UPDATE! NeoGAF Owner accused of sexual abuse, site officially back up and statement

Nah, I never been a member of the site. lol I am usually on social media mostly like Facebook and reddit. I hope you will feel well soon!

Never bothered with that site. Pretty fucked up culture there. Never cared about Gamergate or the other SJW bullshit that seemed to plague it. Not many fucks given from me about its demise.

Ahhh! Thanks for your wishes. Don't be a stranger to OT now :)

This does suck. I have about 15-20 open tabs on my phone that I occasionally perused when I had nothing better to do. Will keep them for another week in the chance the site may come back online, however slight the possibility.

It is unfortunate the whole barn had to be burned down to eradicate some cockroaches. This doesn’t just feel like the simple loss of a forum or the comeuppance of the CEO, but the loss of a valuable resource within the overall gaming community.

I hope a decent replacement arises from the ashes.

I don't see why the site should close for good because the owner is accused, couldn't somebody else just take over? I mean it's just a forum

Rest in peace

@pinkanimal: its reputation has now been severely tarnished. There’s an explosion of resentment and anger on the web right now towards Gaf, much of it in the form of jubilant celebration. With the news about Amirox and now these long known accusations towards Malka finally coming to a head, I don’t think many people would be so eager to touch the domain name with a ten foot pole.

Just my opinion though, perhaps it can be saved. One thing I do hope is that the contents are archived and made available somewhere as there’s much to be salvaged.

As I undertand from reading about it, it already had a sort of shady reputation so I don't see how this could tarnish it considerably more. People who visited didn't probably care so much. But as with all these things whenever a vaccum appears there's something else that will fill it up.

Only on the internet is a playful ass grab (when the woman in question actually got physical first), and a mixed signaled trip to the shower which led to absolutely nothing considered rape. Jesus Christ. And people want to moan about all of the SJW nonsense that happened on that forum? How's this kind of slander any better?

I don't know the guy personally, and have zero love for how too strict the moderation could be at times, but you want to talk about dogpiling? What exactly is happening right now? All someone has to do is cry foul, and true or not it's believed, and the perpetrator is now Satan, the mad rapist. I'm sure the timed release of this news wasn't accidental either. It could have been released at any point, but they waited until now, which is the perfect time to strike with something like this given what's been going on in the news lately. Internet revenge at its finest. Hook, line and sinker.

As for Amir0x? Dogpile away since he was already proven to be guilty.

And now that its shitty mods are gone there's a chance it could come out of this a much better forum. Feeling optimistic about this.

One thing people need to realise is that a lot of NeoGAF members weren't happy about the progressive hive mind, they had just been there for so long and didn't get involved in the political discussions because mods/admins would ban for any little deviation from their progressive hive mind virtue signalling. Unfortunately it was still the biggest gaming forum to discuss new game releases which is why many people stuck with it, the rest of it had become too political to have a casual discussion about anything, god forbid you make a few jokes here or there, no banter allowed, dont question anything. A part of me is glad it's gone, looks like the same cucks want to start a new forum, the discord leaks shows me they have learnt nothing... People aren't celebrating neogafs demise just because evilore had some bad encounters with women, he barely interacted with the site -- people are happy because the mods and admins were closed minded pieces of shit with their holier than thou attitudes. Let them fade into obscurity.

@Isaac_Redfield: As I said before it feels really difficult to feel sorry for him since he got hit by the community and harshness he cultivated. Do I think he is guilty? I do not know I would personally call it a stupid dickmove but I would not call it sexual assault or even harrasment since he immediately stopped after she said no. That of course if this was all that did happen in that night.

@SaltyMeatballs: Yeah arcording to the leaks they are on the same level they were before so nothing really changed.

I think this here fits many people who were on gaf before and who posted shortly before it went down.

neogaf.com is back up, kind of. no longer gives an error.

Nobody in System Wars said the obvious to keep the subject of NeoGAF going down System Wars worthy. They should have just said what I'm going to say, which is I don't care about the events that got this site to shut down, I only care that it's gone. Hallelujah! Thank God Almighty! That place of a cesspool of Sony fanboys having one giant circle jerk, and those that refused to toe the line had to walk on eggshells or risk the ban-hammer. All that bullshit masquerading as some kind of gaming intelligentsia of industry insiders.

The place was what it was and what it was is obvious, but what made it even worse was the goddamn gaming journalism. There were times when I couldn't go on System Wars and not find the forums full of topics yanked right out of NeoGAF, sourced NeoGAF, but that's at least expected in System Wars. But even the goddamn websites for gaming and gaming YouTube channels, their shit was almost always like "...today on NeoGAF blah blah blah", and that shit was going on for far too long that there's no way the internet gaming journalists for websites and YouTube channels weren't internalizing the carefully cultivated bias of NeoGAF. That's why even on sites like this one they'd start a discussion of The Division impressions with an opening volley of "oh my god the Xbox One version of the game is the absolute worst looking version of the game".

So yeah, I consider NeoGAF being gone to be System War worthy news, because it is the Russian bot army that elected Donald Trump of the video game world influencing the industry and media, and they're gone. Yeah, f*ck them, they won't be missed by me, and the world will be a better place without them. Maybe gaming journalists should be gaming journalists, you know, go play some games, go visit a studio and see what they're working on. Just don't regurgitate the news of the internet like a hack.

Look at what it made me do, I had to log into my old and abandoned gamespot account after years of absence.

Agree. I came to hate Neogaf for all the reasons already stated (SJW cesspool, echo chamber, mods, etc) but I'm failing to see the crime here. Guy made a play when they both were drunk, was told no, he respected that and walked away.

@oliver8114 said:

Edit: Ok I take everything back. It will be WAY worse. Do I read this right they are restricting and delaying non minority registrations by 28 days? WTF. Also the Anita Sakessian part is just lolworthy.

Probably because that's fake. Brand new twitter account days old. If it were really Besada, why would his/her original twitter account not mention the new one? Looks more like someone borrowed the displayname/avatar to post stuff to fan the flames, and apparently it worked.

-Byshop

@Byshop: My bad its better to check your sources which I obviously not did. I jsut looked at her/his old account and profile pic and thought it was real. Deleted the accusation and the picture. Sorry for that.

No worries. There's a lot of information/misinformation going on out there at the moment so in lieu of an actual statement from someone at GAF it's hard to know what's going on. My own experiences with GAF were somewhat mixed so I didn't spend a lot of time there. I signed up for an account several years ago and read during the registration process that every new member is reviewed by an actual person, so they'll get it them when they get to them. 6 months later I got an email telling me that my registration was denied with no explanation. I thought this was odd, since pretty much all I provided in my registration was username, email, password, etc. I applied again with the exact same information and 6 months after -that- I got an email telling me that my account had been created. I came in as a junior member (presumably as does everyone) which meant that I could post replies but not create threads. There was no clear indication as to what the requirements were to eventually become a full member. Since they only really had two forums (gaming and non-gaming), individual threads were often hundreds (if not thousands) of replies deep by the time I posted in them.

-Byshop

Wish the best for Gaf members who had nothing to do with the political and social drama NeoGaf spewed out. And just wanted an active forum to discuss a variety of topics like any other forum dweller.

As for the closed minded individuals. Looking to blame everyone and anything but the site owner and a select group of mods, for NeoGaf's demise. Time to take a break off forums, to develop a different non-cult like perspective. Gamergate and what not didn't destroy Gaf. The community was finally fed up with Evilore and his minions, and clearly revolted so badly. Tyler didn't respond. and shut down his own site. Knowing his safe space and comfort zome, was now up in flames with no firefighters.

Let the courts handle it folks, otherwise save the drama for your mama, as they say.

Again, sexual abuse is serious, but right now this all seems like a bunch of drama. And it's not even for this site!

You can tell right away who couldn't manage keep their GAF account.

Patrick Klepek wrote the probably best article about this whole mess so far. Its pretty long but worth a reading

Inside the Sexual Misconduct Allegations Rocking NeoGAF's Last 48 Hours

So tyler just plans to revamp neogaf in the future to an non-OT site? I wonder if he will say anything about the whole incident once the site reopens unless he is not suppose to legally.

That site is not back up, I still got the error message of 502 Bad Gateway!

It's still dead to me!

Yep, same here.

No error message for me, it's simply still down for maintenance.

Also, from that long article linked to above:

The future of NeoGAF is unclear. All sorts of NeoGAF alternatives have been popping up, but an heir to the throne is unlikely to emerge so quickly. Just moments ago, Malka told me NeoGAF should be fully operational later this evening, and in the near future, will be restructured to more exclusively focus on video games. NeoGAF will apparently move "away from the increasingly untenable off-topic discussions that made 2017 such a stressful year for everyone."

So it's alright to bash everyone with your moral bat when you're in a position of power, but as soon as it's you, it's time to forget about such frivolous nonsense - because you say so.

Great.

It was for me this morning on my phone and desktop. I just got a 502 gateway error now. Will update the post

Yep, it was a "lover's quarrel" that turned into internet revenge that people gobbled right up. It's pretty telling that the incident everyone is so up in flames about happened, yet they remained friends after and even slept together later. I'm sure she only did any of that because she was so traumatized over the shower incident that she couldn't say no to his advances ever. Give me a break. This is just dirty laundry that's been dramaticized and spin doctored.

It remains strange that Malka's first public comments on the allegations came to a reporter, rather than the community itself. More than 48 hours after questions were raised, Malka still hasn't said a word on social media. A pattern begins to emerge: Malka was slow and awkward to respond to the revelation that one of its own moderators, an outspoken progressive, was a pedophile, and Malka was slow and awkward to respond to allegations made about his own conduct.

Yes, a pattern of most likely speaking with an attorney for the best course of action instead of doing emotional and reactionary Twitter shit like our president does. He knows how the internet works. Plus, when you have as much traffic as what NeoGaf had, you're bound to get plenty of creeps, and you aren't going to be able to know or police everyone's dirty little secrets at all times, especially if it had not really been proven yet.

Oh snap, I just saw this:

@mitu123:

I can confirm that I saw that also.

@airraidjet said:

No error message for me, it's simply still down for maintenance.

Also, from that long article linked to above:

The future of NeoGAF is unclear. All sorts of NeoGAF alternatives have been popping up, but an heir to the throne is unlikely to emerge so quickly. Just moments ago, Malka told me NeoGAF should be fully operational later this evening, and in the near future, will be restructured to more exclusively focus on video games. NeoGAF will apparently move "away from the increasingly untenable off-topic discussions that made 2017 such a stressful year for everyone."

i can see this backfiring on him if he tries to get rid of off topic. he's only doing this to cover his ass.

@TheShadowLord07 said:

@airraidjet said:

No error message for me, it's simply still down for maintenance.

Also, from that long article linked to above:

The future of NeoGAF is unclear. All sorts of NeoGAF alternatives have been popping up, but an heir to the throne is unlikely to emerge so quickly. Just moments ago, Malka told me NeoGAF should be fully operational later this evening, and in the near future, will be restructured to more exclusively focus on video games. NeoGAF will apparently move "away from the increasingly untenable off-topic discussions that made 2017 such a stressful year for everyone."

i can see this backfiring on him if he tries to get rid of off topic. he's only doing this to cover his ass.

People were literally creating threads about him on the gaming boards to on GAF if I recall before it closed for maintenence.

Guess we'll see how well it recovers. Gaming was such a nice and easy source for game news all in one place with a large community to discuss it with.

@super600 said:

@TheShadowLord07 said:

@airraidjet said:

No error message for me, it's simply still down for maintenance.

Also, from that long article linked to above:

The future of NeoGAF is unclear. All sorts of NeoGAF alternatives have been popping up, but an heir to the throne is unlikely to emerge so quickly. Just moments ago, Malka told me NeoGAF should be fully operational later this evening, and in the near future, will be restructured to more exclusively focus on video games. NeoGAF will apparently move "away from the increasingly untenable off-topic discussions that made 2017 such a stressful year for everyone."

i can see this backfiring on him if he tries to get rid of off topic. he's only doing this to cover his ass.

People were literally creating threads about him on the gaming boards to on GAF if I recall before it closed for maintenence.

Yeah, there was a lot of threads like that on that section.

@Gatygun: I can see why those banned from GAF would have that opinion of it and why a couple of mods and admins would bring cause to the creation of conspiracy theories by banned members (which piled up over time). That said though, your claims seem more based on the perception by those groups as opposed to what actually happened. Yes, there was a point in time when a thread did try to dox someone from Microsoft, but those people were banned very quickly because it was against the ToS. Meanwhile, when people try to dox GAF members (which they did a lot, and are still doing now via Twitter and Discord), there's no one to ban them. Rule of law vs the lack of law. No, GAF members don't go out to punch Nazis, but they certainly weren't going to pull a forced "both sides" argument, because that would involve defending an actual Nazi, which is absurd no matter where in the world you are except for in a super hard right community.

However, GAF was a pretty massive forum, and it's ToS rules banning all forms of discrimination ended up in it being heavily left-leaning (by US standards); so it was very intimidating and it created the impression of a hive-mind; since if you disagree with something, you're only going to see hundreds of posters who disagree with you and not the ones that agree.

lol Vice is still alive?

Updated title and added statement from Tyler Malka

Ok everyone, Neo Gaf is now back online, but without Off Topic!!!

Kind of ironic, don't you think?

Lol, yeah. Right now I can now view threads and such, and it's looking to try to recover now.

He probably removed Off-Topic to try to suppress those allegations against him. I'm not sure what happened in NOLA, but he could be just stoking his ego right now. Although, eliminating political talks is his only smart thing to do. Do you think it's too late now?

Well, it depends really, but I guess he has to remove OT for now(or forever). There's a lot of damage done though.

I see that Aljosa quit GAF with a ban request, I don't blame him. The dude is a giant hypocrite I still can't believe there are those that are still loyal to him!

SWJ BS COMING HOME TO ROOST! LOL AT THE LIBERALS. THIS COMBINED WITH THE WEINSTEIN THANG HAS MADE THIS A FANTASTIC YEAR FOR EXPOSING LIBERAL BS. SAD!

Offtopic was the area were the story blew up on. Evilore has multiple reasons for deleting OT for now. Also, OT on GAF has not been that great in the last year or so. Anyway, I'm not sure at this point if GAF will be a profitable venture anymore.

Well, it's temporarily off, but I do believe he'll keep it off

@airraidjet

That gif is really not appropriate for this type of thread.People actually lost love ones in that terror attack. Find another appropriate gif to post on this board.We need to keep this thread on topic.This is your final warning for now.