Reach for the Skype

In an interesting attempt to spin the gaming press narative over "Incarnageddon", CCP -- in the person of CCP Zulu -- hosted a "press conference" yesterday.  It was composed of two Skype conference calls.  The first was for the EVE-specific community press.  The second was for the more formal gaming mags.  Even more interestingly, Mittens was invited to both Skype calls to provide the perspective of the CSM.

In my opinion, the best coverage is from Ten Ton Hammer.  It appears to be just a straight transcript of the questions and answers, with no analysis or opinion.  It might be overly complete, though, heh.  Page 6 does not exactly paint Mittens in the most positive light.  And on page 3, he steps just to the right of taking credit for the Failheap effort to get copies of CCP's financial records.  From the transcript, if you didn't know the story of how that came about, you could be forgiven for thinking it was Mittens's idea, which it was not.

Still, the basic transcript of the event allows you to read exactly what was said and draw your own conclusions.

In my opinion, the worst coverage -- though, interestingly, what will probably be the most widely-read -- comes from PC Gamer.  They go more or less in the opposite direction, with no transcript and very few quotes.  It is almost entirely all opinion and analysis.  Overall, the piece comes off as rather negative, spinning CCP as dismissive of the incident.  In particular, it states:

CCP is quick to mention that their initial reaction was flawed, and to promise that if anything of this sort happens again, they’ll have a better structure in place to deal with it, but it was still a major problem. [Mittens] clearly said that the CSM didn’t pull any punches during their meetings, and really let CCP know about all of their unhappiness with everything that’s come out recently. But it sounds like he’s been converted by CCP’s argument.

...which is rather a stretch, I think.  ;-)

Several other websites have been covering the event, and you can find links to the various articles in a post by CCP Manifest on the EVE Online forums.  If you're interested, check it out.