Earlier this year Mitchell S., also known as "Kuja" online, decided to take his own life. Beforehand, he posted about overwhelming issues and the option of suicide on a few Internet forums (including GameFAQs.com and MetalGearSolid.org). MetalGearSolid.org members pleaded with him not to commit suicide for hours. A little later, he posted this.

"I made madethe decesion I'm sorry. I lied to ylou, Dorry I had to doo it, Sklep to 10. Manged to clean up sum pukce. dorry. soor. hwlp is. a [knock. i dnt twat it. lov yuaall."

After which, Mitchell went missing from the forums. Members of the MetalGearSolid.org board looked for any information about him, and eventually contacted Mitchell's parents via telephone. The worst assumptions turned out to be true. News was given to the community, and a memorial to the passed member was put on the home page of the site.

A few days later, the administrators of the Metal Gear Solid website were notified of a government agency looking into their site and that it would be shut down until further notice.

News sources such as Yahoo! News and CNN picked up the story from AFP--an international news agency. After reading through the widely distributed article, users of MetalGearSolid.org were confused. The article misreported many things including, but not limited to the following passage:

Named as Mitchell S., the gamer switched on his web cam and swallowed a large amount of motor antifreeze and pills after complaining about family problems and a lack of money, forum administrator Boyan Georgiev told Bulgaria's BGNES news agency on Wednesday. Other forum members thought the man nicknamed "Kudjo" was joking even though he rambled for six hours about the effects of the substances and disappeared from view several times.

After he failed to appear at regular meeting spots, gamers went to his home and learnt he died in hospital on January 7.

To start, the story of the suicide is inaccurate--according to the administrators' account of the tale at no point was "Kuja" on a web cam. Nor were there any "meeting spots" or any physical visit to his home. As well, the credited administrator "Boyan Georgiev" is the head of "Max Effect," a design firm the web designer for MetalGearSolid.org is employed by, not an administrator of the involved website.

The loss of any life is tragic, but what complicates this tale is the lack of journalistic integrity on the part of the press. People who tried to talk him out of the suicide are now cast to the mass public as a group of callous individuals. This sort of misreporting not only runs the name of a singular community through the mud, but also the hobby as a whole. Administrators have contacted AFP about a correction to the story, but no reply. One can only hope that someone in the media steps up and takes responsibility for this mockery of journalism.