OFFICIAL NEWS

I am amazed that apparently there are many players out there who don't consider this new feature a privacy issue.

It is definitely a feature change if something that would have to be observed manually by looking at icons in a friends window suddenly changes into a status message that can easily be grabbed by scripts. The hurdle to capture player's logon/logoff has been lowered.

This is ok in my eyes because I can see the benefit for those wanting to be notified when their friends logon.

However, not providing at least an opt-out is careless, to say the least. As a matter of fact, I would have expected that this is an opt-in feature.

Come-on folks, if it comes to spam email, to unwanted mail delivery, unwanted phone calls and other pestering side-effects of companies and individuals trying to make money, most people do agree that there must be an opt-out facility, and a growing population believes this should be opt-in. When online websites suddenly publish private pictures there's an outcry. If google would suddenly publish the search terms and times of all those people who have an account at their site - with the username attached - there would be an outcry, too.

Although this friend list notification may seem harmless to some, it is a fact currently that it cannot be turned off by those who'd like to stay private, and it is a fact, that logon/off profiles of toons can be established.
This is the first thing I'd personally ask the developers to fix asap.

It does not matter if you're stalked or not. Everybody has a right to decide for himself what information one is to publish. The last thing we need is a few more players dropping out just because of ignoring some common sense good practices when it comes to personal privacy.

Try to not make the debate a matter of personal issues.

erm, not to downplay any concerns here, but i think the only thing that the patch did was to allow ppl to friend others when they are offline... it's really a very simple change.

previosly there was nothing to say that a person with ill intent couldn't friend someone while they were online...

so, I think that a micro-update to *hide* someone from a person they've ignored is the best solution at this time; furthermore, the freinds list patch really has nothing to do with Voldani's stalking issue.

Hadriankross: Slight misunderstanding: I refer to the feature that when people log on, their friends get a message. Since you cannot control who befriends you, others can subscribe to logon/off notifications of you.

I dont believe there is any privacy issue here. I dont believe anything at all has changed that would make any difference to anyones safety. This entire discussion is completely ridiculous. If there really was a serious threat Vodani had options other than posting wild claims of privacy issues in the forum over a very small change and then deleting his character because "the community doesnt care about such a real threat".

It was a severe over reaction and none of you should be encouraging it.

I quote Beeficus. Having an option to hide your status could be fine, but the argument about privacy issues is ridicolous.

I think you're falling prey to the erroneous but emotionally very tempting and thus very common thought pattern that goes something like this: "Well this problem never affected *me*, therefore I cannot imagine it being a problem, therefore it cannot be a *real* problem. Therefore anyone claiming to be affected by it must just be exagerating and a solution that would mildly inconvenience me is unacceptable."

If you think the discussion is ridiculous, why don't you step out of it after voicing that you have no problem with anyone being able to see when you log on or off, and leave those of us who do have a problem with it to voice the fact that we do have a problem with it. Why on Atys would you feel the need to convince us that just because you fail to see a problem with it, it's ridiculous that we do?

I personally didn't even consider the stalking issue when seeing this feature, but now that it's been laid out to me, I agree it's a serious issue.

This is a feature that was commonly asked for... it is not a new thing to gaming and it is in many other games. This is the first time I have ever seen someone claim it to be a privacy issue due to the possibility of someone being stalked.

And the reason I didnt bow out of the conversation after stating that I dont believe it really is a serious issue is because somebody used my differing opinion to theirs as a reason to delete their character. An overly dramatic reaction but then again overly dramatic seems to be the trend here...

I would also like to point out that even if its true, how common is it exactly for someone to be stalked in ryzom by a person who is a threat to them in real life? Is it really on the devs to account for such a rare and unlikely occurance when implementing commonly requested features? And if we do expect that where is the line drawn? Im sure there are people out there with severe epilepsy who would react to effects even on minimum settings. Do we ask for them to be removed?

hmm, having read over this a few times, hopefully this may clear up some things:

Irfidel: yes, the message you mention (assuming it shows up in the info tab) would be something that could be monitored; however, I think the ToS prohibits scripts from being run in the first place, (though client chat logging is possible), so, it still boils down to ignoring the person and/or reporting the issue so someone can monitor it.

easiest solution possible: if you ignore someone, they no longer see you in friends (i.e. can't friend you); subsequently that means the "griefer" is unable to track you, whether through the friends list or the info tab--this could include email as well. this would easily keep something very simple from becoming something much worse.

again, at least for this new feature, it is not the patch that is to blame, since it was something the player base asked for; however, the discussion seems to have shown that some tweaking in the area of privacy may be in order--specifically, effectively *hiding* a player from someone they've ignored.

furthermore, some discretion is in order on the part of both the player base and the devs in terms of what they request, and what they implement.

Regards,
Hadrian Kross

I would agree that a feature to hide your online status from other peoples friends lists could be nice for those popular folks who get tell spammed the moment they log.

perhaps something like /hide that would turn off all your guild/status/etc. stuff and make you invisible in chat and friend/ignore lists??

I opened a thread here for discussion on this topic:
http://app.ryzom.com/app_forum/?page=topic/view/11782/1#1

I don't think Guild status should be affected - you elect to be in one - if you're having issues with a member then you should report it to your HO/Leaders and then to the CSRs

Hi folks,

We understand and appreciate the stated concerns regarding the new online/offline notification and a resolution for this is planned for the next major patch.

what about all the other bugs? I.E. mac users, OP PvP, mission timers etc...

is there any ETA on this new patch? remember we are paying customers.

I believe mission timers were fixed, Solo. And I think he means the next content update, not the patch to fix the last patch.

Any news at all guys? you are leaving paying members in the dark on what is happening!