count.

But it's not efficiently unsolveable with current tech. Therefore, companies
simply aren't prioritizing it. And won't, as long as the impact of toxic users
isn't impacting the bottom line.

~~~
shawn
Kay. What are the odds that some HN commenters are going to solve the same
problem that has been an active priority for years of the people in the field?

I can’t speak for Valve or Riot, but at S2 it was a concerning issue. There’s
just no good way to do it when the people involved are actively malicious. If
you think there is, get ready to have your community collapse around you as
everyone complains about unfair bans.

I don’t think you really appreciate the scale of the problem. Final human
analysis is not possible when there are literally millions of games per week.
It’s also not something that ML can identify cleanly — the moment it does, the
culture will adapt to bypass the evaluator. It always does.

~~~
ethbro
I absolutely appreciate the scale of the problem, and the adversarial nature
of peer reporting. My day job has those same characteristics.

Millions of games per week * 30 minutes per game * avg lines of chat per
minute = manageable w/ a proper streaming architecture

Especially when _you have access to a massive, perfectly-scaled, distributed
edge compute system_. (i.e. running minimal, performance-optimized models on
users' opponents' clients to do the initial detection / filter / compression
pass)

But my point is this is fundamentally an economic problem, given current state
of the art, not a technical one.

Companies are looking for pure-technical solutions because they're cheaper,
and then complaining that it's a hard problem because they're unwilling to
properly fund hybrid systems until state of the art can deliver.

ML is a first order approximation of human ability, not a magic unicorn that
gives you exactly what you want. Thats the definitions of engineering: how do
I build a system that fulfills my requirements from the pieces I have, not the
pieces I wish I had?

So I don't feel much pity when companies allow toxic user bases to flourish
because it's cheaper than funding solutions.

* Above intended in no way to belittle the awesome work folks are doing in the space with ML detection. But sometimes as engineers we need to admit when management is making unethical choices for financial gain

~~~
shadefinale
On the base level, it is not very hard to examine a chat log and glean who is
being blatantly toxic from the log.

A big problem with games like League of Legends or Dota 2 is that you can
easily be toxic or cause your teammates to be toxic without chatting or using
voice comms.

There are very common trolling methods that do not require any use of chat
with the express purpose of trying to incite toxicity in other players, some
blatant, and some not.

However, the bigger problem is that honest mistakes can be misinterpreted by
your teammates as toxicity:

Losing a close 1v1 vs your laning opponent

vs

Accidentally going too deep into enemy territory and dying once.

vs

Getting killed while attempting to secure map control for your team.

Vs

Playing too aggressively and overextending and dying many times over the
course of a game.

When things like this happen, your own teammates may become upset at your poor
performance and begin to lash out.

The biggest problem here is that in these games, it can feel like you have no
agency over the outcome of the game when your teammates do not perform at the
perceived skill level you have of them.

This is where toxic players become hard to deal with. They will start doing
things that will incite toxicity in their teammates while maintaining
plauisble deniability:

\- Confusing teammates by providing useless or inaccurate information about
the current gamestate. (Pinging, map calls, cooldowns, timers, etc - many of
these require no use of chat of voice comms)

\- Picking on teammates by making consistently selfish plays to their
detriment.(Courier stealing, going out of one's way to steal farm from a lower
position teammate, unnecessary kill stealing)

\- Improper role identification, your team strategically expects you to do X,
you do Y. Y could even be better than X in terms of winning the game, it
doesn't matter.

All of these above examples can either be common gameplay mistakes or
intentionally malicious, but the point is that once your teammates do not
trust one another, some will start verbally abusing, while others will begin
to make similar mistakes as above (tilting) and lose the game for their own
team.

Many players want to feel like they were the influencing factor that decided
the game's outcome, and make choices that increase the influence they have on
the game even if it might actually lower the chances that they win - and this
is what many times leads to toxicity.

~~~
ethbro
Granted. And I'd be curious on the correlation between community toxcity and
individual agency in competitive games. Possibly also game length.

It certainly feels like modern team games engender a different level of hate
than, say, Quake III or Unreal Tournament.

Global matchmaking vs hosted servers probably haven't helped.

------
marsrover
> While on a team outing, the same senior staff member messaged a new
> employee’s girlfriend on Facebook asking if she was “DTF”

I would probably do something that would get me fired if this happened to me.

~~~
beart
My question is, why did a senior staff member have access to a new employee's
girlfriend anyway? I'm guessing the new employee friended the senior staff
member on Facebook. This just seems like so many cross boundaries.

~~~
etrevino
Does that really matter?

------
amarant
wow, I would expect such behavior from teenage gamers, but I'm surprised to
see it reported among (presumably adult) game-devs.

what is perhaps even more surprising is that they seem to somehow be able to
cooperate enough to deliver a undeniably popular game.

don't get me wrong, I don't doubt for a second that what Meagan says is true.
I am simply surprised they manage to produce anything at all in such a
culture, let alone a hit game.

~~~
masklinn
Why? Shared behaviour — even juvenile — creates strong in-group bounds. And
some competition within a cooperative environment is common. Especially if
most of the group does relatively menial work.

Furthermore juvenile behaviour is commonly encouraged by both gaming and SV
companies/corps: aside from being convenient to pull in just out of college
without necessitating their adaptation to adulthood, it also serves as
distraction/misdirection from work environment issues (permanent crunch,
burnout, comp'): people who complain can just be feminized and dismissed as
needing to "man up".

In fact, regular introduction of critics (and their following violent
rejection) serves as both outlet for frustration and a strengthening of in-
group bonds.

~~~
amarant
I mean, you would appear to be right. I wont argue the contrary. still, I had
not expected it.

~~~
mozumder
So, in tech, do people not go to strip clubs anymore?

Like, what's the culture now? Are all interpersonal relationships now
formalized into an algorithm?

Do people not get into actual fistfights at the office anymore?

~~~
pjc50
> do people not go to strip clubs anymore?

I've been in the industry 20 years and not had that happen anywhere I worked
in the UK.

> Are all interpersonal relationships now formalized into an algorithm?

Eh?

> Do people not get into actual fistfights at the office anymore?

The guy I knew who did that at his gaming company Christmas party got put on
"final warning" for a year.

~~~
mozumder
> I've been in the industry 20 years and not had that happen anywhere I worked
> in the UK.

Do you think that's because of the corporate culture you're at or due to you
personally not knowing about it?

What do you do after-hours at conferences in Vegas? Check out the Britney
Spears show or Cirque du Soleil?

> The guy I knew who did that at his gaming company Christmas party got put on
> "final warning" for a year.

So, how come he didn't get fired? Was he critical to project success at all?

~~~
Balero
In the UK there is no strip club culture like there is in the US. The only
people who go in them in the UK are slimy old men. It is not something even
remotely acceptable, and I would think less of anyone going to one here.

"What do you do after-hours at conferences in Vegas?" Probably gamble, not
everything is different.

"So, how come he didn't get fired? Was he critical to project success at all?"
We don't have on-demand firing. It has to be a process, and you have to have a
justifiable reason, and process.

------
inertiatic
I'm a male software developer that cringes hard when hearing things like that,
and I can't imagine using that sort of language in the workplace. In fact I'm
part of an all male team at work and things like that get thrown around all
day long, and I find it annoying at times. At the same time I detest the
forced political correctness. And most of the time, all of those terms aren't
actually hateful, but used in an playful ironic way.

I'm somewhat torn between what I would personally enjoy (all workplaces clean
of the "boys" culture) and what I fundamentally believe is right (people
should be free to express themselves in whatever way they choose to, and this
way of communication clearly works for certain groups of people).

~~~
morgtheborg
> people should be free to express themselves in whatever way they choose to,
> and this way of communication clearly works for certain groups of people

Sure. In non-professional capacities. But in professional areas, we expect a
bit of blandness so everyone feels welcome.

While some groups might be comfortable mocking or using language that people
deem derogatory towards minorities, women, different cultures, different
sexual orientations, etc., we've decided that their preferred communication
type does not trump the right of a person to feel safe and respected at work.
If they'd like to be foul with their own sort outside of work, whatever,
people who don't appreciate it can avoid them.

Quitting my job to avoid feeling attacked, on the other hand, is an
unreasonable burden placed on someone just so some dude can say bitch, f
_ggot, and /or n_gger or comment on someone's physical appearance.

------
Djvacto
Sidenote: I've never been more grateful for how HackerNews handles downvotes
and the like. Seeing the comment in gray helps me steel myself for what I'm
about to read.

------
talonx
Just curious - is such toxic culture more common in game-dev companies? Some
of us would remember the EA Spouse story [1] - one of the first such public
disclosures. Have there been any studies done of the prevalence of such
culture across different software dev teams?

[1] [https://ea-spouse.livejournal.com/274.html](https://ea-
spouse.livejournal.com/274.html)

~~~
lmm
I would expect that to be true of any industry that people are desperate to
work in - especially one that hires mainly grads who don't have any experience
of what a "normal" workplace should look like.

------
bradhe
> urther examples of disrespect include when I argued that we shouldn’t let a
> cosplayer in blackface on our stage for a parade, keeping in mind that Riot
> is a global company. I was repeatedly called racist by my colleagues, who
> tried to convince me that it was an acceptable practice and I was
> overreacting.

This...can't possibly be true. Is this true??

~~~
FlipperBucket
Classic postmodernist eventuality. Everyone is equal, but if you take issue in
highlighting that a practice might offend by implying that there is a
difference, you become the enemy in reverse... eg what, you think blackface is
offensive to those people? What do you mean by THOSE people?

The lampoon in Tropic Thunder was eerily prescient.

------
lubonay
Here's an idea: the gaming community as a whole needs to come together and
think of the most offensive insults possible, that do not refer to
race/gender/religion/nationality, but rather refer to player skill or the
wider gaming culture.

We can have a non-phobic, egalitarian swear-off!

~~~
zimablue
Once something is agreed as an acceptable insult it's not as much of an
insult. This it like trying to hold back the tide.

Much the same way that the medical word for what used to be called retardation
and I don't know the current PC word for has to be constantly rotated.
Whatever that word is, is precisely what people want to call each-other.

------
erlongsb
This is just so prevalent. I thank God for being able to work with family that
has my back. I've become rather cynical about the whole thing. It feels like
the only way to avoid that is to have the power to do so. Otherwise it's an
uphill battle you cannot win.

------
ohashi
LoL has to be one of the most toxic communities for any game I've played. It's
not shocking that it permeates the culture of the company that created it.

~~~
shawn
It is shocking. It was completely unheard of behavior at S2 Games. I was
shocked to even be in the same market segment.

~~~
erulabs
Except for the CEO?

~~~
shawn
Saying the N word once in 2009 in the middle of a game is nothing like being
casually and obnoxiously racist. I’m not excusing his behavior, but he never
acted like that offline. He was a kind and thoughtful manager.

------
derangedHorse
_I needed to get back to the United States somehow. Riot was my best bet, and
I worried that if I didn’t agree to their mandates or went public with
anything that I’d ruin my chance of getting home_

This is kind off-topic, but why wouldn't she be able to get home if she didn't
agree to their mandates?

------
tothepixel
Seems like companies with "toxic cultures" can actually be extremely
successful.

~~~
glenneroo
Why is that a surprise? "Toxic culture" in relation to Riot and Uber is
basically defined as a "sexist bro-fest" and women being allowed to work the
same jobs as men is a relatively new thing (historically speaking) and thus is
still being fought on many fronts.

Also look at e.g. Japan where women in the workplace are generally treated
quite badly. There was a thread on HN yesterday or the day before which
reinforced this trend.

------
ggregoire
Not sure why people are flagging this topic. (was on top of the first page
2min ago, it's on second page now)

~~~
pjc50
There's enough of a pro-sexism faction to flag it off the front page, this
usually happens to discussions of sexism in tech.

~~~
irb
The typical reaction of HN to articles about sexism in tech is basically proof
in and of itself of sexism in tech.

~~~
nathanaldensr
I reject this assertion. I am certainly not sexist, but I flag stories like
these because they belong on Reddit discussion forums. Hacker News should be
for tech-related discussion, in my opinion.

~~~
camel_Snake
Out of curiosity did you also flag the recent posts about Tesla going private
or the NYT financials?

------
MatthewWilkes
9 clicks to opt out of tracking cookies. Why do these companies bother adding
these banners if they're not going to comply with the law?

~~~
majewsky
To instill negative public opinion of GDPR.

~~~
Zak
It's working.

I've found myself unable to access a bunch of US-based local news sites from
Europe without using a proxy, and I'm more annoyed with the EU for trying to
enforce laws beyond its borders than I am with the sites for seeing
geoblocking as the most expedient solution.

------
unstableph
>At Riot, employees are encouraged to play League before/after work, or during
lunch. My very first week at the Dublin office, I heard shouting from
individuals playing together, calling each other “f _ggots” repeatedly. I was
unnerved, but it was my first week and I didn’t know if this was a common
occurrence. I didn’t say anything at that time. Eventually, the language would
escalate to “n_ gger”. No one flinched, and I realized it was considered the
norm. Nearly the same thing happened my first day of meetings at the Riot LA
office, where two men were loudly calling each other “c*cksuckers” right
outside the office of the CEOs.

That's gaming culture, plain and simple. Is it a new necessity to change
gaming culture to pander to people who've never played games? I believe this
is being done for the sole reason of extracting more money by tapping into
markets that weren't being exploited before.

Case in point, woman-friendly games like Fortnite or Overwatch. This is not a
problem by itself, but it's sad that some companies are pushing this narrative
to make it look like they care about social issues and gain the favour of
those who do, when they just want more money.

~~~
vaeix
Your gaming culture is not my gaming culture.

You can say nasty things to each other without being racist or homophobic,
especially at a place of work.

~~~
unstableph
Of course, I agree. As I said there's this new "egalitarian and respectful and
social justice and all of that" culture that is being created by the games I
mentioned and many others, but traditional online games will probably always
follow the "classic" gaming culture.

"A place of work", that's another matter; I agree it's unprofessional. I'm
talking purely about videogames and those who play them at home.

~~~
mnem
Speaking as a dinosaur, that is not classic gaming culture. Anecdotally that
highly anatagonistic language became far more the norm in my circle after
gamers from the U.S. (and vocal communication) became common. I’ve always
unfairly made the assumption that it was a reflection of culture when growing
up in the U.S. It is disappointing that it is generally accepted as the norm
worldwide now.

------
madengr
Why isn’t the “bro culture” being weeded out of tech at the university stage.
Bros’ and frat boys don’t make it through electrical engineering; they flunk
out, at least from my experience. I don’t work with anyone like that.

What’s wrong with the tech sector when it comes to computer science? Maybe the
science is no longer required?

~~~
indigochill
My perspective is that in a tech company you usually still have the nerds and
bros dichotomy. The nerds are the engineers, while the bros are the ones in
sales/management/community/design positions. You can also see this in pop
culture portrayals of tech jobs as well, such as Silicon Valley (Bachman is a
bro caricature) or Halt and Catch Fire (Joe's about 90% psychopath, 10% bro).

~~~
taurath
I think this is definitely an outdated dichotomy, especially in the context of
a game company. The bros/jocks now are the gamers, who used to be nerds - now
the nerds are the hardcore programmers/database people/accountants. Those who
are in the gaming culture are every bit as much in hypermasculine jock culture
as football players, just without the physical abilities.

------
tinderliker
Oh wow, another attention seeking woman doing a tell-all. That's new. /s

~~~
sctb
If you post like this again we'll ban the account.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

------
zimablue
Looking at this skeptically, given that as she says she put a target on her
own back there's not much concrete here about problems she personally faced.

Companies have a culture, it might not be your culture, and it's mental to
expect to be able to walk in and attack it in the first six months then
everything be sweetness and joy. Joining a gaming company and complaining
about female outfits is roughly equivalent to joining the NRA hierarchy and
then in your first six months standing up at the AGM shouting about
restricting assault rifles.

Asking people about their sex life is dangerous territory but depending on the
context people have conversations about that at work. It's probably the worst
thing in this article I think and worth a HR complaint.

Other than that it's almost all "I saw men acting the way men do in a very
male environment and objectifying/trying to sleep with women." Well yeah, if I
joined the NRA they'd be discussing hunting and stuff I don't care about or
even find offensive but it's kind of expected.

You can argue that every single company should have an extremely
corporate/restricted culture when any talk about the opposing sex is banned,
the upside is that people would have less opportunity to be offended, the
downside is that you've just substituted a system of state police where people
play very Machiavellian games with HR and don't see each-other as humans
because the way that they can interact is extremely restricted.

I'm sure if I joined a small enough female-dominated company I could feel
really uncomfortable with the conversation topics, and the way that men were
talked about. I could then pin my colours to the mast in some way (it's a
company making vegan stuff and I stand up and extol meat eating), get quietly
ostracised and instead of being horrified by aggression and blunt social
nuances, be horrified by gossip and social politicking.

Maybe everything should be completely corporatified but I just find the idea
deeply depressing.

~~~
wild_preference
My older brother settled down in the suburbs and picks up work as a substitute
teacher in a school with female-dominated staff. He’s a handsome guy. Every
time I see him, he tells me the latest story of a teacher or fellow
staffmember making a crude sexual joke or coming on to him. All of these being
mostly middle-aged women. We have a chuckle.

It’s interesting how men generally don’t “whistleblow” on those sorts of
scenarios. Yet only men ever get nailed with “ugh, pigs!” as if women never
have open sexual thoughts.

~~~
trowawee
It's almost like...there's some sort of gendered power imbalance in society?
That might make men comfortable disregarding this? But that might not afford
women the same privilege?

~~~
zimablue
There are a million power imbalances in society and gender isn't close to the
most important, it's just the most discussed. The real wage gap when you
control for time worked and job choice is tiny.

Ask yourself this - would you consider your child more lucky to be an ugly,
short boy or a pretty girl? Or a boy and you have 20k a year to bring him up
vs a girl and you have 50? Walking around furious as a good looking middle
class woman that you're incredibly disadvantaged is basically a religious
status. But instead of being offended by very specific insults or assumptions
you're offended by everything.

~~~
danShumway
> _" A senior staff member proceeded to repeatedly call me sexist for not
> being willing to room with a man I’d never met before. At first, I thought
> he was kidding, but he continued to make arguments to his point. I explained
> why I would be more comfortable sharing a room with another woman, and told
> him I wasn’t enjoying the conversation and would leave if I was continued to
> be called sexist. The conversation continued, with him eventually saying
> that my unwillingness to room with a man was the same as not hiring a woman
> due to her gender."_

You're not arguing in good faith right now. The above scenario isn't a joke -
it's harassment. No matter who it was done to; any gender in any context, it
would be harassment.

You're phrasing this like it was a few offhand comments; as a man, if any of
the stuff in this article had happened to me, regardless of whether it had
been a male or female doing it, I would have been appalled. I would be having
the exact same reaction.

To talk about experiences like this as if they just boil down to political
correctness requires a kind of willful ignorance.

~~~
zimablue
I think you have to look at the quote in the context of the situation, she'd
already antagonized the whole company in her first 6 months by throwing
probably the most explosive political grenade that you can. Her manager
clearly wasn't trying to make her room with him, he's trying to hit her with
what he sees as "her own philosophy" given that he thinks she's a SJW. I don't
really agree with his point but you can see the argument, a lot of modern
feminism starts from the assumption that there are zero differences between
men and women, you can draw a line from that to "you should room with anyone
we're all identical any discrimination/segregation is bad". I don't agree with
it but it's just a stupid political argument he's having with her, it's not in
any form sexual harassment. If he'd booked himself into a room with her, that
would be sexual harassment.

If you have a low level ongoing argument with your manager it's going to get
rough at some point. My whole point was that the article is very thin on
specific bad experiences and mostly about her own reaction to third party
conversations within earshot.

~~~
dragonwriter
> she'd already antagonized the whole company in her first 6 months by
> throwing probably the most explosive political grenade that you can.

Questioning the lack of diversity of body types for female avatars compared to
make avatars is “throwing probably the most explosive political grenade that
you can.”?

I don't see it. Or, I sure see how the blatantly sexist _response_ [0] could
be viewed as politically explosive, but I don't think she anticipated or
reasonably should have that that would be the response.

[0] which either outright claimed or implicitly relied on each of these: (1)
that avatars of a particular gender matter only to players of that gender, (2)
that female players are concerned only with the attractiveness of their
avatar, while men have more varied interests, (3) that only a single female
body type is attractive.

> a lot of modern feminism starts from the assumption that there are zero
> differences between men and women

No, it doesn't, though a lot of sexist rants about feminism start with the
claim that it does.

> I don't agree with it but it's just a stupid political argument he's having
> with her, it's not in any form sexual harassment.

Alone, it's maybe not extreme enough to constitute sexual harassment as a
single event, though it's quite easily the kind of thing that with a bunch of
other stuff reported in the story could easily qualify as part of a pattern
constituting sexual harassment by creation of a hostile workplace.

------
eurticket
Recently Riot has been getting a lot of, what feels like hit pieces.
Conspiracy theory: suspiciously after they were telling on Spectrum, saying
they were throttling them and they had to pay for it to stop..

