Here’s Part 2. It’s a fair bit longer so I decided to break it out into it's own post. There's some extra reading to explain my stance on things that I've hidden behind spoiler tags to keep the meat of this post visible and hide anything that's not esssential.
The New Order
When I went to bed, there were only a few options if the coup succeeded and many of them relied on the actions of Lychton Kondur. He was still the CEO of Brave Newbies. That corp still housed the alarming majority of members in Brave Collective. If he decided to leave the alliance it would still be in a crippled state similar to if the coup had failed.
I woke up the next morning on roughly 3 hours of sleep to head into work. I knew it was going to be one of those days where EVE was going to bleed into my real life more than usual. When I got to work I loaded up the Brave Newbies subreddit and braced for impact. Brave Newbies got its start through this subreddit, and its poorly moderated on a good day. I knew everything would be on fire. I was greeted by this post by Anna announcing the brand new change in Brave leadership. It was also “/signed” by a number of corporation CEOs. I wasn’t one of them. It felt like I missed a memo somewhere.
The reaction was heavily mixed. Many Brave members who had seen Lychton’s inaction in recent days came out in support of the change and expressed hopeful optimism. Others remembered the fun they had with Lychton and his innate ability to speak dynamically. Those people were either sad or outright angry. I was personally focused on Anna. I had made him “quit EVE forever” by slightly annoying him once. Both CEOs of Kite Co. (post joining Brave) have had the distinct pleasure of making Anna “quit EVE forever” in frustration. Similar to the time Mattisen Arcanth made him do it, he came back a week later and somehow found himself in a position of more power than before he “quit.” It’s a weird strategy but somehow it worked for him.
It was fair to say I had misgivings about entire leadership structure. I truthfully didn’t know Lquid very well but none of my interactions with him had been particularly stellar. I also had no almost clue who Malanek was, but he was wildly popular and the few members of Kite Co who went on fleets with him seemed to think he had a good head on his shoulders. I was optimistic that at the very least things couldn’t have gotten much worse than they already were.
My Frustrations
The Mob Cometh
This tentative optimism was almost immediately shattered. The once inactive and non communicative CEO of the Brave Collective issued a statement on the recent events. It was worded very plainly and very truthfully. It was sticked to the top of the Brave Newbies subreddit and the previous announcement of the change by Anna slowly sunk from the front page. You could tell that the man behind the keyboard had been wounded in a real and tangible way. It was a way that extended far beyond just being a game. He acted with class and in a way that was designed to protect the line members. It was a powerful move, whether it was intended that way or not. The mob had awakened and it had certainly picked a side.
There were definitely positive qualities to Lychton. When he was around, he was amicable and friendly. He spoke with fire and passion in all the things he did and he naturally possessed a personality that makes people strong leadership material. His post made people remember that. It became a very human issue from this point. It was a king who was run out of his kingdom in the middle of the night without any warning. If anything this quick turn illustrates how hungry people were for communication, especially from Lychton.
You Should Have Expected the Inquisition
Things got nasty. People wanted answers and explanations of what went down. I was on the outside of the inside for this whole ordeal. I posted a brief version of why I voted for the coup, apologized for making a decision that affected so many without being able to consult them, and also voiced my thoughts on the new leadership. I said that I had very real issues with Lychton that I didn’t think would be resolved (they’ve been around for so long after all and the last group who tried to effect a change was purged). I also made it abundantly clear that the ball rested squarely in the coup’s court now. They were the ones who thought they had a better way of leading and they needed to prove it. I mostly stepped out of the spotlight from there. The last thing you try to do is reason with a mob. I saw that and I had no obligation to the new leadership to be a spokesperson. Their actions had to speak for themselves.
Not every CEO shared my thoughts. I watched the internet in its finest form launch an all out assault on a couple of CEOs who took it upon themselves to be cheerleaders for the new order. I have no clue why they did this. They were given no reason to. Maybe it was to calm the discomfort in their own minds that was growing over the situation. These CEOs took every opportunity to defend their actions and were mercilessly ripped apart by former allies, friends, and absolute strangers thanks to the anonymity of the internet. The only people who were truly safe ended up being a couple of CEOs who had the good fortune of being asleep or away from the keyboard when everything went down and a couple members of the Brave leadership who were not consulted.
Also stoking the fire was a bit of reddit tomfoolery. Multiple people were flash-appointed as moderators of the sub-reddit. The way reddit works is that higher up on the list you are the more control you have over the subreddit. A lower mod can not trump a higher ranked mod. The highest ranked mod was the original founder of Brave Newbies and the subreddit. He never gave up the moderation of the subreddit when he passed control of the EVE corporation. And he used that control to restore almost every single post that was deleted by the new moderators and those that were trying to rein in the situation. This helped contribute to the mob mentality and made for a real fireworks show.
One last person would finally step into the line of fire. Lquid, the person currently in charge of the executor status of the Brave Collective, held an AMA. If the mob had pitchforks before, this was the kerosene to light them on fire. Through this AMA Lquid explained why he called the Evac. The mob, however, had come to think that Lychton was solely ousted for the disastrous evac from Catch. At this point, the facts don’t really matter. The mob had decided for itself what the “truth” was. At points it seemed like I was watching a TV show instead of real people.
What Happened?
On the council subreddit, multiple people started asking "What Happened?" This a subreddit available to to CEOs and division heads for the alliance that is supposed to replace the functionality and security of a forum. The answer to this question was strange. The more people tried to answer it, the more nobody was able to adequately explain the series of events or even name the initiating parties. This didn’t bode well with me. I knew the situation I had been placed in felt very dire. Maybe some of that severity was manufactured in a way to manipulate my vote. After an attempt at figuring things out most of the vocal parties shrugged and resigned themselves to accepting their new leadership.
The next “meaningful” thing that the coup did was hold a meeting (yay meetings). I was unable to attend it because it was scheduled for the middle of the day. There was a lot of hemming and hawing over the coup, Should Malanek be the leader and what Brave should do next were big questions. Then all the present parties decided to help write a letter titled “Important Brave Leadership Statement.” After hours of work this masterpiece was created. It did not inspire confidence in the line members.
This mail from the Brave Council would serve as one of the few updates that anybody received for the new order’s plans. In hind sight, Malenek was probably a bad choice for the role of mainly because he was Australian. When the majority of your members are in US timezones, having to wait until Austrailian prime time for an update from your new leader doesn’t always work. People were impatient for answers and Malenek still had a real life to attend to and had to sleep sometime. He did continue this error of non communication willingly as the week went on assuring everyone only that “He had some plans but he couldn’t talk about them yet”.
Again What Happened?
After that pitiful letter went out, I had to figure out what really went on. I started contacting the people I knew had been left on the outside. A logistics director, an HR director, numerous CEOS, and telling them everything I knew. Not a lot of the people I had talked to were happy. I wasn’t sure I was happy either. I had voted for this change because I felt like I needed to but also because I felt it would improve communication. It hadn’t. I continued to post my concerns. Each night I had contemplated changing my vote just to see if I really was a swing vote or what would happen. I opted not to because I didn’t want to add to the chaos. It was still tempting.
Things reached a turning point for me mid week. I was at the height of my frustration with the lack of clarity on what was going on. It seemed like everyone was sold on the new situation. This wasn’t because everyone liked it but it seemed more like people were becoming resigned to the fact that this was the way of things now. I was on the verge of writing a very long and extensive post to the council subreddit that would list the names of everyone who contacted me and what I was contacted about. Then hopefully others would start speaking. As i was readying myself to post this, I noticed a mail in my reddit inbox that would change everything.
“Hey Man”
The message was titled “All This Drama” and said something along the lines of “Hey man, I have some concerns I'd like to talk to you about. I like to think you love brave. Hit Me Up on skype”. It was from another CEO. I don’t know if I’d classify myself as loving Brave. Love is a strong word. I certainly liked Brave and all the things it stood for. I was also willing to hear anything out that people had to say because there was a serious shortage of talking going on. So I hit up aDAMNPATRIOT on skype. aDP was one of the CEOs of the wormhole corps who, either intentionally or unintentionally, was left out of the initial coup discussion and vote.
We chatted back and forth. He told me he did not like the way thing went down but was willing to let things go until one of his members started digging. His guys had started finding inconsistencies in the behavior of few members of the diplomacy team prior to the coup. Toasty Biggums would be at the center of all these inconsistencies. He was a member of the Brave diplomacy team and also in charge of corp recruitment. He was appointed to this role by lquid only weeks after his corporation joined the Brave Collective. He would also go on to accept a corp by the name of Hispanic Enterprises that lent its vote to the coup and then immediately left once tensions rose. He would prove to be the central instigating figure in all of this. There were even more facts and inconsistencies around this character that were shared with me but they were hardly relevant. I finally had an idea of what might have actually happened.
Another area of concern was raised that the votes didn’t add up. It looks like a number of leadership types had used their alt corps to vote for the executor change and pulled a near majority without the help of any of the sister corporation. It was beginning to look more and more like the sister corporations were actively manipulated in order to form a screen for the men behind the plan. All of this was interesting but I wanted to be more sure this time than I was last time. I spoke directly to Lychton and let him know that I had many issues with how Brave was running and how it affected my corp members but was willing to work with aDP because the new leadership was being as non communicative as the old leadership and was being 10 times more shady about it.
The Counter Coup
I didn’t need a lot of incentive to be in on the counter coup. Once it became obvious that I had been pushed towards voting by an artificial sense of urgency I was okay with restoring the status quo. Hopefully something would come of it. If it didn’t then I’d just leave this time and wish everyone well. That’s a far less dramatic approach. I was contacted again by the CEO who had convinced me to change my vote in the first place. It was an interesting conversation that started “Well Jester, I fucked up”. He explained some of the stuff that aDP had already told me and let me know that he had done independent research on his own regarding the other leadership. I ended up cutting him short and letting him know aDP already got to me. We both agreed that we had been deceived and were willing to vote one more time.
A date was set. It was dramatically timed for the same saturday that Malanek’s acceptance and leadership transfer ceremony was planned. I feel like this was intentional but I also know that the counter coup wanted to cover their bases a little bit better the second time around and not make a knee jerk reaction. The coup continued their habit of vague communication or little communication at all. This was usually delivered through recorded speeches and QA sessions. None of this gained them favor. For me, April 11th couldn’t come quick enough.
You Best Not Fucking Miss
I had an alarm set. I was ready to go. aDP had given me a time that we needed to be ready for the change. It ought to be done all at once so that the coup wouldn’t catch wind and start kicking people before the votes could be made. Now, I wish i could tell you I was there when that fateful button press happened. But what I said about my position of being on the outside of the inside was completely true. Even though I woke up hours in advance of the time and I missed the fateful, dramatic, movie moment by a few minutes. Oh well! The executor swapped back before my vote hit and I changed mine just to cement the deal in case there were any shenanigans with alt corps in a last minute struggle for power. Somehow the confirmation that I wasn’t ever the swing vote helped me rest a little easier.
Almost all of the recently joined corporations were kicked from the alliance. Many of them contained accounts associated with the coup. Lychton delivered a speech that included aDAMNPATRIOT bombing in on it due to technical difficulties. Spirits were high and Lychton ended his speech in the words of Omar Little. You come at the king, you best not fucking miss. 7o, Lychton Kondur, out.
The Aftermath
Most of the coup was run out of town on a rail. Anna was chased out with gusto. Malanek was invited back under the assumption that he was only a figurehead for more devious players in the coup. He didn’t accept. Lychton only recently announced that Lquid would be staying on as head of IT with next to no eve duties. I think IT director for internet spaceships has to be a hard job to fill. Other casualties of the coup where people like Kira. Kira was a newbie instructor who had played cheerleader for the coup and been ripped apart publicly for poorly planned statements. Other organizations that cropped up prior to the coup also saw an influx of members from Brave Newbies. Karma Fleet, a newbie based organization affiliated with GoonSwarm and founded by a former member of brave leadership saw numbers rise. So did Pandemic Horde, a group formed by pandemic legion that was also aimed at catering to newer players of the game.
I continued to learn of the events after the dust started to settle. aDP had a big Q&A session after the counter coup and was more than a little proud of his role in organizing it. There was even a giant post of logs on the Zulu squad forums. These logs would only cement my position as the outside of the inside as many people I knew were in these channels but somehow I missed the invite there. Strangely enough, where brave now is not very different from where brave was prior to the coups. Many of the same organizational issues still exist and the story with Catch is starting to look familiar in our new region of Fountain. We have a similarly strong foe, Black Legion, who hasn’t yet taken to beating us senseless but also can still win most engagements. We have meetings galore, and the subreddit is only slightly better moderated.
I know that I have a new perspective on eve having been one of the lucky or unlucky few to live though one of its stories. These stories come with loss of sleep and they have a way of making a mark on you. I’m not really sure it’s a story I’ll tell at parties but its something I’d likely never forget. I’m looking forward to far more relaxed EVE playing in the future. As the situation in the Brave Collective is largely unchanged, I feel like dramatic situations may come my way soon. In a situation with all the same variables it’s hard not to have the same events happen again and again. Next time though, I’ll probably just go to sleep instead.
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