A Friendly Reminder: Unless It’s Confidential, Let’s Discuss in Public – Stonemaier Games

A Friendly Reminder: Unless It’s Confidential, Let’s Discuss in Public

Five years ago, I wrote a post called, “Can’t We Have This Conversation in Public?” At least once a day I get a private message for a non-confidential question, comment, or request, so I thought it might be time to revisit this topic.

Here’s a truly hypothetical example (I’m not referring to anything specific that’s happened to me): You’re playing a game, and you encounter a situation that isn’t explained by the rules. You Google it and can’t find an answer, so do you (a) privately message the designer to ask them to settle the rules dispute or (b) do you post the question in a game-specific forum like BoardGameGeek or a Facebook group?

Perhaps other designers will disagree, but I think it’s vastly more effective for you to ask something like this in public. You’ll probably get the answer faster, and by creating a thread about it, you’re helping other people who have the same question now and in the future.

Privately requested feedback only helps one person, but posting on a public forum shows a generosity of information–you’re creating a way for others to learn with you (and from you).

This is particularly true when you’re asking a creator for advice (and perhaps looking to establish a relationship with them). First impressions matter, and if your first impression is to ask for advice privately instead of publicly, it comes across as a bit selfish. It isn’t a good look.

Of course, we love hearing from customers. We don’t take it for granted that you’ve taken your valuable time to reach out to us about something you want to know or share–thank you for doing that. We’re available online all the time, and we’re a simple tag away from assisting you.

We also understand that you’re taking a risk when posting publicly. Not everyone on the internet responds with kindness and compassion. But you can mitigate that risk by framing the post in a way that invites a productive discussion. If some people still don’t reply respectfully, you can flag their comment and notify the admin.

The only exception I can think of when it’s better to contact a creator privately instead of posting publicly is if it’s truly confidential or private. An example of this is if you have a question about a specific order you placed where the answer requires the the creator to verify your address. This includes replacement parts requests. [Morten brought up a great point in the comments: If posting a public comment would trigger depression or severe anxiety, please send a private message instead.]

So overall, if you have a comment or question for a creator, first ask yourself, “Could this topic potentially benefit anyone else?” If the answer is yes, I highly encourage you to post it in a public forum.

For me or Stonemaier Games, here are the publicly available options for you to post your thoughts, questions, and comments in places that either I or someone ready to help will reply:

  • This Blog: for conversations about crowdfunding, entrepreneurship, and running a business
  • Game Design/Publishing Page: conversations about game design and publishing
  • YouTube: conversations about game design
  • Instagram: conversations about games from other publishers (and sometimes our games, my cats, or other random topics)
  • BoardGameGeek: conversations about game rules, variants, stories, etc
  • Facebook Groups: conversations about specific games (there’s one group per game brand)
  • Personal Blog: conversations about books, movies, TV, and other things I love
  • Twitter: we use this minimally, and you can post rules questions here, but BoardGameGeek and Facebook groups are better
  • Facebook Live (Wednesday at 10:00 am CT): conversations about literally anything (except for spoilers)

I’m very curious to hear what other creators think about this topic. What types of conversations do you prefer to have with customers and fans publicly vs privately?

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20 Comments on “A Friendly Reminder: Unless It’s Confidential, Let’s Discuss in Public

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  1. […] I will answer the question before suggesting public forums. I’m a strong believer that 99% of questions should be asked publicly–I have multiple blog posts on this topic. However, if someone messages me on Instagram with a […]

  2. Jamey,

    S a 26-year veteran of the Air Force, we learned as young officers to praise in public and punish in private…to that end, when someone has a criticism, I feel it’s best to have that conversation with the designer or in my case as a developer, off-line as opposed to in a thread which tends to inflame others versus keeping it civil. As to inquiries, I would absolutely answer the questions, but I would also ensure that the information gets out to the broader community of gamers.

  3. I completely agree that asking questions in public is better than in private, but there can be multiple valid reasons for contacting a creator privately.

    People are different and what’s completely natural for one person can be an insurmountable challenge for another. Being shy can for example prevent a person from writing in public.

    Not wanting to look dumb in public is a related reason for going directly to the source in private, this can be because the person fears asking a dumb question or because they are embarrassed for writing English badly. The latter can be because English is not their native language or because of dyslexia.

    Mental health issues are another set of related reasons. Anxiety and depression can for example make a person unable to ignore negative or aggressive replies and instead be affected very badly. I know from personal experience that when I’m in a depression a negative comment can get to me, make me lose sleep, and reinforce the depression.

    I’m most definitely not saying that these are the reasons in the majority of cases, but I’m sure that they sometimes are.

    1. Thanks for bringing this to my attention, Morten! I agree, if a public comment or question is going to trigger anxiety or depression, I would rather someone contact me directly (and perhaps share that information with me if they’re comfortable so I don’t immediately direct them to public forums).

    2. Thank you, Morten. This is such a good post.

      I’m the type of person that would really never post a question or anything like that to BGG, but as you know I am happy to have a private conversation. I am grateful that you have brought another viewpoint to the conversation.

      1. @Joshua, Jamey, Chris: I’m happy that my comment added to the topic. I guess it goes to show that by posting his blog entry in public everybody can now read my contribution to the discussion instead of only Jamey seeing it :).

        @Chrism, yeah, our conversations have been a great help during Automa development, Chris.

  4. I’m actually guilty of this; not by email but in-person…with you. A couple of years ago my husband and I were planning to buy some Viticulture expansions at Geekway. Before I got around to researching or just doing as I normally do and haphazardly buy whatever is in my eye line, you, serendipitously, were walking around near by. I walked up and asked you your recommendation. It did not occur to me that this was selfish but I guess in retrospect it was. I think as fans we sometimes forget ourselves when we see someone as approachable as you are. I say this because I honestly don’t think you were annoyed or offended but I should have thought first. Maybe said hello and tell you I enjoyed your games instead of soliciting advice at that moment. I do always enjoy reading your thought provoking blogs.

    1. Thanks for sharing this, Jana, and I’m glad you mentioned it. In the rare (but wonderful) occasions when I get to meet someone in person, I’m more than happy to chat and answer questions. I look forward to doing more of that at future Geekways!

  5. This is a good reminder. I have often fell into the trap of seeking out a one-on-one conversation when a public forum works best for these things. Fortunately, you and Joe have gently prodded me in the right direction each time. :)

    That said, I would like to know how you feel about having so many platforms for this sort of public information to be spread across? I ask because at the beginning of 2020, I made a commitment to divorce myself from all of the major social media outlets, such as Facebook, Twitter, and so on. The ‘why’ of that choice is not important; the fact that it is a choice that I and several of my friends have made is what it relevant here.

    I remain active on Board Game Geek, I do watch many of your YouTube videos, and I try to consume as much information as you are willing to provide here. But in all of those other platforms, I am a customer that will not see what you and others are sharing. I do not think it is plausible (or even possible) for you to duplicate all of the information shared on those platforms here…

    So what solution (shy of rejoining those platforms) works here? I am not sure. But it raises the question asked: how do you feel about having to be active on so many social media platforms in order to reach your audience?

    1. Thanks for asking about this! I see it as a two-way street where the publisher offers a variety of lanes on that street. Like, I post the design diary articles on Facebook and on our website to give people options, but if someone will only consume that content if I make a video of myself reading the article, they’re just going to miss out.

      This post isn’t really about consuming content, though–it’s about conversations on public platforms. So if you have a rules question to ask, even if you’re not on Facebook, you can ask it on another platform (BGG) and we’ll help.

      “how do you feel about having to be active on so many social media platforms in order to reach your audience?”

      I feel fine with it as long as we’re serving you well! :)

  6. When a person asks a question in a group, they can sometimes get many conflicting answers from that group. I don’t care much what 1000 people on a BGG forum think about the ambiguous rules for a game they didn’t design.

    Of course, that only applies to questions where there are 1000 different possible answers. There is sometimes one clear and obvious answer and the person asking is just dumb or can’t be bothered to think about the problem.

    I have been lucky to not encounter much ambiguity in Stonemaier games. There are some rare weird card interactions in Tapestry that I see people posting about but they are not common. The thing is, I’ve seen people get conflicting answers to their questions about those Tapestry cards so I can understand why someone might want to ask the designer.

    1. Definitely! I think that’s a great opportunity to tag the company or designer in the thread so they can comment on it and clear up the confusion publicly (not privately).

      1. Jamie, I agree wholeheartedly with what you say here and if all companies were as active and responsive I think this would quickly become the norm. However, many companies do not respond on public forums (e.g. Fantasy Flight/Asmodee, Games Workshop etc) so in these instances contacting the designer/company seems to be their preferred method, usually followed by a minimal or non-response, eventually followed by a FAQ document.

        What the OP (David Rector) posted I whole-heartedly empathise with- some online folk are dismissive (and often give wrong info) in rules forums on BGG, Reddit, FB etc). Your efforts to maintain engagement across so many platforms are admirable.

        This clearly muddies the water considerably, particularly for newcomers to tabletop gaming, who will struggle to know how to approach each company in the “preferred” way.

        I should also add that instead of messaging you separately I recently received Wingspan and was missing a set of action cubes. Within 2 days I had replacement parts sent. Especially impressive in the midst of a pandemic! I sent an email thanking those involved (Mark O’Reilly in the UK and Joe Aubrey), and also posted on the UK BGT&chat Facebook group praising your employees/partners but- awesome job!

        Oh, and Wingspan is phenomenal- my wife and son love it too!

        1. Thanks for your thoughts, Tom! I agree that the lack of consistency among game publishers as to their communication preferences (and willingness to communicate at all) can confuse gamers as to which method is preferred. My general response to that is: First try publicly, and if it doesn’t work, try privately.

          1. Sounds like very good advice! Worth printing on future rule books for the benefit of new gamers? (And a reminder to us old hands!)

          2. Tom: We do! :) At the end of our rulebooks, we have a line that says, “If you have rules questions, please post them in this game’s Facebook group or on BoardGameGeek.”

  7. It’s interesting to me that you’d even need to post this Jamey – but clearly you get questions that would be better posted publicly. In general terms, I think posting a question publicly is always to the poster’s benefit… you’ll probably get your answer and you might get further context, ideas and information you hadn’t expected that could be helpful in some fashion you never envisioned. And, as you point out, beyond your own needs, you’re helping the broader community by having that information out there.

    You ask what kind of conversations designers like to have with their audience… and maybe that’s the dividing line for me. A rules-clarification question, for example, isn’t really a conversation… it feels more like a one-way street. However, if I’m contacting a creator to express an opinion or share a well-considered thought, then I think that’s different. I’m offering something up to the creator – not just asking for their time to help me.

    That all said, there are lots of edge-cases one could debate… keeping to the same example, if a creator hasn’t done a great job with the published rules and no one in the community has those answers – and if that creator isn’t filling in those gaps somewhere, then yeah, they’re going to get questions asked. But those are a lot of ifs! =)

    1. Jamie wrote a post a while back about receiving unsolicited feedback and how he and others react to it. So I think even going directly to the publisher/designer in that regard may be considered selfish.

      What you might do instead is post a thread in bgg along the lines of, “I came across this issue and think it could be solved this way. Anyone else have this same thought?” If you get enough reaction you’ll likely be viewed by the individual you’re referring to and still garnering opinions from the community.

  8. HI Jamey, As a creator I highly prefer public questions for almost everything. I’ve even responded to private messages, answered their question, and let them know that I will also address it in my next post. It saves me time and feels more like a community when the question is posted in a public place I can respond.
    I especially feel this way about criticism. If it’s constructive, it is a huge opportunity to show my willingness to adapt and respond well. Even if it’s just trash-talk (we all get those sometimes), it’s also a great opportunity to respond positively.
    – Rob

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