From 880cfbeb74546056feab63ed6e92a10c0dbaf2c3 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Ashelyn Rose Date: Mon, 8 May 2023 02:17:40 -0600 Subject: New layout, uses nextjs --- posts/07_29_2022-on-communities-and-trust.html | 107 ------------------------- 1 file changed, 107 deletions(-) delete mode 100644 posts/07_29_2022-on-communities-and-trust.html (limited to 'posts/07_29_2022-on-communities-and-trust.html') diff --git a/posts/07_29_2022-on-communities-and-trust.html b/posts/07_29_2022-on-communities-and-trust.html deleted file mode 100644 index 4aef9ae..0000000 --- a/posts/07_29_2022-on-communities-and-trust.html +++ /dev/null @@ -1,107 +0,0 @@ - - - - On Communities and Trust - - - - - -

- On Communities and Trust - Some thoughts on the VRChat security update -

- -

- So we've had the VRChat Security Update for a few days now, and while I'm - not the most prolific VR community member, I have heard a fair bit of - discourse about the update. This update has been a polarizing one to say - the least, with users excited for the new features that were and will soon - be added, others decrying the performance issues they have now from Easy - Anti-Cheat, and still others still unable to play due to missing - accessibility features they previously would have gotten via mods. -

- -

- Overall, my personal concerns about update itself have been resolved: - although I used to run into issues with EAC crashing when hardware - virtualization was enabled, that seem to no longer be the case, and I - personally haven't even seen a performance hit. I was not - using any mod features, and the changes in the most recent beta - certainly a welcome addition to my experience. -

- -

- However, I do still have some broader community concerns about how the - update was announced and rolled out, as well as how the VRChat team seems - to be handling this whole scenario as if they're only playing public - opinion damage control. -

- -

- Regardless of their official policy or any amount of discouragement - towards mods for VRChat, the fact of the matter is that a large portion - of their community relied on mods to add accessibility, performance, or - comfort features to the game. While I have to acknowledge that the VRC - team has added some of these features back into the game since blocking - mods, the fact that they needed to reprioritize these features (as they - have been pretty clear about in their updates) shows us that they had - no interest in adding these features until they faced public backlash. -

- -

- You might think that a reasonable development team (if they wanted to - reduce the use of mods for their game) might look at the sizable portion - of their community using mods for this sort of enhancement, - and come to the conclusion "clearly there is need for these features, - let's reduce the need for mods by implementing those features". But instead the - VRChat team decided to actively make their game worse for those people instead. - Disabling comments on Steam further indicates that they knew this would - be disliked by the community ahead of time, but chose to do it anyways. -

- -

- Listen, VRChat team - what sort of conclusions am I supposed to draw about - your priorities here?!? Improving the game experience for your most - vulnerable players doesn't make the roadmap, but pushing an ineffective - solution to a problem against the angry backlash of your community - makes the cut? -

- -

- So yeah . . . I guess in one sense, the game is fine. It's getting new features, more are - on the horizon, the community feels like they've been listened to. -

- -

- But in another sense, the security update has made it incredibly clear - that the VRChat team either does not care, or did not think to consider - how their priorities would affect large portions of their community. -

- -

- Social games grow and shrink with their communities. Regardless of technical - decisions, updates, or anything else, if large portions of the community - leave or can no longer join, then VRChat will no longer be the same game - (and it will be worse for it). With the latest changes and how they've - handled the community response, I just can't convince myself that the team remembers - this. -

- -

- In that regard, I feel that even more than the actual removal of features - they have violated our trust - and unless this newfound responsiveness to - the needs of their players sticks around longer than it takes to clean up - their PR mess, I personally am hesitant to forgive them. -

- - - - -- cgit 1.4.1