It turns out that Leo Laporte follows our news site closely. Just a few minutes ago he stopped by #twitlive chatroom to share his thoughts. It’s important to note that the language Laporte uses is not always that precise, so a translation guide is in order. When he says “troll” he means someone who criticizes him, points out the falsehoods he spreads. Laporte said this explicitly during the height of backlash over his destruction of the TNT show at the end of 2013. “Trolling is criticizing in public”, he said adding “if you want to send feedback, put it in an email to me, don’t say it publicly”. Keeping this in mind, this is what he said in his chatroom:
<~Leo> I think there’s another server where the trolls hang out
<~Leo> At least two of the most active users are mentally ill. It’s disturbing but I don’t believe they’re operating normally.
Not only does he follow #TotalDrama closely, he even know the mental health status of our contributors (this probably violates about half dozen statues about disseminating medical information). Our Google Analytics confirms his regular following as we have 10-15 users from Petaluma, CA and now we know one of them is Mr. Laporte.
Well of course he is. He’s a basement kind of guy! Though could be his split personalities. I have a whole document (5 pages) all about it and the deep Adam Curry style deep forensic analysis of our pundit friend, or fiend.
Burntheadbob» Quote comment
I’m glad Adam Curry spoke his mind about the faked Moon landings when confronted by Leo.
Leo knew the types of things Adam believes in, and he shouldn’t have been so shocked or offended by whatever Adam said.
I think Leo just wants to surround himself with “YES” men, which is what at small time business owners do when they are terrified of growing past the point of them HAVING TO DELEGATE responsibility (and potentially pay/praise) to others.
TWiT will never be bigger than this because Leo is the bottleneck.
Scott» Quote comment
I assure you, I am not mentally ill either, just sick to my stomach at how TWiT treats people. Everything Leo stood for when he started the network was wiped out when he moved to that new building and had someone dictate the shows that needed to be dismantled.
Let’s not all forget Erik Lanigan. In the many years I was an avid (and very polite and happy) TWiT follower, I used to write Leo about how I enjoyed Erik Lanigans’ contributions. Infact, I even got a response from Leo’s sister (who answers his email). She replied about how much she liked Erik Lanigan too.
Several months later, Erik was slandered to no end by the soup guzzling sushi slayer. He was so belittled by Leo that he effectively wiped himself from the face of the internet to avoid the disgrace.
Leo should know. He lost a lot of several decade long viewers in the last year or two simply because he has become the a-hole that he lied and said he would never become. TWiT is not a community, it is a cult. If you have any comment or suggestion that does not agree with praising of the king and queen.. you are effectively banned or labelled a troll. No matter how politely you try to voice opinion. Leo Lies.
Don’t even waste your breath trying to comment via email. IT will just get read by his sister. No one else.
tyns» Quote comment
Yes! Laporte used to care about technology and making good shows. But somewhere along the line it became all about money. He does not prepare or even knows what’s going to be on any show he’s on. Even the “flagship” TWiT podcast is prepared by a producer and Laporte often doesn’t know who’s this week guest 30 min before the show. Not to mentioned knowing what stories are being talked about.
And he’s arrogant enough to think he can wing it. That the viewers and listeners will not notice. He thinks that he’s good on the mute button so that when he uses Windows Weekly as a lunch break we don’t see it.
lkalif» Quote comment
In fact tyns you will find that it is Leo’s M.O. to justify banning or kicking someone he will make up whatever lie he needs to justify the actions. In fact sometimes he starts early, first he will publicize on one of his shows about the shows that a presenter is doing and then a few weeks later an announcement that says the show is cancelled or the as he is now saying about some “He cut the show free so that the presenter can take it off network (as long as they don’t advertise)”.
In fact your interpretation of TWiT being a cult is pretty spot on accurate!
For a while I played Clash of Clans as part of one of their clans but if you didn’t play it religiously and do what they wanted, “Praise be to the Great Leo”, you are pushed until you left and if you clung on too long they would kick you of the clans.
It was interesting watching clan chats when they would wet themselves if they were mentioned on one of the shows and if one of them got interaction on IRC itself they would have a high five party and you could almost visualize them peeing themselves like over-excited little puppies.
I didn’t dance to the beat of their drum and it became pretty clear that I was not wanted and I was tired of being expected to donate to those that had over-inflated ego’s and kept referring to themselves as Leo’s Clash of Clan Friends.
In fact the Moderators on TWiT literally have an open policy when it comes to the rules, they are so open to wild interpretation as the Gold Diggers legs are open to man that passes by that may have a positive bank balance. In fact the TWiT IRC Chat rules are meaningless, you can say something quite innocent and be banned. Some poor guy got banned for not spelling Elgan’s name right. It is not that person’s fault that Ello has someone trolling as Gum and using an alternative spelling. In fact I sometimes type Elgan and spell it Elgin instead.
One of the reason’s that TWiT dare not ban people from watching the live stream is that they need every view they can get. Gum and Soup are busy begging people to subscribe to multiple podcast streams that register as ‘views’, double dipping advertising to boost revenue. Personally I believe that their Advertising revenue is on a steep decline and it is all related to the good work of those that publicly highlight the hypocrisy of Soup and those closest to him (in size or attitude).
In fact after all the worries from BB & JRY about sites like TD maybe publishing video and causing problems for the liked of Friar Ballsucker and Chad Johnson etc it turns out that the backstabbing came from within the ranks of TWiT.
I watched an episode of DIYTrying over at R3 and it was entertaining. I can almost guarantee that we will see Friar Ballsucker trying to do the same thing for Know How. He already copied one of the episodes and it was a mess, it was like having sloppy seconds, just not good at all.
Soup is looking for an exit strategy and a way of dumping most of the shows. I think he will end up using a room at his brothel as a studio and probably using Chad or similar to do TD and all the other background stuff and just say “Tough Shit” to those that moved to Petaluma to work for TWiT.
Burntheadbob» Quote comment
Exactly, I used to be an active chat user. I even spent $20.00 for XChat, so I could make it readable. I quickly learned that the chat is only for sycophants. I only open it now to watch people get kicked.
Mark Harry» Quote comment
If he thinks that public criticism is trolling then so are newspaper editorials, movie reviews, political criticism etc. That’s just silly. He just wants to be able to control the message. That’s why he wants people to send him emails instead. I think that the reason for that is that he wants to keep advertisers from seeing the criticism and being scared away.
Count_Funkula» Quote comment
In fact, while Leo Laporte trashes trolling, both Gum and himself Troll. We don’t ask them for their opinion about Tech but they are quick to give their lousy biased drivel and them claim they are “Pundits”.
Using their interpretation for “Pundit” then that makes every single person that gives their opinion, even if it not liked by Soup or Gum, a Pundit giving their opinion about them.
In fact I want to see or hear all your opinions, I want to see/hear the opinions of everyone else that has an opinion and it disgusts me that anyone that has an opinion that is not in line with LaTurd or ElGum are treated as Trolls and if you mention certain words you are immediately banned from their IRC.
They want to (to paraphrase Adam Savage) remove reality and replace it with an illusion of his own making.
Burntheadbob» Quote comment
All very nice points. I am extremely happy that this site is getting on his fucking nerves as his castle falls down around him.
manimal» Quote comment
The decline and eventual failure of TWiT can be directly attributed to hiring a construction company bookkeeper to run your business.
Diego» Quote comment
you’re welcome in the chat room anytime diego.
Goofballz» Quote comment
I gotta hand it to you guys, it takes balls of steel to take on a wealthy freemason yalie who can barely keep his pants up.
He could literally call in a favor while choking on a sammich and smearing his limp sweat noodle on S.L’s face.
You guys got massive balls.
John Favara» Quote comment
No defamation of character or slander equals no case. The evidence is in LaPorkes own words. Besides he can’t afford Lawyers, he spends all of his money on the CeHo.
Mark Harry» Quote comment
So last night I got stuck in the YouTube Vortex and as I was there I watched WatchMojo top 10 something and I came the movie “Citizen Kane.” I haven’t seen this movie in years but the short clip they had reminded me of Leo. If you read the plot alone you’ll get the idea of what I mean http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizen_Kane
I wonder what will be Leo’s “rosebud”?
David» Quote comment
David, Leo’s Rosebud is one of the CeHo’s 24KT Gold Dildo’s!
Burntheadbob» Quote comment