There is a line that that Tina Turner delivers in one of her movies where she says “Today, cock of the walk, tomorrow a feather duster” – truer words were never spoken.   Perhaps its the way Jessica Price said “next rando asshat who attempts to explain the concept of branching dialogue to me–as if, you know, having worked in game narrative for a fucking DECADE, I have never heard of it–is getting instablocked” that I found upsetting.  Mind you by itself it wouldn’t have mattered.  I found it upsetting because it was in response to “Derioir” who is part of the partner program ArenaNet runs, who was attempting to have a conversation about the game.

But people have a bad day. But this doesn’t seem to have been a matter of a bad day, or the proverbial last straw so much as a trend, when I see someone who said of the death of TotalBiscuit  (John Bane) “The kindest thing I can say is ‘I’m glad he’s no longer around to keep doing harm.'”   For those who don’t know (and I can’t imagine there are many) Total Biscuit was a much respect game critic and content creator.

Perhaps one of the best comments I saw on the matter was by Evan McGann on twitter replay to Jessica Price “I sincerely hope for your future that you realize your actions and words on social media will have an impact on your employment and the rep of the company you work for. Most employee agreements will strictly state that there’s an expectation of professionalism in the public arena.”

You can grouse all you want to a friend or co-worker once you hang up the phone or turn off the computer; but you can’t espouse a toxic attitude to the public, when they are your client and in the end your livelihood.   Perhaps Tina Turner said it best…

“Today Cock of the Walk – Tomorrow a feather duster.”