1. Most times when such teasers don't get posted by GOG to the forums other goggers do so for them. As such why should GOG do it as well if other goggers have it covered?

2. Lesser citizens? You act like we're making those who don't use FB/twitter live in a GOG ghetto where they prohibit those inside to join in on anything and everything GOG, and possibly kick your puppy into a river. You're just missing a few lines on some twitter/FB pages, and usually these also get posted by other goggers after like a few minutes. :\

Then again, I doubt that it would add much workload for TET if he'd copy paste the message in a separate thread on a forum he's supposed to handle anyway ;)
And it wouldn't clutter up the forum as much as it does now, which seems to have been one of his worries.

TET asked what could be improved and I provided my personal, biased, strange (and most likely dumb ;)) opinion. I don't hold a grief against GOG for this or anything, at least not for the lack of that functionality :p

1. Again if others do it for him/gog why do it himself? And why basically double post the same info seeing as others would be posting it here as well?

2. Lol I get ya. I was just posting my pov as well. We cool? :)

Personally (subjective!), I consider it more professional appearance if the PR manager takes on the job of informing the community, than arguing that the community can take that work as well (similarly I'd much prefer GOG to get a decent customer support and refer less to the various game forums for help, though that would drain a lot more resources compared to a simple copy and paste).


I doubt that they would soon as they realize that there's a centralised posting of these information way before they can even read it (assuming that TET knows first hand what he's going to write himself *grins*).


Sure, I wasn't trying to offend you (nor did I feel offended), but rather to explain why I was 'arguing' on such a minor 'nit picking topic'.

I'm normally not a fan of too many sticky threads, but to have one thread with all smaller news would be a really good idea. Maybe you can combine it with the welcome thead and maybe some newbies will also read this thread before posting ;-) They can also post other news (articles, little updates, problems, etc) there. One reason for the success of the forum is that it is an important source for informations, by only using social medias it gets devalued. One official thread allows everybody to bookmark it, otherwise you need to check the last forum pages or the other services. The freedom lies in diversity - forum and social media.

1. I agree somewhat....but I'd more want them to use their seemingly limited resources on actual problems though.......;)

2. k

If hitting 'New Post'-button, Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V, 'Post my message'-button a few times a week is a massive drain, I fear GOG would suffer a lot more serious problems ;)
Estimated additional workload... 60 seconds per week (with an additional roughly three minutes once for creating the thread ;))

Can you add a twitter update feed to the main page? I've seen other websites that have something along those lines, where it just shows the last 2-3 twitter updates. That saves people constantly going to twitter to check it.

Cool idea, I like this. :)

One of the first things they teach in media handling is to say it first and say it accurately otherwise others will say it for you and they might be wrong about what you want to say. It's not about repeating yourself it's about producing accurate and plentiful information once to stop misinformation/speculation.

Forums shouldn't be a marketing operation, it should fall under your communication/PR role since it's how people get the sense of community/news with GOG not about marketing since people who read this are already here. Press releases are in that fuzzy middle since it depends on the target audience. There is some marketing involved and there is some PR aspect as well. If your first thought was "everybody is my target audience" I'll hurt myself facepalming. Different audiences deserve to be talked to differently cause you know, they are important to us at ...

During the letters issue, it was a member who brought this up and he quoted **outside sources** (a "journalist" who got things wrong) and because of incorrect information, the member put GOG on blast. The proper way to handle the issue would have been to be the first to put out that information (before the member and give customers a heads up, you'll be hearing about this and this is our stand sort of thing) or if that's not possible, be among the **first** to explain the situation and explain GOG's stance on it. No comment, late responses, or finger pointing doesn't work in N.A. since most see as "we're guilty as sin but our expensive lawyers will make it better and sweep it under the rug for all to forget about it" even though, like in this case, it really wasn't GOG -but you need to explain that sooner and clearer and then get ahead of it. No need for millions of new threads, just use the existing one and post a reply. If the reply is accurate and factual consider it solved with the magical three words -boom done next. If it's not, you'll know soon enough and then you need to do it again.

On the flip side, there's no need to participate in all the forum postings. Dungeon crawls and fave movie/music/will I play this game topics aren't things we'd need to have an official response. It's tricky to know when and when not -but this is when experience and a good feel of the community is key.

[Edit: typos]

Well it can take some time to get the message right - one can also move so quickly that one just continuously spouts garbage that then has to be retracted or qualified and makes you look even worse. It's sometimes better to wait to formulate the best response than jump in immediately. Yes waiting too long is also the wrong thing to do, but I'd rather them err on waiting too long and getting the message right than immediately saying the first thing that comes to mind. The latter is a much, much worse trait in a PR department/head and often gets a company into worse trouble than if nothing had been said at all.

Adding a single, stickied thread where EnigmaticT posts all the new, small news unworthy of a large announcement and/or a ticker on the front page with the last couple of tweets/social media updates could be good.

There may be no need for posting in other kinds of threads, but I don't think the T, Gal, and the several other GOG employees who post in fun threads do it to give an "official" response. They're simply doing it because the topic is interesting to them and they want to post. Obviously posting in those threads shouldn't distract from their jobs but I'd be hard pressed to say that the odd post in a fun, community thread is terribly distracting from their jobs. Further, engaging the community in something other than pure marketing/technical assistance is a good thing for a company that bases much of its success on customer loyalty and appreciation.

EDIT: Hey I noticed we're back "online" :P - the bug has been squashed!

Thanks for agreeing with me about the need to be factual and accurate. This is why the PR position is one of the most difficult position to hold in a company. You hit the nail on the head about what happens when a company doesn't have a good PR person at the helm. It's a tough dance (timing/wording etc) to learn but one that's needed.

Yeah, there's a difference between socializing and official words from GOG. I'm assuming people work at GOG because they truly love and believe in what they are doing so it's natural to join in with a vibrant community. The more the merrier, right? I think where it differs is tone of the reply and the engagement and most would pick up on that.

[Edit typos]

Indeed. In fact, I would expand on what you said - that in many ways the internet and the 24hr news cycle have actually made the job more difficult as while it is certainly easier to get information out, the news cycle also moves so fast that it can put a great deal of pressure on PR. The dance has sped up considerably.

Completely right again. I don't know if you've worked in an office but I've had the misfortune of having a boss that would carry entire one word email conversations with staff for an entire day instead of a single phone call. Letters were contemplated for days while countless off-the-cuff emotionally driven emails were regretted the moment the send button was clicked.

The fact that the dance has been sped up considerably also makes it more obvious if the PR department is aptly handled and how quickly something can snowball and cause massive damage to the good will and reputation of a company (a la Nestle most recently) and this is why GOG needs to take note.