So Flappy Bird is gone. A fact I am sure you were already aware of due to the game's viral nature. Regardless, I feel that the situation deserves a closer look, as this has happened before, as well as the fact it shows an important aspect of fame in regards to the internet. First of all, the reason he decided to take the game down. Well, when you reach so broad an audience, especially and internet audience, you are invariably going to attract some crazies. And attract them he did. The quite literal torrential out pour of virulent tweets and messages was astounding. People complaining about this and that, demanding he change it, hurting themselves, threatening to hurt him - insanity is indeed the right word to describe it. Moreover, Mr. Nguyen realized how many people were getting addicted to it, and the overall unhealthy nature of the game. So, I guess he pulled a Frankenstein and killed his own monster. Anyway, as I said, this is not a unique incident. I remember one particular example where a developer of a Call of Duty game increased the reload time on a gun by approximately .275 seconds - and was immediately awash with people on Twitter threatening to kill his family. There was also Phil Fish, who got so sick of incidents like this he quit the entire video game industry. And remember Anita Sarkeesian? She was attacked in much the same manner. Just a reminder that the anonymity of this internet is not always a good thing - I guarantee this will happen again.
So true Michael! People can do great things with the Internet, but there is definitely a dark side. Another interesting thing about Flappy Bird is that since it has been deleted, some people have been selling phones with the app on them on Ebay. One phone with the app on it got bids of almost $100,000 before the auction was shut down by Ebay!
ReplyDeleteOh wow. It is crazy what some people do over a game! I find it sad that people would push a game creator so hard that he would delete his own product. Still, that game truly went viral! Over the past few weeks, all I've been hearing people talk about is the flappy bird app. I find it slightly amusing that it has become so popular when it is, in reality, a pretty simple (not to mention frustrating) game. Whatever the reason, the flappy bird trend was going crazy and taking it off the app store may have been a good decision for all of us. Nice post, Michael!
ReplyDeleteI think that when you decide to create a game and release it to the world, there are certain, inherent risks. These risks, as unfortunate as this is, include death threats and other such things. You have to realize that even though what you've created has brought you a few death threats, you've engaged a whole lot of people in something you've created. That's amazing. You shouldn't snap just because of a few crazies.
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