Sean Smith, one of the four Americans killed last night at the consulate in Benghazi, was a long-time player of EVE ONLINE and a beloved member of that game’s player community. A devastating eulogy on The_Mittani, as well as a testament to the power of online gaming social networks:

I’m clearly in shock as I write this as everything is buzzing around my head funnily and I feel kind of dead inside. I’m not sure if this is how I’m supposed to react to my friend being killed by a mob in a post-revolutionary Libya, but it’s pretty awful and Sean was a great guy and he was a goddamned master at this game we all play, even though a lot of people may not realize how significant an influence he had. It seems kind of trivial to praise a husband, father, and overall badass for his skills in an internet spaceship game but that’s how most of us know him, so there you go.

UPDATE 2:20: Another eulogy, this time from Chris Peterson of the MIT Center for Civic Media and a friend of Smith’s from Something Awful’s discussion boards.