CCP as a company is an alcoholic, and its liver (read community) is riddled with an insidious unseen cirrhosis

Communications Center General Discussion
90

I guess it’s just a principle. I get what you’re saying. My EVE account doesn’t connect back to my real-life identity either, at least not in a way that makes it possible for most people to discover who I am unless they really have some wide-reaching technological resources. So, I am not so much concerned about that. And like you – I am one of the most privacy-oriented guys on the internet.

But take EVE mails, for example. There are a couple of guys in the game I’ve exchanged quite private information with. Nobody besides those guys and myself have any business reading it. I am protecting their privacy as well by not letting some irrelevant parties have a field day in my inbox. Yes, it’s just a game. The megacorps and alliances here shouldn’t take themselves too seriously either. And if somebody wants to bring them down, they will do it, and not on a traceable EVE mail log that details everything.

I am a highly skilled cap and subcap pilot in this game. I get benefits from joining an alliance? Excuse me, but so do they. It’s a two-way street. But I’m the only party in this two-way street who has to give out my personal character communications. That’s just not okay. Sounds like a real-life exploitative employer-employee relationship where one party can dictate the other to do anything they want them to just for the meager monthly paycheck and the other party better keep their mouth shut. Not saying it’s that serious, but it’s an analogy. And you know these nullbloc corps do take themselves that seriously.

I don’t really care that much anyway. A nullsec bloc wants to have a max-skilled dread/titan pilot? I’m all for it. But they’re not getting my private mails in exchange. They can look for that maxed out pilot somewhere else then. Better have a deep hat.

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91

I’m not a recruiter, so I can’t say what exactly they look at, but I would imagine that contract history and wallet transactions are some of the likely data sources. You can delete mails, but I expect wallet transactions are particularly useful for revealing connections to other players or groups (i.e., “follow the money.”) That’s how IRL law enforcement often establishes criminal connections (see: the recent SPLC scandal in the U.S.).

See, I would never do this. I have an out-an-game email address for Hatch. I don’t use it often, but if I ever needed to exchange anything of a sensitive nature, I wouldn’t use the in-game mail system.

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This. I was CEO of multiple corps for many years. And in the times before discord, most communication went over EVE mails. Since we were a very tight group, that means information about personal relationships, divorces, problems with the kids, mental issues, disabilities, problems with the job, financial problems or legal issues of RL.

For that reason alone, I would never ever under no circumstances join any group that requires to read my mails. That also goes for my current alliance, the moment they want to make API/ESI access beyond the “public data” and “location” for the mapper or “skills” for the doctrine ships mandatory, I’ll be gone instantly.

That. Tbh the game would be so much better if growth became expotentionally more difficult (management, upkeep costs) the larger a group grows. And yes, I am aware that people might find ways to circumvent certain limits, but thats not the point. That it would be an increased effort and a lot of lost convenience would be enough.

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94

Perhaps it bears pointing out for anyone not aware: The in-game mail system (like all game assets) is owned by CCP. Not only does CCP have the technical ability to read your mails, but every legal right to do so, and there are certainly more than a handful of employees with access to read player messages.

I would not send anything in an evemail that you wouldn’t feel comfortable writing on a postcard and handing to your local mail carrier.

For sensitive communications, there are many cheap or free, privacy-focused alternatives.

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Agreed, but 20 years ago ppl weren’t so paranoid on one side and on the other side the question isn’t what I would write or not. The point is that such mails exist, and be it simple “inactivity notifications” because a member is going to be in hospital or has some RL issue. Or managing a corpmeeting where RL names are exchanged…

I absolutely doubt those API/ESI checks are nearly as helpful to provide “security” as they are violating privacy of the members. And the only reason those big alliances are getting away with that policy is that the game still is designed largely in favour of blobs that can easily dominate (aka devastating progress or denying content) to everyone else below their power level.

That is a problem that CCP should have been adressed a decade ago by clever design choices. And yes, thats absolutely possible. It would, just as a side effect, also have prevented those year-long periods of political stagnation that hurt the game so much.

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96

I honestly would not be unhappy if eve did a total wipe and everyone had to start over again. I know I know, it wont ever happen and it would probably kill a major portion of this game. I’m not really even saying it should happen.

I’m saying this because I have seen many many times over the years that people feel that they need to compete with established long time players and that everything is unfair.

So I wouldnt mind a total wipe so those people could see that they would still never be able to compete. Knowledge of game emchanics trumps any skills a character can learn.

As for the privacy issues, I have major concerns. Yes, I am aware of the people saying you shouldnt communicate anything important through this game. However, I would like to say to that I have made some friends in this game that I have met irl and we’ve had discussions that sometimes end up in mail. Sometimes just a pep talk from a friendly can be all it takes to bring someone on the edge of taking an irreversable step.

Is that right or wrong, I don’t care to argue. Some people are in those places in life and even someone they only know online can mean a lot more than what some would consider normal.

Why should anyone else be able to read any of that? Outside of CCP of course.

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I still have not seen anything that addresses the write-mail stuff though.

Is it as it’s written in the permissions or is it not? If it is not, why is it written like that? I am not a computer programmer so I have limited knowledge on the subject.

Is anyone able to address that?

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Might i also point out at this stage, that api access and confidentiality around eve-mails and who gets to read them, isn’t all that related to the original topic of CCP killing the cow to get to the milk.

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Its a long running problem I have been arguing against for years.

The Summer of Rage was supposed to be a profound, community wide “NO” to what CCP eventually did with Citadels/Ascension/Lifeblood, CCP allowed money to dictate game design, and the current major issues with the game are a symptom of this.

A small history of how we got here

Just before Citadels (2016), CCP released skill extractors, this allows for people to PLEX their accounts passively and whales to infinitely scale their accounts, before skill extractors character progression was 100% time locked, even bazaar characters needed months/years to get skilled for their roles, this allowed for multiboxing to grow exponentially without massive time friction to prevent players from scaling rapidly just by whaling their accounts.

Then Citadels removed the logistical limitations to industry, we went from having limited science/industry slots per system (Even POS’s were limited by moon counts), we now have no cap on building slots per station/structure, you can build thousands of Titans in a single structure now as long as you have the characters with the skills, which isn’t a tall ask anymore thanks to buyable SP (see above). Coupled with Asset Safety guaranteeing 100% super capital safety, it was inevitable the game would see a massive proliferation to Titans which is why when adjusted for prices, B-R5RB, despite having smaller losses than modern giant battles still ranks at or near the top for ISK lost. A myriad of other issues, like spammable citadels and infinite m3 made structure warfare in any setting (outside of WH space) a mind numbing and tiring experience and you don’t even get to loot what you kill.

Then you have Ascension, aka F2P, which I am all for, but they simply did not limit F2P players enough, and while its against TOS, its very easy to bypass the no boxxing rule to play multiple characters, as well, you can just train thousand of accounts, wait for a plex sale and free omega, and suddenly skill extract yourself a bunch of new omegas. Now you got wars where people are shooting vexor alts at eachother with their titan bridges just to bog down the field in tidi. At least they eventually got around to locking every alpha to safety green, but thats still not enough, and they need to address the issue before the winning move in a war is to bog down the servers on purpose with throw away accounts.

Lifeblood just took the problems with Extractors, Citadels, and the new age of boxxing, and cranked it up to 11. CCP and the playerbase at large like to scapegoat the rorqual buff as the source of the problems that lead into scarcity, but the problems were inevitable, Lifeblood just quickened the pace, its like a gaping, crippling wound becoming infected, scarcity might have addressed the infection, but you still have a wound to fix, and it never was.

And we as players kept chugging along, we won the Summer of Rage, right guys? Sure the game pivoted to a multiboxing hellscape and CCP dug themselves into the P2W hole with a spoon instead of an augur, but we won the Summer of Rage! Except CCP keeps selling P2W indirectly, and sometimes tries to sneak in stuff that they explicitly said they wouldn’t, like combat boosters exclusive to PLEX packs on the NES.

Sadly, what are we to do? CSM members have repeatedly told me to ‘stop being poor’ when I bring up these issues, and then they turn around and tell CCP to continue to enable these things. You either just have to love the game for what it is, or move on. I still find reasons to log in, but those reasons are fading, do we really need another god damn faction warfare expansion after Uprising and Havoc aren’t even 3 years old yet, do we really need another sit in PLEX and wait for bars to fill game mode, do I really need to sit around and wait for a guy with 10 algos’s to warp into my site and awox me again? Meanwhile the last true major content expansion was in 2009.

You are right, CCP has grown fat and lazy off selling power in the form of boxxing, and I don’t even know if we’re past the point of addressing that, and I doubt another summer of rage could happen when the boxxers can just gank any protest. and 20 to 1 our subscriptions

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100

Oh man, what a good read. I wanna drop you a thousand likes for that on-point description of CCP’s design failures over the last decade. Unnessessary to say that I agree wholeheartedly.

Great thumbs up! :+1:

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i just wish they’d see their reputation as MMO developers in the same light as their revenue.

Going to be a real shame if in 20 years they are remembered as the ppl who had it all, and then lost it all through basic and obvious greed.
Imagine getting a call from a journalist asking questions about the company that ended up bankrupt and owing millions.

Personally i would prefer to see a fanfest 43 instead.

But as has been pointed out, the multiboxers have CCP by the crotch, and will continue to keep them in line.
All we can really do is ask ourselves, is this evolution of eve interesting to me?
Those of us who have been around for all this time have the advantage of patience that some newbies might not; and thus we often weather poor circumstances better.
However, even we can loose hope.

What do you do when a long time friend becomes an alcoholic, and beer is his biggest social media sponsor?

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The reputation of eve online is mostly due to fabricated or blown up bs stories about gankers and how this game is so unwelcoming to new players. It’s negative propaganda from upset former players that didn’t get what they wanted.

This game is very welcoming to new players. There are hundreds of people out every day looking to assist them. Multiboxers is not the death nail for eve or ccp. It’s negative propaganda from people that are upset or were upset that they lost a fight in a pvp game.

As long as many of us are alive irl, ccp will continue to receive money to keep this game going.

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I would also say that the premise of not being able to do anything unless you have multiple accounts is completely bunk.

There are a lot of solo players in this game, just because they arent blasting these forums all day every day does not mean solo gameplay is dead.

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Most MMOs offer alternate characters (ALTs) to offer the player more options to play as other races and classes with diverse abilities. EVE is an odd duck in the field of MMO games. They don’t have different races or classes, every character has the same zero abilities modifier. Instead they offer unlimited accounts. I suppose one could say we are offered alternate accounts (AAs) and that is more precisely what @Orion_Supernova is driving at here.

Alternate accounts work well for the omega junkie, who pays for 8 or 10 accounts to fleet up as a solo armada. Those are the ones CCP welcomes to the game with open arms. They love the players with $1,320 of disposable annual income.

Meanwhile the alphas don’t really “benefit” since they can only play 1 account at a time. AAs for any alpha, would only assist in making their game play more diverse. Assuming they are not cheating, ( multi-boxing alphas ) then there is not much point for an alpha only player to obtain more than the one account. As for myself, I drop in here to play test Linux OS, check on build issues, play on this alpha account, or see what friends are doing.

I agree with most of what Orion has stated, I don’t see AAs as game breaking mechanics. I have always stated that running an omega fleet of ships is attempting to juggle, tap dance, and play the banjo at the same time. I personally would find that sort of activity ineffective and stressful. Once they start botting their fleets, then they are breaking the rules, and rightfully deserve to be banned. The real issue is players not obeying the rules.

Fly Safe o7

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Does anyone even read the long posts and replies.

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109

I don’t all seems a bit like a storm in a teacup.

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Only the objective ones with historical data.

Most of them are pretty much it. If you see a lot of quotes, it’s a red sign.

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Since I was also half-cocked, I will let it slide…

Wrong approach and definition, but it’s so easily searchable it does not worth the discussion.

I mean, Aiko wouldn’t call herself one without a plan B, right … right? I really don’t want to go into that rabbit hole.

TIP: Use Grok.

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With some guys EVE mail has been the only channel of communication between us. Not everyone wants to create a new email address specifically for their EVE character (and I’m not talking about myself).

I’m not worried that CCP reads my EVE mails. I mean, they do have the right to do it, but I’m pretty sure the only times they go snooping in mails is when an account is being flagged for RMT, EULA violations, real life threats, and that sort of things. They don’t care what players converse about privately, and I’m also pretty sure they don’t have the time to go through the mails of all the characters they have active in the game. So, CCP is a minor concern to me, in fact a no-concern.

Player corporations and alliances are a different thing. They’re specifically interested in what your private communications are about and, unlike CCP, they have no legitimacy to it.

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Actually there are 2 reasons they’re getting away with it: CCP turning a blind eye is one, and because the players agree to give that kind of access to them. Which is insane when yo think about it. Nobody in their right mind would give their real-life employer access to go through their private email account to read their emails and send new ones in their name! But over here, this is just voluntarily handed over as if there was nothing to it.

Wake up people! Nullsec blobs need their members more than their members need the nullsec blob. If everyone revoked ESI access to their private data – guess what will happen – nullsec blobs will still accept their members even without ESI access. They’re just gonna have to start working harder and smarter to catch all those ‘‘spies’’ they’re so afraid of.

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