There’s a term in business circles called the Osbourne Effect. For those not around in the 1980s to experience it first-hand, the story goes:

The name comes from the planned replacement of the Osborne 1, an early personal computer first sold by the Osborne Computer Corporation in 1981. In 1983, founder Adam Osborne pre-announced several next-generation computer models (the “Executive” and “Vixen” models), which had not yet been built, highlighting the fact that they would outperform the existing model. A widely held belief was that sales of the Osborne 1 fell sharply as customers anticipated those more advanced systems, leading to a sales decline from which Osborne Computer was unable to recover.

Sound familiar?

One can see the parallels between Osbourne and CCP’s handling of Dust 514. Immediately after the announcement of Eve:Legion, I noticed a noticeable drop in active players, and a corresponding spike in bitterness.

Damage control on the forums didn’t work, neither did gifts. It’s ridiculous that damage control even needed to be applied, since the CPM is on record as warning CCP about the sensitivity of the announcement for five months, but were overruled because :fanfest:

In short, this announcement was poorly announced, poorly prepared, and smacks of interference from other departments inside CCP, to the short- and long-term detriment to Dust’s bottom line.