The Le Games: Apology to the Gaming Community

[Treebore]

Don't get me wrong, but who cares? Seriously, who cares? AFAIK OBS/RPGNOW doesn't pay to have their own impartial group of quality reviewers so instead they let any yahoo on the internet post a review without any quality control mechanism in place that prevents abuse from occurring in the first place.

So yea, it's not surprising that the site's review system was abused; and at least you owned up to it unlike the dozens to hundreds of other publishers who have abused the system (or are continuing to do so) and will go on unnoticed.

Yeah, actually I would like to know if the reviews I think were secretly written by The Le are the ones written by him. Because if they are the ones I think they are then they aren't exactly dishonest in what they say about the products. I own most, if not all, of The Le's stuff, and I never saw a review on the websites that were wrong about the products.

So I would find it humorous if his reviews were/are honest about the strengths and short comings of the products. It is possible to give a critical review of your own stuff, often harsher then others would judge it, when trying to give an honest self critique.

So maybe he would have been better off just disclosing he was giving a self critique. Especially once people bought his stuff, and saw themselves agreeing with his own assessments.

 

[malladin]

My take on this is it's not much of an apology that shamelessly advertises a sale designed to get some more money from long tail sales on their pdf's as a way of compensating people. I can't say I wish them any success after such unethical behaviour coupled with a plug for the company disguised as an apology. Further, the two week ban is a joke. The way to stop such behaviour, and restore faith in reviews, is to kick companies off the site who are caught falsely promoting their own products.

Nigel

 

[joethelawyer]

i agree with the poster who said who cares. someone who buys something based on someone else's review of it, who hey don't even know, and gets a crappy product, did it to themselves. why would you trust some stranger's opinion? everyone has biases and motivations.

companies of any real size do this all the time in every way. they fund purportedly independent scientific institutes and think tanks to spout off opinions which the companies then use in advertising. the whole campbell's "soup is good food" ad line was one of them. they funded the organization which did a scientific study that said soup was good for you. they then used the research results in their ads. they had some actor guy in a commercial saying "hmm. i guess mom was right" after a waitress told him the results of the scientific study. i can name 30 others.

what this guy did was just good marketing. i would change your name to a pseudonym and keep putting out products. if they are any good they will sell. if they don't, put out some more reviews.

caveat emptor, always.

 

[JeffB]

My take on this is it's not much of an apology that shamelessly advertises a sale designed to get some more money from long tail sales on their pdf's as a way of compensating people. I can't say I wish them any success after such unethical behaviour coupled with a plug for the company disguised as an apology. Further, the two week ban is a joke. The way to stop such behaviour, and restore faith in reviews, is to kick companies off the site who are caught falsely promoting their own products.

My thoughts exactly.

 

[Michael Dean]

I'm kind of in the camp of 'who cares'? I mean, it's embarassing for him, and he should be embarassed, but it's not like he molested puppies.

I give him some kudos for not trying to downplay it or make excuses, but it's not like he's elevated to hero status in my book. As a human being who's made a lot of f'd up mistakes in my life, I'm certainly not going to be first in line with some stones in my hand.

As far as reviews go, I can't imagine people who would ever buy something based on a review if they didn't already know the reviewer or the reviewer's tastes/likes/dislikes. A review is a tool, but it's only a useful tool if you know how to use it. Taking Joe Blow reviewer's word for something if you don't know if you and Joe like the same things seems weird. That's why I read some movie reviewers but not others, even though quality-wise they are equally talented; because I know some reviewers have a take on movies or genres of movies that are similar to my own.

So I don't think this necessarily reflects badly on all reviewers. If anything, by it coming to light, it's a warning to others who have done it or are thinking of doing it for their own products, and it increases awareness and a healthy bit of skepticism.

 

[Treebore]

My thoughts exactly.

So how do you expect him to apologize? Some form of restitution is often a part of apologizing.

 

[AbsolutGrndZer0]

People reading this thread have every right to voice their disdain of my actions regarding this matter. But please do not make false accusations of sexism.

Jaerdaph is speaking of the topic in the The Le Games Yahoo Group concerning this "prominent woman" who publicly bashed me in her blog and allowed other publishers to come on and do the same. Their actions were reprehensible, but everyone rallied behind them anyway. I made it very clear that I held no ill will against this "prominent woman", but the conversation continued.

One of the people in the Group (which is free for anyone to join) responded by saying that the prominent woman "needs to get laid". I responded by disagreeing with comment, but I also made it very clear that everyone in the Group has the right to speak their mind as long as it doesn't get too nasty.

A few people were dissatisfied that I didn't censor the members or start restricting what can be said, and left the group. Of course, they never got to see the apology that the original poster left moments later.

I hold no ill will to people who choose to leave my Yahoo Group, but making false accusations of sexism just isn't cool.

-The Le

As the one that said the ""needs to get laid" thing, yeah. It was me, just me, not The Le or anyone else on the Yahoo list, and I was severely chastised by most everyone on the list.

 

[Ranger REG]

My take on this is it's not much of an apology that shamelessly advertises a sale designed to get some more money from long tail sales on their pdf's as a way of compensating people. I can't say I wish them any success after such unethical behaviour coupled with a plug for the company disguised as an apology. Further, the two week ban is a joke. The way to stop such behaviour, and restore faith in reviews, is to kick companies off the site who are caught falsely promoting their own products.

Pray you do not fall from grace, despite I like some of your earlier works (I have downloaded and used your Universal FX for my d20 Modern games).

Pray I can forgive you should the fall come.

 

[Henry]

My first comment: The Le, what the Hell, Man???


My second comment: I'm sorry to see it, but I'm glad you "manned up" and apologized.

 

[Amphimir Míriel]

Apology accepted.

Sometimes the only way we kick bad habits is by being caught and publicly embarrassed.

It has happened to us all at least once, I bet.