Concerns about the new EULA
By
all_hell,
Posted on: 2011-09-11 04:59 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
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I think you're missing a key point here:|
Originally Posted by Ironblade
Yes, I do. But that doesn't mean I need to "get behind" classic paranoia and conspiracy theory. I'm really not concerned about what you, or anyone else, thinks the EULA might say NCSoft can maybe do some day in some near or distant future. If they do something I find unacceptable, I will leave. It's that simple.
There was no 'overly broad EULA' giving warning before Sony covertly installed rootkits on peoples computers. There was no 'civil rights violating EULA' before Apple phones were covertly tracking the owners movements. The existence of this EULA does not mean they will do anything shady. If/when NCSoft does something I consider inappropriate, then it's time to do something about it. |
The existance of the EULA clearly suggests that they are considering doing such a thing, and furthermore, it prevents you from doing many of the things about it you otherwise might.
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You play CoH, you post a lot on one of the hacking boards out there, and while there you conspire to some hack/crack/griefing action with other members. Private investigators with contracts for many/most of the big titles there tip off NCSoft, who ban/block your account before you ever do anything on THEIR turf.|
Originally Posted by Santorican
Why would they need to monitor what we say on other boards?
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You use an unmoderated "third party" MMO that the devs frequent to talk about a new exploit that you've been messing with. The devs use that knowledge to datamine your account, suspend it, remove all ill-gotten gain, and give it back.
Those are the kinds of things that clause is for.
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And the EULA acknowledges that any and all parts may be considered invalidated by local law.|
Originally Posted by SlickRiptide
The fact is that they required you to agree that you have no expectation of privacy at all, anywhere. Not in NCSoft message board. Not in a third-party message board. Not in your own personal computer.
" SUCH MONITORING MAY ALSO INCLUDE, BUT IS NOT LIMITED TO, MONITORING FOR THE PURPOSES OF DETECTING SOFTWARE UNDER SECTION 8(c) or 8(e)." "Is Not Limited To". NCSoft can monitor for those prohibited programs but that's just the stuff they feel like listing. They can monitor for anything they please and you agree that they have the right to do it. |
I'm confident that if NCsoft did what you're worried about, the US Federal Government and the State of NJ would come down on them like a ton of bricks for any statutory violations and both would allow any civil suit against them to proceed.
Zombie Man has no problems with the EULA. <click> <play>
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They said watchdogs - they have a herd (more than a pack, really) of watch-chihuahuas to swarm over you and take you down.|
Originally Posted by Golden Girl
That's no problem - we've already taken down the Big Dog quite a few times
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Originally Posted by Golden Girl
I don't really know who he is, but going by his registration date, I assume this is some kind of ritual thing he does every so often?
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Originally Posted by Obscure Blade
*Not that much of a joke; there was a school that did that with its take-home school issued laptop computers to "monitor the behavior" of the kids. It didn't turn out at all well when people found out.
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It came to light when a kid was expelled for drug use. They were actually a variety of Mike and Ike, I believe.
Orc&Pie No.53230 There is an orc, and somehow, he got a pie. And you are hungry.
www.repeat-offenders.net
Negaduck: I see you found the crumb. I knew you'd never notice the huge flag.
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Originally Posted by Chase_Arcanum
You play CoH, you post a lot on one of the hacking boards out there, and while there you conspire to some hack/crack/griefing action with other members. Private investigators with contracts for many/most of the big titles there tip off NCSoft, who ban/block your account before you ever do anything on THEIR turf.
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You see that I can't agree with, punishment without any 'action' to trigger it?
Isn't that just thought crime?
Brawling Cactus from a distant planet.
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How did you infer I had any such proof?|
Originally Posted by seebs
This is a fascinating inference. Could you explain how you reasoned it out? I assume that you have handy a proof that there's not a single living human anywhere who cares what documents say?
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My comment stands. Anyone that will quit over the new EULA is looking for an excuse to quit.
Of course there are humans that care about documents. I care very much what many of the documents I signed for my condo say, for instance.
A EULA of this type is, in no way, enforceable to a degree that would violate anyone's rights. That would be illegal, making the EULA null and void.
If someone quits because they are under the impression it violates their rights, they are mistaken, to put it lightly.
So, again, anyone so pedantic as to quit over the new EULA, is simply looking for an excuse to create drama over nothing, get attention and in the end, was looking for an excuse to quit anyway.
Would you like it better if I threw in a few IMO's?
"The side that is unhappy is not the side that the game was intended to make happy, or promised to make happy, or focused on making happy. The side that is unhappy is the side that is unhappy. That's all." - Arcanaville
"Surprised your guys' arteries haven't clogged with all that hatred yet." - Xzero45
This is in response to what happened with Sony and a few others. Basically, they are reserving the right to investigate you if they suspect you are doing something malicious and it is detected on their end. Do you seriously think this development team will invade your privacy willy nilly? No, this just means they have the right to scan for hacking software and bots and that is likely all they will do. Btw the big W has been doing this for a long time now.
Telling an autistic guy not to overreact is a lot like telling most people to stop breathing; sure, he can do it for a little while, but at some point he's just going to pass out and smack his head on the table because he tried standing up after abstaining for over a minute and a half, and then there's blood on the carpet so you have to go rent a freakin steam cleaner to...
...wait, what was I talking about again?
Anyway, my point is that Westley isn't going to stop overreacting to possible abuses of rules any sooner than I am.
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People who read this as "clearly suggesting" anything are reading too much into this. They write the EULA to give them the broadest possible arsenal of options available to them to combat certain behavior. It doesn't necessarily suggest that they'll ever execute them on a broad scale.|
Originally Posted by seebs
I think you're missing a key point here:
The existance of the EULA clearly suggests that they are considering doing such a thing, and furthermore, it prevents you from doing many of the things about it you otherwise might. |
Being a "big brother" costs money and resources. History has proven that broadly-applied monitoring tools tend to catch more innocents than the guilty. They're not going to be reading your email or logging in everything you type. They're not going to be profiling you and selling the gameplay data to gamestop. The industry's done these things in the past and the costs- including the public relations costs- proved there's a better way.
Just because you have a nuclear option doesn't mean you intend to use the nuke. Having it available-- just in case its absolutely necessary-- is handy. So is the public awareness that you have it available: many botters argue "how could they ever tell I'm using a botting program? Its sophisticated enough with enough variation that you can't be 100% sure by looking at the activity data logged by the server! "- knowing that they can check for the bot in active memory means the devs have ways to know with certainty.
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So, yes, they *might* have something that looks at active programs for known exploit applications or security risks. If they had known names, file fingerprints, install locations, registry keys, etc, then those could all quickly be scanned without doing blanket checks for everything on your hard disk. They'd still need the range of consent already given in the EULA.
They could also assume a more targeted approach:
Imagine that they're cracking down on a major exploit. Through their datamining, they have about 50 certain offenders and 2500 "maybe" offenders. Enabling their "client hardware usage reporting" on those 50, they see all of them were running a particular program that enabled the exploit. They run it on the 2500 other potential offenders and find it on another 500. Said app lets them correctly not-ban 2000 accounts.
This is fairly common. I can think back to a multibillion credit exploit in another game where, from server side apps, they could find only about 25 clear offenders and 250+ that were "questionable" they banned them all & let the people appeal to clear their name. There were another 5,000 marginal accounts that they decided to err on the side of tolerance.
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Note also that the EULA doesn't specifically say you consent to such searches-- it says you acknowledge that they may take such action. It means that you can't argue that they did so without ever warning you of the possibility.
It may sound like I'm splitting hairs, but this is a key legal difference. The acknowledgement does mean that a judge isn't going to give much consideration to your "but I didn't know..." argument if you sued to get a refund on the $500 worth of microtransaction loot your banning took from you, but it is also sets the how and why that NCSoft may use for these pursuits. Should they step outside of the purposes they define here or misuse that data, you haven't given up the right to sue their butts off.
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With the aforementioned Sony example, it was Sony (Music, specifically) being Malicious. For a PC to play the music discs, you had to use their special player that covertly installed a program (called a rootkit) that made any file beginning with a certain sequence of characters invisible to other programs yet still executable. Which made those systems wide open to hackers who knew.|
Originally Posted by LadyGrimrose
This is in response to what happened with Sony and a few others. Basically, they are reserving the right to investigate you if they suspect you are doing something malicious and it is detected on their end. Do you seriously think this development team will invade your privacy willy nilly? No, this just means they have the right to scan for hacking software and bots and that is likely all they will do. Btw the big W has been doing this for a long time now.
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Oh, and removing it could disable your external media drives unless you re-installed.
Orc&Pie No.53230 There is an orc, and somehow, he got a pie. And you are hungry.
www.repeat-offenders.net
Negaduck: I see you found the crumb. I knew you'd never notice the huge flag.
Westley flew off the handle. Fine. That doesn't mean the issues he raised are not worth discussing or that the EULA shouldn't be held up to close examination just because "they're all like that;NCSoft is just protecting themselves and it's unenforcable anyway".
There's a whole lot of trust that we're putting in NCSoft when it comes to something like this. In general, I'm okay with that but it doesn't mean that I don't question some of the things that I'm trusting them about or that I don't want to know what the limits of the agreement are.
For instance: Is Titan Sentinel or HeroStats " software that intercepts or otherwise collects data from or through the Game; "? Am I breaking the EULA if I use it to record my badges to display on the City Info Tracker?
As for benign monitoring, NCSoft was using NProtect to do anti-cheat monitoring on Exteel, and that software has plenty of detractors, what with it acting like a root kit and having no standard uninstall procedure.
I'm not saying "EULA Bad! NCSoft bad!". I'm saying "it behooves us to read it and realize what it gives NCSoft license to do, and not blindly assume that everything they do will be benevolent and in our interest, because the EULA is actively antagonistic towards our interests". We all hope and expect that NCSoft will be benevolent and only punish the wicked and not abuse the priveleges that they demand and that we acquiesce to. The EULA, however, does not demand or require any such benevolence. The only reason for them to stay on the straight and narrow regarding OUR interests is that it remains profitable to them to do so.
There are some things i don't like about this EULA. Most have already been mentioned. A couple of things i didn't realise about until others mentioned them. I agree that some work needs to be done with this EULA.
On the other hand, I'd almost pay to see gold spammers and botters have legal actions taken against them. So i'm not going to quit just yet. I'm just going to see what becomes of all this and take actions if needed. Until then, i might as well have fun in the game.
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No. Wrong. |
Originally Posted by seebs
I think you're missing a key point here:
The existance of the EULA clearly suggests that they are considering doing such a thing, and furthermore, it prevents you from doing many of the things about it you otherwise might. |
Here you are being foolish. The entire thing is designed to protect them from lawsuits. They can decide tomorrow to include some massive intrusive mess of spyware/security software as part of their game. The EULA isn't the thing allowing them to do that or not do that.
THEY DON'T NEED THE EULA TO DO THAT!
They can do all of the things you appear to be certain that they will do without it or without changing it.
Wake up and smell reality the EULA's entire purpose is to let them short circuit any lawsuits people might bring for various normal things that happen with the game. It isn't there to do other nefarious things. They don't need the EULA to do such things.
But it's MY sadistic mechanical monster and I'm here to make sure it knows it. - Girl Genius
List of Invention Guides
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1) Conspiracy is still a crime|
Originally Posted by CactusBrawler
You see that I can't agree with, punishment without any 'action' to trigger it?
Isn't that just thought crime? |
2) The offending action- conspiring to disrupt the game service- is still real.
3) We're not talking about a crime or "punishment" -- we're talking about a contractual relationship.
4) We're talking about a company that has a duty to provide a service to a wide range of people... hearing that some are planning to disrupt/damage that service and deciding to act to prevent said disruption. If the conspiracy was done under their jurisdiction (in the game or on the boards) nobody would really be surprised to be banned for such activity. The devs are just putting you on notice that even if you do it elsewhere, if they catch wind and can coorelate accounts, they may take action.
5) And note that this doesn't necessarily mean "banning." As Zwill notes, they wouldn't ban based on what they saw on another boards... but they may flag those users for more scrutiny when they're online, based on what they saw. That's still 'taking action' based on what they discover outside their domain.
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Good point. |
Originally Posted by SlickRiptide
For instance: Is Titan Sentinel " software that intercepts or otherwise collects data from or through the Game; "? Am I breaking the EULA if I use it to record my badges to display on the City Info Tracker?
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The devs have a long history of supporting the player community and encouraging us to extend our experience beyond what they provide. They should probably identify such permissible software and set policies where player-developers can submit their creations for addition to that list.
If you leave it open to question, then some people aren't going to see the difference between Sentinel and BotManager3003.
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What part of EULA's are not enforceable in part or in whole don't you understand? It is well known and understood that a EULA would not hold up in court if NCSoft were to try and go after YOU for breaching it. |
Originally Posted by SlickRiptide
There's a whole lot of trust that we're putting in NCSoft when it comes to something like this. In general, I'm okay with that but it doesn't mean that I don't question some of the things that I'm trusting them about or that I don't want to know what the limits of the agreement are.
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What it does do is the opposite. By putting the rules out there in as broad of terms as they can they generally protect themselves from you suing them. That is the actual real purpose of a EULA to provide ammunition that you knew about X and so can't sue if they do X. The breadth of the EULA is because they can't predict every X they might want to do. So rather than try to exhaustively cover every random thing they might need to do with regard to the game they try instead to make it as broad as they can.
But it's MY sadistic mechanical monster and I'm here to make sure it knows it. - Girl Genius
List of Invention Guides
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I understand it perfectly. I object to people claiming this supposed unenforcability as a reason to squelch discussion of it, whether outright (STFU) or through ridicule of the people engaging in the discussion.|
Originally Posted by TerraDraconis
What part of EULA's are not enforceable in part or in whole don't you understand? It is well known and understood that a EULA would not hold up in court if NCSoft were to try and go after YOU for breaching it.
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There are points of the EULA, like property rights, that are new ground for NCSoft and that are uncertain ground for the industry as a whole. These have nothing to do with this assumed unenforcability of whatever aspects some individual thinks are unenforcable.
For instance - If you buy five enhancement unslotters, do you know for certain whether you "own" those enhancement unslotters? Can they be taken from you? Can they even be said to be "things" that you are capable of losing?
The EULA is where you find the answers to those questions and people who intend to buy stuff from the Paragon Market ought to be a little bit interested in what NCSoft thinks those answers are.
I'll give you a hint - You won't find those answers by saying "All EULAs are unenforceable; it's axiomatic" and then ignoring the issue.
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I just hope this isn't REALLY Westley's farewell post.|
Originally Posted by ObiWan
Westley overreacting?!? I don't believe it!
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I've argued with him, disagreed with him more than a few times, and even gotten pissed at him, but I've always seen him as something of a kindred spirit.
He's a little like I was....
... before my first round of electroshock therapy treatment.
... yeah, well before that.
... but AFTER my first dose of LSD.
... definitely after the LSD
... don't judge me- it was the 60's! everyone was doing it.
... er... or was it the 90's? One or the other-- Same basic shape, really. it's all just a matter of looking at it.
*No, no LSD, no electroshock treatment. No drugs. Despite what people think, it only took good ol'fashion army brainwashing, WAY too much caffeine, a few 100-hour work weeks, and toxic dose of video games to get me this way..
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Exactly right.|
Originally Posted by SlickRiptide
I understand it perfectly. I object to people claiming this supposed unenforcability as a reason to squelch discussion of it, whether outright (STFU) or through ridicule of the people engaging in the discussion.
There are points of the EULA, like property rights, that are new ground for NCSoft and that are uncertain ground for the industry as a whole. These have nothing to do with this assumed unenforcability of whatever aspects some individual thinks are unenforcable. For instance - If you buy five enhancement unslotters, do you know for certain whether you "own" those enhancement unslotters? Can they be taken from you? Can they even be said to be "things" that you are capable of losing? The EULA is where you find the answers to those questions and people who intend to buy stuff from the Paragon Market ought to be a little bit interested in what NCSoft thinks those answers are. I'll give you a hint - You won't find those answers by saying "All EULAs are unenforceable; it's axiomatic" and then ignoring the issue. |
Some facebook games are closing and people are preparing lawsuits trying to reclaim the cash value of all those virtual goods they bought using the logic:
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The developers said we owned the stuff we bought.
That makes them our property.
They reside within the game, meaning our property is entrusted to the game's care.
The developers are closing down the game.
That destroys our property.
The devs thus destroyed our property- the property with real dollar value.
The developers need to compensate us for that property loss.
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Now, as silly as that may sound to some people, in the REAL LIFE:
-A farmer sells you a horse.
-You keep the horse at the farmer's place.
-You pay the farmer for the horse's upkeep.
-The farmer goes nuts, sets the barn on fire.
-The horse dies.
-The farmer owes you a new horse (or its monetary equivalent) *
*unless said horse-care contract (EULA) says otherwise.
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There are several reasons to argue that EULA's may be unenforceable--
- they're not often readable until after purchase (not true for F2P games)
- they're contracts written by one side with MUCH more resources than the other party, in a position to leverage that advantage unfairly (so are most cell phone contracts, and most are upheld).
- they're easily bypassed, to the point that the 'checkmark' for having read the EULA practically encourages them to be not-read.
But there are serveral reasons why EULA's will NEVER be totally made unenforcable:
- if you remove them, then ENTIRE BUSINESS MODEL for multiplayer online game services disappears. If developers can't protect themselves against being sued by idiots that got banned and therefore lost access to stuff they paid for, the developers can't manage the game. If they have to REFUND people for everything ever spent in the game when they decide to close it, they have no financial motive (refunding the last 30/60/90 days' investment is offered in many cases, but the old horse analogy above would obligate a dev to more). If developers are held as custodians of all the resources of all the players, the liability insurance alone would mean tripling or quadrupling of subscription fees. Heck, even a nerf that "devalues an item" could be seen as intentional property defacement! If developers can't have unconditional license to distribute your "creations" then they can't transmit your character's likeness to others in the world without constantly getting your express consent. The system falls apart.
So, like SlickRiptide says, if you just shrug off the EULA as totally unenforceable, you miss the point that some of it HAS to be enforceable for businesses to keep offering the service... and then you have to start asking what parts fall in which category.
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Best part of the deal...
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Originally Posted by TerraDraconis
...and since you'll be premium you won't be able to post your next rage quit without paying $15.00 first.
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Where to find me after the end:
The Secret World - Arcadia - Shinzo
Rift - Faeblight - Bloodspeaker
LotRO - Gladden - Aranelion
STO - Holodeck - @Captain_Thiraas
Obviously, I don't care about NCSoft's forum rules, now.
I have an idea, someone bring this up Wednesday. I'm curious to hear Zwill and Positron's responses. But, of course, there will be those that think they are covering up deeper plots. Nemesis maybe?
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FWIW Zwil, you'd be silly NOT to monitor for botting software. I just hope you never find any! |
Originally Posted by Zwillinger
And stepping in...
We have no plans to introduce malicious, harmful or intrusive software to your computers. While we do remain vigilant in our fight against exploits (we will be introducing a new anti exploit measure, server side, come Issue 21, but more about that later) we also respect your right to privacy and will not gather any information without your explicit permission (i.e.; you agreeing to send us crash/bug/whatever feedback via the launcher functionality). I understand your concerns, but please be assured, we are keeping our watchdog on a leash. |
To the VERY small number of people who thing NCSoft would use this to do naughty things to your PC, do get some level of common sense, please? What POSSIBLE reaason could they have for doing so? They REALLY don't care just how big your pron folder is, you know?
They just want to protect the game and other users from the kind of people you get in F2P games, botters.
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Originally Posted by Zwillinger
I can also assure you that while we certainly do read third party websites
, we do *not* directly action anyone based on comments made outside of our official forums or in game. While we certainly take things said everywhere seriously (all feedback is valid) and investigate concerns no matter the source, we do not action/ban/suspend or otherwise based on second or third hand information that we cannot verify by our own tools. |
Although anyone stupid enough to leak stuff like that using identifiable accounts needs to be banned anyway, as they're too thick to allow near live servers!
@FloatingFatMan
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
A) Floating... Love the avatar
B) Simply and well put.
((Edit: First after the FloatingFatMan)) Had to do it!
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Why thank you! |
Originally Posted by LadyGrimrose
A) Floating... Love the avatar
B) Simply and well put. ((Edit: First after the FloatingFatMan)) Had to do it! |
Also, first after LadyGrimrose!
@FloatingFatMan
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Wait, you can do that in a EULA? Man, we need to work on our Titan Network utilities EULA. The current one of "we reserve the right to, you know, try to do useful and cool things and stuff" just seems so inadequate now. I wonder if I can put something in there that gets me free pizza?
We've been saving Paragon City for eight and a half years. It's time to do it one more time.
(If you love this game as much as I do, please read that post.)