I agreed with him, not only because I have friends who are very fond of the man who once ran TOR, but because I am acquainted with him and it seems unlikely this is a policy he would allow to be promulgated through his company. It is a large publishing company, after all, and they were only one (possibly two) employees. When the Nielsen-Hayden’s first began to cast false accusations on their personal blog, Making Light, Larry Correia made it very clear that we could not blame all of TOR Books for their behaviour. This is what is happening right now with TOR books. Because when a person using their real name, which can easily be tied to their workplace, starts to cast slurs on their own colleagues, not to mention large sections of the business’s client base, that can reflect very badly on their employer.

And this situation is why most reputable companies have policies in place about the use of social media. On occasion, though, we are not dealing with a lone individual, but one that is tied to a corporate identity. Personally, I find it unkind to taunt the mentally ill and don’t stoop to pillorying their personal lives). This is disturbing and upsetting, but it is easy enough to avoid this kind of behaviour if you want to (and some like to troll-bait. One person starts screaming and frothing at the mouth, and others are drawn like moths to the flame to scream along with them. Imagine, if you can, standing in Grand Central Station and screaming slurs at the top of your lungs, while the sane people standing near you back away slowly. The internet is a vast and mostly public arena. Almost since the advent of the internet, there have been warnings about what to say – or not – on it.

Boycott tor books