My thoughts on this weekend: The leaks

[Former President tack50]

Well, as you all know, there's been a lot of stuff happening these days. I want to summarize my thoughts on everything that's been happening so far.

For the record this is probably going to be a 2 or 3 part series. However I felt this part really deserved its own separate post due to its nature, since it deals with the leaks and the info therein. This is going to be the most drama-heavy; so I hope it doesn't go too out of hand.

The other 1-2 will deal exclusively with in-universe content (Presumably my thoughts on the plot itself, ignoring the leaks + a retelling of events from my own POV. I played absolutely no role on the leaks and secret stuff so again this will be all in-universe stuff; I expect no drama there). I've been busy lately so I hope I have time to write those at all

Without further to do

The leaks themselves

I will start here since it's the most important part and one that has barely been discussed on the site. I will preface this with the following 2 caveats:

a) I have not read the leaks myself. And no I am not interested on them tbh.
b) I am still lacking a lot of information about what exactly happened that night. I didn't have even a semi-complete picture of what happened until well into Monday afternoon. There's barely any info on Atlas itself and even on Discord it was surprisingly hard to get information. I've seen drama unfold many times on my time in Fantasyland yet I've never seen the drama be so hidden away! So much of this might still be based on wrong guesses on my part.

So, for anybody who does not know: personal information was on the leaks done by MB and is probably running around on PMs and Discord messages. I am not aware of exactly what personal information there is (and even if I was, I obviously would not post it here). But still, it is not good; it's the second time something like this happens in about a 1 year or so. Leaking stuff from private discussions has been a thing in Atlasia (and arguably Atlas as a whole tbh) since basically the time the game started. But I think we can all agree that leaking personal information breaches any and all reasonable boundaries we can set and should be condemned to the fullest extent.

Now, I will say that I don't think MB was acting out of deliberate malice and it was probably an honest mistake on his part. However; he should have known better, this is not a justification; nor does it exonerate him of blame. I am not sure what the way to go from here would be. Reform of some kind is probably needed on this area, but I am not sure on the specifics.

I also want to disagree with the narrative that Atlasia (or even Atlas as a whole) is an evil or nefarious thing or a bad influence on people. I've had a lot of fun times on the game and this also applies to Atlas at large.  In my own particular case it has been at worst an innocent waste of time (just like I could have been playing videogames); and at best allowed me to form a sort of community feeling and have fun playing pretend-politics.

Yes, it is not for everyone. And I do not blame anyone for leaving Atlasia given the current circumstances. I would want an environment that is as accepting and welcoming as possible (just like it was for me when I started here a bit over 3 years ago) but given current events I don't blame anyone for leaving.

In any case, I hope we can look forward to the future and have the whole of the Atlas community recover from this very dark, sad and unfortunate event.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

There was public interest in what MB revealed, and it helped save the game a lot of trouble. It even saved the conspirators trouble, because they didn't have to get banned from the board. Any discussion about personal information and all that should keep that in mind.

[Former President tack50]

There was public interest in what MB revealed, and it helped save the game a lot of trouble. It even saved the conspirators trouble, because they didn't have to get banned from the board. Any discussion about personal information and all that should keep that in mind.

I mean, personal information and the right to privacy would trump all of that. That is a right that should be absolute (or at least, as absolute as practicable). I am a long time Atlasia player and a big defender of the game but come on. No one should see their identity threatened to be revealed for playing.

If this was a leak based off of well selected screenshots with personal info removed, we would not be having this conversation. We'd just brush it off as dumb Atlasia drama and call it a day.

Tbh I really wanted to highlight the fact about the personal info leak since it is a very important fact that basically changes everything about it and its nature in my opinion.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

There was public interest in what MB revealed, and it helped save the game a lot of trouble. It even saved the conspirators trouble, because they didn't have to get banned from the board. Any discussion about personal information and all that should keep that in mind.

I mean, personal information and the right to privacy would trump all of that. That is a right that should be absolute (or at least, as absolute as practicable). I am a long time Atlasia player and a big defender of the game but come on. No one should see their identity threatened to be revealed for playing.

If this was a leak based off of well selected screenshots with personal info removed, we would not be having this conversation. We'd just brush it off as dumb Atlasia drama and call it a day.

Tbh I really wanted to highlight the fact about the personal info leak since it is a very important fact that basically changes everything about it and its nature in my opinion.

Did the leaks have people's first AND last names? Did it have their addresses? Did it include names of their family members? Because if so, that would be pretty terrible.
We need to balance the specificality of the personal information with the amount of time it would take to comb through it all and remove any personal info and the scale of what they were planning and the timetable they were working with. There was an election going on when he posted the leaks - god knows what shenanigans they might have done if not stopped...
MB was not prudent to just dump it all in the way he did, but he was still a hero. And he should be treated as such, even if his methods were highly unideal in some of their particulars.
EDIT: By "pretty terrible" I meant "would render the leaks completely unjustified no matter the context". Sorry if my wording was unideal.

[West_Midlander]

I saw a copy of the leaks as of today. I didn't read the whole thing--I took about a 10 minute glance at it but I didn't notice anything that could identify a person in real life it seemed to just be some Atlasians' Discord usernames which don't have any personal information but there may have been something that was identifying that I didn't notice.

I think I will also now take the opportunity to say that from what I saw several individuals hold myself and others in the game in contempt but I don't hold any malice towards those individuals and in fact I will pray for them.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

If all MB did was post a new thread that he on his good confidence could confirm the existence of a conspiracy, and then publicly posted it excluding redacted personal info with Yankee's help and all that, I can safely say he did nothing wrong whatsoever with how he handled it.

[beesley]

As you will not find me on Discord I have not seen the leaks. Perhaps it's best that I don't, but feel free to inform me if there's anything pertinent to me.

[Mr. Reactionary]

There was public interest in what MB revealed, and it helped save the game a lot of trouble. It even saved the conspirators trouble, because they didn't have to get banned from the board. Any discussion about personal information and all that should keep that in mind.

I mean, personal information and the right to privacy would trump all of that. That is a right that should be absolute (or at least, as absolute as practicable). I am a long time Atlasia player and a big defender of the game but come on. No one should see their identity threatened to be revealed for playing.

If this was a leak based off of well selected screenshots with personal info removed, we would not be having this conversation. We'd just brush it off as dumb Atlasia drama and call it a day.

Tbh I really wanted to highlight the fact about the personal info leak since it is a very important fact that basically changes everything about it and its nature in my opinion.

Ive read through it twice now (yuuuge chat log). The main personal info I noticed was a few purported ages, my hometown which I believe Ive referenced openly on here before, and a map showing the driving distance between 2 posters purported cities of residence. Plus one poster's general living situation and another poster's deteriorating mental state.

While screenshots of some of the most important and damning statements will be posted in the coming days, all will be carefully culled and cropped so as to remove any and all personal info. All we are interested in is gameplay stuff to show the truth and terrifying depth and planning of the month-long conspiracy that involved more than a dozen players who were clearly party to a plan of "rigging the election", "imprisoning the court and other players", "bullying players out of the game", "falsifying evidence", "nuking the south", "violence against players", and ultimately "killing the game once and for all". The actions of the conspirators was condemnable and must be made public however all manner of safeguards will be made to excise any private info about real people as such info is revealed.