[Open Letter] The Pied Piper and the Tune of Death

Day 977, 09:47 • Published in Romania Finland • by Erwin Schauman


Many of you have probably heard the story of the Pied Piper of Hamelin when you were younger.

The Disney version tells how the Piper was hired to clean the city of rats by playing his pipe and compelling them to follow him outside the city limits where the rats were then released. The real version of the story is a lot grimmer, as they often were prior to the Disney kiddie age - the Piper revenged the townsfolk for not paying him his rat-catching fee by playing a tune with his pipe and luring the town's children to follow him and then drowned them in the near-by river.

That is the tune of death, and unfortunately the administration of eRepublik seems to be playing it too...

Author's note: Worst intro ever, by the way. So sue me!



The year is 2010. eRepublik lies in ruins...


===========Forewords======== ===


The V2, which I refuse to call 'Rising' as it is nothing but a public alpha version, was pushed out unfinished, leading to a massive loss of players and resentment towards the administration. The long mismanagement of the game in all areas coupled with the disastrous implementation of the V2 drove the community over the edge and virtual rioting broke out, first in the in-game media system and then moving on to external sites.

The anger of the community can be witnessed in the hundreds of negative comments in this eRepublik Rising ad: http://eu.techcrunch.com/2010/07/21/erepublik_releases_rising_and_gives__new_meaning_to_power_to_the_people

A failure of epic proportions in customer relations, and an issue that will not disappear by itself, no matter how much the administration so would wish. On the contrary, it is likely to escalate and have even longer term impact on the image of the game. There will be no site in the world that allows free commentary where eRepublik can be advertised without the disgruntled and mistreated users pouring their hateful comments on it. Not really something I, as the owner of this game, would like to see.

The current mentality of the community is perhaps best defined by the King of Pop himself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HSNeHHuQA4



Nearly a year ago I wrote about the issues in community management in hopes that the administration might wake up to the situation. Unsurprisingly, they didn't. However, despite being labeled as a hopeless cynic, I am optimistic enough to repeat the same message I gave them last September. Perhaps, in this situation, the message finally reaches its destination.

Reader beware!

What follows from this point on is a long and boring piece of text (as if it hasn't been so far). It might interest those who want to learn about the history of the game and its management issues, but sane men with healthy libidos should be opening the tab containing porn right about now.

Before you tune out, though, I'd appreciate it if you showed support by voting the article. Thank you and have a good ***k!





=======Community management=====
==========User perspective=========


Having read Eric Reis' excellent article about community management in a browser game and the inherent problems of it, I felt I should write an open letter to the eRepublik management team concerning the matter from the view point of an user that has invested time in the game for over a year.

I cannot claim to speak for all the users. That would be incredibly arrogant. I only speak of changes I've seen happen in the time frame of one year, and how I have perceived these changes and their effects on the community.

Source material, Eric Reis' The Cardinal Sin of Community Management: http://www.startuplessonslearned.com/2009/09/cardinal-sin-of-community-management.html


Slightly over a year ago I joined the game after receiving an invitation from a friend with whom I played another browser game. I didn't have high expectations at first, as I heard the game is still in Beta phase. I was expecting glitches and bugs and indeed those were common at the time. Yet, despite all the flaws and unfinished modules, I found the game oddly enjoyable. As a fan of strategy games, the concept of an easy-to-play, user controlled, free strategy/economy/political simulation based on the real world intrigued me. Interacting in a massive world with other people from all around the Globe in a competitive, national environment... brilliant concept, isn't it?

As I got more involved in the game, taking part in the politics and joining the IRC community, I grew more attached to the game. It became a sort of extension to my own life. A separate world that I helped build and mold with other people.

One of the first things I remember from the Beta times, is that the admins of the game actually interacted with the users. They commented on articles and when someone asked a question on the Erepublik Insider or via PM, it got answered very quickly. There was near constant dialogue with the administration and the users. Of course, the community was much smaller back then, and it was easier for the admins to listen to the users. It helped build the trust between the users and the admins. There were, of course, complaints about bias, unfairness and unworking game system even back then, but I ignored those as natural user resentment towards authority.

After the introduction of the V1 version of the game, I noticed these complaints might not have been as wrong as I initially thought. V1 was introduced as a great improvement to the game, including such new features as resources and an actual working war module. Every one was eagerly anticipating its implementation. That excitement quickly turned into despair after the launch date came. It was by all definitions a massive disaster: nearly all functions were nonoperational. The economy was crushed by sudden need of resources, the resource map was different from the one shown to the users, people couldn't log in the game at all for days... nothing worked. Complaints flooded in and the trust between the users and the admins was broken. Users quit by the hundreds.

It was very much a defining moment in the game. It was shortly after that incident when the admins took a step away from the users, and the interaction level dropped drastically. Explanations were no longer given and eRepublik started to move towards more authoritarian system of dealing with the users.

After the discovery of a massive gold cheat in December, the media was flooded with complaints of admin incompetence and demands for reset. Very quickly after that incident new eRepublik laws were started to be enforced to limit the public accusations, thus alienating the admins from the users even more as it was seen by many users as an attempt to cover-up for a failure to solve the issue.


Erepublik Insider article concerning the case:
http://www.erepublik.com/en/article/...d-724012/1/all


Under the pressure of the users after the fake gold incident, the admins decided to do a favor to them (or to quiet the constant complaints) and removed the abused trivia module from the game. For those who weren't here at the time, there used to be a flash trivia (later !!) consisting of 5 questions each time you worked, trained or fought and each right answer gave a slight bonus. This was loudly rejected by the community since the questions were basically about astrophysics, the flash program very often froze and all the bonuses were lost, but most of all there were multiple decoders used by hundreds of users to always answer the questions right.


Erepublik Insider article about the removal of Trivia:
http://www.erepublik.com/en/article/...e-731330/1/all


Even the people using the decoder wanted to get rid of trivia, and the admins eventually yielded. Had they listened to the community months before that, they would have saved a lot of money and time, but unfortunately pride is hard to swallow. Regardless, the admins somewhat redeemed themselves in the eyes of the users but the truce didn't last long. There was a new problem in the horizon.

During the great war between ATLANTIS and PEACE, the old gold and item duplication bug resurfaced. The users that were present during the last gold bug, having gotten assurances from the admins that it would not happen again, went berserk. The rules were yet again tightened. The admins started to hand out bans and censor all complaints about the matter in order to get control of the situation. Again, hundreds of users left the game, disappointed not just because of the the admin inability to stop the cheating, but mainly because of the the increased censorship and arbitrary bans of respected members of the community that were asking for justice. Trust was broken yet again.



The reason why I listed these big events causing upheaval was NOT to discredit the admins, but to make the reader understand what were the reasons behind the tightened censorship rules, and how we ended up in the situation where we are now.

Where are we now, you ask? Having been there in the ancient times when admins still interacted with the users, I see the current situation as intolerable. There is no longer any honest dialogue between the users and the management team. Open letters to the admins are no longer answered, but the user is asked to use the proper channels, which just makes the users think that the admins don't care for them and/or are trying to cover up the issues at hand. Honest answer to the whole community would be more effective than answering each reoccurring case separately. It gives hope to the users. The users want affirmation that the admins acknowledge their existence.


What the users really want from the admins is that they listen and listen good. Actions must back this up.


Everything Eric Reis' mentions in his article are happening on eRepublik, and it can't be denied.The fact is, there's a symbiosis between the users and the company running the game. It's the users that offer a free way to market the game to new users, but the users can just as easily do the exact opposite. It all depends on the treatment they've received in the game, and it is the responsibility of the administration to treat them fairly and with proper respect. Only then will the users offer the same respect to the admins.

All I want is that the managers of the game,as well as the users, think about their values, what are their expectations from the game, and why did they take part in this in the first place. We are all to blame for the lack of trust and dialogue, but it doesn't have to continue like that forever.

Some claim that the users and the admins are natural enemies. I claim they can co-exist in a mutually beneficial relationship. All it needs is a change in perspective.





However, the community has no reason to back off now. The ball is in your side of the court, administration. What shall it be? Will you finally admit your mistakes and seek true reconciliation with the community and compensate for your crimes, earning back the trust one good deed at a time, or will you rather see the fight continue, eventually finding yourselves in a situation where you no longer have a job as the game does not bring any revenue to the company due to destroyed reputation?

Quoting the greatest musician ever having walked the Earth: "If you wanna make the world a better place, then look at yourself and make a change!"

Michael Jackson, Man in the Mirror: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wUrqFkR7QlI

-Erwin Schauman