Blizzard Employees - Why So Serious?

People want personable community managers, sure. Some want to know that we're like-minded individuals, and that we wouldn't be here discussing and writing content about games we didn't love. People also want professionalism though. It's actually even a bit of a double-edged sword. We want to be personable and show we're sentient beings, but we also have to communicate with a large number of players in a very careful manner. We need to prevent any chance our words can be misconstrued whenever possible, as it can be difficult to recover from a situation where we don't express ourselves clearly and are held accountable for that.

I can only ask you one question in return. Consider its depth and potentially even repeat it as mantra. How am I not myself?

Q u o t e:

I'm really really sorry about this, and I know it's a jerk move... but I couldn't resist the irony in a thread about blues always spelling correctly with proper grammar.

Should be 'its depth...' :p

Don't accuse me of having human qualities.

Q u o t e:


That was a great professional response. But as a personable community manager, what is your opinion, as an individual, not a blizzard employee, about the forum change?

Adapting to change is a key component to my line of work. As with all matters, I'm merely looking for the best way to excel at my job and try to help support our gaming community, both via internal and external communications.

My personal opinion beyond that isn't of much consequence. I enjoy what I do. I enjoy where I work. I can't think of a better place to be in my professional life right now, so I'll keep my thoughts and feelings concentrated on areas of my personal life, the concept of human consciousness, the universe, and other trivial matters.

Q u o t e:


TLDR: Blizzard pays me to not have an opinion

I share my opinions on new community features or ideas when it counts, that's with my superiors. This also includes sharing feedback we're receiving from players on the forums. That said, sharing every personal feeling I have about any announcements we've made with the community would accomplish very little for Blizzard, the players, or me.

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Sure, respond to the troll but not the guy who sincerely tried to address your philosophical query, "how am i not myself"

:(

That was amazing by the way. :)

Q u o t e:
So what are you telling your superiors? What kind of feedback are you giving them? Are you tellin them the truth or what?

We're reporting everything we're seeing. We send regular community reports out every week to nearly everyone in the company summarizing the tone on the forums, as well as what players are discussing. Whenever big announcements take place (like the one Tuesday morning), we're giving almost hourly reports on what we're seeing. These reports are actually extremely important to a lot of people, all the way up to Mike Morhaime.

A community manager is not only responsible for relaying information to the community, he or she has an equally (if not more) important role in relaying community feedback to the developers and executives at Blizzard. We are the best link between the playerbase and those making decisions for the future of our company and games.

Q u o t e:
I can't help but notice that the Tool lyrics in Zarhym's signature seem very apropos at the moment.

That song has applied itself to so many different moments in my life, but right now it's about something much more personal and specific than anything taking place on the forums.

Q u o t e:


But not all the way up to Kotick and his ilk, I assume?

Some people have a gross misunderstanding of the way decisions are made around here. When it comes to Blizzard's future, having Mr. Morhaime's attention is about as important as anything.