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Can someone give an in-depth statement regarding the "BoB" scandal?
Cymdai
Member UncommonPosts: 1,043
in EVE Online
I've been looking around the forums, and any topic that seems to make any mention of BoB or the dev that was allegedly involved is locked/deleted, etc etc.
Can anyone give me a good, thorough read on what happened?
I only played Eve for a little while, but this has certainly kicked up quite a storm, so I'd like to read up on it.
Can anyone give me a good, thorough read on what happened?
I only played Eve for a little while, but this has certainly kicked up quite a storm, so I'd like to read up on it.
Waiting for something fresh to arrive on the MMO scene...
Comments
As you might have read and heard, there were recently some allegations posted regarding developer misconduct that basically come down to:
* Developers helping (an) alliance(s) gain information they otherwise would not have.
* Developers having an unfair advantage of game mechanics.
* Developers helping themselves acquire goods in-game by means of in-house tools, otherwise not available to regular players.
All allegations mentioned above are untrue, except one. Sadly enough, the allegation regarding unlawfully obtained blueprints are, in my case, true. I’m here, laying out the facts of what happened in June 2006 so this whole issue -- which jeopardized my colleagues, my company and our community -- can be put behind us, I hope for the better.
The blueprints in question will be returned to CCP and reintroduced through a new raffle in the future. Specifically, these are:
* Flameburst Precision Light Missile Blueprint
* Phalanx Rage Rocket Blueprint
* Havoc Fury Heavy Missile Blueprint
* Bloodclaw Fury Light Missile Blueprint
* Spike L Blueprint
* Sabre Blueprint
Regrettably, my actions inevitably led to a shadow of suspicion being cast on a number of my co-workers, as well as Reikoku and Band of Brothers. I wish to make it clear that I acted alone and my co-workers and corp/alliance mates have been cleared of any alleged wrongdoing.
As much as this is a confession it is also a request for your forgiveness for events of which I’m truly sorry.
Hellmar's post (CCP's CEO):
Most recent events have given me an opportunity to clarify CCP’s official position on the subject of unethical behavior by persons in the service of CCP.
Throughout our history, there have been a handful of cases where our employees or members of our various volunteer and partner programs have taken advantage of the proprietary powers they are granted through access and knowledge. These cases have been investigated, prosecuted and judgment rendered. Usually the punishment has been quite simple: termination of employment.
A pivotal case was uncovered last summer during a routine investigation of developer accounts. Unfortunately CCP did not act with the same decisive consistency we have used on previous occasions. Those left at the helm chose to react cautiously, as sometimes is appropriate under these circumstances, leading to more leniency and understanding than we are used to in these matters. Upon review I personally would have chosen to act differently, but what's done is done. Difficult decisions always have to be made, and we cannot always second guess how these would appear if, in part, they are revealed to outside parties who do not have the same information to base their choices on.
This particular case, involving a single developer, underlined where improvements needed to be made and we have since focused our efforts on reinforcing rules and processes so that consistent ruling is assured. As of the beginning of January this year, we have been building up a special institution within our company similar to the Internal Affairs divisions of law enforcement agencies. For this team, we have assembled the most ardent hardliners in our ranks. They all fully understand the enormity of what they have accepted to do and we are certain that they will be able to shoulder this responsibility.
---
It is no trivial thing when corruption takes place. In our case it's no different than the injustice of public servants in the real world feathering their own nests rather than ensuring the prosperity of the many. Living in a country of a comparable population as the world of EVE (Iceland only has 300,000 inhabitants), I sure know how it can feel when governance is not balanced and feeling powerless to stop it. I am certain that members of the EVE community are now going through similar emotions.
I am sure that we all appreciate that it is no coincidence that Dante reserved the lowest level of Hell for "the worst of those who betrayed their benefactors." In our case, I would regard the EVE community as our benefactors. We are not the "gods" or "the masters" of EVE Online or the EVE community. We serve the community. You have entrusted us to safeguard your hard work.
---
When the recent allegations came to light, our Internal Affairs department immediately went to work, reexamining logs for all the developers involved in great detail over the course of several days. They have concluded that none of the other developers abused their positions to gain any advantage for themselves or others. In accordance with our rules however, those characters must be removed from the game. Developers have had, and continue to have, characters in many alliances in the game, and it is wrong to assume that the presence of several characters in any one particular alliance is either uncommon, or automatically indicative of cheating.
This incident has raised the question of whether developers should be allowed to play the game they work on. There is simply no way to develop a world like this without experiencing it first hand. You cannot develop it by proxy, evaluate fun through statistics, or make judgments without fully understanding how it is growing and evolving, when nearly every tool can be used by players in ways that were never anticipated. In order to do justice to the game, we must share your frustrations, joys, successes and failures. You cannot fully appreciate the investment of time and effort that players make without doing it yourself, and every employee at CCP is aware of what it is like to work yourself to exhaustion for something you believe in and love.
In Closing
As we look to the future, we will endeavor to improve our handling of these matters by acting in a manner that is both swift and consistent with company policy. It is regrettable that such instances reveal flaws in our governance, but by the same token, addressing them decisively is what makes our company stronger. We now have resources dedicated to performing audits of dev activity on Tranquility with much more frequency than before. This, combined with additional layers of security, and the non-negotiable penalty of employment termination upon conviction of such acts, represents the full extent that we will go to deter dev misconduct.
The developers of this company will always play the games that they build here. Without being fully immersed in the player experience, perspective, and community, it is impossible to build, maintain, and expand online worlds with any degree of competency. And while that does expose us to some degree of risk, the rewards are incalculably higher. EVE has grown stronger every year since its inception; these bumps in the road are an inevitable part of the journey we must endure as a growing company; and we would not be here today if we opted to isolate ourselves from the player experience of EVE Online.
It is thus that we look forward to putting this matter firmly behind us, and move forward with our continued mission to improve and expand a world that we hold close to our hearts.
Sincerely,
Hilmar Veigar Petursson, CEO
CCP
Eve Online quite a bit different than any MMORPG any of you have played. There is ONE server, everyone is in one game universe, so if you love playing the game you only have one place to go.
The entire economy is player driven. Players form corporations and corporations get together to form alliances. What was happening was that the developers were joining the largest alliance in the game and giving them "help" in the form of heads-up on special events so that they could be prepared to grab the prizes, creating very rare items called "Blueprint Originals" that are used to make other very rare items which gave this already powerful alliance a huge boost, and banning players who caught them in the act.
Also keep in mind that several weeks or months of game play might be needed to purchase some of the nicer starships in the game, having it destroyed due to developer interference is a BIG deal. I am not a hard core player (god, I don't have the time) but I remember other games I've been hard core into, so I am really offended by this. Also they swept it under the rug because this is a fairly big scandal as far as running an MMORPG goes. They made sure it stayed hidden until after their merger with White Wolf was complete.
One of my big problems with the way they're handling this is the way they treat players like they're little children who aren't entitled to an opinion. As long as we can discuss it in a civil matter there should be ZERO censorship on this topic.
BUT the MOST dangerous aspect of all this, is that one of the people associated with the developer's corporation posted the personal REAL LIFE name, phone number, and job information of the guy who caught the developers cheating. This is a severe breach of the rules...and is instantly bannable. Instead the person who posted this information was allowed to edit it away after hundreds of people saw it. Apparently the victim is now getting death threats at his work. Yet CCP condoned this behavior by not even slapping the poster on the wrist. No punishment at all. All of you know that there are some really intense types out there to whom their MMORPG is their life. There ARE weirdos out there who will use that info against someone. People have been killed or hurt in the past IN REAL LIFE over MMORPGs, and it's generally not the victim's fault. And according to CCP's own policies that's supposed to be instantly bannable.
And to cap it all off, they did decide to ban the user who busted the cheating developer...he had 5 accounts (in Eve Online you can only train up skills on one character per account, so people tend to keep multiple accounts). That's $75 per month the guy was giving to CCP. This person admits to hacking into the non-CCP owned forum sites run by the player corporations (guilds) involved to gather the evidence, which was later partially verified to be true by CCP. That's the excuse they used for banning him although hacking into a non-CCP owned site isn't against the EULA. To be honest, not a fan of hacking someone's site...but it still isn't a bannable offense by CCP's rules, from what I can tell the person did not actually do anything bannable by CCP's rules since they're very specific about how posting the information on CCP owned sites or hacking into CCP owned sites is bannable, but he didn't go to a CCP site. More importantly though, why is it ok for someone to post this guy's own personal information in CCP's own forums?
1) dev help players (t20)
2) he get petitioned for using "god mode"
3) CCP tell him to leave and char get banned/deleted
4) before leave t20 leave for hes cop some BPO t2 (BPO, u can spawn infinite number of a item T2= second generation of tecnology = uber )
5) some how a player get info about that from player corp forum data base (hax supposed)
6) he post all that on a forum
7) ccp start inverstigations
http://mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/setView/news/gameID/14/showArticle/7130
http://myeve.eve-online.com/ingameboard.asp?a=topic&threadID=471868&page=1#7
8) after some days ppl say not sufficient
http://mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/setView/news/gameID/14/showArticle/7146
http://myeve.eve-online.com/ingameboard.asp?a=topic&threadID=473335
additional info
"hacker" get a mail from ccp to close hes site and like that help the investigation after that hes 5 accounts get banned
BoB boss release some info about hes RL name contry on eve-o forum and not baned
BestSigEver :P
It's like an MMO-Soap Opera.
Thanks for the posts!
Waiting for something fresh to arrive on the MMO scene...
LOL welcome to Eve.
Sometimes people take it a "little" too seriously.
But then again that is what makes it fun.
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/68601-Jumpgate-EVEs-Devs-and-the-Friends-They-Keep-Part-2
(it is in a few parts, cannot find the links to the others)
http://www.kugutsumen.com/forumdisplay.php?f=2
(this is from the K, the guy who found out what was going on)
There ya go.
www.eve-tribune.com/index.php
We're also trying to get an interview with Kugutsumen for the next issue.
BoB Devs Controversy
Tuesday, Feb 13It started on January 30th when Kugutsumen, also known as AnthonyZ, posted the first part of his series “Reikoku Makes Its Own Luck.” In this first part he showed alleged private messages from the RKK internal forums that showed one character, Lord Stone, a director in RKK, offering a job to another director, Gunstar Zero. The catch? The job was at CCP: It was immediately obvious from the Pms that Lord Stone had disclosed his identity as a CCP employee.
The next part, posted a few hours later, followed another character, Ishos Rerajan, who became the head of the Band of Brothers capital ship fleet . He, also, was fingered as a dev, and accused of cheating, and the character of Ishos was forcibly abandoned.... But not before he left 8 T2 BPO's to the RKK directorate, including those for a Malediction and a Sabre.
Part 3 related to the Serpentis invasion of Fountain, which apparently a RKK director, Dianabolic, had advanced notice of, but refused to share because he was “sworn to secrecy by CCP.” Also in this thread, RRK director dimensionZ allegedly stated that “I never kept informations from you i beleive, hell even t20 secret infos i had in the past, i trusted u all with those.”[sic]
At this point, both stories had been cross-posted by Kugutsumen to the goonfleet.com internal forums, by way of a hacked forum account and met with by much uproar. Threads were posted on the eve-online.com forums about it, but instead of responding to them CCP simply locked and/or deleted the threads, claiming that it was an inappropriate place for them to be discussed. In retaliation to this censorship Remedial gave permission to Goonfleet members to spam the Corporation, Alliance and Organization Discussion (CAOD) forums until CCP gave an official response.
Within fifteen to thirty minutes kieron, CCP Community Manager, had posted a thread stating that CCP was looking into the matter and left the thread open for discussion of the topic. Twenty-four pages of drivel, baseless accusations, and flames later he closed it until further notice.
Parts four, five, and six of Reikoku Makes its Own Luck were posted in the following days and seventh part was promised but never materialized. Part four outed a total of five CCP employees from Reikoku using their IP addresses, two of the forum accounts linked, interestingly, had all but one of their posts deleted. Part five showed evidence that some members of RKK, and potentially a developer, sanction of account sales and eBaying ISK. Kugutsumen quoted Dianabolic as saying “I dunno which annoys me more, the fact he sold it without speaking to us or the fact he didn't offer it to us in the first place.” Part 6 related to a RKK member caught using a macro who was not banned for it, although posts in CAOD indicate that he was warned and may have been banned temporarily.
In one of the many threads on the eve-online.com forums that became devoted to this discussion, the head of BoB, SirMolle, stated “We play the game on a high level, we have a high profile, this isnt the first accusations of cheat, hax, and god knows what else that has been flung at us. The tinfoil hattery is amazing, i know that you would love for us all to be framed for some conspiracy. Since we are all still here, all the accusations are totally baseless. There will be devs in every alliance in the game, and i for one, do not wanna know who is a dev or not, i want them to be in the middle of everything,from low level gaming, to high level gaming, so that they see the issueswe all face, from day to day. Face it, you love the drama and the conspiracy theories, and thats all there is, drama and conspiracy theories.”[sic]
Some days later, despite having complied with previous instructions from CCP and closing his forum to the public, all five of Kugutsumen's accounts were permanently banned by CCP. While CCP refuses to comment on this banning, citing their privacy policy, Kugutsumen posted the message he received when banned: “Hi It it is my sad duty to inform you that your account has been banned from our server for various violations to our EULA and TOS. I want to refer to the Terms of service. http://www.eve-online.com/pnp/terms.asp 7. You may not violate any local, state, national or international laws or regulations. 16. You may not engage in any activity that increases the difficulty and/or expense of CCP in maintaining the EVE Online client, server, web site or other services for the benefit and enjoyment of all its users. 18. You may not communicate, post or publicize any subscriber’s personal information within the EVE Online game world or website. 25. We reserve the right to ban any user from the game without refund or compensation. Account that has been banned is: sullafelix gilagila Best regards, GM Nova Senior Game master EVE Online Customer Support”
Much argument has come about because it is widely believed that Kugutsumen lives in Indonesia, where none of his actions would have violated article 7 of the ToS. Some people on the forums have also been interpreting the citation of article 16 as CCP banning him for being a whistleblower, while others have taken it to mean that he was banned because of the difficulties his hacking had created for the community as a whole, such as when he hacked the goonfleet.com forums (allegedly under hire of Lotka Volterra director Lallente). While the article 18 citation is not disputed, it is a rather common violation and it is rare for it to lead to anything other than a minor warning.
The controversy took one final swerve when EVE developer t20 admitted to having illegitimately created the T2 BPO's that were given to Band Of Brothers. He denies, however, leaking any information to them despite alleged claims by dimensionZ on the RKK forums, which were officially denied in CAOD by BoB whose representatives stated that Kugutsumen forged the information.
Interestingly, however, it was claimed by CCP that this was uncovered during the summer of 2006. t20 was supposedly not fired because only the summer staff was on duty at that point in time, and they had felt as though it would be overstepping their boundaries to take such an action. He was, however, given unspecified punishment for is actions. The T2 BPO's were, however, not removed form the game until the issue was brought into the public eye.
It is also unusual that it took so long -eleven days- to formulate a response since, according to the devblog by CCP's CEO, the allegations had been uncovered roughly half a year ago one would expect that this could be resolved more quickly. However as CCP has declined to comment further nothing can be done save speculation.
CCP does seem intent of preserving its appearance as it has promoted senior GM Arkanon to Director of Internal Affairs. In his devblog, posted today, he stated that “I believed, and still believe that we owe our player community the right to be the focus of EVE, without paid employees using dirty tricks to swing our universe in their favor. Even playing by the rules, I frown on employees being power players to the extent that their gameplay results in any sort of domination over others. I don't believe CCP employees should run the EVE universe; that spot is reserved for the paying customer. EVE is a sandbox, but it's not our sandbox. We're here to keep it clean and provide the sand.”