This is my first post on TL - long time reader, though (I don't usually participate on forums). For those of you who don't know me (probably, erm, every one of you), I'm the owner of Evil Geniuses... for those of you who watched the EG Masters' Cup stream so brilliantly produced by EG.SirScoots, I was "That Guy Behind The Broadcast Desk Who Didn't Want To Be On Cam." I've been involved in pro gaming for a long time now, and I decided to register my account on TL just now because I all of a sudden find this thread very problematic.
As everyone here is probably aware, TL is a juggernaut SC entity in eSports, and "wears two hats," so to say, as both a professional team and a coverage website. Some would argue that its influence as a coverage website and community stretches further than the influence of its pro players. In any case, obviously the two identities are intertwined and overlap to a certain extent.
Moving on (finally) to my point: as a very important, influential coverage hub focusing on what is currently pro gaming's most prevalent community, you can't be censoring players' names. I don't want to jump the gun and start waving around the "journalistic integrity" card prematurely, but I think it's pretty significant. Sure, TL isn't ESPN (yet), and sure, this is a forum-embedded community news piece updated by a very dedicated TL community member (for which I am grateful), but those - to me - are no excuse for throwing high standards of unbiased journalism to the side. It doesn't matter whether this is a forum post or a front-page news piece: you can't be censoring players' names or clan names just because they beat a community favorite.
Unfortunately, this pattern isn't necessarily restricted to this particular thread. There is a very minor (albeit certainly noticeable) trend on TL of posters only ensuring that Liquid pro players have their clan name mentioned - I.E. HuK is always referred to in TL coverage as Liquid`HuK, whereas SeleCt, for example, has always been just "SeleCt" and never "Dignitas.SeleCt" (at least as far as I've seen). This seems to vary based on the player and the community's familiarity with said player - IdrA, for example, is always referred to be the TL coverage folks as "EGIdrA" (we at EG are thankful for this) - but it is certainly a consistent trend. TL players are always referred to as TL players, but players from other pro teams don't necessarily always have their team name attached to their alias.
This is, of course, certainly *not* a case of intentional bias, and I'm not insinuating that it is in any way (I recently met Nazgul and several other TL executives at Blizzcon, and they held themselves with the utmost integrity and professionalism). At the end of the day, like many in this thread have pointed out, this is TL's home territory, and those covering competitions here ensure, first and foremost, that they point out what's going on with TL pro players. However, with that being said, sometimes intent is irrelevant (or close to it) when discussing matters of this matter - I.E., is neglecting to put in the care/effort to refer to SeleCt (for example) as Dignitas.SeleCt really any better than intentionally leaving out the team name? Maybe marginally better... but maybe not at all.
To summarize this already too-long post, I think it's really important for everyone in this community to remember that TL, while still a team website, is definitively the SC2 coverage hub of the English-speaking world. And any kind of journalistic bias here, whether intentional or unintentional, whether major or extremely minor (as minor as censoring a player's name because he beat HuK today), whether coming from an official TL coverage staff member or a dedicated community member not officially affiliated with TL, is extremely, extremely problematic. With this website getting the amount of traffic and attention that it does get (and should get), the coverage here needs to be held to high standards of journalistic integrity.
And at the end of the day, sure, this is TL's home base, and favoring TL's pro players in coverage posts - if it is desired to do so - may be TL's right... but doing something just because you have the power to ("just because you can") is really a very poor justification for doing anything.
(Thanks to those of you who actually read all of this)
-A
Edit: In the time it took me to write all of this, the censorship was removed. I think the points are still valid, though .
Well, you overlook two points, firstly motbob is not a tlnet employee, he's just a member of the community. And secondly if there is someone to blame its only Select himself- if he doesnt even bother to put Dignitas in his battlenet ID why should anyone else?
On November 16 2010 18:45 EGalex wrote: Hey Everyone,
This is my first post on TL - long time reader, though (I don't usually participate on forums). For those of you who don't know me (probably, erm, every one of you), I'm the owner of Evil Geniuses... for those of you who watched the EG Masters' Cup stream so brilliantly produced by EG.SirScoots, I was "That Guy Behind The Broadcast Desk Who Didn't Want To Be On Cam." I've been involved in pro gaming for a long time now, and I decided to register my account on TL just now because I all of a sudden find this thread very problematic.
As everyone here is probably aware, TL is a juggernaut SC entity in eSports, and "wears two hats," so to say, as both a professional team and a coverage website. Some would argue that its influence as a coverage website and community stretches further than the influence of its pro players. In any case, obviously the two identities are intertwined and overlap to a certain extent.
Moving on (finally) to my point: as a very important, influential coverage hub focusing on what is currently pro gaming's most prevalent community, you can't be censoring players' names. I don't want to jump the gun and start waving around the "journalistic integrity" card prematurely, but I think it's pretty significant. Sure, TL isn't ESPN (yet), and sure, this is a forum-embedded community news piece updated by a very dedicated TL community member (for which I am grateful), but those - to me - are no excuse for throwing high standards of unbiased journalism to the side. It doesn't matter whether this is a forum post or a front-page news piece: you can't be censoring players' names or clan names just because they beat a community favorite.
Unfortunately, this pattern isn't necessarily restricted to this particular thread. There is a very minor (albeit certainly noticeable) trend on TL of posters only ensuring that Liquid pro players have their clan name mentioned - I.E. HuK is always referred to in TL coverage as Liquid`HuK, whereas SeleCt, for example, has always been just "SeleCt" and never "Dignitas.SeleCt" (at least as far as I've seen). This seems to vary based on the player and the community's familiarity with said player - IdrA, for example, is always referred to be the TL coverage folks as "EGIdrA" (we at EG are thankful for this) - but it is certainly a consistent trend. TL players are always referred to as TL players, but players from other pro teams don't necessarily always have their team name attached to their alias.
This is, of course, certainly *not* a case of intentional bias, and I'm not insinuating that it is in any way (I recently met Nazgul and several other TL executives at Blizzcon, and they held themselves with the utmost integrity and professionalism). At the end of the day, like many in this thread have pointed out, this is TL's home territory, and those covering competitions here ensure, first and foremost, that they point out what's going on with TL pro players. However, with that being said, sometimes intent is irrelevant (or close to it) when discussing matters of this matter - I.E., is neglecting to put in the care/effort to refer to SeleCt (for example) as Dignitas.SeleCt really any better than intentionally leaving out the team name? Maybe marginally better... but maybe not at all.
To summarize this already too-long post, I think it's really important for everyone in this community to remember that TL, while still a team website, is definitively the SC2 coverage hub of the English-speaking world. And any kind of journalistic bias here, whether intentional or unintentional, whether major or extremely minor (as minor as censoring a player's name because he beat HuK today), whether coming from an official TL coverage staff member or a dedicated community member not officially affiliated with TL, is extremely, extremely problematic. With this website getting the amount of traffic and attention that it does get (and should get), the coverage here needs to be held to high standards of journalistic integrity.
And at the end of the day, sure, this is TL's home base, and favoring TL's pro players in coverage posts - if it is desired to do so - may be TL's right... but doing something just because you have the power to ("just because you can") is really a very poor justification for doing anything.
(Thanks to those of you who actually read all of this)
-A
TL.net may have elevated to the de facto standard-bearer of the SC westerner community, but they are a team and this is their site, so they have no obligation towards journalistic propriety. As a relatively new visitor (like most people probably who came in during the SC2 beta) I come here for simple reasons...site has a good layout the best community members posting frequently. The only standards they should hold by are their own, which judging by their success are just right..any bias towards their own team members is the exact opposite of extremely problematic.
Nobody is stopping you from attempting to prop up the EG website as the bastion of integrity you think the SC community needs.
Shouldn't we all be trying to grow esports in the west to be more professional in general?
On November 16 2010 18:45 EGalex wrote: Hey Everyone,
This is my first post on TL - long time reader, though (I don't usually participate on forums). For those of you who don't know me (probably, erm, every one of you), I'm the owner of Evil Geniuses... for those of you who watched the EG Masters' Cup stream so brilliantly produced by EG.SirScoots, I was "That Guy Behind The Broadcast Desk Who Didn't Want To Be On Cam." I've been involved in pro gaming for a long time now, and I decided to register my account on TL just now because I all of a sudden find this thread very problematic.
As everyone here is probably aware, TL is a juggernaut SC entity in eSports, and "wears two hats," so to say, as both a professional team and a coverage website. Some would argue that its influence as a coverage website and community stretches further than the influence of its pro players. In any case, obviously the two identities are intertwined and overlap to a certain extent.
Moving on (finally) to my point: as a very important, influential coverage hub focusing on what is currently pro gaming's most prevalent community, you can't be censoring players' names. I don't want to jump the gun and start waving around the "journalistic integrity" card prematurely, but I think it's pretty significant. Sure, TL isn't ESPN (yet), and sure, this is a forum-embedded community news piece updated by a very dedicated TL community member (for which I am grateful), but those - to me - are no excuse for throwing high standards of unbiased journalism to the side. It doesn't matter whether this is a forum post or a front-page news piece: you can't be censoring players' names or clan names just because they beat a community favorite.
Unfortunately, this pattern isn't necessarily restricted to this particular thread. There is a very minor (albeit certainly noticeable) trend on TL of posters only ensuring that Liquid pro players have their clan name mentioned - I.E. HuK is always referred to in TL coverage as Liquid`HuK, whereas SeleCt, for example, has always been just "SeleCt" and never "Dignitas.SeleCt" (at least as far as I've seen). This seems to vary based on the player and the community's familiarity with said player - IdrA, for example, is always referred to be the TL coverage folks as "EGIdrA" (we at EG are thankful for this) - but it is certainly a consistent trend. TL players are always referred to as TL players, but players from other pro teams don't necessarily always have their team name attached to their alias.
This is, of course, certainly *not* a case of intentional bias, and I'm not insinuating that it is in any way (I recently met Nazgul and several other TL executives at Blizzcon, and they held themselves with the utmost integrity and professionalism). At the end of the day, like many in this thread have pointed out, this is TL's home territory, and those covering competitions here ensure, first and foremost, that they point out what's going on with TL pro players. However, with that being said, sometimes intent is irrelevant (or close to it) when discussing matters of this matter - I.E., is neglecting to put in the care/effort to refer to SeleCt (for example) as Dignitas.SeleCt really any better than intentionally leaving out the team name? Maybe marginally better... but maybe not at all.
To summarize this already too-long post, I think it's really important for everyone in this community to remember that TL, while still a team website, is definitively the SC2 coverage hub of the English-speaking world. And any kind of journalistic bias here, whether intentional or unintentional, whether major or extremely minor (as minor as censoring a player's name because he beat HuK today), whether coming from an official TL coverage staff member or a dedicated community member not officially affiliated with TL, is extremely, extremely problematic. With this website getting the amount of traffic and attention that it does get (and should get), the coverage here needs to be held to high standards of journalistic integrity.
And at the end of the day, sure, this is TL's home base, and favoring TL's pro players in coverage posts - if it is desired to do so - may be TL's right... but doing something just because you have the power to ("just because you can") is really a very poor justification for doing anything.
(Thanks to those of you who actually read all of this)
-A
Edit: In the time it took me to write all of this, the censorship was removed. I think the points are still valid, though .
A very very interesting and much needed post. You are airing a concern that I've had a long time now (not at all connected to TL.net primarily) and that is the lack of journalistic professionalism that the e-sports scene faces daily. I wont go into detail (because my hometake midterm is due in the morning) but you managed to summarize my thoughts very well. For e-sports to get to the next level outside of Korea, this is one of the absolute most critical problems we need to deal with. Thanks again for voicing this with the rest of us (and please make an official thread here on TL!).
On November 16 2010 18:45 EGalex wrote: Hey Everyone,
This is my first post on TL - long time reader, though (I don't usually participate on forums). For those of you who don't know me (probably, erm, every one of you), I'm the owner of Evil Geniuses... for those of you who watched the EG Masters' Cup stream so brilliantly produced by EG.SirScoots, I was "That Guy Behind The Broadcast Desk Who Didn't Want To Be On Cam." I've been involved in pro gaming for a long time now, and I decided to register my account on TL just now because I all of a sudden find this thread very problematic.
As everyone here is probably aware, TL is a juggernaut SC entity in eSports, and "wears two hats," so to say, as both a professional team and a coverage website. Some would argue that its influence as a coverage website and community stretches further than the influence of its pro players. In any case, obviously the two identities are intertwined and overlap to a certain extent.
Moving on (finally) to my point: as a very important, influential coverage hub focusing on what is currently pro gaming's most prevalent community, you can't be censoring players' names. I don't want to jump the gun and start waving around the "journalistic integrity" card prematurely, but I think it's pretty significant. Sure, TL isn't ESPN (yet), and sure, this is a forum-embedded community news piece updated by a very dedicated TL community member (for which I am grateful), but those - to me - are no excuse for throwing high standards of unbiased journalism to the side. It doesn't matter whether this is a forum post or a front-page news piece: you can't be censoring players' names or clan names just because they beat a community favorite.
Unfortunately, this pattern isn't necessarily restricted to this particular thread. There is a very minor (albeit certainly noticeable) trend on TL of posters only ensuring that Liquid pro players have their clan name mentioned - I.E. HuK is always referred to in TL coverage as Liquid`HuK, whereas SeleCt, for example, has always been just "SeleCt" and never "Dignitas.SeleCt" (at least as far as I've seen). This seems to vary based on the player and the community's familiarity with said player - IdrA, for example, is always referred to be the TL coverage folks as "EGIdrA" (we at EG are thankful for this) - but it is certainly a consistent trend. TL players are always referred to as TL players, but players from other pro teams don't necessarily always have their team name attached to their alias.
This is, of course, certainly *not* a case of intentional bias, and I'm not insinuating that it is in any way (I recently met Nazgul and several other TL executives at Blizzcon, and they held themselves with the utmost integrity and professionalism). At the end of the day, like many in this thread have pointed out, this is TL's home territory, and those covering competitions here ensure, first and foremost, that they point out what's going on with TL pro players. However, with that being said, sometimes intent is irrelevant (or close to it) when discussing matters of this matter - I.E., is neglecting to put in the care/effort to refer to SeleCt (for example) as Dignitas.SeleCt really any better than intentionally leaving out the team name? Maybe marginally better... but maybe not at all.
To summarize this already too-long post, I think it's really important for everyone in this community to remember that TL, while still a team website, is definitively the SC2 coverage hub of the English-speaking world. And any kind of journalistic bias here, whether intentional or unintentional, whether major or extremely minor (as minor as censoring a player's name because he beat HuK today), whether coming from an official TL coverage staff member or a dedicated community member not officially affiliated with TL, is extremely, extremely problematic. With this website getting the amount of traffic and attention that it does get (and should get), the coverage here needs to be held to high standards of journalistic integrity.
And at the end of the day, sure, this is TL's home base, and favoring TL's pro players in coverage posts - if it is desired to do so - may be TL's right... but doing something just because you have the power to ("just because you can") is really a very poor justification for doing anything.
(Thanks to those of you who actually read all of this)
-A
Edit: In the time it took me to write all of this, the censorship was removed. I think the points are still valid, though .
Thanks for the post.
Well. Whoever the Mods on TL seem to have poor judgment, and therefore have the tendency to abuse powers. Censoring is one thing, but in many other posts as well, banning posters just because of a different in opinion.
Wonder whether TL is being handled by a bunch of youngsters who have little understanding of professionalism.
Are you serious? TL is so good because they are so strict especially with the amount of garbage being spewed in the internet.
Having different opinions are fine. Having stupid opinions/garbage opinions are not. I love TL because more often that not, they reinforce that.
So I go to the EG website and I notice that they don't include any clan tags when they mention names (IE: sir scoots' uploaded replays of incontrol vs nony and socke). Parity?
Well, you overlook two points, firstly motbob is not a tlnet employee, he's just a member of the community. And secondly if there is someone to blame its only Select himself- if he doesnt even bother to put Dignitas in his battlenet ID why should anyone else?
Excellent points, basically negates the entire argument.
The problem with EGalex's complaint is that the "journalists" in this case seems to be regular users. Had TL as a site appointed admins, mods or just any regular members to take care of updating qualification threads, live report threads etc, it would have made total sense. I'm all for proffessionalism then.
But really this isn't TLs doing in this case, it's just another user deciding to do the community a favor and keeping us updated rather than us just getting a list of 64 qualified players later on. Demanding 100% professionalism from users like this doesn't seem right. That said, the whole "ima delete this guys record if he beats huk" wasn't too pretty in my opinion and could certainly been handled better.
On November 16 2010 18:45 EGalex wrote: Hey Everyone,
This is my first post on TL - long time reader, though (I don't usually participate on forums). For those of you who don't know me (probably, erm, every one of you), I'm the owner of Evil Geniuses... for those of you who watched the EG Masters' Cup stream so brilliantly produced by EG.SirScoots, I was "That Guy Behind The Broadcast Desk Who Didn't Want To Be On Cam." I've been involved in pro gaming for a long time now, and I decided to register my account on TL just now because I all of a sudden find this thread very problematic.
As everyone here is probably aware, TL is a juggernaut SC entity in eSports, and "wears two hats," so to say, as both a professional team and a coverage website. Some would argue that its influence as a coverage website and community stretches further than the influence of its pro players. In any case, obviously the two identities are intertwined and overlap to a certain extent.
Moving on (finally) to my point: as a very important, influential coverage hub focusing on what is currently pro gaming's most prevalent community, you can't be censoring players' names. I don't want to jump the gun and start waving around the "journalistic integrity" card prematurely, but I think it's pretty significant. Sure, TL isn't ESPN (yet), and sure, this is a forum-embedded community news piece updated by a very dedicated TL community member (for which I am grateful), but those - to me - are no excuse for throwing high standards of unbiased journalism to the side. It doesn't matter whether this is a forum post or a front-page news piece: you can't be censoring players' names or clan names just because they beat a community favorite.
Unfortunately, this pattern isn't necessarily restricted to this particular thread. There is a very minor (albeit certainly noticeable) trend on TL of posters only ensuring that Liquid pro players have their clan name mentioned - I.E. HuK is always referred to in TL coverage as Liquid`HuK, whereas SeleCt, for example, has always been just "SeleCt" and never "Dignitas.SeleCt" (at least as far as I've seen). This seems to vary based on the player and the community's familiarity with said player - IdrA, for example, is always referred to be the TL coverage folks as "EGIdrA" (we at EG are thankful for this) - but it is certainly a consistent trend. TL players are always referred to as TL players, but players from other pro teams don't necessarily always have their team name attached to their alias.
This is, of course, certainly *not* a case of intentional bias, and I'm not insinuating that it is in any way (I recently met Nazgul and several other TL executives at Blizzcon, and they held themselves with the utmost integrity and professionalism). At the end of the day, like many in this thread have pointed out, this is TL's home territory, and those covering competitions here ensure, first and foremost, that they point out what's going on with TL pro players. However, with that being said, sometimes intent is irrelevant (or close to it) when discussing matters of this matter - I.E., is neglecting to put in the care/effort to refer to SeleCt (for example) as Dignitas.SeleCt really any better than intentionally leaving out the team name? Maybe marginally better... but maybe not at all.
To summarize this already too-long post, I think it's really important for everyone in this community to remember that TL, while still a team website, is definitively the SC2 coverage hub of the English-speaking world. And any kind of journalistic bias here, whether intentional or unintentional, whether major or extremely minor (as minor as censoring a player's name because he beat HuK today), whether coming from an official TL coverage staff member or a dedicated community member not officially affiliated with TL, is extremely, extremely problematic. With this website getting the amount of traffic and attention that it does get (and should get), the coverage here needs to be held to high standards of journalistic integrity.
And at the end of the day, sure, this is TL's home base, and favoring TL's pro players in coverage posts - if it is desired to do so - may be TL's right... but doing something just because you have the power to ("just because you can") is really a very poor justification for doing anything.
(Thanks to those of you who actually read all of this)
-A
TL.net may have elevated to the de facto standard-bearer of the SC westerner community, but they are a team and this is their site, so they have no obligation towards journalistic propriety. As a relatively new visitor (like most people probably who came in during the SC2 beta) I come here for simple reasons...site has a good layout the best community members posting frequently. The only standards they should hold by are their own, which judging by their success are just right..any bias towards their own team members is the exact opposite of extremely problematic.
Nobody is stopping you from attempting to prop up the EG website as the bastion of integrity you think the SC community needs.
I feel like if TL has indeed become the Western bastion for everything SC2, it should indeed feel responsible to practice every bit of integrity and professionalism it possibly can. If TL supports e-sports (which I'm sure it does), it would be far more beneficial toward the development of e-sports if they buckled down and became as professional as possible rather than just going, "Oh, this is our privately-owned site, so we'll just do what we want."
True, this site is theirs, but due to their incredible prominence in the Western world, professionalism and journalistic integrity would greatly benefit the cause that they dedicate countless hours of their time to.
I dont see why TL would purposely try to hurt "esports" or anyone on purpose. I highly doubt TL is out to hold grudges or purposely shun player clan tags or sponsors. But even if so:
"1. THIS IS OUR HOUSE
You are our guests. We will make all attempts to treat everyone with due respect and to accommodate everyone's wishes as far as reasonably possible. But, this is a private site. We are not a "for profit" enterprise. We are not funded by any governments. This means we run the site the way we see fit. We are not obligated to observe anyone's notions of "free speech" or even "fairness." We try of course, and that's why we're consistently considered one of the best gaming sites on the web, and you are always free to give us suggestions (Website Feedback Forum). But, we have our limits. If we don't like you, we simply IP ban you. If we're really pissed off, then we IP ban you AND nuke every single post you've uploaded to the site - ever. It will be as if you had never existed here. This is our house. You've been warned."
EPT
.
IMMvp will face 
Cella in round 2 
)
