Makoto_the_Phoenix

I'm on a shorter schedule this Sunday than I'd like to be, but I read through the third article. Very well written. It doesn't provoke any new thoughts in my mind, as we all grow out of our sense of euphoria of any game, but it serves as a reminder that there will be a time to leave RuneScape.

At Runefest: "Jagex, what are you doing to stop autotalkers and bots?" "We go in game and mute them now." *shows pictures and videos of JMods doing just that* "Didn't you say like, four years ago, that this was ineffective and one of the reasons you needed to remove Free Trade/Wilderness?" "..." Well, the argument that's being made is that they're doing something. It's just that this something isn't enough. :|

Here you go, jumping to conclusions. There's nothing saying that, before those movies were ever made, that he didn't go around and try and report those bots. Again I can only speak for myself, but every time I felt like someone was botting, I sure would report them. It's just that, when faced with more than 1,000 of them per server per hour, it's untenable to report them, and unreasonable to ask any one volunteer to try and take it on. Even if it's a slice of that, it gets unreasonable after a while. Not to mention. You've conveniently glazed over the point I made earlier - any player, regardless of if they're a PMod or regular player, can only refer the name of the account to Jagex, and hope that Jagex believes they're botting. So honestly, it's not a matter of a PMod not doing anything about the situation, it's that they're woefully under-equipped to deal with this problem. So you do expect Player Moderators to report everything they see, even though flooding the report system (despite it being for a good cause!) would do more harm than good. Okay. I won't try to convince you otherwise any further. For the most part, I don't believe I was upset or angry with Jagex that he was demodded...it's well within their right to do so. However, it paints Jagex in a pretty shady light. It conveys retaliation against someone that they championed when a major point was brought up to the community. It also means that, if you disagree with Jagex's policies publicly as a moderator of any sort, you can expect to be retaliated against as well. It doesn't make the Moderator communities feel very good about voicing their concerns with the rest of the player base, who they are said to be a part of as well. So that's all, really. I'm kind of tired debating the issues here, since it seems they may be dragging the thread off topic. If you want, we can finish this in PM.

What the hell do you expect of Player Moderators? Are they required to report every rule breaker they suspect? I can see your logic but it's flawed; no, Player Moderators have to draw a very clear line as to how much they can and cannot do before they start spelling "check" with a 'q'. I never said I didn't want to. I said that the clause existed so I didn't have to. The clause exists so I didn't have to stop enjoying a Corporeal trip to report four or five rule breakers, and have them come back 10 minutes later. I've already addressed the "cautious" point. Please re-read my earlier post. I'll address your third point more directly later, although it blends in nicely. You've mentioned "responsibility", and for the most part I agree. However, it really boils down to how you view Player Moderators. Speaking only for myself, I volunteered because I wanted to make a difference. This was only to find out that most of the efforts made by myself and others like me were, for the most part, thrown under a bus with internal changes, as well as the Wilderness + FT update. I'm not saying that not reporting them was the right thing to do, and if it seems that I advocated that then I apologize for the confusion. However, it's merely the option of the moderator - if they don't want to, then they shouldn't be forced to. Again, it boils down to how you view Player Moderators. Lastly, and this is important - reporting bots is a bit of a hodgepodge. How can we prove that this person is botting beyond a shadow of a doubt? All we can do is refer the name to Jagex, and they have to look into the matter, and if they determine that they're not botting, that's all that can be said about the matter. Period. Ultimately the decision with who's botting and who isn't lies with Jagex. Players and Player Moderators alike have no other power to thoroughly stop botting, like the community - and yourself - expect them to. No, I asked the right questions. I genuinely want to hear from you [in PM if it derails the topic] what you expect from Player Moderators. But keep in mind, these are people that have jobs, college obligations, families, or something outside of 'Scape going on. I agree that they shouldn't air their own, personal dirty laundry for the world to see, but this is the oft-misinterpreted-as-blurry line between whining and whistleblowing. Then again, what could have been done? As I said above, referring the name to Jagex is all that any player can do, period. Displaying their names in a video doesn't give Jagex "proof" to take action against the alleged botters, but it does shed light as to what appears to be happening with the amount of bots in-game. If Jagex, who claims repeatedly to have systems in place to detect cheating, could do so automatically, then reports from players serve merely as a placebo, to give the feeling that something is done. Problem is, unless you're a JMod, you can't do much better than that placebo effect.

You should realize that I'm not making excuses in the least. Fact of the matter is, regardless of if I've got a crown in-game, or a green background on the forums, some days I just want to play the damn game. That's why a provision such as "you don't have to report" exists. It's also one of many reasons why I ultimately left the team - there's so many problems going on with the game that it's difficult or impossible to tackle alone, and my time would be far better served blowing off steam at Castle Wars or on a Slayer task. Hell, Jagex wasn't paying me to play rent-a-cop for the year that I was there. Was there a problem with me willfully playing the game instead of dedicating 6 to 8 hours of my week just to fix an epidemic which Jagex said they could handle on their own? It's also true that multiple false reports does get your account flagged. If a PMod went around reporting everyone they saw, that'd raise some eyebrows. I say it's happened before as I've known player moderators, previously disenchanted with the system, try and report every bot they saw - but that wound up costing them their crown. But perhaps it boils down to what you do and don't know about the Moderator team. There's a lot that can't be said about their procedures, or how they handle situations, but in reality, this comes out with the reporting habits and their optimistic outlook on the community, or lack thereof. Then again, I want to know how you view the moderator team. What are they do you? Are they the community's personal watchdog? The police before the police? Or are they inadequately equipped to deal with a problem that is, technically and realistically, out of their jurisdiction?

I remember saying something similar back in March. Only problem is that change is resented. :| If the fundamentals change, the game changes, and you have yet another fragmented fanbase.

Mods do have their own forums to post in but I honestly found talking about anything controversial in those forums to be useless. It usually ends up in ridiculous arguments and fights between other mods/mentors then a J-Mod usually locks it up. There is more merit to writing up a thread and having it being discussed publicly with the community to get everyone's input. I didn't bother reporting any of the bots because it is an ineffective means of dealing with the actual problem. There were times where I would go on those bot busts with J-Mods and other P-Mods and report bots, but what's the point when they come back just as instantly as they get removed? I filmed them not because they weren't aware (everyone is aware it's a problem) but to show the extent of damage that bringing back FT/W had on their players. I'm glad that not everyone displays your attitude of 'doesnt matter if I dont report, another will be along in a minute'. Pschoqueen pretty much summed up your attitude to this whole thing in disregarding any form of responsibility. You took a disregard to your responsibility to your role as a pmod and representative in the way you did what you did and you thought there'd be no consequence. You deserved the boot. This statement is flawed, but we can start at the beginning. It is not irresponsible to simply not report something. It is, and always has been optional to report any player, for any reason, at any time. The fact that he didn't report the bots isn't a testament to him slacking off or not following his "duty" - first, as I've stated above, it's an option to report someone. Second, the notion is for you to report every bot you see without giving Jagex the impression that you've been hacked or are abusing your power. If you were to report every player you saw that you thought was botting, only to come back have have a third of the reports return true, then that'd give them circumstantial evidence to re-review your account. And yes, it's happened before. I suppose now this is a matter of how the PMod role should be viewed. Are they nothing more than automatons that report every wrongdoing that they see, or do they expose the wrongdoing in another way? Reports don't seem to be effective, and the volume of them would overwhelm the poor few guys handling the reports anyway, so I'm really not sure what you want. If you want the PMod team to literally go around and report every bot that they think they see, then those people would be paying Jagex to work for them. That's ass-backwards, if you asked me. Honestly, if you think that it's easy to report every bot or autoer you saw: Report one player and pretend you have no time limit to your next report. Then report the next one. Then report the person with the name 0O0oOO0121, followed by IlIIlIllI. Good luck to your hands, you'll need it.

Oh, so they shouldn't have done it for fear of being viewed as a Jackass company, because it's immoral in your mind? Are you serious? You've no idea about the ins and outs of Moderators. There isn't a written rule about criticizing Jagex. There's an unwritten rule about it, sure - but written? It's one of those grey areas that could go either way. It doesn't look good when someone that you put in a position of authority - no matter how small - makes you look bad. But against the rules? Hardly. The game may have changed since I left the team back in May, but making volunteers sign away their right to rant about a part of the game they don't like is so pedantic, I can't even fathom the thought. If you're part of your schools staff and post a video on Youtube, criticizing your school, I'm pretty sure it would cause trouble with your workplace, be it voluntary or not. Let's just say the film was about how 90% of the students are on crack and nobody is doing diddly-squat about it. This is where it gets messy, because you're shoehorning something voluntary like a PMod into a role that you get salary for. In the case of an employee showing footage of how bad their workplace is, it could be interpreted in any manner of ways - one way would be defamation, the other could be corporate espionage (if it showed anything sensitive), or it could be trespassing (if you didn't have clearance to be in the area you filmed). It's not considered defamation of character if any of the statements are based in fact, and retaliating against an employee, while legal, is frowned upon and results in damages. Volunteers can't enjoy similar provisions. If you retaliate against a volunteer, it makes you look like a jackass, but you're not breaking any law. I think that's the situation here, as Jagex was well within their provision to demod Jiblix. But that doesn't make them look any better.

It's been established before that there is, indeed, a difference between "They don't deserve to win this year" and "Don't vote for Jagex". Even if you could twist this into a defamation case, then it'd have to be dismissed since what was shown was nothing outside of fact. The issue of "free speech" is a non-issue when it comes to privately-owned forums. Companies have a right to decide which speech gets shown, and which doesn't. However, that only goes as far as the company's own slice of the Internet; anything outside of that is typically considered protected under the free speech clause. I also disagree in that it'd "be the same" as a famous player being banned, as this issue is a lot more hot-button than the whole Duke Freedom fiasco, as a for-instance. I don't know about the "forcing PMods to be loyal" statement - it certainly felt that way a while ago. It probably feels like that even more so. I mean, if you're not supporting Jagex, then you're basically a waste of space to them.

That post doesn't look like a response MMG made to that particular thread. It looks like an older response to another thread he made sometime last year. Let's not mislead the folks here, shall we? ;)

Interesting articles this week. The first one, Quitting, does touch on a bit of a nerve. Not a bad nerve in particular, but a nerve nonetheless - long-time players who threatened to quit are finally carrying out what they said they would. Many of them do come back, as was mentioned, but for the most part, there's no feeling of enjoyment when they leave. I remember seeing Racheya's signature after MMG came to be the CEO, and subsequently remember reading remarks from her after the so-called "honeymoon" ended, and I realize that, for the most part, Jagex's loyal fanbase is crumbling. I've always stated that for every one player leaving, two take its place, but now I'm not confident I could make such a statement. The second article, Earn Your Keep, seems to have an ulterior tone to it, despite the author not having one intentionally. The game's content has shifted to more end-game levels, but it seems that the remedy is to stock up on resources for six months and use them when the multiplier is in effect. That's not to say that this applies to every skill, namely Summoning and Prayer, but most people I knew wouldn't bother training tedious or expensive skills unless the multiplier was in effect. The ulterior motive is, is leveling these expensive skills over the course of this weekend the wisest course of action? Many that subscribe to the metagame logic would flame me if I didn't say "yes", and I think I'd flame myself, too. However, it highlights the very grind-oriented and very tedious nature of gameplay itself, and also brings to light something else - wouldn't it be better to simply fix the skills so they were rewarding without being painful to level up, without just handing over gobs of free experience? Again, interesting articles. The latter one made me think. :P EDIT: Well, we all grow. But does that mean, by virtue, we stop playing games? No. It also doesn't mean you'll always stick to just one game, unless that game is an ageless classic (I'm looking at you, Star Fox 64). If all you do is work in an office day-in to day-out and don't try to take your mind off of that damned red stapler every now and again, those 20-40 hours will be like a death sentence to you. :|

Right...I don't think I've mentioned much about speculation, although there's plenty in the other pages that do. I avoided, for the most part, discussing Hiker and whether or not what he did was legal/illegal/moral/immoral/etc, simply because it's too easy for people who are very emotional about this thing to just beat the crap out of the catalyst instead of discussing the repercussions. I'm not saying he deserved to be flamed to Hell and back on this thread. In fact, I think that it wasn't necessary - he's a non-factor in the fansite, and he's no longer managing Runevillage either to the best of my understanding. He's had a run-in with the law and he has, for the most part, served his time. He's got that label on him that won't ever go away, no matter how you try to reason, no matter how you try to plea, no matter how you try and change. That's enough flame to keep a man warm for centuries. Adding more to the fire is pointless. Right. I'm done taking this off-topic. *steers back on course*

The devil's in the details, but what I gleaned from that post (before they locked their forums down, apparently) - Jagex had mentioned to them that they'd work with the site's new admins after Hiker was removed, but then Jagex came back and permanently ended their ties with the fansite. Even though it's still a he-said she-said sort of scenario that plays out from here, there is an obvious lost of trust between RV and Jagex. So I'd say it's kind of tough to get back in the community's good graces. They were still around 7 years ago, back when the fansite "wars" were still happenin'. IIRC, they were one of the few that had concept art (not official of course) for RS2. People stay at sites because they like the atmosphere. If they loved it over there at RV, then who are we to say where they should or shouldn't be? Well, in the he-said/she-said scenario it's pretty tough. Take the word of a company who's judgement you no longer trust or the guy convicted of posessing and sending child porn. :unsure: The past two quotes were from Henner and Burks, respectively - Not Hiker. Yeah, we've really got to keep Hiker out of this. This discussion thread has done a fine job shredding him already. As for the scenario - It's not just a matter of distrust, but also a proven track record. There's plenty of evidence elsewhere to lead me to believe Jagex would posture one way, and behave another way. [EDIT] It is very hard to walk away from things you have a strong emotional attachment to, be it friends you've made, work you've done, etc. And I'll tell you that from experience, it's that sort of attitude that shatters a community with uncertainty, panic, and stonewalls it; it's really very hard to deal with. I've only ever had to experience it from a clan's standpoint. I can't imagine how much stronger those feelings would be with such a vast community and project (in comparison to the size of the typical clan.) I can testify to this first-hand. Imagine being the member, moderator, half-op, global moderator, administrator, and full-op of a fansite and its respective IRC channel - in the span of about six years - all to have it shut down due to lack of activity. So much work was put into that place, not just by myself, but by many people I considered friends. Leaving a fansite's community is a painful thing to do. You forge bonds, memories, rivalries, and have a whole boatload of fun. Seeing it come to an end would make even the most stoic among you shed a tear.

The devil's in the details, but what I gleaned from that post (before they locked their forums down, apparently) - Jagex had mentioned to them that they'd work with the site's new admins after Hiker was removed, but then Jagex came back and permanently ended their ties with the fansite. Even though it's still a he-said she-said sort of scenario that plays out from here, there is an obvious lost of trust between RV and Jagex. So I'd say it's kind of tough to get back in the community's good graces. They were still around 7 years ago, back when the fansite "wars" were still happenin'. IIRC, they were one of the few that had concept art (not official of course) for RS2. People stay at sites because they like the atmosphere. If they loved it over there at RV, then who are we to say where they should or shouldn't be?

I'll just re-iterate a point: Jagex could have handled this a lot better than they did. I'm not defending the owner of RV in terms of what he's done, but Jagex really made a bone-headed move here. Then again, this is Jagex we're referring to here. I don't think they did. If they kept it quiet, people would've railed against them for their secrecy and persecution of RV. They knew that. Given the morally reprehensible actions too I think they decided they shouldn't have borne the brunt on this. It's public information. They were honest. If Hiker didn't want to be shamed maybe he shouldn't have had child pornography? :shame: ...But at what cost? Here you have a community who had nothing to do with this man's legal problems thrown to the wolves in the same motion that the actual perpetrator is. Had Jagex quietly negotiated with the fansite about this whole matter, and allowed Hiker to disappear without airing his dirty laundry, then I doubt any of us would have cared. Hiker has been punished according to the law, and the past really came back to bite him this time. However, the fansite was caught up in all of this, and that's the real victim of this situation.

You have no idea how freaking happy I am to see this. Just plain elated. Jagex didn't have to sully the name of a fansite over the actions of one man, and now they missed their chance to make amends. Truth be told, this last week or so has spoken volumes about how Jagex views fansites, and how willing they're going to be to negotiate with them during tough times, or unusual circumstances. Whose to say that they won't target TIF or RuneHQ or Sal's Realm next? Now is not the time to be concerned about a single person, but the community at large. This changes everything, folks.

Well, that's partly right. They do realize that companies can switch domains. I think they think that we don't have a clue about their BS. Keep in mind, domain seizures are actually what Jagex is referring to when they say they're taking "action against RWT companies". They really should stop giving such vague answers. It's easy to justify yourself if you say you're only taking "action" against them. The question is, what kind of action, how soon, how frequent? How dedicated are you to actually solving the problem, and not attacking the symptoms of it? Jagex likes to skirt their way around these questions by leaving as many details as blank as possible. And if they do realize that the majority sees through their BS, I guess they seriously don't care anymore and are taking any last steps (the sex offender fiasco, this) to preserve the final remnants of their tattered gaming image whilst simultaneously milking the cash cow for all it has left. That said, none of what I just said should be a surprise to anyone. What I want to know is, why would Jagex pay tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, in legal fees to pursue RWT this way when it's obviously ineffective? Believe it or not, news posts declaring victory or progress against RWT/botting - regardless of how hollow or meaningless the actual victory is - scores a major PR victory. Although, considering that the one major case has been in the courts since about 2009, coupled with the fact(s) that Jagex has remained tight-lipped about their fight against bots, morale in the community is low, and botting numbers, along with RWT advertisements, have reached an all-time high, most of the community is pretty much done with the silly masquerade.

So Jagex went after a domain that engaged in RWT. What else is new? What would this gain? All it would do is slightly delay the company from selling their product for a little while longer. It's really not a big deal, and more resources were wasted in getting them to remove the "RS" out of their URL than implementing trade restrictions back in '07. I also have to laugh at the WoW settlement earlier. No company is going to be able to shill out that kind of cash. Blizzard would never be able to fully collect. Hopefully Jagex doesn't try to go down that road. I mean, you can spend millions in lawsuits to come up with a settlement for...a net loss. But Jagex could potentially save face and millions and just implement something that actually works.

Conflating the issue doesn't make your point any better. Yes, you lose some of your rights if you're convicted of a crime. However, the whole point of convicting the person in the first place is to give them a chance to rehabilitate (or the restoration of someone to a useful place in society). If he's denied the chance to pay his debt to society and conform to social norms, then the system has utterly failed. He didn't have to register as a sex offender until the laws changed, and I'm not sure where you're from, but in the United States, we don't all get a memo saying that such-and-such law has now changed. I'm sure in his mind, he felt that the matter was legally taken care of, and he wanted to move on with his life. I should point out though, that we know nothing of what really transpired outside of what he's shared. There's no point in knowing, either. He's gone. He's not coming back. RV is not associated with this man any further. It's time for RV to move on, and those of us with pitchforks and torches, to set them aside.

Well damn. How much must a man suffer before he's paid his debt to society? Listen. I'm not interested in hearing whether or not he should be punished any further than what the law already has. I'm not concerned with whether or not him creating the fansite in the first place was a violation of some probation order or plea deal, which it doesn't seem like it was. I'm more concerned with how that fansite will be able to rebuild itself after having its image thrown to the wolves like this. It wasn't doing so hot before, and now it's got this steaming pile of crap to deal with. Check it out. Being labeled a sex offender sticks. Regardless of what you do, or how you behave from there on out, that's the kind of mud that sticks with you. And yes, he was guilty of distributing child pornography. Some years ago. What'd he do since then? Tried to make a clean start for his life and himself, and to put most of this behind him. It's only some legal voodoo that got him caught back up in this mess (as he was tried twice and released/plea-bargained out of higher charges). I've gotta admit, it's hard to watch some of these arguments. They're more or less interested in punishing the man instead of reflecting, taking a real-life lesson out of this, and moving on. Why should I care what he does or doesn't deserve? He's no longer a part of that community. The community wants to distance themselves away from him as far as possible, and they want to make a new start. The only real problem is that some folks just can't let it go. Jagex's trumpeting of this matter didn't help things at all. I'm kind of with Omali on this, but I'd fire anyone in the PR department that breathes. If this is how they do PR and damage control, they could use a good Spring cleaning. He knows what he did was wrong. He knows he's got a lifetime of apologizing to do, much of it unnecessary now, to people he'll never meet in person. Punishing the man any further is both pointless and vindictive. Aside: Yes, people can change. He was trying to, but the law changed before he could change with it. I don't condone what he did, but I sure don't condone folks around here wanting blood. I did want to point out, though: ...If this is the case, then why was it 18 months later that it came to light? Consider that 12 or more months ago, not many of us even knew what happened.

Even companies should behave responsibly with information like this. Though Jagex following moral obligations is a bit funny considering what's gone on for the last year or so.

So why didn't they give the site a chance at retaining their status instead of making the site look like they supported, let alone condoned this from their admin?

1) Of course not. There have been many Moderators (myself included) that have been vocal against Jagex and their actions in the past. It's what happened and how this whole thing blew up (Streisand Effect) that made Jiblix [in]famous for this, depending on your point of view. 2) The number of videos he's made and the content he's put with them have been virtually the same, in regards to the botting ones. The only difference was that this one touched on the Golden Joystick Awards, and that set someone off in power. --- With that out of the way... It's been an interesting week for articles. The first article touched on Farming, which at the time was so negatively received that the results from an opinion poll were removed from the site, does post an interesting point with the skill. It's not feature-complete, and there's more that could be done with the skill than what's currently being done now. I do have to wonder though, if the break-of-pace style that Farming offers means that higher-end allotments or more exciting things would be marred by the raw time it takes to level the skill (since, depending on how you train it, the time it takes to level is 1/n * time for growth, for any n allotments used). The second article - interviews are always interesting. It's somewhat truthful that you have to "tow the company line" when you're in that role, even though you're not getting paid by them. I could never view my role there as anything more than a volunteer, as I had my own life and obligations to attend to. Doing away with the entire role? Well, I can't say I disagree. Player Moderators are nothing better than figureheads with mute buttons, and God help you if they use that too much. Forum Moderators are more in need since the forums are so active, but truth be told, JMod presence in the forums would only help, and hiring more to handle the forums on a daily basis would be a wise move.

Alas, RSC; you hardly got a proper burial. :|

RS on consoles? Not that optimistic. Consoles, as was said earlier, are giving way to smartphones and tablets. We (as a society) already carry machines with us daily that can play well-designed games, so in my mind, slapping RS on a console is going backwards. If they want to take the market by storm, Android could use more love with some games.