Mr. Smart is the Best Forum Poster [INTERNET HISTORY ITT]

[Ard]

Was that a stealth edit or does the forum automatically prevent DS from being mentioned?

It's clearly to stop plagiarism.  We wouldn't want him suing the site out of existence for improper use of his name, would we?

[Bzalthek]

To name him is to summon him, to summon him is to doom us all.

The howls of a thousand hells rides on his heels, and his sycophantic minions of syphilitic decay scurry with him.

[LK]

 

[Soulflame]

I wasn't aware He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named had minions.  Maybe they are instead correctly referred to as sock puppets?

[Samprimary]

plagiarism's okay now

brb off to make Planet of Combatcraft

[Lantyssa]

You should make Algenon: The Plagiarning instead.

[tmp]

Holy crap, that is literal plagiarism.

No, no he changed the tense there, see. It's not literal.

[Velorath]

Last week I received an e-mail from Alganon, announcing their launch.

I thought I'd share this:

"Traditionally, massively multiplier online games have been about three basic gameplay pillars - combat, exploration and character progression," Serek Dmart continued. "In Alganon, in addition to these we've added the fourth pillar to the equation; a story

Good stuff, eh?

I wonder how long it will be until he accuses SWTOR of stealing his ideas.

At first I thought maybe that e-mail might have been some sort of joke or something, but it's right there on the fucking website also.

[Falconeer]

SWTOR faq:

Traditionally MMOs are built on three pillars; Exploration, Combat, and Progression. We at BioWare and LucasArts believe there is a fourth pillar: Story.

Alganon official press release, on their website, April 28th, 2010:

"Traditionally, massively multiplier online games have been about three basic gameplay pillars - combat, exploration and character progression," Serek Dmart continued. "In Alganon, in addition to these we've added the fourth pillar to the equation; a story."

I had to double check it myself. I still find it hard to believe he is that amount of idiocy. Unless he coined that phrase, wore it so proudly to say it out loud at every given time, told it to a friend working for Bioware, who ended up using it for the SWTOR faq wthout realizing the legal trouble he was getting himself into!

[Grumblesmurph]

SWTOR faq:

Traditionally MMOs are built on three pillars; Exploration, Combat, and Progression. We at BioWare and LucasArts believe there is a fourth pillar: Story.

Alganon official press release, on their website, April 28th, 2010:

"Traditionally, massively multiplier online games have been about three basic gameplay pillars - combat, exploration and character progression," Serek Dmart continued. "In Alganon, in addition to these we've added the fourth pillar to the equation; a story."

It's actually from a Bioware press release:

""Traditionally, massively multiplayer online games have been about three basic gameplay pillars - combat, exploration and character progression," said Dr. Ray Muzyka, Co-Founder and General Manager/CEO of BioWare and General Manager/Vice President of Electronic Arts Inc., "In Star Wars: The Old Republic, we’re fusing BioWare’s heritage of critically-acclaimed storytelling with the amazing pedigree of Lucasfilm and LucasArts, and adding a brand-new fourth pillar to the equation – story."

http://www.swtor.com/news/article/press-release-001

[Stormwaltz]

I had to double check it myself. I still find it hard to believe he is that amount of idiocy. Unless he coined that phrase, wore it so proudly to say it out loud at every given time, told it to a friend working for Bioware, who ended up using it for the SWTOR faq wthout realizing the legal trouble he was getting himself into!

To be clear, since I started working at Bio in 2004, the company has internally talked about those four pillars. They applied to single-player RPGs before they were applied to SWTOR.

[Falconeer]

I had to double check it myself. I still find it hard to believe he is that amount of idiocy. Unless he coined that phrase, wore it so proudly to say it out loud at every given time, told it to a friend working for Bioware, who ended up using it for the SWTOR faq wthout realizing the legal trouble he was getting himself into!

To be clear, since I started working at Bio in 2004, the company has internally talked about those four pillars. They applied to single-player RPGs before they were applied to SWTOR.

Then it CLEARLY means someone at Bioware met Serek Dmart before 2004 

[Samprimary]

I had to double check it myself. I still find it hard to believe he is that amount of idiocy.

i am become idiocy, destroyer of worlds, voldesmart voldesmart

[UnSub]

There's clearly an easy fix for this:

SWTOR faq:

Traditionally MMOs are built on three pillars; Exploration, Combat, and Progression. We at BioWare and LucasArts AND MR D. SMART believe there is a fourth pillar: Story.

[schild]

Traditionally MMOS are built on three pillars; Exploration, Combat, and Progression. We at Bioware AUSTIN believe there is a fourth pillar: Slave Labor.

[Raegar]

Pardon my recent registration, but this is just way too good to not come here for.

I had to go and read the whole gamasutra battle for its awesome entertaining/time wasted ratio, + now this.

Lets just say, F13 has a new visitor for life because of Smart's smarts! 

[Tearofsoul]

[Stabs]

Ah, it's someone else's fault!

"Serek Dmart continued" was clearly not supposed to be taken literally.

[Musashi]

Pfft.

[Goreschach]

How very Smart of him.

[Raegar]

like with wine, gets better and better huh?

Having read all that garbage just recently and still for the most part, fresh on my mind, the fact that company finances and assets were mishandled (by who it doesn't really matter) is clearly undeniable. So sweeping Dave and friends under the rug and forgetting [for whatever it is they're at fault] may not be such a great idea, but this guy is just beyond me. It's almost as if he saw the shitstorm and said "hey guys, I wanna join in on this...and I wanna be in the center."

edit: clarification

[Falconeer]

Alganon official press release, on their website, April 28th, 2010:

"Traditionally, massively multiplier online games [...]"

Didn't notice this before. Lovely. And the press release is still up, hilarious misspell included.

[Samprimary]

they should just permanently keep the G out of it, officially make this al-anon

[raydeen]

I want to know what church he attends. As crazy as he is, I'm betting they handle snakes in the evening service.

[Stabs]

Serek Dmart said on 4:00PM 5-09-2010

I don't know wtf you're going on about or what motivates your ire (at least I have an excuse), but wtf does the announcement (in the news you linked to on MMORPG) about the game being released have to do with this discussion?

Of course I knew about the release. But how the hell am I supposed to know if parts of it were either plagiarised, referenced without credit to the source, based on homage or whatever if I didn't compose it? Do we have to now go out and fact check press releases? Seriously?

More importantly, what has this got to do with Google Alerts? You do know how that actually *works*, right? Right? My guess is that you don't. And even if you did, you're trying to claim ignorance in order to continue your net rage ire.

The first I even heard of this issue was when Warcry sent me an RFC which I was greeted to this morning when I opened my email. Then I got one from Massively and others. Most of us with families and jobs, actually have *lives* beyond the Net. So its not like we're no-life-having cretins looking to stir up trouble at every opportunity. So excuse me if I wasn't trolling the net on Saturday when this was first posted.

I am waiting to get an official answer back from the PR firm, but from where I'm sitting, this is a non issue and I'm not throwing anyone under the bus.

Anyone with more than two functioning brain cells can read easily see that the opening commentary is nothing more than a reference.

Even running the original link* through www.copyscape.com doesn't yield anything other than similar phrases being used in both releases.

The reference to "pillars" is a commonly used phrase in various structure driven arenas (e.g. the government). And the bit that preceded my commentary is a single line that the firm chose to use in order to make their point and precede my commentary.

"Traditionally, massively multiplier** online games have been about three basic gameplay pillars – combat, exploration and character progression,”"

Nothing beyond that is remotely the same. Since John Smedley made similar remarks in a talk he gave, go find out who first uttered those words, source it, then go back and accuse anyone else who uses it of plagiarism.

And if you really want to have fun with semantics, go ahead and run "Traditionally, massively multiplayer online games" through Google. Have fun with that.

This is just stupid and why it even made the news is beyond me. But it just goes to show that sites - trying to scrap a few dimes together - will do anything for hits. And since we're the latest flavor of the day, here we are.

You clearly have an axe to grind and have no common sense whatsoever; so arguing with you is going to just be a lesson in futility. So go ahead, have fun. I'm sure you need to validate your otherwise inconsequential [anon] existence.

* http://www.swtor.com/news/article/press-release-001

** sp due to spellchecker

comment #63 in the Massively thread.

He's outed me. I'll do anything for hits on someone else's site. Apparently Schild owes me a few dimes.

Edit: I think the first person to notice this publicly was a guy called Blazinglynx at mmorpg.com. I posted here after noticing it before I saw that thread when I read the e-mail, Kill Ten Rats picked it up from our discussion, Massively picked it up from Kill Ten Rats.

http://www.mmorpg.com/discussion2.cfm/thread/277158/page/1
later in that thread is a true wonder of Smartist rhetoric:

Yeah it is 6:40 MST and there is 61 players in total playing from all the servers. So not a lot of people to play with or talk to.  But then Smrt said he is happy with  no more then 100 players because of the network code. Funny way he deleted that in his post on the forums.

Marvellous! A comment so dumb that even Serek Dmart retracted it!

[UnSub]

Best part of that: the president or whatever of a MMO developer who himself has been a long-time computer game developer pulling the, "Christ, don't you online losers have lives? Get out of your parents' basement!" routine.

He should take this show on the road.

[Stabs]

So, summing up Derek's rebuttal:

It is NOT plagiarism.
And if it is plagiarism, Serek Dmart didn't write it.
And if he did write it, GET A LIFE.

[Vaiti]

A rebuttal that pretty much covers all bases. I like it. We still have much to learn from this man.

[Stabs]

Thank you, I adapted it from a defence a lawyer friend told me is commonly heard in criminal cases:

I wasn't there.
And if I was there, I didn't do it.
And if I did do it, I didn't mean it.

[tgr]

And if you did mean it, your father/mother/aliens abused you as a child and so they're to blame?

[Dtrain]

Traditionally, massively multiplier online games have been about three basic gameplay pillars - plagiarism, plagiarism, and plagiarism. In Alganon, in addition to these we've added the fourth pillar to the equation; plagiarism.

[Sky]

And if you really want to have fun with semantics, go ahead and run "Traditionally, massively multiplayer online games" through Google. Have fun with that.

Or you could try the more statistically improbable phrase "three basic gameplay pillars" which, despite many hits on the Dmartisms, still front pages the SWTOR press release.

[March]

Serek Dmart said on 4:00PM 5-09-2010

Do we have to now go out and fact check press releases? Seriously?

Random forum posts, maybe not... but Press Releases - yes.  Seriously.

Serek Dmart said on 4:00PM 5-09-2010
I am waiting to get an official answer back from the PR firm, but from where I'm sitting, this is a non issue and I'm not throwing anyone under the bus.

Kinda the definition of throwing someone under the bus... or at least positioning someone to stand in the street at the bus-stop while holding the schedule in your hand.

[Mrbloodworth]

I have heard some grumblings about the back story and wows back story being quite.. the same. 

[Dtrain]

I have heard some grumblings about the back story and wows back story being quite.. the same. 

I don't think you understand the 4th pillar.