Author Topic: Is tracking a player an infringement of privacy (Read 3504 times)

Blueeagle · « **on:** May 26, 2008, 05:09:12 pm »

The dilemma here is

- FC allows for silent tracking simply because they have got no way to effectively police this.

- FC may ban an account for harassment if it conciders tells from it as spam

- For some people it's ok to track others if you just notify them of the fact they are being tracked.

- For some peope it is immoral to track others without providing a way for the player to protect themselves from tracking.

What do you think?

_{A request has been sendt to FC to clarify their position on wether or not a single tell from a bot resulting from an active command for each player recieving the tell does qualify as harassment. FC has yet to answer.

We will not put any functionality into the bot if it increases the chances having the bot banned, however infringing of privacy is a serious matter. Since I don't want to be tracked without giving my concent I am not sure if I can be part of the team that makes such tracking easier.}

Temar · « **Reply #1 on:** May 26, 2008, 07:50:03 pm »

any 1 can track some 1 them selfs they just add to buddy list

if fc was against this they should of added an aproval to freinds list

Glarawyn · « **Reply #2 on:** June 03, 2008, 07:54:18 pm »

Anyone can add anyone to their friends list in AO and see their online/offline status. The player being tracked doesn't know. In my opinion this is a non-issue.

Nytridr · « **Reply #3 on:** June 04, 2008, 03:44:10 am »

I know the bot tracks or did track the last time a person was on or used the bot or what not. Is this what your talking about, or are you talking about tracking the persons online history type of thing. like say.. So and so was on at this time and logged off at this time on this date.. and so on?

If your talking about the last one, then I would be against that.. as far as tracking the last seen, then I do not see any problem with that.

Nyt

Khalem · « **Reply #4 on:** June 04, 2008, 02:30:05 pm »

Tracking of players is designed into the Anarchy Online chat system, as it also is in AoC afaik.

As far as the ethical and moral issues surrounding it, it's ultimately in the hands of the bot administrator. We already provide the tools needed to track someone, because the game provides the tools needed to track someone, and we make use of this for very basic functions of the bot like logon/off announcements, auto invites, news and so on.

I know there are bots out there that effectively monitor all members of notable orgs on both or some sides of the conflict.

I strongly doubt BeBot will ever ship with something that would be considered to invasive, while at the same time i know of many orgs who would welcome with open arms more detailed player tracking to allow them to build stats of what times the org members are more active. The problem that arises from that is that there is a small step from innocent statistics to full tracking of individual players allowing you to for example say that Khalem was online 6 hours today, 12 yesterday, 40 hours this week, 200000 hours since i began tracking.

Ultimately it comes down to Funcom allowing and designing for this to be possible.
Funcom themselves actively tracks your online time and activities for their own internal statistical use.

I know some online character databases has kept track of players online time in the past, and i know firsthand that people have actually been fired based on the fact that said database showed them as having been online while alledgedly being home sick.

clashbot · « **Reply #5 on:** June 04, 2008, 05:51:06 pm »

to add a slight bit of humor, to a very serious topic, that's why you never should play with co-workers...lol...boils down as the same as dating the boss's daughter...

back to the topic, we technically do have that feature in bebot, with the online org module...as it will give you an online list of any org. The only thing it doesn't do is keep track of statistics. I see both sides of the coin, and think that more than it being the bot's admin being morally responsible, it actually falls down to all users of said bot. On the plus side, onlineorg, during a tower war, gives you a peek into their org as far as levels of toons, so you can match accordingly. On the negative side, it gives you a peek into their org to see exactly who is online to plan attacks...good and bad are always hand in hand. My thought is this, you can already do anon, to prevent your character from being listed in the PF, and getting funcom to develop an "invisible" setting for online is not entirely unfeasible, but probably will never be developed. As the bot goes, this is much easier for someone to grant an "invisible" setting for online and sm.

Parfet · « **Reply #6 on:** June 05, 2008, 02:11:22 am »

Quote from: Khalem on June 04, 2008, 02:30:05 pm

I know of many orgs who would welcome with open arms more detailed player tracking to allow them to build stats of what times the org members are more active.

Loud and enthusiastic "Yes please!"... I've been asked several times for just such a feature, specifically I'd love to see a breakdown of monthly/weekly/daily usage, in raw statistical numbers (not who's on, but when 12 people are on, vs 4 people, vs 40 people, etc)

Nytridr · « **Reply #7 on:** June 08, 2008, 10:25:23 pm »

Quote from: clashbot on June 04, 2008, 05:51:06 pm

On the plus side, onlineorg, during a tower war, gives you a peek into their org as far as levels of toons, so you can match accordingly. On the negative side, it gives you a peek into their org to see exactly who is online to plan attacks...good and bad are always hand in hand. My thought is this, you can already do anon, to prevent your character from being listed in the PF, and getting funcom to develop an "invisible" setting for online is not entirely unfeasible, but probably will never be developed. As the bot goes, this is much easier for someone to grant an "invisible" setting for online and sm.

auno dose this also.. you can track people through there website. onlineorg just brings it into game.. eliminates 1 step if you already have auno opened.. (the tabbing out of game step)