Hello! There is no TLDR of this, so let's just get right to it. As most of you have already know, DSA Encore (renamed DSA Uncore by 1 of my supporters with a sense of humor) was C&D'd a few months after GB ended. I won't go into too much detail about it for legal & private reasons; however, I wanted to set the record straight for several rumors about the situation that are negatively affecting myself, my supporters, & the reputation of the vendors who supported the GB. It's been brought to my attention that the following assumptions have been made & circulated as the truth.
1. MYTH: I ignored the C&D and lied to my vendors.
This is false. I don't know who made this assumption and spread this based on pieces of information from sources either not directly involved or sources without a full grasp of the situation, but this is utterly untrue. My vendors as well as Riot Games can vouch for me. Riot Games and I spoke about this after and as it stands, Riot Games and I are on good terms as they understand I never meant to offend them. When my vendors were directly contacted regarding the C&D, I did not try convincing them to ignore it & instead urged them to comply while thanking them for their support & patience. I kept them in the loop the entire time throughout the process when it was clear there was a misunderstanding between myself and the third-party representing Riot Games.
2. MYTH: The keyset was rushed into production shortly after GB ended to try and circumvent a possible C&D.
False. I'm not sure where people are getting their information, but it certainly isn't from me nor my vendors, who are the only sources of truths in this matter. The keyset was being prototyped and sent to me. I approved V2, but the set itself never went into mass production before the C&D as I was still noodling on some stuff for it. No sets of DSA Encore were produced beyond the two prototype sets.
There's also a less serious rumor saying I tried to hide the C&D and the provided "proof" of this was that I didn't notify/update the GeekHack post ASAP. Also untrue. As many of you are aware, when things went awry with the IC initially, I pulled back from Geekhack and moving forward, provided updates about the set ONLY in my server and my Instagram. My server was notified first because that was where the majority of the set's followers were. In my server statement announcing the C&D, I also stated I'd be updating my Instagram accordingly soon after. As you can imagine, my first priority was handling the C&D itself followed by notifying my supporters whenever I had major updates. Updating a post on a forum I hadn't been active on for several months and NOT where the majority of my followers were residing was obviously not at the top of my list. The fact that some members are using this against me as proof that I tried to hide the C&D happening is wild to me.
I'm aware that when I first landed on GH with my IC, my initial reaction to most of the comments was immature, arrogant, & inflammatory, so I understand how most of GH is reveling in a "They had it coming / Told you so / Haha get f*cked" moment. That's fair. Everyone is entitled to schadenfreude every now and then, especially when it's towards someone who was deserving of it with an attitude like mine before; however, I would greatly appreciate it if community members would stop playing a broken telephone game and create their own theories to spread regarding what occurred. If it didn't come directly from me, then there's a high chance that the information is skewed and not 100% accurate.
I am not asking the community to simply forget my initial behavior on the IC, as I understand that the C&D was no fault of my own, but I am humbly asking that you not mentally hold me to what I was previously; however, I also understand there will always be people who refuse to accept that people can grow & learn from their mistakes. I've seen enough of this toxic behavior of cancel culture on Twitter to recognize the similarities in some of the Discord server conversations surrounding me, but to each their own. Whether you as an individual would like to forgive my initial arrogant behavior is up to you, though I strongly believe I've grown as a person and designer since. Anyone who has truly followed me within my server can see that. I say truly since I'm well aware there are a handful of folks who lurk in my server to screenshot content and share elsewhere to discuss in a malicious manner. I find that a bit sad, but it do be like that, so feel free to come and go as you may in the server.
The C&D situation got me down bad to say the least. Besides that though, I was extremely disheartened and hurt having seen a few designers who I thought were true friends of mine in the hobby, some of whom I've collaborated with for projects, say some of the most mean-spirited comments regarding the situation. While I may have pulled back on my previously very active status in the Discord servers in the community to handle the issue, I was still lurking in them. I’m shocked how some people can feign sympathy in a server to maintain their nice façade to everyone there while simultaneously spewing some seriously hurtful sentiment in another server. I understand general toxicity coming from strangers I didn't really interact with outside the GH IC, but to have it come from a few folks I befriended is something entirely unexpected.
Some vendors also unfairly received misdirected negativity towards them just because they backed my GB. I want to emphasize that the C&D was solely my responsibility and my vendors were nothing but great, supportive, and patient. They are all still 100% trustworthy vendors and none of them (nor myself) attempted to deceive anyone during this process.
On a completely different note, if any designer is curious about how to handle a C&D, talking to the offended party, what constitutes a gray area of a policy, or just do's & don't's for a situation like that, my Discord DMs are open for the genuinely well-meaning and curious. It was a rocky road, but I did learn a lot from it, and I have to thank Riot Games in helping me understand the situation too and they were kind enough to have an open discussion about it when I politely requested one (details of that convo won't be revealed though).
And with that, I think that's all I've to say about the situation. If anything else major comes up, I may or may not address it depending on what it is. This hasn't stopped me from designing. I do plan to come back to using these colors, but after finishing my 2nd keyset design. Have a great day/night, stay safe, and thanks for reading!
