Pink Poogle Toy Forum

AySz88, you are really trying my patience, I can't do with you talking down to us like you know anything that goes on in Neopets HQ. You're going on as if you know what they think and have expressed this. They haven't and you know nothing more than the rest of us, yet you carry on with this feeble attempt to make us look stupid for merely discussing a bad situation and trying to come up with a solution. Your "jargon" only told us the same as you said earlier, "Live with it or shut up". Please don't insult our intelligence further.

If all you have to argue against us is to tell us you think our attempts at changing things are useless, then it's not an argument. You're practically telling us what to do and second guessing the outcome in the process. You've totally gone off your original effort to prove that it's not a privacy issue and are now shooting down everything we say with comments like:



I honestly don't see how my point of view will affect anything. They will either change it, or they won't, it's nothing to do with my comments and doesn't change my opinion on the matter.

Please don't repeat anything you've said. I've found it increasingly hard to understand your point and don't wish to be told to give up yet again.

I don't know from where you're getting anything like "Live with it or shut up". Since you don't want me recasting my posts to make my point more understandable, at least try to comprehend what I've written instead of putting words in my mouth.

edited to add:



I don't think you really mean this (since it would contradict what you wrote about trying to come up with a solution - which, again, I'm not discouraging). But if you do think this, then fine, but please don't get in the way of people who think otherwise and are trying to do something constructive.

I just want to say, I second everything you said! Very well thought out and put together!

(I was going to edit this in again, but since there's been an intervening post and it doubles the length, I'll just make it a new post...)



I think it was made pretty clear that it's not really a privacy problem, and that going into a moral panic over privacy isn't going to do anything. I'd like to think we've moved past that, towards the real problem and its solutions.



If you read my last post, you'll see where TNT indeed showed exactly what they were thinking. And I've done work with fairly sensitive websites - I help with our Comp Sci Department's Course Management System - so I'm pretty read up on access control considerations. So in fact, I'm pretty sure I know what they were thinking, thank you very much. Trying to call BS doesn't work when it's not BS.

I don't really see it as an intrusion of privacy. All it does is let you know when someone is online, which would mean, what? You can be sent neomails, occasionally, that you might have received regardless. Oh, a neomail has appeared in my inbox! Let me ignore it. Any suggestions that it could provide a gateway to crimes against children (racking my brain for a word, heh) are to be honest, ludicrous. I don't see any realistic way in which this feature could have these implications. I really don't see what everyone's problem is.

Guys - cool it. This is not the place for heated discussions.

I agree with Pixa. I miss the old feature because I could quickly tell if my friends where online the same time without logging on msn.

[quote="Pixa"] Any suggestions that it could provide a gateway to crimes against children (racking my brain for a word, heh) are to be honest, ludicrous. I don't see any realistic way in which this feature could have these implications. [/quote]

I don't quite think it's ludicrous. I've been bothered for years by the fact that all anyone has to do to find out another player's age is to request to be their neofriend. The name appears in their list of neofriends immediately along with the age, even though they haven't been accepted yet. I'm not certain if they would also appear in the box on the left of the screen, but if I were a parent with young children playing neopets are would be *really* bothered by it.

Just a heads up. Premium members who choose stealth are back on the Neofriends module. My friend and I, who are both premium and both stealth, are showing up on each others' Neofriends modules. So, those of us who are paying for Neopets thinking we are getting the stealth feature that Neopets touts as a feature are not getting it whatsoever. Invasion of privacy for which I am paying. How nice! Why did they take it away and then bring it back? Why not give us the option of choosing those Neofriends that we don't mind sharing this info with? Such as only our VIPs?

I don't see why people who pay should have their privacy protected, if that's what you want to call it, while others who do not have not got this option. If you really believe this is an intrusion of privacy, surely it should be a feature for everyone on the site? I don't see why people should have to pay money to protect their status, if the feature is available at all.

I agree there may be problems marccaty, but the module is in no way a gateway for these.

I think Morningstar is more upset about the fact that the Premium Package comes with a Stealth feature which is a big attraction for many people, however, the Neofriend module effectively ruins the point of being stealth as all your NFs can see you online anyway. Part of what the Premium Members pay for is the "Stealth" feature, which isn't Stealth at all.

I think the best option would be to have a set up somewhat like

- On your user preference page, there is an option "Display the time I am online for", which you can toggle on and off.
- In the Neofriend module, there is a drop down list with 4-5 options such as "Display Online" "Display Offline" "Display 'Restocking'" "Display 'Playing Games'" etc which you can switch between.

I say what I do because when I signed up for Premium, Neopets boasted about Stealth being a feature that was for Premium users only. So those of us who paid a monthly fee could go online without anyone knowing when we were online or the last time we were online. So, if TNT enticed people to join Premium based on this feature, then they really cannot take it away from those of us who pay for the site without some type of notice and without offering us a refund of the money we paid in advance for their services. It is a legal term called reliance. Those of us who paid for Premium have a contract with them. We pay and they provide services in exchange for our payment. So, if they claim to have certain features and a person agrees to pay them because they want that feature, then they are "relying" on Neopets to provide that feature once the contract has been performed (in other words, when the user has paid their money). So, they are not allowed to take away that feature without some type of notice and without offering an option out--and a refund of money paid in advance for services. And if they aren't careful, someone might be tempted to sue them for breach of contract. And might do so just to make sure Neopets realizes that they cannot do this to paying customers. Paying customers have rights that non-paying customers do not have. And that is because there is a contract between the two parties. A contract that does not exist when a user isn't paying anything in return to play the site.

What is acceptable to one, may not be acceptable to another - this thread has shown that.

Some here like to be seen at the exact moment they sign in to Neopets and don't find it intrusive for Neofriends to see how long you have been on for (even though the feature is not accurate), but for others (myself included), we find it an intrusion of our privacy and don't want the feature. At the moment we have no choice but to be seen by neofriends and to see our neofriends as they pop in and out of Neo.

TNT gave Premium members the Stealth Mode as part of the package that we PAY for - if it is taken away, TNT are reducing what is in our package but we still pay the same amount. Most Premium members use the Stealth Mode and that is our right within the terms of the contract. We should not have to defend ourselves for something that we pay for.

Basically until TNT introduced the Neofriends module, there was no problem, so instead of taking away Premium members priviledge, TNT should be taking away or modifying the cause of the problem.

And as far as I am concerned, it is an invasion of privacy. Once upon a time, I worked for a boss who also played Neopets. Once we found out that both of us played the same game, we had a chuckle and became Neofriends. I no longer work for him. But if I did, I wouldn't want him to know that I was playing on my lunch hour--on the company computer. Not that doing so is against company policy or anything like that, just that I wouldn't want him to know. And because it appears that the Neofriends module is inaccurately reporting hours played, I wouldn't want that same boss to think I was online playing Neopets when i was actually doing real work and due to some stupid glitch, Neopets hadn't logged me off of their system.

Another example: Some of my competitors are my friends. People who are in my guild. And because they are in my guild, I have no choice but to make them neofriends. I would rather they not know when I am online because then they know to look at my shop and lower their prices by 5 points.

And the scenarios could go on and on. The fact is that I paid Neopets thinking I would get to be stealth. And now I am not. And I am half tempted to prove to them that this is against the law. That you can't do this sort of thing to paying customers. Not if they told me something to the opposite when they got me to give them my credit card number. This isn't the old Neopets where we had no choice but to do whatever they told us to do. Because the site was free. There is a large portion of people who now pay to play and TNT needs to respect that. And remember what they told those people in order to get them to sign up. And maybe run it by their legal staff before deciding something that goes against the legal contract they have with their Premium players.

And thanks, TDG, you knew exactly what I was trying to get across in my first post about this latest change. Your idea about toggling the module on and off is a great idea. And Daze, you made some excellent points and added such weight to my argument. ((hugs)) They are going to hear from me. And I better get something more than an auto-generated neomail back from them.