Game Guides Archive
Thread: My findings about banned and un-banned accounts.
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1963explorer
Fri Aug 20, 2004 1:26 pm
#1
I did some searching on the forum, especially some of GarVa's replies and this is what actually happened:
To stop the duped money from spreading any further, all people who had any in possession (whatever way they got it) were banned from the game. Everybody who was banned but was innocent could contact SOE by email to explain their case. I did find a few posts about people who were cleared. Because banning is a personal issue, no information was (and is) given out by SOE on who got banned and who got their ban lifted. That's the facts that are certain. Another fact I found is that some posts send out by SOE are treated by Hotmail (and others?) as spam. This leads me to the conclusion that if people were contacted byemail and they had a hotmail account, an email account they never check orfilled in a wrong emailon te subscription pages they may have never received any info about the ban.
I've seen plenty of posts by GarVa telling people that the banned persons could and should defend their case but it took some active searching to find that info. If this info had been available more easily then theoutbreak of mass- hysteria would propably not have occured? (Although lots of people would probably not understand why SOE simply had totemporarily ban all people who were contaminated with the duped money.)
Orew
Fri Aug 20, 2004 1:54 pm
#2
1963explorer wrote:
............
Everybody who was banned but was innocent could contact SOE by email to explain their case.
............
I beg your pardon?!
If I'll ever be banned for any reason while being innocent I'll most certainly expect to be contacted by SOE by email to explain their case... And they should do it really fast, before I cancel all my accounts.
Necrogeist
Fri Aug 20, 2004 2:30 pm
#4
Blimigerite wrote:Innocent until PROVEN guilty.Not the other way around.
I'm afraid SWG has long shown it's not a democracy...
ReptileSpit
Fri Aug 20, 2004 2:59 pm
#5
Blimigerite wrote:
Innocent until PROVEN guilty.
Not the other way around.
No, actually this is SOEs world. They make their own laws here.
Straws
Fri Aug 20, 2004 3:15 pm
#6
oddly enough, SOE does not need to explain why they ban someone. Its an **edit** thing to do but its their game. I'm not saying what they did was right, just saying they can if they want.
WHat I think needs changed is that more information needs to be put out because of this. All we ever got was one little thing in our launchpad. Because of that mass hysteria broke out. SOE did NOT tell people what to do with the money. They said to refuse large sums of money from anyone. Well guess what SOE, WE CANT! You CANNOT refuse a tip. Its not possible. SOE did not tell us to contact a CSR. So most people did what they thought they should, they tipped the money back. That logged them as transferring duped funds. SOE needs to communicate with us more or they will lose their customers, no doubt about it.
WHat I think needs changed is that more information needs to be put out because of this. All we ever got was one little thing in our launchpad. Because of that mass hysteria broke out. SOE did NOT tell people what to do with the money. They said to refuse large sums of money from anyone. Well guess what SOE, WE CANT! You CANNOT refuse a tip. Its not possible. SOE did not tell us to contact a CSR. So most people did what they thought they should, they tipped the money back. That logged them as transferring duped funds. SOE needs to communicate with us more or they will lose their customers, no doubt about it.
station1
Fri Aug 20, 2004 4:46 pm
#8
It does seem apretty crappy way to do things - shotgun bans accross the board on anyone who has contact with the 'tainted' funds.
Maybe its the best way to do it logistically though. They can probably easily run a query on who is currently in possesion of such funds, but they can't (easily) go through all the logs to see if it was their fault they got them.
Maybe they figure the actual dupers won't bother to complain since they know they would be caught in a lie anyway, and then they can just concentrate on looking at the logs on thevictims and reinstate their accounts.
/shrug
Still doesn't excuse them from not posting such information on the front page or something to let us know w.t.f is going on though.
1963explorer
Fri Aug 20, 2004 5:13 pm
#9
The reason the did ban first and ask questions later is because(as far as I can tell) the dupers were creating a massive amount of credits. I read posts about people emptying whole armor vendors or even buying all stuff on storage vendors. Those excessive amounts of money would severely hamper or even destroy the economy. Prices would inflate beyond reason. And if they let this continue too far tracking the duped money would become sheer impossible. That's why they banned first and then investigated to see if the persons were legit or not.
Think of this as a largeoutbreak of a deadly and very contagiousvirus. If this were to happen in abigcitythen the authorities would call in the military and forcefully remove anyone who had the virus and also anybody who came in contact with them and put them somewhere in quarantine. They would then check everybody and release those that didn't get infected.
The only other two optionsSOE had to remove the money in time would be to take the game offline for a while or role-back all servers a couple days.
But while their actions may have been sound, the lack of information is what really caused the upheaval. Especially so if those banned got their emails a little late or, for reasons I explained above, never received the emails.
It could have been so easy. Threesimple sentences in announcements: "In order to remove all the duped money from the economy we are going to temporarily suspend every account that has received any of the duped money. All cases will be investigated on an individual basis and all those involved are urged to contact us through email as soon as possible. Only those players who duped the money or willfully aided the dupers will be permanently banned."
Trynian1
Fri Aug 20, 2004 5:14 pm
#10
Not quite
Blimigerite wrote:
Innocent until PROVEN guilty.
Not the other way around.
This is not the United States government and playing this game is not a right. It is a privilage allowed by SOE for a fee. Therefore you follow their rules and they always give themselfs unlimited rights to give and take away anyones privilage to play their game.
It is not public domain and those rules that apply there do not apply here.
I congradulate them for taking swift and strong action. Not only does it set an example for those that can't seem to follow the rules it keeps those that were unwittingly drug into it on there toes for such things and report them faster.
1963explorer
Fri Aug 20, 2004 5:26 pm
#11
Oh, and about that "innocent until proven guilty". They way people got banned isexactly the way it happens in real life !! You get arrested first, put in jail if needed and THEN you get the chance to plead your case in court.
ZoomyY
Fri Aug 20, 2004 5:49 pm
#12
1963explorer wrote:
Oh, and about that "innocent until proven guilty". They way people got banned isexactly the way it happens in real life !! You get arrested first, put in jail if needed and THEN you get the chance to plead your case in court.
Very good point. But you are also given a quick a speedy trial. My account has been banned for 2 days and they still have not yet reviewed it.
1963explorer
Fri Aug 20, 2004 6:08 pm
#13
ZoomyY wrote:
1963explorer wrote:
Oh, and about that "innocent until proven guilty". They way people got banned isexactly the way it happens in real life !! You get arrested first, put in jail if needed and THEN you get the chance to plead your case in court.
Very good point. But you are also given a quick a speedy trial. My account has been banned for 2 days and they still have not yet reviewed it.
Where I live, our trials are never speedy nor quick.Sometimes the police lack people and resources to complete their investigation on time. And all courts have a lack of personelincluding judges. This leads to people having to wait several months at least andmore then ofteneven years (!) before they get their trial.
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