This interview was originally conducted by Jezaja’s Giant Secure Container in German and has been translated to English by the EVE University Communications team.

Some names in EVE Online stick with you for years. Just like Hideo Date, who I met at some point, unfortunately lost sight of and then suddenly found again. I asked him a few questions about his involvement with EVE University…

Jezaja: How long have you been playing EVE and in what area are you currently active? (PvE, PvP, Industry etc.)

That’s not so easy to answer. In November 2012 I started playing EVE for the first time (through somebody from my old WoW guild, who had been active in RAZOR). Then I was in two German corps for a few months. They were focused on industry and mining, which didn’t really appeal to me. I guess I also did a bit of missioning. But from the start I only had real fun with exploration – which I still really like doing.

Because of my vocational training and studies I had to leave EVE for a longer period of time. But I always kept an eye on its development and followed the news. In 2016, after getting my first job, I returned to EVE. This time I wanted to have more of a purpose rather than just get into any small Corp again. What I appreciated a lot in EVE was the internationally diverse community (in WoW I had played only on German servers). As I had heard many great things about EVE University over the years, it was clear to me that their mission is what I was looking for. Over the following two years after joining EVE Uni, I was increasingly involved in the cooperation. I focused mainly on PvP in various forms and eventually plunged myself into PR work for EVE Uni (later as Manager). After my return I did a bit of Alpha exploration, attended a few mining ops and resumed my path as an FC.

Shameless plug: every Monday 1800 EVE time you can watch my chill fleets live at twitch.tv/hideodate – in case you are part of EVE Uni, you can also join the fleet ingame. 

Now that I opted for Omega again, I will set forth on my journey to complete my long-term project. In the Uni we got several areas of operation and many teams that offer a variety of options to keep oneself busy. I want to fully experience that and show the whole process via stream, videos and blogging. I want to present our wonderful Corp culture, as well as our Cross Campus Initiative to the outside world – and get myself a neat medal while I am at it.

Jezaja: Why did you take a break from EVE? And what brings you back?

RL of course. I was busy with moving and job changes, so I wanted to take a few months off. That sadly turned into two years (it was a pretty unsteady time for me). But I always had it firmly in my mind that I would return at the earliest possible time. My parental leave was a good opportunity to finally come back.

Jezaja: What is your favorite ship in EVE?

If this was part of the one-word-interview, I had to go for the Rifter at the moment: a classic, beautiful design, great ship for basic Solo-, Gang- and fleet-PvP…and all my fleets are currently flown with them. But there are so many (naturally only rusty^^) great ships. I especially like the Stabber and Vagabond hull design wise. Both are great for PvP as well and the Vagabond is even fun to fly in high class abyssals and C3 Sleeper sites (or at least was, haven’t tried that again).

The epic One-Word-Interview 

• Which faction is the best?

Minmatar

• What’s your view on PvP?

Great

• Brawling or Kiting?

Brawling

• Triglavian or Edencom?

Edencom

Jezaja: You ensure that people at EVE University learn more about EVE. How many people are you actually reaching?

Phew, I don’t actually see myself like that. But essentially everyone in the Uni does this. EVE University is not a corporation where a few capsuleers teach others but rather a learning community, where everyone helps each other. I guess you are mainly referring to our classes. By the way: those are free to attend for anyone in New Eden. But that’s obviously just a small part of what pushes learning in the Uni and for the whole community forward. But if there is one person for me to point out as an outstanding individual contributing to EVE University’s mission, it would be our Teaching Director YooJin Moon. I did probe him about this question:

Within the ongoing year we already delivered about 150 classes and on average reached 20 people with each of them. Obviously it’s very much up to the subjects how large the crowd is each class attracts. Some classes are attended by 50+ people, but if only two or three people show up, there is time for one-to-one teaching 😉

Jezaja: How does planning for a lecture work?

It’s not that hard. Our wiki has helpful guidelines for anyone interested to be a lecturer (https://wiki.eveuniversity.org/Guide_to_Teaching_Classes) and you can rely on getting a lot of support from the teaching team, Management as well as logistics, if needed.

If you have some working knowledge about a topic, just put together as many notes as you need (I myself am more on the side of few to none, but I am also used to talking freely in front of RL classes). For the notes you can of course look up respective wiki articles of the topic. We had complete syllabi for some crucial topics in the past, but those are no longer updated and might be a bit dated. It’s vital that you have a solid structure and are prepared for possible questions.
We also have a library of slides that anyone can use and customise to hold the perfect lecture.

Finally the class needs to be planned in the calendar, as well as the forum and should be promoted. We have a dedicated channel on our Discord to ping for classes as well as the in-game “Class (EVE Uni)” channel. In the Comms team we try to stay on top of promoting all classes and public events on the EVE Uni Twitter.

As I said: this is no rocket science. And if you are doing an introductory class you won’t need to be a complete expert on the topic.

That’s why I encourage everyone: even if you are not in EVE Uni and have never taught a class, be daring! We are always on the lookout for guest lecturers who want to talk about their pet subject.

Jezaja: If I am interested in a topic, where can I find the appropriate class?

If you want to be actually in the class, check our calendar and look for the [CLASS] marker. Typically classes are planned a week in advance. To attend the class you should be in the ingame channel “Class (EVE Uni)” as well as on our public mumble.
If you just want to watch, you can also check out the live streams of many lecturers or watch their VODs. You can find out if and where the classes are streamed on the respective forum post. Furthermore you can find recorded classes in our library ).

Jezaja: An important topic is always the NEP (New Player Experience). It has gotten more extensive and a lot better with a double tutorial etc. What are your thoughts on it? Are other concepts, e.g. a mentor program maybe more useful?

If anything has been done to the NEP within the last two years, I can’t comment on it, unfortunately. The wide-ranging update back then, I have found to be very good. Sure, not perfect, but a huge improvement. And I think it’s impossible anyway to create a classic comprehensive tutorial for EVE, it’s just too complex.

Jezaja: What exactly are you envisioning with the mentor program? 

We got one at EVE Uni. But you are probably thinking of something for the whole community for every new player? Would be helpful – having a mentor is very valuable in EVE – but I can say, that it is not easy to organise.

Jezaja: You’ve been playing EVE for quite a while already. I always talk about the fact that the community “back then” somehow was more creative and engaged and community offers were better perceived. Have you noticed a difference between “then” and “now”?

As I described above: I haven’t played EVE actively for that long, so I don’t see myself as particularly competent to answer the question. I also only got to know the German community through a g-fleet meet and you. That’s why I can’t really say anything about the national community.  

Overall I’d tend to slightly disagree with that observation. Maybe the focus of the community has been shifted. Now there are more streamers and more content on YT. Those channels are becoming more and more successful. I am not sure what  other community offers you could refer to. Maybe there were more offers back then? I really couldn’t tell.

Jezaja: Any last words?

I’d be happy if the readers would drop by my stream at twitch.tv/hideodate. Every Monday 1800 EVE time I have a planned fleet, and I also stream whenever else I find some time. When I am playing EVE, I stream it if possible. So the streams are getting more diverse. 

I also recently created a website, where everything concerning my content can be found. I also started a blog there: hideodate.WordPress.com
Concerning social media, I am really only active on Twitter, there you can contact me @hideo_date. And last but not least I also have a YouTube channel on which you can find VODs and highlights from my streams. I also strive to create one original video per month, possibly in conjunction with a blog entry.

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