For reference, this is the first time I’ve watched anything by PirateSoftware, and I’ve only heard about him in the past week or so. So I’m coming at this from a pretty neutral position and as someone who generally supports SKG (I’m not in Europe so I can’t sign, but I would if I could).

Clip of his response

Looks like he’s responding more to online bullying, not the petition. The only time he mentions Ross at all (and not even by name) is him giving sarcastic support (hope petition gets everything you asked for, but nothing you wanted), which underscores his view that the petition is overly vague.

The video summary is useful, it looks like PirateSoftware completely missed what the petition was for. I’ve read the petition and watched the supporting materials, and it’s clear to me that the focus is to make games (SP or MP) continue to work in some fashion for those that bought it after support ends. But it seems PirateSoftware somehow misinterpreted it as “all games must be playable SP after support ends,” which isn’t the case at all. Using the WoW example, players just want to keep doing raids w/ friends after support ends, and they’re happy to host the server themselves.

here’s the best I could find

I think that’s the one I read. Here’s my takeaway, I obviously haven’t confirmed everything (I’d rather not dig through his videos)

WoW controversy part

Idk, that situation looks dumb. I don’t know who the group leader was, but here’s how it seems to have unfolded:

1. someone says run (beginning of the clip), so he runs
2. on the way out he exhausts his manna trying to save the group
3. someone else says to come back because they’re getting wrecked
4. seconds later that same person says “just run”

I don’t think there’s a good outcome there. Either he returns to help the person getting wrecked and likely dies (I’m not familiar w/ WoW, but it seems he’s out of resources), or he runs and doesn’t die, and there are conflicting commands from the group. It was a tense situation and the group was looking for someone to blame. The article mentions the group worked it out.

I think what he’s done is pretty scummy

Here’s how I see it, taking things from PirateSoftware’s perspective:

1. misinterprets the petition (honest mistake IMO), probably because Ross Scott isn’t some suave presenter and jumped to conclusions (i.e. this is just some angry gamer who threw something together); that last part is absolutely speculation on my part, drawn from my own initial reaction
2. got a ton of unrelated backlash, like people digging through his history to defame him, death threats, etc
3. he doesn’t see his error, and instead sees Ross Scott as the unwitting leader of a horde of angry gamers who are going to accidentally destroy a chunk of his industry

What needed to happen is for PirateSoftware and Ross Scott to jump on a call to clarify the petition. It’s absolutely fine if he still thinks it’s a bad petition, but at least ensure you understand what it’s talking about so you can elucidate reasons for opposing it.

I think PirateSoftware is your typical self-centered streamer/YouTuber. He probably didn’t watch Ross Scott’s rebuttal, probably because the community’s reaction left a bad taste in his mouth. On the flipside, one of the streamers I like also initially rejected the petition (not sure if he changed his mind, I don’t watch him all that often), probably because the rational initial reaction to proposed laws is to reject them.

I think it’s an unfortunate situation. I wish Ross Scott was more charismatic. I wish PirateSoftware didn’t misread the petition. I wish they jumped on a call to work through the details, which would be especially valuable to Ross Scott to get the feedback of an industry insider. A lot of unfortunate things happened, but I still don’t think PirateSoftware is a bad person, I think he’s just a typical streamer who tends to jump to conclusions (easy to do when doing things live) and is a bit self-centered (which you need to be as a streamer IMO).

Anyway, that’s my take given the limited amount of time I’ve spent on this.