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How many politicians did we used to Pit for making lame half-assed apologies like that?
I haven't seen the Dope since I got banned, but it doesn't sound hopeful. (By the way, on Tuesday SkipMagic told me he had no idea whom I meant by "CRSP". Is that possible?)
There is a difference between "possible" and "probable".
;)
So... Brewha has a plate in his head?Quote:
Originally posted by NinetyWt
The SDMB used to be the first place I'd check when I get online, but now I think I'm done with it. Ed's "improving" the place straight into the shitter and it's depressing to watch. I'll be spending my time here and at Giraffe's place.
Hush, you! We don't want him to know. Mind control experiments and all that, you know.Quote:
Originally posted by Julie
;)
Here's hoping no one truly magnetic ever shows up.
Hmm. There's that whole airport-security-gate thing, too.
That his passive, businessese writing revealing that knows he fucked up and he's sorry about itQuote:
Originally posted by Excalibre
sucks
hairy
testicles.
[qiote]Yes, there are ways to express essentially the same thoughts without using the passive voice, if he had decided to rewrite the sentence.[/quote]
Yes, and they are active.
Using the active voice is how you own your actions.
And his decision to use passive meant that he didn't own his actions.
He wrote this:
It was weak. He would have done a hell of a lot better, looked a lot better, been taken a lot better, had he written this:Quote:
I wasn't intending to alienate the SDMB community, and to the extent this has occurred I deeply regret it.
That, along with a complete reworking of the communication line and some serious edits elsewhere, and I'd be back there posting.Quote:
I wasn't intending to alienate the SDMB community. Clearly, what I did alienated the community. I am very sorry people feel alienated and that what I did alienated them.
Instead of that, we get "this has occurred" and "I deeply regret it."
When we fuck up, do we ask for statements of deep regret, or do we say we're sorry?
It's an issue of word choice. He chose weaker, less direct language. And if that was not deliberate, he's a bigger idiot than I've given him credit for.
But he's done this before. It's a conscious thing. And he ought to know, if he didn't already, that it's infuriating.
And I am saying that his entire way of writing that attempt at an apology (there are no caveats or conditions in an apology; there is only the apology) bit.Quote:
He couldn't have used the active voice in that clause without totally recasting the sentence, as you did.
It needed to be recast entirely.
And his words were deliberate.
And he hasn't gone back to fix them, has he? Or has he let people tear him up for his absolutely grotesque, middle management "mistakes were made" writing?
The words he used, the order he used them in and the general tone (including passive voice) are my main issues with that nonapology, actually. So while it did not piss you off, please don't take that to assume that's not the case for anyone else.Quote:
At any rate, the passive voice is not what made his semi-apology irksome,
I expect people who fuck up to admit it, full-on -- to say they're sorry and not go all passive on me.Quote:
and I don't think he used it any more than one would expect in any similar stretch of written English.
That's why we differentiate between active and passive voice. That's why we teach the differences between active and passive voice.
When manhattan said something like "michael fucking masterson" in GD, he apologized. I still remember his words:
"I fucked up. I apologize."
Not hard.
Some of my complaints are specifically about the grammar. Yes. They are. I don't see how they could be otherwise.Quote:
The (legitimate) complaints you guys have about what he said are not grammar-based, that's all.
Grammar, from m-w.com:
Syntax, same source:Quote:
b: a study of what is to be preferred and what avoided in inflection and syntax
Inflection:Quote:
1 a: the way in which linguistic elements (as words) are put together to form constituents (as phrases or clauses)
What is to be preferred in inflection and syntax in an apology, by me and obviously others, is:Quote:
3 a: the change of form that words undergo to mark such distinctions as those of case, gender, number, tense, person, mood, or voice
1) Don't be a passive fucking weaner. You fucked up. Admit it. Use active verbs and the word I. Example: "I fucked up by coming down from on high and telling you you couldn't use the Pit as you've been using it for nine fucking years. Fuck me for thinking this. I'm a fucking tool, and I've come to my senses about this."
2) ... actually, that covers a lot of my bases.
All is forgiven. I still disagree that it wasn't even partly about how he said what he said, but we can rally together behind this while disagreeing furiously on language issues.Quote:
And besides, fuck him. He's a loser.
And a partridge in a pear tree?Quote:
Originally posted by Liberal
Don't know if this has been seen yet, but ... another apology from Ed.
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/...&postcount=130
Well, there is one glaring difference between this one and all the rest...
He said "I'm sorry".
From Ed's recent post:
Perhaps it's too late. I hope not. I would hate to see a board that has gone through so much, and of which I'm very proud, dissolve or diminish over something like this. I still think the SDMB is the best board on the Internet. Plenty of forums run by big media companies have crashed and burned; I thought we would be different. If it all goes south I'll have only myself to blame. I was stubborn and self-righteous and wouldn't listen. I'm sorry.
Got to admit I'm surprised to see him openly acknowledging that he may have killed his board.
I think it's funny that he thinks board criticisms will do better in ATMB. Also known as TubaDiva's House of Threadclosing and Lock-a-torium.
Well. Time will tell whether or not that will heal the rift.
I still think the whole way in which he regards the thing needs to be adjusted.
I was just about to post that link. I can't believe out of all the people who've complained, and all the people who have politely tried to explain our displeasure to him, that he picked me to apologize to. :shock: I mean, I know it was meant for everyone, but the fact that he was responding directly to me from my post to him. . . I don't know, I'm just gobsmacked, I guess. I have no friggin' clue how to respond.Quote:
Originally posted by Ice Wolf
At the end, yeah.Quote:
Originally posted by Suburban Plankton
And you have to wade through so much garbage to get to the end.
And I know I am not being overly picky because I learned about this kind of writing in college, where they first teach you to write incredibly long sentences and then -- maybe -- teach you how to write short, effective sentences. And as an editor, I wade through this crap from people who haven't learned, and they don't call him Little Ed because he writes concise sentences.
The first few, then, as an intellectual exercise (because his is the kind of second attempt at an apology you make as a first attempt BEFORE people have posted their goodbyes because you're a rake short of a toolshed):
I wasn't trying to tell you ... and I'm sorry I said or did things that made you think I didn't care if you left.Quote:
It wasn't my intention to tell you ... I deeply regret that I did or said anything that made you think I did.
I'm not sure I can say anything to get you to come back, but please let me try.Quote:
I'm not sure if there is anything I can say at this point that will change your mind, but let me give it a try.
I handled it poorly, but I was trying to get people to be nicer to each other, and I hope few of you would have a problem with that.Quote:
However ineptly I may have handled it, my goal throughout all this was one I think (or thought) few would quarrel with: I was trying to get people to be nicer to one another.
(HOWEVER INEPTLY? Yes, clearly having people TELL YOU THEY'RE LEAVING BECAUSE YOU FAIL requires some qualification of your ineptitude.)
Bonus coverage:
Oh, yes, we should all be very proud of when Dex wrote about Cristi's kids making garbage angels on the carpet.Quote:
I would hate to see a board that has gone through so much, and of which I'm very proud ...
Proud of that point where Ed let us all back in because P2P FAILED.
Proud of that nonupgrade upgrade.
Yes, very, very proud.
I will tearily confess to experiencing a near-toxic overdose of schadenfreude at this latest round of auto-intercourse by Zottie et al. I do not even care to think of how many manhours were poured into my contributions at the SDMB. The amount of selective moderating and outright abuse of privileges by the mods was appalling, to put it kindly.
When I confronted Zottie with the most egregious case, involving Ukulele Ike's meanspirited plagarising of over 1,000 words of my work with a 1% total alteration of content, he essentially told me to suck it up. I was banned shortly thereafter and only returned once to see if they migrated my "SDMB Art Gallery" thread, which they did not. To have deleted such a tremendous creative effort by the SDMB community told me all I needed to know.
I find zero irony in the hamfisted way that Zottie is killing what was once the most vibrant online community in Internet history.
Perhaps someone could satisfy my curiosity about Jenny's evidently monumental online gaff. I sent her a very nice package many years ago and barely received a response from her. I'll not visit the SDMB to find out so any explanation here would be appreciated.
Finally, major kudos to CRSP and all the moderators for creating a superb versimilitude of the SDMB in its prime.
Personally, I would wait until tomorrow - let things settle a bit. But that's just me.Quote:
Originally posted by Jill
Yeah, I closed that board and came back here where I feel more comfortable at the moment. I think I need a hug. This is really bothering me for some reason.
Not me. He'd have admitted being the real killer if he'd thought it'd have helped.Quote:
Originally posted by Oakminster
That was a business decision. That was him trying to inspire and uplift ("This place rocks!" "You were right; I've learned.") His sentences got shorter and more direct, and his verb and noun phrases were more direct.
I have to admit I was wrong. I did not think he was capable of writing that way -- that he knew how to be succinct and contrite.
No, he knows how to apologize. He knows how to write sincerely.
He just doesn't until he thinks it's beyond necessary. Not when it is necessary; after it was. Or maybe he didn't know it was necessary because he is frequently absent.
And maybe it'll help. And maybe it won't.
But he had his chance(s) with me, and with others of us, and he wasn't willing to do the obvious until he'd seen just how bad it was -- twice.
(Incidentally, I misread one part of his apology, so I should here note that I read "all of which I'm very proud" where he wrote "and of which I'm very proud." Shows me for scanning. I should have just stayed quiet.
And Zenster and anyone else, e-mail me -- sadpunk@gmail.com for a link to one person's account of the Stagemanager/TubaDiva issue. I can't promise it's all accurate, as I don't remember enough of what went down, but it should give you enough information so you can get an idea for yourself.)
Now he can show how much he really cares by dumping some moderators and bringing others back!
Just saw this from Skip in the same thread:
Mod Warning:
Quote:
This is ATMB, Tuckerfan, so please keep the insults out of it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Tuckerfan View Post
Time after time, however, we were patted on our heads, told we didn't know what we were talking about, and you jerks did whatever it was that you wanted.
Ed tries to make nice, at least as much as he can. Skip comes in to piss all over it.
Pretty funny, in a train wreck kind of way.
Well, I'm sure I just got myself a suspension, if not a banning. Too bad. I was hoping to go out in a blaze of fiery invective come Monday when I had plenty of free time to compose a half-way decent rant. Buncha douch bags.
We can all give you a hug, Jill. But that won't help. Know why? Because Ed's new improved apology with added bleach was designed to make you feel guilty. It's like the apology given to the beaten wife after she calls the cops and he's threatened with jail. He puts himself across as the new victim, and only the woman with the black eye can save him.Quote:
Originally posted by Jill
You don't need a hug, but a mild shake — so you can come to your senses and realize that yet another apology is still for the wrong thing. Ed is sorry that his empire is crumbling and that people don't like the new rules, when he's been told a hundred times that it is his heavy handed brutishness, as well as that of his staff, that's the problem. If he sucks you back in, then the next time is happens — and it will — you'll be right back in the same position: feeling bad about something you didn't do.
When he fires TubaDiva, Lynn Bodoni, and SkipMagic. THEN you can believe he's sorry.
I'm getting the same vibe as you. This is making me uncomfortable, too. I didn't want Ed humiliated; I wanted him to do the right things for the right reasons. This doesn't feel like victory; it feels like everyone lost. There is a feeling of desperation in Ed's latest post, and that is icky.Quote:
Originally posted by Jill
What would my response to this be? I think I would graciously acknowledge his apology, but not let him off the hook. This doesn't fix anything.
I wrote this take on the situation and Ed's apology on Giraffe Boards -Quote:
Originally posted by iampunha
Quote:
It took a lot to get me to this point, and I don't think there's anything Ed could say or do that would make me forget how he's behaved. This apology isn't a response to him feeling bad for his mistakes; it's a response to the consequences of his actions being more negative than he anticipated. It's about him feeling negative consequences, not us.
OK...I'll be getting banned for this one. Skip used his mighty mod powers to move my comment on his bullshit warning to make it look like I started a thread ATMBing him for it.
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/sho ... p?t=509549
My response:
Quote:
Originally posted by Oakminster
I agree with the guilt element, though I'd shy away from the domestic abuse angle. I think it was more that he really wanted us to see that he knew he'd fucked up.Quote:
Originally posted by Liberal
And because he's never done that, he had to be extra special sincerely sincere. Only it took him until the end of it -- maybe he realized he was still communicating largely the same way -- to actually get to what he should have said in the first place.
I disagree; I think the only point at which he will show he's truly sorry is when he removes himself from all decisions concerning the board.Quote:
Ed is sorry that his empire is crumbling and that people don't like the new rules[. ...] When he fires TubaDiva, Lynn Bodoni, and SkipMagic. THEN you can believe he's sorry.
As with a government, where changing the Cabinet is something but changing the leader is something else, changing the mods and admins is something, but unless and until you realize YOU are the problem, you're just inserting different people -- appointed by the same guy with the same judgment -- to do the same job.
Oakminster, I'd wear that banning like a badge of honor if I were you. Anyone want to lay odds on what Ed will do? 'Cause I'm betting he'll back Skip all the way on this. Here's your test, ladies and germs, if Ed ignores what Skip did, or comes out publicly in support of Skip, then it means that Ed was talking out of his ass when he apologized.
Oh, sure, Pun, he needs to step away. But do the other first. Dump the petty tyrants who will fill his void when he's gone.
From SkipMagic:
You can? Really? Is this true? Anyone know? (Should I start a thread in Cafe Society for a cite?)Quote:
(You can also call someone an "asshole" in a G-rated movie, but I don't think we'll be allowing that one, either.)
Jill, Featherlou, I'm with Liberal on this--Ed's playing the fucking victim in the drama that only exists because of his own bad decisions and actions. When you tell someone during every single step of the process of making fifteen sticks of dynamite that it's a terrible idea, when you reiterate that warning as the fool straps the homemade dynamite to a large rock and holler it one last time as you're running hell for leather while the fool lights the damned fuse you are the LAST person who should feel guilty when the fool is very, very, very, very, sorry he did it later on in the hospital. Of COURSE he's very sorry. Of COURSE he's terribly contrite--he fucked the dog and he knows it and I'd lay odds his corporate masters laid down the law, probably in a conference call telling him in no uncertain terms to "fix it, fix it, FIX IT." The crocodile tears are flowing copiously but I'm not buying a single one of them. Ed no doubt got the word this week that he's getting a pay cut and he might very well have been told that the pay cut could be about 95% higher than it already is if he doesn't quit fucking up a CL asset for no good reason. What the fuck kind of a media person does ANYTHING to reduce readership? What kind of a moron assumes that corporate suits of a bankrupt company are going to take it kindly when an employees ill-considered actions reduce traffic to a website? Nope, I think old Ed got an ass reaming and that's the only thing he's actually sorry about. Otherwise he would have, y'know, LISTENED to us when we told him that his words and actions were insulting and liable to drive us away--but his heedless, patronizing, dismissive attitude is much more his reality than this sudden volte face.
Too fucking little, too fucking late, Ed--you spineless cunt. :roll:
Not in any produced before 1983 or so, but Skip can blow dead bear cubs for all I care. I'm done with the Dope. I'm not even goingto bother writing the firey post I was planning on, since that might send traffic to the boards it wouldn't be getting otherwise. Feel free to let Ed & Co. know, because there ain't dick he could do now to get me to post there, save a large check.Quote:
Originally posted by Kat
The funniest line from the New Improved Apology was this:
"However ineptly I may have handled it, my goal throughout all this was one I think (or thought) few would quarrel with: I was trying to get people to be nicer to one another."
Nicer to one another? Nicer to one another? It reminds me of a radio talk show I heard in the 80s, when a woman called in to the atheist guest and declared, "You'll know the love o' Jesus when you're burnin' in hell!"
If Ed wanted us to be nicer to one another, he could have done two main things: (1) be nice himself, and (2) order his goddamn pissy mods and admins to be nice. Niceness would have sprung up like tulips.
This will not answer your question to the degree that a slimy fellow like Skip will shut his peanut butter hole, but http://www.filmratings.com/questions.htm (bolding mine):Quote:
Originally posted by Kat
Now, if Skip happens to encounter "asshole" (I quote that for what I hope is an obvious reason: the first parsing is way too funny) all the time off the board, that's one thing, but I kind of doubt the average parent of a 12-year-old is paying for their kid to hear someone say "asshole."Quote:
A G-rated motion picture contains nothing in theme, language, nudity, sex, violence or other matters that, in the view of the Rating Board, would offend parents whose younger children view the motion picture. The G rating is not a “certificate of approval,” nor does it signify a “children’s” motion picture. Some snippets of language may go beyond polite conversation but they are common everyday expressions. No stronger words are present in G-rated motion pictures. Depictions of violence are minimal. No nudity, sex scenes or drug use are present in the motion picture.
If you do start a CS thread on that topic, expect it to get moved to ATMB.
I also loved the part where he said that what drove him to "You can't tell a person to fuck off or ever invoke the mighty cock" was that he doesn't like seeing women called cunts.Quote:
Originally posted by Liberal
You don't like Exhibit A, so you go after Exhibits A-F. (Yes, the first item on the list is cunt, but everything else has to do with cock. Mmm, cock.)
I did not know we had an Iraq War strategist running the SDMB.
Now it all makes sense.
Honestly Jill, I think the only reason Ed singled you out was because yours was the last post in the thread before his. I'm pretty sure you shouldn't take anything more from it than that.Quote:
Originally posted by Jill
For some reason, reading Ed's apology made me think of Pippin's face in the Lord of the Rings movie after he makes all that crap fall down the well in the Mines of Moria: he knows he fucked up big time, but he really doesn't get it.
Um, yeah, I got a little heated about that myself. I'm not up on all the fucking pissy ass rules but I don't THINK I'll be getting banninated over that one... Then again, who the fuck knows?Quote:
Originally posted by iampunha
This would be hilarious, if it wasn't so sad. Ed makes what I feel is a sincere attempt at an apology and Skip jams in his Mod Cock and stirs everything up again.
Anyone is obviously free to ignore or criticize any or all of this, but it's not impossible, with some reasonable guesses and some basic psych math, to make a good guess at what happened:Quote:
Originally posted by featherlou
1) Ed responds to a polite and, one might say, pleadingly needy series of questions from the OP of the thread in question, who has (certainly compared to some of us) kept calm through this whole thing, and offers the first attempt at an apology. (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/sho ... st10913056) This attempt is semantically identical to most of the things he's said from time to time before when he's done what he's felt like doing and it's gone over horribly. He figures hey, it keeps on doing just enough, so we go with it.
(Of note: The effect of his responding to this post and not even saying "I hope this answers questions you and others have had" is to ignore the others -- the angrier ones, the ones mods have attempted to answer (Marley is to the SDMB as a Speedo full of rocks is to Michael Phelps). By doing this, he thus tries to redefine the beginning of the thread as being where he posted. It is the new focal point, he'd like you to think. Instead of inviting people to read the OP and get pissed, it invites people to think Ed has things under control, that he understands, that he's not some guy who checks his messages once a week. Pay no attention to the stuff Before Ed's Post.)
2) We tee off on Ed's lazy fastball, which was delivered with an attempt at all of the guile of Gaylord Perry making you think he's got something other than oiled-up junk -- but instead came with all the ferocity of that Rookie of the Year kid after he trips on that baseball with 20 minutes left in the movie. And Ed ain't delivering underhanded.
3) This part I'm not sure of. I don't think Ed's the kind to read all the responses to anything, even if there's only one response and it's his. So maybe an underling says, "Hey, you just poured gasoline on the fire, Mr. Zotti," or maybe Ed sticks around for an hour to see if it worked. It didn't.
4) He needs to do something before the cascade of people telling him he blew it convinces fence-sitters to leave as well.
But he can't respond to the angry people because there's nothing favorable to quote as his starting-off point. He has no reason to respond to folks like me, who call him out at length and give him no place to quote or save his ass. And I've already said goodbye, so he doesn't get the emotional lift (felt by people reading the thread) of Ed talking to someone and convincing them to stay.
He has to pick someone readers will believe has left him an opening. That there is no opening -- "I didn't leave because of the rules, I left because you're a jerk" (paraphrased) is of no consequence. What is of consequence is that he believes there is and he thinks he can paint a door on a wall and get people to reach for the handle as if they're looking at a door -- if that makes sense.
So he picks someone who has addressed him as a person. Someone with history. Someone who reminds him of the good times. Someone who, if you go back and look at her post, is a sympathetic figure. Someone who has not told him he's the biggest dick in dickland.
(That this person gave no opening, and that this person had no interest in this manipulation and is above his crap, is obvious. Had it not been Jill, it would have been someone else -- What Exit? or Fenris are two easy examples -- Ed would have wanted to take on this magical ride. And had there been no openings, he would have invented one -- by addressing the angriest part of the angriest post of someone who was going to leave. And he would have started it with language implying the person would be back to read it and ended it by saying something like "I hope you'll return to the SDMB so we can start over.")
And then he launches into his "no no no, I didn't mean any of it like this! I can explain! Things will get better! See, I just don't like seeing women called cunts. All that other stuff was just ancillary, and I didn't think it would happen, and I'm sorry it did! I'm sorry!" bidniss.
Because he thinks it will work.
Not because he necessarily means any of it.
In fact, I don't think he does. Look at the sentence length, verb/noun phrase size and word choice of the first four words of the first paragraph -- "It wasn't my intention" versus the length of the first four words of the last paragraph -- "Perhaps it's too late."
He's gone from a nominalized (turned into a noun) subject -- one third of a clause -- to a complete sentence. And I am probably boring everyone here but Lib (because I have a feeling he has not so much topics he isn't interested in as topics he hasn't considered recently), but this is relevant because every word he types is carefully chosen.
He has to LOOK like he's learned a lesson. He has to LOOK desperate. He has to LOOK like he's so flustered that he's resorting to short sentences. (If he'd actually learned it, the smooth language of the first paragraph would be gone, and the whole of it would be fairly short sentences, maybe with a few in-sentence transition words.) But he hasn't. His sentences are long, his clauses are long, and he's not using the language of the emergency -- "Call the doctor!" "I broke my leg!" "The Internet is down!" (Separate situations, for the confused.)
But if he's not flustered by the tone and content of Jill's post and my post and Fenris's post and the whole last week ("things have been hectic"), ain't nothing in what he's written previous to those last few paragraphs, and especially the last one, that's going to take him there.
5) See if that works.
So far, the responses to the actual apology have been much better, from Ed's perspective, than the responses to the attempt were. This is partly because they were fairly quick to the punch (before the elements of the apology were as obvious) and partly because the apology was substantively different from anything Ed's ever posted before.
So it looked like Ed was sincere in his desire to change.
Hell, maybe he is.
But I'll believe that when he's sincere and contrite when the board isn't about to burn to the ground.
And I'm sorry this is so ridiculously long, but message board software doesn't allow for cut tags. And again, I could be off about everything here. I just see a lot of conscious and unconscious elements at work here that make this anything but sincere.
If the Skip thread turns out to be my curtain call, at least it's funny.
Some cunt named Ed. Or maybe SkipMagic, if he's hoping he'll get a promotion for playing Bad Cop during all of this.Quote:
Originally posted by SmartAleq
I just posted this exchange (from December) between me and Ed on the SD:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/sho ... tcount=211
I hope it's my final post there, but I may have more spew to unload. Congrats to those who've kicked the habit completely.
I'm really having to bite my tongue over this Skip bullshit. This, this is exactly the reason we need to be able to Pit the mods. Glad, I'm not drinking tonight or I know I'd be banned by now.
Fantastic. Here's how I read his post:Quote:
Originally posted by prr
"You're exaggerating when you say that a lot of people will leave if we don't put The Pit back the way it was, but let's suppose a bunch of people came and said they wanted The Pit to be fair game for anything, which nobody in this or any other thread has ever seriously suggested.
If a bunch of people wanted to do something your post didn't even sniff at suggesting, I'd tell them to walk.
So there. I answered your supposed exaggeration with one that should show you how much I respect dissenting opinions."
That about the size of it?
Yeah, pretty much what I got out of it. That's what has driven me off, the "If you don't like it, get the hell out" attitude.
Yes, though my amazement is even greater that Ed explicitly noted his eagerness to scuttle the SD and take a job at McDonald's before he would consider changing his position. He was, to my mind, trying to stifle dissent from the get-go by letting us know how futile even the most powerful objections we could offer were.Quote:
Originally posted by iampunha
Now that he's seen what even mild objections lead to, he's changed his tune.
Does the phrase "schoolyard bully" ring a bell? "I'll take any punishment any of you weaklings here could ever dish out. I'll beat you up one at a time, or all together, you pathetic wimps!" [Little girl comes up and slaps him across his face.] "WAHHHH!!! I'm sorry, I didn't meant it. Please stop hitting me!!"
This one is much better.
Yeah, Q.E.D, I almost had a warm, fuzzy feeling until Skip fucked it up for me. Nothings going to change.
That's the apology we've been talking about, QED. The "I'm the real victim here" apology. The "I just wanted to make everybody play nice" apology from someone who played like a mean and cruel bully, declaring that if 20,000 people wanted to leave, he wouldn't care. The "If you come back, I promise not to hit you anymore" apology.
It was all about what he didn't mean to do, not about what he did. It was about "mistakes", not deliberate actions. It's about racing to the high ground to stake a claim, with "Gee, it breaks my heart that people are leaving," when he's already said, "Go. See if I care."
It's the apology of a weasel who isn't doing any staff changes or any changes of consequence to make things better. I imagine he's humiliated by having to take even a conciliatory tone. And once he's gotten people back, that tone will disappear to the void from which it came.