You did nothing for the charity though. Your addition to the bundle is just free advertising for you as you didn't actually put up anything of value into it. You're backpacking on a charity for the advertising.
Now that you pointed it out, there is a lot of free stuff in it. Thanks for making filtering all the stuff in the BLM and palestine bundles easier
Viewing post in To the Palestine Aid Bundle Supporters! comments
It sounds like you feel very strongly about both of these causes - we're very much on the same side, there. I can understand the frustration that could come seeing free games in a charity drive, especially one so important, and thinking they add nothing of value. What makes you think that I haven't done anything for the charity, however?
I decided to add my work early on, when the call for games was first released long before it became the huge success it ended up being, because I wanted to increase the amount of voices in the cause and make a statement: I, and anything I create on my own consequently, stand behind Palestine's freedom.
To that end, I made sure to see if demos were allowed in as it's all I have to offer on itch - all I had to offer since 2017 until last December, when I had to make the full game paid in order to afford my own medical bills.
It's been part of the bundle since, even though there's been nothing to gain from keeping it in up other than the constant stream of people who would assume it was done in bad faith. Do you think it would have made any difference to my online presence if I had asked the itch.io staff to remove it after that, other than make my life easier?
I've been on top of developments these last two years, doing everything in my hand to uplift Black Lives Matters and the Palestinian cause. I have bought these bundles as well hoping to be a grain of sand in a mountain and make some change, like everyone else. That's why I added years of my own work to the bundle, to stand strong by my resolution on this matter.
I want your honest, opinion - how would any of us removing our contributions, free or otherwise, improve the bundle for you?
How am I supposed to achieve that? I don't have any PR team or Community Manager beyond myself as I'm making this game on my own. Replying to every single accusation of bad faith over these last few months takes hours of my own time that I could have spent in developing the game further - in which way is agreeing with the people who insist I did this with bad intent showing ethics on my part?
Intent really doesn't matter here. What matters is you, and everyone else who did it, profited off of a charity.It's more the site fault really for allowing it in the first place, but that doesn't absolve you, or others, of taking advantage of a charity. That's enough reason for me to ignore any free content in these bundles.
Sorry I was more aggressive than necessary. There are more at fault than just you and I shouldn't have jumped on the first person I saw. Your post at the top of your page caught my attention and was the only reason I found out about this.
Thank you for your patience in talking to me, regardless. I still don't really know how to move forward with any of this, but I'm thankful that you helped me gain some insight into how this comes across months after it happened. I'll be seeking advice from game industry seniors on what their thoughts are on how to proceed.
I hope that you have a wonderful day and a wonderful rest of your week
I think a donation outside of buying the bundle would be nice, but I'm not necessarily the best person to ask about it. I'm just one person and I'm sure you got more than one other interested in your game. I know advertising can be very difficult.
Most charities get into quite a bit of trouble if they just let people do that without some sort of mandatory minimum donation and I found nothing about it on the submission rules. I should have contacted the website with my grievances and not jumped so quickly on someone. It was entirely unfair of me and I really do apologize(am canadian).
I hope you do too.