A Frank Address And Statement on Recent Events and Revelations

[Ickus 40]

2 hours ago, Lorilay said:

On every other server, charging back donations is grounds for a permanent ban across all accounts. Grow some balls and ban him and his drama.

What lorilay said. 

[Xerxes 0]

10 minutes ago, Ellipsea said:

Here's the thing, that money wasn't donated to Alex for his OPINION of the servers, it was donated FOR the servers.  I'm sure it was not implicit in the donation that the funding would be removed if Alex changed his mind about Elysium.  He took it upon himself to act as judge and jury.  In the end, Elysium was able to recoup funding from us directly.

If people wanted to donate directly to the server, they were free to do so. If people want to take back their donations to Alex's stream and then put that money right into the server, they are still free to do so as he has offered a service for refunds after this. Alex has no other way to donate to him during streaming other than through the system where he chooses to give a ~75% cut to Elysium. There is not two separate, Alex-money, and Elysium-money channels for donations. The money people put in is FOR HIM, and then he CHOOSES to give it to Elysium.

Imagine a separate scenario. Imagine that I gave $20 to my friend to buy something nice for his girlfriend, because he's short on cash. Imagine then that that friend buys a present, but on his way to deliver it, he gets a text from his girlfriend saying "I'm breaking up with you." He's mad as shit so on his own initiative he takes the present back to the store and gets a cash refund, and offers the money back to me. I could still take that money back from him and buy her a present on my own if I had a good relationship with his girlfriend separate to his, but expecting him after being fucked with to then give her the present is naive. That's the exact situation that Alex was in.

[Ellipsea 36]

Just now, Xerxes said:

If people wanted to donate directly to the server, they were free to do so. If people want to take back their donations to Alex's stream and then put that money right into the server, they are still free to do so as he has offered a service for refunds after this. Alex has no other way to donate to him during streaming other than through the system where he chooses to give a ~75% cut to Elysium. There is not two separate, Alex-money, and Elysium-money channels for donations. The money people put in is FOR HIM, and then he CHOOSES to give it to Elysium.

Imagine a separate scenario. Imagine that I gave $20 to my friend to buy something nice for his girlfriend, because he's short on cash. Imagine then that that friend buys a present, but on his way to deliver it, he gets a text from his girlfriend saying "I'm breaking up with you." He's mad as shit so on his own initiative he takes the present back to the store and gets a cash refund, and offers the money back to me. I could still take that money back from him and buy her a present on my own if I had a good relationship with his girlfriend separate to his, but expecting him after being fucked with to then give her the present is naive. That's the exact situation that Alex was in.

Your analogy is not correct.

 

Imagine I collect a lot of money from many people for what appears to be a good cause.  Everyone is in agreeance it's a good cause.  Then I decide unilaterally that the cause is not good and withdraw all funding on your behalf because of it, regardless of what anyone's opinion is but my own.  That's the analogy.  Also, there clearly was no difficulty for Elysium generating these funds seperately.  They stopped seeking funding because all the monies collected were sufficient.  One person decided to remove a large chunk of that funding for their own reasons, which made it necessary to open funding again.  it didn't matter where the funds came from, it only mattered that they were sufficient.

[Xerxes 0]

Just now, Ellipsea said:

Your analogy is not correct.

 

Imagine I collect a lot of money from many people for what appears to be a good cause.  Everyone is in agreeance it's a good cause.

This was before the full story was known. The money was given under a false pretense.

 

Quote

Then I decide unilaterally that the cause is not good and withdraw all funding on your behalf because of it, regardless of what anyone's opinion is but my own.

The funding that, once again, was donated to him and entrusted to his judgement by people who like him and agree with him, and not to the server itself.

 

Quote

Also, there clearly was no difficulty for Elysium generating these funds seperately.  They stopped seeking funding because all the monies collected were sufficient.  One person decided to remove a large chunk of that funding for their own reasons, which made it necessary to open funding again.  it didn't matter where the funds came from, it only mattered that they were sufficient.

Then why whine incessantly about it and call for the guy's virtual beheading if it wasn't a big deal? You have conflicting ideas. Idea A is that the server would be fine without the donations (which only totalled to $1000, a pitiful amount honestly relative to even the smallest indiegogo or kickstarter campaign). Idea B is that this cash is somehow the linchpin of everything and Alex should be hanged for doing what he had the full right to do. Need I remind you once again that people are free to take the money and put it back into the server if they so choose (at a higher rate, 75% -> 100%), or will you continue to dodge that point as if it's irrelevant?

[Ellipsea 36]

Where am I whining?  The monies weren't donated for strictly his use, he said he was giving a cut to Elysium.  He used their name.  The monies were given under that pretense not under the pretense he could change his mind on everyone's behalf.  Where did I call for his head?

 

How are they conflicting ideas?  It doesnt matter where the money comes from.   In this case one person offered up an amount that he later withdrew.

Edited February 17, 2017 by Ellipsea

[DruBoi 0]

13 minutes ago, Ellipsea said:

Your analogy is not correct.

 

Imagine I collect a lot of money from many people for what appears to be a good cause.  Everyone is in agreeance it's a good cause.  Then I decide unilaterally that the cause is not good and withdraw all funding on your behalf because of it, regardless of what anyone's opinion is but my own.  That's the analogy.  Also, there clearly was no difficulty for Elysium generating these funds seperately.  They stopped seeking funding because all the monies collected were sufficient.  One person decided to remove a large chunk of that funding for their own reasons, which made it necessary to open funding again.  it didn't matter where the funds came from, it only mattered that they were sufficient.

This is so true.

Also...

I think that there is not real "bad guy" in all this situation and I want to express the following points.

1. @Alexensual if people give you money for something you should honor that.

2. @Shenna/Elysium managers you need to be more open about new team incorporation 

3. Community you need to calm down

Edited February 17, 2017 by DruBoi
Adding the community part

[Ickus 40]

Crazy how quiet Alex has been. Dudes soft as hell and can't take the heat to even post. What a douche move. Gg bro 

[DruBoi 0]

1 minute ago, Ickus said:

Crazy how quiet Alex has been. Dudes soft as hell and can't take the heat to even post. What a douche move. Gg bro 

I think that @Xerxes is actually Alex with a "under cover" account but I could be wrong.

And there is a lot of people going nuts for all this nonsense/drama/"problem"  

[Xerxes 0]

Just now, DruBoi said:

I think that @Xerxes is actually Alex with a "under cover" account but I could be wrong.

And there is a lot of people going nuts for all this nonsense/drama/"problem"  

Hilarious accusation. No, quite frankly, I type much more coherently than he does. You can have a picture of my realmlist and characters if you'd like. I play Xenik on both Darrowshire and Zeth'kur, and Xenivus and Pressbuttons on Zeth'kur. I have no other characters that I actively play other than alts logged out in inns for rested xp.

I don't really have anything else to say on the matter of the donations, I feel like I've made my point. I think Alex was perfectly in the right with what he did, and the OP does indeed lie about his involvement and delves into pointless name-and-shaming over someone who didn't even do any digging or "dox"ing and was concerned for the server that he enjoys. (If Alex dox'd a single person, post proof of the dox and his involvement. I have not seen any and I will continue to assume that it is a complete fabrication.) As somewhat of a fan of Alex (only seen one of his streams and his class guides really), I watched the video that this started over, and I thought that this entire thread was an idiotic, shameless knee-jerk scapegoating effort to distract from the real issue at hand, which is the shady characters that the video brings up. Notice that very few people are talking about that at all. 80% of the comments in this thread are baseless bashing on Alex with no actual substance. I had more to say to Ellipsea but I find her arguments completely irrational and not taking into account the situation Alex was put into and the options that he actually had at his disposal, both technically and morally. Given the circumstances, he made the correct choice, and if he went ahead with the donation as planned he would be going against his conscience considering the information that he had available to him at the time.

[Wirt 8]

You could've easily refrained from even mentioning Alexensual. Yet you adress him in 5 sections, labeling him as a thief and an obstruction for the project. This means you've become your own nightmare. You're now officially witchhunters.

8 hours ago, Shenna said:

We are not stupid. We know that several of these individuals have pasts in which they have done things that are disagreeable to the community. However, NONE of us are spotless, not even you who are reading this. Regardless, we do not grant any ability or information access to anyone whom we do not trust to use it responsibly.

You tried to sneak them in without us taking notice. It backfired and it understandably shrinks your credibility. I've asked for you to be transparent regarding both staff and donations. Right now it's as if you're wearing a niqab.

However, I think you abandoned your standpoint on witchhunting in order to draw attention away from the shady business with Zzuk and Radeghost. There are possibly more aswell. These 2 were just the ones that got caught.

[Ellipsea 36]

1 hour ago, Xerxes said:

I had more to say to Ellipsea but I find her arguments completely irrational and not taking into account the situation Alex was put into and the options that he actually had at his disposal, both technically and morally. Given the circumstances, he made the correct choice, and if he went ahead with the donation as planned he would be going against his conscience considering the information that he had available to him at the time.

Let me break this down for you in a legal sense, so you can understand:

"The promise by the donor to contribute funds constitutes the offer. The promise should be unconditional or if payment is conditioned upon the occurrence of a specific event, that event should be stated clearly."

from here.  Further, no one asked for, nor did alex ever offer, the protection of his judgement on the matter.   If one collect monies towards an end, in good faith, one expects it to happen.  Had this been larger amounts of money, EVEN IF Alex offered the money back, he would be in court.

[Xerxes 0]

1 minute ago, Ellipsea said:

Let me break this down for you in a legal sense, so you can understand:

"The promise by the donor to contribute funds constitutes the offer. The promise should be unconditional or if payment is conditioned upon the occurrence of a specific event, that event should be stated clearly."

from here.  Further, no one asked for, nor did alex ever offer, the protection of his judgement on the matter.   If one collect monies towards an end, in good faith, one expects it to happen.  Had this been larger amounts of money, EVEN IF Alex offered the money back, he would be in court.

"He would be in court" ahahahahahah. That would require Elysium being considered a charity, first of all, and second of all the legal argument here is entirely pointless because we're already playing on an illegal version of a 14 year old video game. I'm making an argument from a moral standpoint. Do you actually want me to sit here and go through every single possible thing that Alex could have done in this situation?

A) The nuclear option. He could fully chargeback, and then refund, every single dollar he got from that stream. This would be easy to do from a technical standpoint but it would rob him of his own earned money which he uses to pay the bills. No money goes to Elysium, Alex also loses his cut to pay his own bills, the viewers are fully reimbursed to spend their money however they wish. The viewers are happy, Elysium and Alex are not, and Alex had to hurt himself due to Elysium's mistakes.

B) Middle ground. Alex does the chargeback, and instead of losing his own personal income from the stream, he allows the viewers by their discretion to decide where the money goes: to him, or to Elysium. This is where we are now.

C) Accounting nightmare. Alex does the chargeback, and then sits down with a calculator and refunds every single person who donated to the stream 75% of their donation. The only way that he could guarantee keeping 100% of the money that he rightfully made, but not practical in the slightest. Think of all the $1-$5 donations streamers get, and think of the shit interface paypal has. This would be days of work to actually do for him, once again because of Elysium's mistakes.

D) He goes through with the donation. Alex started the stream under the pretense that Elysium was working in the best interest in the community. After placing the donation on paypal, he then realizes that Elysium is hiring complete scum of the vanilla wow community and that's where the donations are going. He has to suck it up in this scenario, and let the money go through anyways, which may not even be what all of his viewers wanted. Here Alex is ALSO serving as an arbitrator anyways, just like he would be if he did the chargeback, just in the opposite direction. Who's to say most of his viewers didn't want the refund? Did you ask them?

Now, explain to me why you think D is the correct choice here, from a moral standpoint, or if you don't, explain what other option would've been a better choice.

[Ellipsea 36]

Read the law.  Or, conversely use common sense.  I could set up endless charities in which I collect money towards a communal goal.  Then decide, nah...I'm not going to actually donate the monies promised, just contact me and I'll send the money back.  : )  Surefire goldmine.

[Stondus 1]

10 minutes ago, Xerxes said:

<Shitloads of Snip>

from a moral standpoint

<Tonns-of-snip>

what other option would've been a better choice.

From a moral standpoint?

A) NOT TO PROMISE ANYTHING ON STREAM.

B) Shove it up, and let the donations be where they were intended.

 

Yes, it *has* at least 50 shades of grey, but still, on moral perspective:

No matter how much you are lied at, no matter *what* the "facts" were, you make a promise, you FCKING keep it. Yes, you bitch about it, you ragequit, you start flamewars, but you GODDAMNIT keep the promise, no matter what. Why? because you ARE a "public person", AND made that promise FOR your public.

 

*edit* typo.

Edited February 17, 2017 by Stondus

[Bolk 0]

I don't think anyone realizes that, Elysium, isn't denying anything. The conversations took place on that chat channel. The admin team requested help from individuals that are known as shady persons on the private server circuit. There is no denial of anything, yet there is an admission of these events in the main statement. They even further say that they have committed not so spectacular acts themselves. It may not specify what misdeeds they have done in their past, but there are many things coming to fruition. Not to mention they claim others reading the post have been guilty of things as well (whatever that means). We should be careful with our monetary donations on either side, as there is definitely something more going on in this picture than we are being led to believe.    

[noob257 36]

1 hour ago, DruBoi said:

And there is a lot of people going nuts for all this nonsense/drama/"problem"  

Drama? Yes.

Problem? Maybe.

Nonsense? FUCK NO!

 

It's not just another white hat hacker who fucked around with the server and got on the team.

There was / is a person involved, that actively harmed the server only 1 or 2 months ago and (as far as I am informed) it's not clearly evident that this person ever intented to stop his or her business.

 

BUT Alex shouldn't have acted like he did.

The correct behaviour would have been:

1. Contact the team and ask for a statement on this topic (he even had a interview with one of the Elysium devs before ffs).

2. Make a short video to inform the players about the issue BUT tell them to NOT freak out and to be patient.

3. Provide further informations, when you get them.

 

What he did was just ranting about the informations he probably got while lurking on 4chan.

[Xerxes 0]

16 minutes ago, Ellipsea said:

Read the law.  Or, conversely use common sense.  I could set up endless charities in which I collect money towards a communal goal.  Then decide, nah...I'm not going to actually donate the monies promised, just contact me and I'll send the money back.  : )  Surefire goldmine.

Your answer shows your weakness. I have confronted you with a situation in which I have clearly laid out every single scenario that could reasonably take place, and instead of answering a simple multiple-choice question on which one is the right one and why, you instead weasel out of the conversation with a scenario which did not happen. You clearly do not want to have a logical discussion about this problem and instead want to attack Alex as a person for motives which you assume with no proof, after he's done multiple donation streams in the past with no issue before this fiasco with gold sellers and bot developers arised. I don't have anything further to say to you, and I hope that you'll see now why I refused to continue this conversation before you brought me back to it.

 

13 minutes ago, Stondus said:

From a moral standpoint?

A) NOT TO PROMISE ANYTHING ON STREAM.

B) Shove it up, and let the donations be where they were intended.

 

Yes, it *has* at least 50 shades of grey, but still, on moral perspective:

No matter how much you are lied at, no matter *what* the "facts" were, you make a promise, you FCKING keep it. Yes, you bitch about it, you ragequit, you start flamewars, but you GODDAMNIT keep the promise, no matter what. Why? because you ARE a "public person", AND made that promise FOR your public.

 

*edit* typo.

This is more of an argument and I can respect this standpoint but I think that it's naive. Suppose for example that we found out that one of the members of Elysium staff was actually doing something a lot more sinister than just manipulating a video game. What if we found out that a member of the staff was a bank robber? Or was currently on bail for a rape charge? Would you still make him enforce that promise? There's danger to this level of black and white thinking. And, once again, there would not be a problem here if Elysium did not do what they did to begin with, the promise of the donation would've gone through.

[BrookCee 0]

4 hours ago, Xylon666Darkstar said:

I'm sorry you and your staff had to suffer through such drama bullshit and its effects on your staff and server capabilities. It was all unwarranted.

Unwarranted? Did you even read the post? Openly naming and shaming a guy who has / was helping the servers, because he decided to discontinue the help due to some downright shady business happening, is actually pathetic considering the more important issue here is so CLEAR, which a LOT of people are missing.

 

12 minutes ago, Bolk said:

I don't think anyone realizes that, Elysium, isn't denying anything. The conversations took place on that chat channel. The admin team requested help from individuals that are known as shady persons on the private server circuit. There is no denial of anything, yet there is an admission of these events in the main statement. They even further say that they have committed not so spectacular acts themselves. It may not specify what misdeeds they have done in their past, but there are many things coming to fruition. Not to mention they claim others reading the post have been guilty of things as well (whatever that means). We should be careful with our monetary donations on either side, as there is definitely something more going on in this picture than we are being led to believe.    

I haven't made a donation since playing this project, but I am thankful to those that do keep the servers active and running, including the team. But if I were going to make a donation in the future, I would definitely not after reading the original statement made by the OP. 

It seems that there needs to be some big changes within the team in terms of who they take on-board, and the manner in which they release these statements. Aimlessly branding the readers as not "spotless", is definitely not the right way to go about resolving these issues. The team needs to take a good look at themselves and who they surround their work with, if they are to maintain, or even restore a reputable relationship with the community. Let's be honest, Alex isn't liked very much by a large portion of the community, and personally he's not my cup of tea, but the bigger issue at hand right now is the shady stuff behind closed doors, which all of this would, and could of been negated, had the team involved themselves with reputable staff.

I wish all the best to the team moving on from this and hope that the environment and pressure they are under can improve for everyone's sake, but right now the fingers are pointing in the wrong directions.

[Ellipsea 36]

Xerxes, you're making a lot of noise for whatever reason.  There's the law and there's the actual moral high ground, neither of which you are defending.  I don't need to argue with whatever points you are making, because as shown, you have no standing.

Edited February 17, 2017 by Ellipsea

[Cipherr 1]

10 hours ago, Shenna said:

Starting now we intend to ignore any and all personal attacks on the project and its staff, and to  continue our work of creating the best vanilla World of Warcraft experience possible.

Good. This is a very important lesson to learn IMO. Hate or love it, the PServer reddit driven community for WoW private servers absolutely loves some drama. And given a drought of said drama, they absolutely will manufacture it. Throw in a few large egos and you have a recipe for nonsense.

Ignore that crap and keep making the server better. Interacting with these retards is really only fueling them. So ignoring them going forward is the best path. And for the love of GOD don't make any of them Martyrs by banning them surrounding this stuff. They would just LOVE that. No more gasoline for this dumpster fire, let these losers pack up and move on.

Edited February 17, 2017 by Cipherr

[Crowley 8]

Shenna killed any credibility this server had in this post. Nice try diverting the attention and the blame on to Alexensual instead of admitting you shot the project in the foot by associating with rotten people.

You showed total lack of any class by dragging a players name into the reason for this mess. Very low. It just shows us you're just as much of a snake as the crooks you brought into this project.

 

 

[Ellipsea 36]

2 minutes ago, Cipherr said:

Good. This is a very important lesson to learn IMO. Hate or love it, the PServer reddit driven community for WoW private servers absolutely loves some drama. And given a drought of said drama, they absolutely will manufacture it. Throw in a few large egos and you have a recipe for nonsense.

Ignore that crap and keep making the server better. Interacting with these retards is really only fueling them. So ignoring them going forward is the best path.

I tended to think this is correct.  I really disliked having to go on reddit to get necessary info.  I never understood why anyone posts in that cesspool.   But now, I'm kinda feeling like Pandora's box has been opened.  I also agree with earlier assessments that alex shouldn't have even been mentioned in this post.  I understand the feeling from staff how they've been wronged from someone they invested in.  Can't say I didn't see this coming.

 

At the end of the day, people that never use any of the social media are probably just playing the game and having fun.

[Schlomo 0]

10 hours ago, genovaheroo said:

be more agressive towards chinese wtintrading/acc selling mafia and ban them instead of muting the people that report them, because it seems like the GMs dont really care and the playerbase loses their trust in the admins in that way. thank you.

Ever bothered reporting those people to the GMs?

[drust66 0]

You guys realise noone is forcing them to share their list of team members and they can choose whoever they want to work with? Maybe stop judging on people before they can actually contribute to the work despite whatever past they have.

I just cannot understand all these freaking people crying on reddit, discord, youtube, elysium forum, twitter and all other places instead of actually playing the game. Sure, you have the right to critic things when it comes to scripting, website or release times, but in my opinion you have zero word on who they hire.

All of you scared of server dying/shutting down? Well there is a fucking thing called trust in the private server community you gotta learn even if you are new. There are and always will be some shady stuff you gotta be able to overlook - anyone who played before on servers like Feenix, Vanillagaming, Kronos etc. knows that.

So my advice: play the freaking game, chill  on drama, judge on long term work/script : if there are major exploits or cheats going on you will notice it anyway, no need to go witchunting and sherlock mode 24/7, it is just obstructing them.

Just my 2 cents.

[Lopherus 4]

I'm no fan of Alexensual...but this post made me watch the video which prompted this reply, and I think the post's personal attacks against the youtuber go way too far. He mostly just presents reddit posts, etc., others have made, and which include details that made me scratch my head as well - such as, that a known gold-seller on Elysium (per January 8 of this year!) is, or was, now a member of the team. That's just not ok, and I don't understand. It's one thing to bring hackers on board to help you patch security holes, or a good botter to work with them to prevent botting (very often an excellent idea)...but someone who so recently took advantage of this very server? This blows my mind.

Alexensual should not have refunded; this was immature and not ok given that he had received said funds for a specific purpose. He also should not have refused to talk, if that really happened. But the team here should not get personal with him either, and strive to be more professional. When a new team-member's integrity is questioned (such as  WhiteKidney's in a prior forum post), then the reply shouldn't end with a snarky "P.S.: He's cool." That's arrogant, and doesn't make users feel taken seriously. 

Edited February 17, 2017 by Lopherus