I *knew* it!!

[narf poit chez BOOM]

...Both!

[Saber Cherry]

One of the names on the list shocked me. And I have 75% lightning immunity...

The company's own page:
http://www.aeginfo.com/clients.shtml

Which I found by way of X-Bit:
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/edi...tions2006.html

Now, I consider this to be not a "dirty litle secret" but a "dirty big secret", like the client list of a questionable Swiss bank or a Washington, DC escort service. However, if the business really is as immoral as it seems - and this is not a foregone conclusion, considering that the entertainment industry (e.g. circuses, playhouses, street performers) has used shills for millenia - it seems to me that the client list would be top secret. Furthermore, if a company felt that AEG's business model tasted bad, it would not enlist their services, knowing that the client list is public. That would be akin to a politician taking bribes from polluters ABOVE the table.

So, have these companies been 'caught with their pants down', or is the situation more innocent than it seems at first glance? Nobody really knows what these people do. Their business statement is perfectly vague - no outsider can accuse them of wrongdoing (or even bad ethics) on the basis of the information they make public. And yet, organizations that hide their doings from the public eye (secret police, drug lords, animal-testing firms [which I heartily endorse]) generally do so because what they do is illegal, unethical, contraversial, or deeply offensive to much of the population.

That said -

There's a quick test to determine who is a mole. Ask, "Are you a mole?" ...but in more direct phraseology, like "Do you or have you ever received goods or money from or on the behalf of AEG, signed any contracts with them or companies having common ownership, or provided any services at the request or stipulation of any of the said parties?" An innocent person can say, "No." But an employee would have to stay quiet, lie, or commit fraud... in which case (if any of the employees could be unmasked) the company would clearly be engaged in illegal fraud.

I wonder which is the case?

[Caduceus]

I know I would be tempted with a 30" liquid crystal display to hype up a product I already believed in. Somehow that seems different than hiring a guerilla campaign company to post 800+ messages a day to "build a trusting persona" that can steer people towards a product.

If we can't trust an avatar who looks like a beloved (if somewhat retarded) mouse, who can you trust?

[Ed Kolis]

Maybe *that* explains why Captain Kwok is the only SE5 beta tester who says anything positive... Strategy First is too bankrupt to bribe them all!
So, Kwok, Do you or have you ever received goods or money from or on the behalf of Strategy First Interactive, signed any contracts with them or companies having common ownership, or provided any services at the request or stipulation of any of the said parties?

[Captain Kwok]

Well what do we expect when even the US president has 'citizens' and 'journalists' planted to provide positive reviews?

[Captain Kwok]

Ha Ha Ha!

I guess I was typing my post when Ed had posted his and know it looks like I'm in collusion with some sort of corporation!

[Kamog]

Hey, it's working! I now have this irresistable urge to buy SEV immediately when it comes out and spend many many hundreds, maybe thousands, of hours playing it.

[TurinTurambar]

Careful.... you guys are almost back on topic here....