Yoshi-P: Flippant dismissal of player criticism is a poor look for a lead developer.

[Raven2014]

I worked for many corporations before and need to be in close relationships with mangement because I did ERM. At most corporations it is mandatory to have a "dedicated spokes person" who is chosen to speak for and on behalf of the company. There is a literal agreement that these people must sign that they will approach public audiences in a way that will not tarnish or diminish the reputation and thereof the sales possibilities in any manner. Now, because of his position Yoshi P might have something different to this, but to say that customers cannot influence how a grown up adult (that represents a corporation) is just wrong. IF you work at a bank and you are a manager and you see that one of your colleague approaches customers in a way that will send mixed feelings, you can literally fire them based on that. I worked for a bank as well and this was very common. If you cannot "speak well" -so to speak, - in stressful situation, then you are going to lose customers, therefore profit.

PR is very important for companies and reputation is one of the main risks many companies focus on. Especially in today's world where there is an instant flow of information and bad news usually make bigger headlines than good news.

So here we have a tradition where the top designers of the game sit down to have a fun, organic, and holistic talk with the community before each major patch ... and you're making a case for it should be another pointless, soulless, scripted by lawyers event? The kind companies like EA or Activision do?

Hell, I thought people hate PR/Corporate talk, or is that just me? Between this and the way the community jumped at him for his opinion on NFT, people just want to nitpick what they don't want to hear. Well, if your goal is to eventually make the communication between the dev and players strictly become a list of bulletin point written in standard PR language with a triple checker from corporate lawyers, I say keep going because the community is doing a fantastic job of making that happens.