Adam Orth, a creative director at Microsoft Studios, recently came under fire for comments made during a Twitter conversation he held with a friend.
The comments concerned rumors that Microsoft’s successor to its Xbox 360 video game system will require users to be connected to the Internet at all times. In the conversation, Orth stated that he “[didn’t] get the drama around having an ‘always-on’ console. Every device now is ‘always on.’ That’s the world we live in. #dealwithit.”
His friend, Manveer Heir, a developer at video game studio Bioware, replied, “Did you learn nothing from Diablo III or SimCity? You know that some people’s Internet goes out right? Deal with it is a s****y reason.” (Diablo III and SimCity are two PC games that experienced major technical problems related to their requiring players to be connected to the Internet at all times.)
Heir also pointed out that Orth had primarily lived in cities that provide quality Internet connections, such as Los Angeles and Seattle, and that many regions in the United States don’t have such quality connections. Orth replied, “Why on earth would I live there?”
Needless to say, a wave of negative publicity hit Orth and Microsoft, which eventually led Microsoft to issue an official apology on Orth’s behalf.
Orth has since locked his Twitter account.
Comments