Hello everyone,
I resigned today. I will try to keep things as brief as possible.
As some of you know, my mother passed away from cancer in February. I had taken a six-month remote exception for my job to spend time and help out in those final months, which is quite a long time to experience what it’s like to see someone dying. I knew cancer was bad, but I wasn't prepared for some of the things I experienced. The final days are horrific - after watching your loved one wither away over the course of months, something flips. You're cleaning poop and vomit, changing diapers, listening to them beg for the nurse to make the pain stop.
Which is why I was disgusted when a community member decided to weaponize that experience against me, and especially disgusted when [REDACTED] allowed that harassment to continue over the course of thirty minutes.
In fact, [REDACTED] did the following things before a moderator stepped in and timed the user out:
The next day, [REDACTED] had to be shamed into allowing someone to step in and extend the ban. He then issued the following ominous announcement on April 21st, 5 days before proper, frosty, and tea were banned:
So after having the night to think about it, [REDACTED] response to [REDACTED]’s behavior was that other people with ZERO connection to that specific incident were the problem.
If you’re like me, you might wonder what might have caused [REDACTED] to handle the situation like this. Although we’ll likely never know the true reason, I believe the following screenshots suggest his true motives — he viewed me as a bad-faith actor, so [REDACTED]’s behavior was somewhat deserved. They also show how comfortable he is with burning down the community if it means getting his way.
This incident was incredibly personal to me, and it was also personal to others. I will refrain from releasing the screenshots of this out of respect, but a lead administrator posted an incredibly heart-felt and lengthy message to [REDACTED] — only to be ignored despite following up. But more importantly, it shows everything wrong with [REDACTED] management skills. He gets hyperfocused on the wrong things, and relentlessly pursues those goals at any cost. He is incredibly biased against those who he sees as part of the “out group”. But worst of all, he has a compulsive need to control every minor decision, which means every single flaw of his permeates throughout the community.
Though, if we’re talking about bad faith, I think it’s worth bringing up how manipulative [REDACTED] can be. When I agreed to give GL permission to use AHG’s intellectual property, one of the stipulations was originally a “prestigious” rank for myself. This was AHG’s equivalent of Legendary, which [REDACTED] had a role in renaming. [REDACTED], saying there was no such rank on GL, and that it would be called “Legendary”.
In the written agreement for the IP rights, I had written down something to the effect of “permanent VIP+ rank”. When Legendary came out, [REDACTED] that I would not be getting it, because it was a “permanent elite rank”. To this day, there is no “elite” rank on GL, and there likely never will be. I ended up agreeing to do development work for free in exchange for that legendary rank, because being able to build something for my friends meant more to me than whatever money he’d likely be able to offer.
Let’s take a look at what led to [REDACTED] downfall on AHG. You will see the same familiar themes.
Giant's Lair TTT did not die - it was killed.
Thank you [REDACTED]!!
I resigned today. I will try to keep things as brief as possible.
As some of you know, my mother passed away from cancer in February. I had taken a six-month remote exception for my job to spend time and help out in those final months, which is quite a long time to experience what it’s like to see someone dying. I knew cancer was bad, but I wasn't prepared for some of the things I experienced. The final days are horrific - after watching your loved one wither away over the course of months, something flips. You're cleaning poop and vomit, changing diapers, listening to them beg for the nurse to make the pain stop.
Which is why I was disgusted when a community member decided to weaponize that experience against me, and especially disgusted when [REDACTED] allowed that harassment to continue over the course of thirty minutes.
In fact, [REDACTED] did the following things before a moderator stepped in and timed the user out:
- [REDACTED] for "inciting" the argument in #admins-x-advisor
- [REDACTED] that [REDACTED] had been "bullied out"
- [REDACTED] into an extended argument about the situation in that same channel
- [REDACTED] several members for reacting to his posts with Israeli flag emojis
- [REDACTED] into a game of reaction removal whack-a-mole with another user, where the user "this tbh" reacted to a post that poked at [REDACTED], and [REDACTED] continuously removed the reactions to the post
- [REDACTED] that a 1 day ban was sufficient because it was "harassment 1st [offense]" (he would later try to gaslight and say he did not claim to argue it was protocol)
The next day, [REDACTED] had to be shamed into allowing someone to step in and extend the ban. He then issued the following ominous announcement on April 21st, 5 days before proper, frosty, and tea were banned:
So after having the night to think about it, [REDACTED] response to [REDACTED]’s behavior was that other people with ZERO connection to that specific incident were the problem.
If you’re like me, you might wonder what might have caused [REDACTED] to handle the situation like this. Although we’ll likely never know the true reason, I believe the following screenshots suggest his true motives — he viewed me as a bad-faith actor, so [REDACTED]’s behavior was somewhat deserved. They also show how comfortable he is with burning down the community if it means getting his way.
This incident was incredibly personal to me, and it was also personal to others. I will refrain from releasing the screenshots of this out of respect, but a lead administrator posted an incredibly heart-felt and lengthy message to [REDACTED] — only to be ignored despite following up. But more importantly, it shows everything wrong with [REDACTED] management skills. He gets hyperfocused on the wrong things, and relentlessly pursues those goals at any cost. He is incredibly biased against those who he sees as part of the “out group”. But worst of all, he has a compulsive need to control every minor decision, which means every single flaw of his permeates throughout the community.
Though, if we’re talking about bad faith, I think it’s worth bringing up how manipulative [REDACTED] can be. When I agreed to give GL permission to use AHG’s intellectual property, one of the stipulations was originally a “prestigious” rank for myself. This was AHG’s equivalent of Legendary, which [REDACTED] had a role in renaming. [REDACTED], saying there was no such rank on GL, and that it would be called “Legendary”.
In the written agreement for the IP rights, I had written down something to the effect of “permanent VIP+ rank”. When Legendary came out, [REDACTED] that I would not be getting it, because it was a “permanent elite rank”. To this day, there is no “elite” rank on GL, and there likely never will be. I ended up agreeing to do development work for free in exchange for that legendary rank, because being able to build something for my friends meant more to me than whatever money he’d likely be able to offer.
Let’s take a look at what led to [REDACTED] downfall on AHG. You will see the same familiar themes.
- Focusing on the wrong things and unilaterally making poor decisions.
- Overcommitting to pipe dream projects while neglecting the core community.
- Providing no guidance or agency to those under him, leading talented members to burn out.
- Leaving others to do the real work while sitting in his ivory tower “strategizing” (hint, as someone who worked with him, it means just coming up with ideas that have no chance of panning out).
- Engaging in bad-faith “gotchas” instead of engaging with people (he leaked the existence of a vulnerability that was not confirmed to be fully remediated, in an attempt to embarrass me and Temar).
Giant's Lair TTT did not die - it was killed.
- It was killed because [REDACTED] knowingly chose to ban three people over the health of the server, despite being warned that this would happen by pretty much everyone.
- It was killed because [REDACTED] ruined the morale of the staff team by pursuing this vendetta over the course of several weeks, because he was too scared to make the decision himself.
- It was killed because [REDACTED] chose to gaslight the entire staff team that a ban was not on the table for proper, then reversing course and issuing her a one year ban despite nothing happening in that time period. The only person who had broken any rules in between was [REDACTED].
- It was killed because [REDACTED] overruled every single lead admin who argued against banning the three users that were issued 1 year bans.
- It was killed because [REDACTED] consistently engages in bad-faith “own the libs” style arguments when faced with dissent.
- It was killed because after doing all of this, [REDACTED] and left others to clean up after his mess.
Thank you [REDACTED]!!
