
Oculus founder didn’t expect “so many death threats” after Facebook deal  - sizzle
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2014/03/oculus-founder-didnt-expect-so-many-death-threats-after-facebook-deal/
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pekk
Death threats are obviously inexcusable. This shouldn't even have to be said.

But this is a classic PR strategy. When you do something that makes many
people very angry, all you have to do is wait for someone to say something
incivil. Then make headlines with whatever it is they said.

Then the message shifts to how you've been wronged. And any time anyone
complains or argues against what you did, associate the critic with the death
threats and demand that they distance themselves from them. At this point
there is no way for the critic to be heard again, and the line of inquiry is
broken. Either they halt their criticism and turn to apologizing for something
they didn't have anything to do with, exactly as if they were responsible - or
they can be effectively smeared as supporting or even responsible for death
threats. If not that individual, then whatever group they are part of can be
effectively stereotyped as vicious animals who make death threats.

For example, this is what the Adria Richards people did when it became
apparent that their case was controversial and Richards' actions were subject
to criticism: they changed the subject to death threats, and the conversation
of the original event never really resumed.

Actually, nobody really even has to say anything incivil in reality. It only
has to be plausible that SOMEONE might send a death threat. (This is ALWAYS
plausible; there are so many crazy people out there.) Then it's easy to claim
or fake the evidence.

~~~
teamonkey
Unfortunately death threats are a very real and toxic problem in the gaming
community. I'd say not only is it believable, but both Oculus and Facebook
were somewhat naïve for not expecting them. Or perhaps they weren't expecting
the stalking and harassment to be _serious_.

Either way, I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt because it does
commonly happen and they have every right to be annoyed about it.

~~~
misingnoglic
Hell, even the creator of /flappy bird/ received death threats, that's how
common they are online.

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ElDiablo666
It's pretty embarrassing for them that their response is incredulousness.
Facebook is largely regarded as a necessary evil by many people, especially
technical folks, and yet these guys are surprised that people might worry that
you'll need a Facebook account in order to use it? Or that Facebook will
insert some microcode or firmware doing satan-knows-what and requiring
authorization for any usage? That's not paranoia or irrational hand wringing;
it's exactly the kind of thing these folks are up to because their business
model isn't charging for a service, it's selling people's information to other
businesses.

But death threats are not acceptable. I just wanted to respond to my shock at
learning the Oculus guys were so surprised. Clearly they do not understand how
Facebook is regarded outside of some wine parties in the Valley.

~~~
LandonAB
Completely agree. That's all I got out of the article. Those guys are so out
of touch with why people are pissed.

Death threats are obviously unacceptable regardless.

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crazygringo
Jesus Christ. _Death threats_? Harassing phone calls to their _families_?

I mean, I understand that a lot of the community supporting them has a
visceral hatred towards Facebook. I don't share the negative response towards
Facebook's purchase of Oculus, but I certainly understand where it's coming
from.

But _death threats_? That's insane. What is _wrong_ with these people??

~~~
DerpDerpDerp
There are hundreds of thousands if not millions of people responding to this
news - why wouldn't some of them just be crazy?

There's no reason to think that this is widespread or representative of the
general response. However, they're expecting that people like you will
distract the conversation from their terrible business move by worriedly
talking about how a small portion of the response is from crazy people, and
surely we must do something about it!

~~~
logicallee
Because crazy people generally don't know what an Oculus is? You have to be an
early adopter, independently rich and well-enough off to be involved in a
super early-stage company at the dev kit/vision stage. Also, you have to be
supportive of a new enterprise, both in deed and with actual dollars.

It is very hard to imagine any of them turning around and making a death
threat to an employee's family member. It's just a different sort of group.

~~~
DerpDerpDerp
Your premise is wrong, as another commentator pointed out.

If anything, there's an above average correlation between the early adopter
tech crowd and crazy people who drastically overreact to news of things.

Also, because of things like Minecraft associations, a widely popular
Kickstarter (which generated news), and the general media love of new
technologies (such as VR), I think more people are aware of Oculus than you're
admitting.

~~~
logicallee
Sure, but I didn't mean insane overreactions on blogs, twitter, and
hackernews. I meant actual credible threats from real crazy people.

~~~
DerpDerpDerp
I mean legitimately insane, whether or not the threats are credible.

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adamredwoods
I'm not surprised. I quit playing multi-player online games (Starcraft)
because of excessive violence threats and verbal abuse. It's an unfortunate
side effect of the gaming community, and I feel the Oculus appealed to that
community.

~~~
JohnnyBrown
Actually my first thought was also, "well, it is targeted toward gamers". But
Starcraft? Was your handle "uglyblacklesbianexxonexecutive"? I play starcraft
II almost every day and I find the community very polite. The worst I ever see
is occasional gloating after a victory or accusations of cheating in defeat.
Most matches the only chat is "glhf" and "gg".

~~~
nwh
I don't think I've seen anybody acting badly either. I've even had people talk
to me after thrashing me to give me hints on how not to lose so thoroughly
next time. I've played since SC1, there's never really been anybody malicious
in a decade or whatever it has been since then.

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bhouston
Oculus VR was in trouble soon as Sony and Microsoft started to develop very
quickly their own VR headsets. There was just very little market let for
Oculus VR that mattered. I think they basically took advantage of Facebook
with some grand and likely unrealistic vision.

I would be surprised if Oculus VR ever lives up to its vision. Rather we will
be using Sony and Microsoft VR headsets in the next decade if VR does in fact
go mainstream for gamers -- which is still up in the air I think.

~~~
timdorr
How can you make such predictive statements when not one of the companies
you've mentioned has actually released their consumer product? There was no
market grab by Sony or Microsoft because there is no market currently
operating.

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stephenaturner
The combination of some very intelligent people with often very poor social
skills will give a greater chance of things like this happening...

That said, they could be a little more honest about recognising why people
don't like this deal...

------
yuhong
I see none of the privacy groups that complained to the FTC about Facebook-
WhatsApp complaining about this one.

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benched
If it wasn't for the money, I'd think these guys were just clueless. Billions
excuse much.

~~~
DerpDerpDerp
It's really hard to get people to understand something their paycheck requires
them not to.

~~~
stan_rogers
What, precisely, is it that you think they don't understand (and a bunch of
random gamers do)?

~~~
DerpDerpDerp
I think they're turning a blind eye to the way many people view Facebook,
Facebook's habit of making decisions that compromise user privacy (since
that's how they make money), and so on because it's in their financial
advantage to be bought out like that.

Zuckerberg's comments about potential paths that VR will take (with Facebook's
backing) already admit that he's planning many of the things that people are
saying they're worried about, and the Oculus people are just going "Huh? What?
I don't know what you mean...."

~~~
stan_rogers
And those potential paths are things that people have been talking about
since,... well, since VR was a runt puppy that only some kid named Jaron
loved. The gaming community has a very parochial, blinkered view of what the
technology promises. Frankly, the last game I was even mildly interested in
was Q*bert, but the promise of immersive VR worlds of every kind - especially
social - excites the hell out of me.

------
clef
Another widespread phenomenon the internet and after it social media
facilitated, the ability to send death threats to people "hiding" being a
computer (or a fake identity). Much easier than doing it in person. It is
unfortunate that for every good discovery or invention, there is always a way
to exploit it for less compassionate means, like greed, bullying (death
threats included), criminal activities.. True that if we stopped in our
innovation tracks just because of possible negative effects, we'd still be
using sticks and stones, but it seems that as much as technology as a whole
has greatly evolved, common sense and compassion is still not something that
comes instinctively to a lot of people in this world.

