Of course... I'm not expecting anyone to forgive or forget. I just really needed to apologize because the things I said are not who I am.
This is here in case the original letter is taken down from Northern Ruins.
Before delving into the details, keep several things in mind.
This all happened because two staff members, Min and Yolk, quit after not being allowed to discuss the idea of compensation for hundreds of hours of work in just the past few months. We just quit after leaving behind a notice of resignation with grievances in only the mod server. The goal was never to hurt Northern Ruins because despite all this, we still dearly loved it and, above all, its community. Northern Ruins contained so many friends that we would not want to hurt just because we were quitting. The only one who had the power to delete the servers was Aug despite what he has been relaying to people. And keep in mind, he has yet to release a comprehensive statement just explaining things to the people caught in the crossfire of his decisions.
Also note, Aug has not made any attempt to directly contact Min nor Yolk after quitting. Min has not been available for contact since the stress of the situation has landed them in the ER so lack of contact with Min might be excusable. However, Yolk has always been open to civil conversation and has told such to each and every messenger Aug has sent his way. Almost every messenger seemed to also think that Min and Yolk were at some fault for the servers being taken down or for the supposed destruction of Northern Ruins. As said previously, we merely quit because of lack of compensation. The only thing that was directly changed was that Min repossessed unpaid decorative code that they wrote and are the rightful owner of. Min left a lot of the code they themselves paid for along with other things on the site despite everything to make sure the site stayed perfectly functional with the database intact.
All destructive actions are by Aug’s hand only.
Plus, it was by his suggestion Yolk quit initially and Min followed soon after.
While Aug will repeatedly say he would have given compensation if he had known, he was the one who did not even want to discuss it in the first place. That is an undeniable fact. The issue is not a matter of money but rather a matter of fairness, transparency, and attitude. Aug does not entertain the idea of compensation in a transparent manner but instead opts to try to push it off till later. Compensation desired wasn’t even necessarily monetary but since he did not even want to discuss it, he would not have known. Min, who spent hundreds of dollars out of pocket, deserves monetary compensation especially considering their personal situation that Aug is completely aware of. Yolk did not want monetary compensation but rather wanted pets, items, and/or slots that were higher than common. But, again, Aug did not want to discuss compensation and therefore would not have known by his own choice. Note, previous staff-wide compensation was a single common slot. The only scaled compensation was a single Aspirith slot for Min. Compensation was not repeated nor otherwise scaled per work time. ONLY slots for compensation is a slap in the face since it requires work to truly get the benefit. Those bogged down by work by Northern Ruins or otherwise or even personal life would not really get any benefit from the slots at all. He also claims that the privilege to do adopts when he chooses to do them is compensation ignoring the fact that creating the adopts in itself is work. The price of an adopt pays for the adopt’s creation. It does not pay for the cost of the assets done. It does not pay for the cost of the site. It does not pay for the time spent on work for Northern Ruins outside of the adopt.
But, these words are nothing without the evidence to back them up. Aug, we know you keep telling people your version of the truth. So, we will tell our truth with the evidence to back it up.
If you wish to know the truth behind the issue at hand, this link will take you there.
If any questions come up, feel free to comment on the linked sheet. Since some of the images may be small, it is recommended to view it in presentation format. Imgur links will be added later to ease reading. For the sake of not overwhelming people, please do not DM any party involved! Additionally, please do not harass Aug. Even if we have issues with him, we do not want to cause him unneeded trouble in that regard. To be transparent, this letter and the attached compilation of evidence have been created and curated by Yolk. In order to ease the reading process, I have been referring to myself in third person. Min has had a limited amount of input regarding this because they have been hospitalized and are still ongoing treatment. Further details regarding their personal health will not be given at this time to respect their privacy.
Thank you for your time in reading this.
〔Edit 9-May-2021〕
Steve from Gumroad finally learns to read.
"If you haven't gotten your refund yet, you purchased through Gumroad, and you are being ghosted or dismissed by Komugitsune, please email [email protected] directly to get your refunds. They will process the refunds for you."
‣ Gumroad is now giving out refunds!
---
! ! ! ONGOING BREAKING OF TOS AND POTENTIAL SCAMMING ! ! !
Aug is currently upselling several designs despite not adding to their value via commissioned work or through any other valid means.
‣ NotDamien's Statement on Sell Value of Designs
‣ SnorkMaiden's Statement on Sell Value of Designs
‣ Heelies's Statement on Sell Value of Designs
If you wish to keep track of what he is attempting to sell and to see if anything might have inflated sell values, the link to his trade/sell thread is below. If you find something that may have inflated value, please report it and make a comment on his thread about it so more people can know. If you wish to, you can also comment here and I will add it to the list here.
〈Komugitsune's Trade/Sale Thread〉
EDIT: Image Transcription of Slides
PDF Version of Slide (Note: this will not be updated as fast but will be updated alongside the original.)
〔Edit 3-May-2021〕:
I'm adding this edit here since Aug decided, in a relatively confusing move, to lie blatantly on his site about the situation. Considering that, the following links will be added for ease of access to emphasize what he has had a direct hand in. This has gone beyond an issue concerning former staff since it has deeply affected many people unrelated to the original grievances I wrote. I sincerely hope this will help open more eyes to the issue.
I will preface with two important links.
This form is to collect formal evidence against komugitsune (Aug). As of right now, we are prioritizing gathering evidence of financial malpractice in order to strengthen cases against him in PayPal and Gumroad. However, if you have evidence of him doing any unsavory acts, we welcome that as well.
〈Please share this twitter link on the issue.〉
I have been informed that the issue is not well known outside of TH so it would be wonderful if you can spread the word outside.
Please note for posterity that this was done in a midst of a spike in anti-Asian crime. Both Min and I are Asian. Threats of police, in itself, is not a joke. But threatening it in this climate is horrendous especially considering he knows both of our addresses as well as the addresses of many others.
‣ Min's statements against Aug's allegations
‣ Persistent lack of communication
I would like to note that Aug has still never attempted to directly contact me and has blocked me everywhere instead.
‣ Cutting off communication avenues
It has been documented that Rook has been aiding with refunds as well as trying to be an avenue of communication between Aug and everyone else since he refuses to communicate directly. Since they have been cut off, Aug has effectively decided he would rather not face the allegations against him. Aug seems to have been using them as a scapegoat for failed refunds.
‣ Proof of selling traced Picrew design
He sold this to me when we were still friends and he had the picrew image hidden.
‣ Chargeback issues as well as Aug's indecision regarding NR
I don't know why Aug doesn't seem to be settled on what will happen to NR. But I will note his waffling on it seems to correlate with his waffling on refunds.
‣ Proof Aug said despeciesing applies to Official designs
‣ Aug lying about refund issues
I, and others, have experienced this. Aug has repeatedly been trying to lie on paypal about "nobody" trying to communicate with him. He's blocked most people seeking refunds so the only avenue of communication is PayPal where he, again, seems adamant on lying.
‣ Aug blocking those requesting refunds
It should be noted this wasn't a chargeback but a formal request for a refund. Basically, chargebacks seem to be the only valid avenue at this point.
Rook it's good to move forward and learn. i can appreciate growth when i see it, especially as someone else who has very intense emotions and has had to learn to take a knee when applicable. being humble is hard, but worth it.
however, i don't believe this thread is a place to put your apology for that- it derails the conversation from the main point: aug's malpractice within the group and the aftermath he has left two peoples shoulders burdened with. it should be in a bulletin on your personal account, not here.
so, i have a long and unpleasant history with aug. i've never spoken about this publicly, only in private with friends, so i'm a bit nervous, but it's been something i've wanted to share for a long time. hopefully this is all coherent, it is very stressful typing this all out
none of these behaviors are new, and none are surprising to me. things started in 2018 for me
i was (and still am ) a member of the dainty cs community- i'm pretty shy and quiet, but i've been around for years. as such, i was aware of aug, though i hadn't spoken to him outside of brief messages to the group regarding official business like myos or edits. i liked his art, and knew some people who talked with him, so i had a neutral-leaning-on-positive view of him. as such, i felt ok sending him a message when an issue came up
for context- i have a severe phobia that can interfere with my normal functioning when it comes up. i've gotten it more under control, but 2018/2019 were some of the worse years for it. one of the main ways i deal with it online is by quietly blocking people who trigger it, but it was bad enough back then that even seeing their art could cause me to spiral. what happened here was, as i was going through the th activity page, aug had uploaded some art of one of his dainties. thinking it was cute, i clicked through to check out the character. when i did, i happened to see an art piece featuring aug's dainty and a dainty i had once owned and had recently gotten back. in the time between my owning it, it had been owned by someone who would trigger my phobia; i had removed all art by them on my end, but this piece was by that person and not in a gallery i had control over. while i don't have a screenshot of this, since it was 2018 and i had no idea it would spiral this badly, i do remember that the two characters were standing next to each other, not interacting, on either a white or transparent background. essentially two individual pieces sharing a canvas
i decided to contact aug to ask if he'd crop my dainty out, explaining that having art by that artist of one of my characters out there made me very uncomfortable. i tried to be polite, and was pretty apologetic in my message, but i wasn't especially scared- i reasoned that the worst he could do was say no
i was wrong
he accused me, a follower of his public profile on a public site, for encroaching on his personal space and essentially stalking him. there were no warnings written anywhere, and i wasn't authorized or anything, so it's not like i was seeing a character i wasn't supposed to see. i was just using functions of the site- seeing uploads as a follower, and clicking through on a character that i thought looked cool
in addition, this was our first (and, on th ) only interaction
i could understand that this was a nonstandard request. having heard good things about aug, i was hopeful he'd understand, but was prepared for a refusal. what i was not prepared for were the accusations thrown at me, or the fact that right after this he softblocked not just me but also my then-girlfriend, who had nothing to do with the situation. this pissed me off (my girlfriend being pulled in for no reason is what did it for me ), but i'm generally a nonconfrontational person, so the way i dealt with it was blocking him and moving on as best i could
unfortunately, this next part i don't have screenshots for. it happened in 2018 on discord. about a year or so back, i did try getting my discord history to see if i could find the chat, but it either wasn't there (because i left, or because it was several years old, or something ) or i was just unable to find it. but it does line up with known behaviors of aug that i'm sure there are screenshots out there of
in probably mid to late 2018, a mutual friend was urging me to make up with aug, saying it was a communication issue. at this point, aug had not only never made any attempt to apologize for acting how he did. while i did not know this at the time, aug had also been twisting my actions to make it look like i was entirely in the wrong and was being completely unreasonable- something which i only found out maybe a year or two later, and which actually persisted even until the current day. that's how much he twisted my actions when talking about me to friends and mods
(there are probably a few older convos about this i could find, but this was just the easiest one to locate, and shows that this, despite starting in 2018, has very much continued into the present day )
against my better judgement, i agreed to talk to aug, to hopefully clear things up and smooth things out. this is not how it went
when we entered a discord chat together, aug was flippant and rude. i was under the impression that because there was a mutual misunderstanding, this would be a mutual apology
instead, aug refused to take any responsibility and tried to make me apologize for everything. i decided 'screw that,' and removed myself from the chat and re-blocked him, because, again, blocking without confrontation is my way of dealing with things like this
fast forward to late 2019. the remainder of 2018 and 2019 was more quiet- while my issues were never resolved, and seeing aug as an active dainty mod caused me distress, for the most part i was able to continue as (more or less ) normal. this is where things got really bad
there were some more minor issues before this, but for time's sake and the privacy of other people, i'm skipping over them
this ties in with a very public issues within the dainty community. it was at this time that aug had stepped down as a mod- and then, several months later, the owner of dainties and another mod both put out public journals detailing the issues they had had with aug. this included aug publicly posting the full real name of one of them. this alone is a whole different ordeal- i do have a lot of the information saved (i took screenshots and saved images because to protect myself, i now always keep records of aug's doings ), but the gist is, on the owner's side, aug not finishing a pixel art commission and issues with refunds, and on the mod's side, aug (much like in the slides linked above ) barely contributing to prompt ideas or running prompts
my issue comes in with aug's public blacklist, the same one with a person's full legal name posted
this was my listing on the blacklist:
and this was me going through to my then-girlfriend, pointing out all the inaccuracies and straight up lies, while progressively becoming more upset:
keep in mind, i am a very small artist. i don't do commissions, i'm shy, i don't talk to many people, i have very little reach. aug was a mod of one of the biggest cs groups out there, and the creator of another large and successful cs group/arpg. i had no way to defend myself, and to this day, have no idea how many people read these lies about me and believed them. there will probably always be people out there who think i am an abusive stalker who attacks minors, which is incredibly upsetting
this also caused a rift between me and several friends who were mutual friends with aug- i felt paranoid and like i couldn't trust anyone. while these issues have lessened, they have persisted to the current day. i recently re-entered therapy, with one of the major factors being how badly i was panicking when seeing aug as a guest artist in species i participate in and that the mention of the month of aug could send me into panic attacks
i think to outsiders, some of this must seem petty and small. but keep in mind, these are all things i have been dealing with on and off since 2018. even when things were quieter, i still had (and still have to ) deal with continued anxiety and paranoia. things that i saw happen to other people, not just directly myself, also contribute- like seeing aug basically doxx another person. all i could think of was how glad i was that i'd never bought anything from him, so that he can't deadname or doxx me
none of the current behaviors shown in this thread are new. i have been dealing with this for over 3 years now, and unfortunately, will likely be dealing with the aftereffects for some time
Update on police intervention!
We're still going to be careful with our lifelines, however, we've contacted an ex of Aug that he alluded to having a restraining order again. It turns out this was false -- and others have come forward to say that it is likely only a scare tactic (Aug had likely assumed through the whisper chain that word of legal actions and the police would scare us, having plausible deniability if the people who he wanted to tell us these things being a he said she said situation.)
However, in this, we discovered a far more heinous crime he has committed which lines up with a few other things we have suspected him on.
TW: Underage dating.
hi everyone, i am doing a little better though i am taking it easy due to my health at the moment. i am no longer in the hospital itself, though in frequent contact with them and related specialists for further testing. thank you for all your kind wishes and support.
yolk has full permission to speak on my behalf and use whatever screenshots i provide to him.
he is in direct contact with me via discord, and i personally verify everything he says on my behalf before he posts.
i will slowly attempt to provide my own testimonies. i would like to, first, make clear what i removed/modified on the site upon my leave.
the following are all i have changed/removed:
- removed my personal extra css stylesheet
- removed an extra bootstrap menukit css stylesheet i paid for
- reset navigation bar to lorekeeper default
- removed my stylesheets, my fontawesome pro license, and extra coding from app.blade
- reset character pages to lorekeeper default (this regards files that include resources/views/character/)
- reset the dashboard to lorekeeper default, as well as removing my extra code blades for it (views/pages/_dashboard, views/widgets/_dash stuff)
- reset user profiles to lorekeeper default
- reset the footer to lorekeeper default
- removed all blades and pages related to the class system, which i planned, organized, and worked on entirely from scratch
- removing my custom secret page, which was used in an event (whoever found it first was awarded a free MYO slot that i paid with my own money)
- the mentioned custom pages i did above removed from the browse routes
- removed an extra bootstrap menukit css stylesheet i paid for
- reset navigation bar to lorekeeper default
- removed my stylesheets, my fontawesome pro license, and extra coding from app.blade
- reset character pages to lorekeeper default (this regards files that include resources/views/character/)
- reset the dashboard to lorekeeper default, as well as removing my extra code blades for it (views/pages/_dashboard, views/widgets/_dash stuff)
- reset user profiles to lorekeeper default
- reset the footer to lorekeeper default
- removed all blades and pages related to the class system, which i planned, organized, and worked on entirely from scratch
- removing my custom secret page, which was used in an event (whoever found it first was awarded a free MYO slot that i paid with my own money)
- the mentioned custom pages i did above removed from the browse routes
under the spoiler are my commit messages screenshotted directly from sourcetree in reference to above.
none of the above were compensated for in any way, shape, or form. nor were they under any contract. furthermore, i have left over half my coding intact on the site which includes backend work i did with migrations, controllers, apps, models, etc. despite what aug may possibly tell otherwise, none of this code belonged to him.
i have even left the code i paid someone else over $200 USD for with my own money (i am happy to provide paypal receipts if needed) on the site still (i.e. galleries, shop hub); as i had purchased this coding for NR specifically, i had deemed it NR's property.
furthermore, i paid for the site's domain name. i also paid for it's annual fontawesome pro license. as cheeriko confirmed in another post on this thread, i also paid for the toyhouse profile layouts.
i have even requested for my art assets and so forth to please be removed from the site, as have many other staff, but this has yet to be honoured and all our content still remains in use.
since the above removals, i have not touched the site except to aid yolk in setting up the public letter and link to evidence. this is easily removable by any person who has access to the admin panel. the following is a screenshot from my sourcetree, attempting to do a push to the site, to prove that i no longer have access to the site's coding and that aug has changed the user & password.
i would also like to make clear that the hours that are shown on the evidence slides only account for what was logged from december 2020 to april 2021. (we only started the staff hour tracking spreadsheet in december 2020, after i had brought it up with aug (who approved), and then i worked with another mod to get the sheet set up and running.) this does not account for the entire 3 years that i had worked at this ARPG for. additionally, i was initially hired for dA coding specifically - working on journal css and whatnot - before we ended up moving to a lorekeeper site since dA's eclipse update.
this means i was specifically hired for fairly simple frontend (html & css at most) work. and then i ended up basically going fullstack, as lorekeeper requires knowledge in html, css, js, php (laravel), and mysql databases. a note that when i began lorekeeper work, i had little experience in php; everything i know now has been entirely self-taught as i worked on the NR site in attempts to make the features aug requested be possible.
aug did mention wanting a site in the first few years of the ARPG. this was before the lorekeeper framework had even been announced to be in production. from this, i had assumed he was aiming for something much simpler i.e. a nice weebly or neocities site that could support lore pages and so forth. additionally, i am no longer entirely sure what his vision for northern ruins was. i believed he wanted it to be an ARPG, but he often referred to it as a pet site instead (which are two kinds of sites that i consider wildly different).
if there are any questions in regards to the coding section, what i have removed, how much i paid, etc - please ping me directly. i will gather whatever screenshots and evidence i can to support my claims, though i will likely only respond tomorrow-ish as it's my birthday and i'd rather not have to think about this situation at the moment.
Hello, this is to anyone who was looking to have a design voided:
I have been kicked from the moderation role of the DA group, so I am no longer able to approve them. If you have any questions you are welcome to DM me, but know that I am no longer able to officially approve these redesigns.
I know that this is not probably the best I can say about this matter here but, I want to still share my opinion about this??
I'm so angry and heartbroken about this situation (specially about min's situation). I've spent a few hours (i'm not part of the species or ARPG) on the site min was working on it (i believe??? unless i'm wrong about it) but I seriously cannot belive the masive work and love put on the site is?? Apart of the links that are getting me lil confused at first, but the main links still remains there.
Can I say that everything on the site is well executed, clean, beautiful?? and it's only the "little over half" of the codding???? excuse me???? I really wish i could see the site full coded or anything but I strongly believe that it was even more amazing and beautiful~
I'm very hurt as a graph designer/programmer by this whole situation since i know how hard work is to create a fuctionable ARPG site, this whole thing isn't easy and takes a lot lot of time and effort. Not even +$620 USD compensates all the work min did on the site. It's a complete steal and Aug absolutely abused it. Those kind of codding works are charged +$1500 USD (min) easily and it's not a one person work, it's usually a team work of professionals. I'm extremely amazed that min along with other people worked on the site with min's money. not aug. this seriously piss me off.
Yes, maybe there was no agreement for monetary compensations when applying for mod and it was "voluntary work" but once it starts with monetary investment for the growth of the species/ARPG, I strongly believe that at least the owner (aug) should cover up the expenses not a mod that applied for "voluntary work". This is a crime.
I've shared my opinion about mods (any mods of any species) with multiple servers and friends and I'll say it here because i think it would fit the situation. The CS/ARPG/Any art community's growth doesn't depend only because the owner, it's also because of the mods. Specially the hardworking/loyal/love mods who trurly love the CS/ARPG/community they are in. I strongly believe that Nothern Ruins grew so much because of the mods's work (specially min), and it really upsets me that all of this had to fall out because of the owner's abuse/no compensantion/ incommunication at all with their mods.
Anyways, my heart goes to those who were affected by this, I'm so sorry, ya all didn't deserve this situation a bit. And lastly I would like to applaud Yolk and Min for all the exposure/work both of you've done for years.
edit: fixed some texting, since i'm not an english speaker but hopefully i could express well~
Hi i was away for a bit and it seems a lot happened here
i havent had the focus to read everything yet but i will as soon as possible
but i wanna say please do not/stop sending hate to komugitsune. i mentioned it in my letter and i want to reiterate since it has come to my attention people have been sending him nasty DMs.
this helps no one. what we want is a resolution not a crusade.
following that, i have been in contact with Rook and they have said to contact them regarding any matters concerning NR including slots, despeciesing, etc. they also have specified that they will not help if you are rude to them