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hatespyware
Apprentice


Joined: 16 Dec 2002
Posts: 103

PostPosted: Sun Oct 26, 2003 6:35 am   

nazi moderation
 
The last three posts that I have made have resulted in Kjata locking threads. I am accused on these forums, regularly, of being misguided and untruthful. I have even been threatened with account deletion! And what behavior have I exhibited to warrant such treatment? Simply posting well-written, if dissident, arguments against e-licensing or the forum code or... My posts are a simple reflection of my opinions - opinions that I suspect that others must share. If they make you feel passionate, then please respond in kind - by posting well-written counterpoint. Fanatical make-last-word-posts-then-close-topic actions serve no one. Perhaps I'm very wrong, but my experience with Zugg's style, and the zMud community as a whole (which I most certainly belong to, regardless of whether or not you label me as a troll), is one of soliciting and responding to constructive input. My input is sincerely intended to be constructive.

Now, with regard to specifics:
quote:
Originally posted by Kjata

The forum code is not done by Zuggsoft, it is free code done by Snitz Communications. If you have a problem with the way it generates web pages take it up to them.


And, if Kjata hadn't locked the thread, maybe the next person who came by would've said something like "hey, I use xxx system, and it works great!" or "My college buddy wrote xxx system, and I'm sure I can get Zuggsoft a free copy!" or even just agreed or disagreed with my assertion that this forum system has technical issues. Again, my experience with Zugg is that if enough people express interest in changing something like forums, that he'd respond in some way. What's more, I can't understand why the post was deemed overly critical or why Kjata felt the need to shut it down.

quote:
Originally posted by Kjata

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Of course, nobody mentions that the e-license software forces the periodic licensing in order to track usage habits. I personally find it annoying that I have to report whether or not I'm using my software every 3 months.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
And.... topic locked!
Don't spread misinformation alright? Also, we don't appreciate trolling in here, so don't go about "stirring the bee's nest". Next time, the eLicense trojan will format your hard drive (just in case, I'm not serious - neither zMUD nor eLicense install any spyware nor do they monitor your usage.)

Incredible how some people will degrade otherwise normal topics into this. That delete user button was so close....


I’m afraid you’re the one who is misinformed. You should simply go read up on e-licensing – I’m sure you’d learn that one of its big selling points is that it enables you to monitor who is using what at periodic intervals. Did you even bother to look into what I said, or did you just reflexively call me a liar and abuse your moderation powers?

quote:
Originally posted by Kjata

Database applications are something that most home users - Windows largest target market - do not use. Anyway, it is not so hard to believe that they would be so sloppy.

This is a patently absurd statement. Try deleting your MDAC subsystem, and you will discover that all sorts of software that you love and depend on (like your Outlook address book, or your mp3 player’s library functions, or …) will no longer work. Again, I wonder why you respond with such a magnanimous manner in cases where you are under-informed.

I hope that this post does not damage general opinion on zMud Gurus or Zuggsoft staff as a whole. While my opinions are seldom in-line with those of the Gurus (of course, you’d expect the customer/employee relations to be somewhat adversarial), I respect their views and technical prowess. Most of them realize, also, that respect is a two-way street and seem to value my feelings. Perhaps that is why I find the recent lockdown of all my postings by Kjata to be so distasteful. I am sure that Kjata helps lots of people and that she has many supporters on this site. Since she is such a rabid supporter of Zugg and his software (to the extent that I often wonder what special arrangements have been made with him), I’m sure that she will never be officially corrected for limiting forum access to those of us with views conflicting with her own. I feel, nonetheless, compelled to make a point of this behavior in hopes of bringing it to the general attention. I know that the forum is provided as a service to Zuggsoft customers and not as a device for promoting free-speech, but I AM a customer and I have ideas and beliefs and tips and questions too, and I don’t think that Kjata’s decision to censor them is reasonable.
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Leto
GURU


Joined: 27 Sep 2000
Posts: 90
Location: USA

PostPosted: Sun Oct 26, 2003 8:33 am   
 
Just a point, hatespyware,

quote:
My input is sincerely intended to be constructive.


quote:
Since she is such a rabid supporter of Zugg and his software (to the extent that I often wonder what special arrangements have been made with him)


Implying adultery is not constructive. Zugg is married. And Chiara is heavily involved in this website and support services of Zuggsoft. I am afraid THAT comment was out of place and completely unnesessary.


Continuing on...

With regards to Snitz Forums,
These support Forums are for Zuggsoft software support. Using Snitz Forums instead of developing his own (which he had at one point) allows Zugg to concentrate on zMud,zMapper,zExplorer... Any problems detected with these forums should go to [url]mailto:support@zuggsoft.com[/url] or posted in one of the Guru Forums you don't have access to.

With regards to the 90day forced relicensing,
Initaily, when Zugg switched to elicense, he didn't require the user to relicense every 90 days. This resulted in a huge amount of support work for him and his wife because users would use up their licenses and would need him to unlock them for him. The 90 day relicense allows Zugg to concentrate on development instead of support.

With regards to MDAC,
I have no idea about any of that, so I won't comment.

With regards to Kjata's actions as a forum moderator,
As stated above, these forums are a place to help users of the software developed by Zuggsoft. All other questions should be taken to Zugg himself.
Your reply to http://www.zuggsoft.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=13492 was more a declaration of what you percieved as Zuggs ignorance than anything constructive. And in no way offered, Rose, a means of fixing her problem. Most of your comments in that post did not belong in that topic.
Your posts in http://www.zuggsoft.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=13509 offered no suggestions or advice. All in all it was an out of place topic (see above) that offered no "constructive" information. It merely pointed out that third party software that Zugg uses to help out his customers doesn't meet with your approval. Of what use is that? You didn't even ask if other users had a viable alternative.

-Leto

P.S. Personal opinion: "Hate" is not constructive, hatespyware.

P.P.S. Whats with all these Zugg Quotes? Do you really think anyone here believes his word is Canon? Even himself? Please, let Zugg join the ranks of mortals.
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IceChild
Magician


Joined: 11 Oct 2000
Posts: 419
Location: Post Falls, ID, USA

PostPosted: Sun Oct 26, 2003 9:29 am   
 
quote:

I know that the forum is provided as a service to Zuggsoft customers and not as a device for promoting free-speech, but I AM a customer and I have ideas and beliefs and tips and questions too, and I don’t think that Kjata’s decision to censor them is reasonable.



Interestingly enough, I do believe if there wasn't a trust placed on the Guru's by Zugg, he wouldn't have granted them that status in the first place. I've been reading these forums for quite a while (posting when approperate), and I've not once seen any of the Gurus do something that I would believe to be an abuse of power. Of course, I've never created a topic that's been locked, so I can't honestly say I've been in your shoes, however, I can honestly say that I would atleast not make such an obvious attempt to publicly slander the person if I believed them in error. A simple, calm, email to Zugg would have most likely gone a lot farther. Just my opinion however again.

quote:

I’m afraid you’re the one who is misinformed. You should simply go read up on e-licensing – I’m sure you’d learn that one of its big selling points is that it enables you to monitor who is using what at periodic intervals. Did you even bother to look into what I said, or did you just reflexively call me a liar and abuse your moderation powers?



Actually, as a developer, and someone who has researched eLicense for my own purposes, I can tell you that in all of the informational packets I've recieved from them, I have recieved not one piece of information that says that I can "track my customers use of my program" via their software. So would you care to point to an official statement if there is indeed one? As quick proof of my statement, please refer to the eLicense Privacy Policy at http://www.elicense.com/privacy.asp .

quote:

This is a patently absurd statement. Try deleting your MDAC subsystem, and you will discover that all sorts of software that you love and depend on (like your Outlook address book, or your mp3 player’s library functions, or …) will no longer work. Again, I wonder why you respond with such a magnanimous manner in cases where you are under-informed.



To quietly prove you wrong in your statement, I've got a Windows 95 system up and running that I use everyday that has absolutely no version of the MDAC installed, and no database software at all. What does it run? A variety of programs, including an MP3 player, Email client, Word Processor, and Web Browser (to name a few). So, would you care to revise your statement into something factual?

quote:

I have even been threatened with account deletion!



Actually, nowhere did Kjata threaten you with account deletion. Kjata simply said that the delete button was close. This could have simply refered to the deletion of the offending post, not the account in its entirety. Might have been wise to confirm the statement before making an accusation.

quote:

While my opinions are seldom in-line with those of the Gurus (of course, you’d expect the customer/employee relations to be somewhat adversarial), I respect their views and technical prowess.



2 things in this statement.

1) Guru's are in no way employee's of Zuggsoft. They're simply people who have given enough insight into the program to earn the official stamp of approval. Not saying you didn't know this, but I thought I'd restate it, as that's how part of your statement came across.

2) You're entire post shows a lack of disrespect in Kjata's decision, which is indeed a view of theirs. So this post make your statement either false, or mistaken.

Just thought I'd clear up a couple things from another readers standpoint. My post is in no way meant as an attack on you or your beliefs, just simply another point of view.
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hatespyware
Apprentice


Joined: 16 Dec 2002
Posts: 103

PostPosted: Sun Oct 26, 2003 12:16 pm   
 
quote:
Originally posted by IceChild

So would you care to point to an official statement if there is indeed one?


With pleasure. How about the very basic list of product features? http://www.elicense.com/what/overview.asp
quote:
Excerpt from http://www.elicense.com/what/overview.asp

ViaTech's eLicense System provides a total end-to-end e-business solution with benefits that include:

Content Management tools to protect, manage and track eLicense-enabled products

Data mining tools to enable one-to-one personalization with customers and product evaluators

Full set of reports that analysis sales transactions for customer profiling and sales projections


I think the phrase "manage and track eLicense-enabled products" is pretty clear, don't you? There is much more information available on the site, and some of it is pretty scary (i.e.. viral distribution) for end-users. This is getting off-topic (and goodness, Kjata may lock us down for it!), but my post in http://www.zuggsoft.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=13046 further explains my dislike for e-licensing as it relates to zMud.

quote:
Originally posted by IceChild

To quietly prove you wrong in your statement, I've got a Windows 95 system up and running that I use everyday that has absolutely no version of the MDAC installed, and no database software at all.

Yeah... that operating system is now rapidly approaching 10 years of age. Move to a current, supported platform, however, and you'll find that not only do a wide variety of applications that you do not usually consider to be "database-driven" require these APIs, but even the operating systems themselves are very much dependent upon the database APIs.

quote:
Originally posted by IceChild

So, would you care to revise your statement into something factual?


If my examples were not precise enough for you, then how about this for factual: MDAC is a required component of Windows XP. Or this: MDAC is required for and included with all Internet Explorer versions after 5. QED.

quote:
Originally posted by IceChild

Actually, nowhere did Kjata threaten you with account deletion. Kjata simply said that the delete button was close.

rofl... You're a lawyer, aren't you? Reminds me of "it depends on what the definition of is is."

quote:
Originally posted by IceChild

You're entire post shows a lack of disrespect in Kjata's decision, which is indeed a view of theirs. So this post make your statement either false, or mistaken.


No, just misunderstood. In example, I can (and do) have respect for you. In this case, I respect your views. My feelings towards you have nothing to do with my feelings towards Kjata or her actions. In this way it is possible for me to still appreciate "gurus" as a whole, without approving of every action or statement from a single guru.

quote:
Originally posted by IceChild
Just thought I'd clear up a couple things from another readers standpoint. My post is in no way meant as an attack on you or your beliefs, just simply another point of view.


Thanks. I'm very very happy to hear reasonable opinions, especially from those who don't agree with me. The zMud user-base that is generally represented on these forums seems to think in a manner that I am incapable of understanding. It seems like any statement which is in the least bit critical of the software or policies is met with rabid defensiveness on behalf of Zugg. It is almost like taunting a sports-car enthusiast about rival brands - Loyalty to the point of fanaticism. I mean, hey... I'm all about brand loyalty, but it sure makes it difficult when you can't get straight answers about a program flaw because rabid fans people take the problem reports as attacks on the software or their person. Just look at the dude who somehow inferred a reference to adultery from my first post - OMG!
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Kjata
GURU


Joined: 10 Oct 2000
Posts: 4379
Location: USA

PostPosted: Sun Oct 26, 2003 2:07 pm   
 
Lol, I'm a guy! Hehe

Anyway, as moderator of these forums it is my job to keep posts on-topic. You joked about it, but you are right, post need to be kept in topic in here. In most other forums you will see that they too try to enforce that rule, it's just common sense to try to keep everything organized.

Next, by the phrase you mentioned in the webpage, it cannot be infered that eLicense tracks your usage. My best guess is that it just gives Zugg some sales data. It says that it tracks eLicense-enabled products, not each individual copy. It might still track each person's individual usage, which I doubt, but from that line in the webpage this cannot be concluded, so the statement is still labeled as misinformation.

Finally, I don't see why this - "Database applications are something that most home users - Windows largest target market - do not use. Anyway, it is not so hard to believe that they would be so sloppy." - had to be brought up. Just to show that I'm under-informed? In any case, I stand by my statement, it is true that most home users do not use database applications, and even if other programs which are not database applications use MDAC, problems with it would not be as noticeable as programs that do a lot of database manipulation.

I'll let this thread continue since there might be others that feel the same way about me and may want to discuss it. However, I can't guarantee that someone else won't lock it, since as I mentioned somewhere else, it does not belong with the topic of the forum category. Also, let's try to keep this civil and not attack each other personally (notice that in none of the three threads I locked nor in this reply I have attacked you personally), because then it will be locked.
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Cuttlefish
Apprentice


Joined: 28 Oct 2003
Posts: 164

PostPosted: Tue Oct 28, 2003 9:14 pm   
 
I'm just trying to figure out how the word "nazi" fits into any definition of "constructive" or "well-written"...
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Zugg
MASTER


Joined: 25 Sep 2000
Posts: 23379
Location: Colorado, USA

PostPosted: Tue Oct 28, 2003 9:40 pm   
 
First, I for one find the entire *title* of this topic offensive. hatespyware: what I've noticed is that it's not so much *what* you have to say, but *how* you say it that seems to offend some people. These forums are for supporting users trying to use zMUD and to help them use it more effectively. It is *not* a forum to discuss philosophical issues regarding copy protection, what forum software is the best, or whether MDAC is good or bad. When topics stray from the main purpose of this forum, they will be locked. I actually feel that we are pretty generous with the amount of side discussions that we already allow.

By granting some people Guru (Moderator) status, I have put trust into these people. As it has been mentioned many times, Gurus are not ZuggSoft employees and they have a right to their own opinions. If a Guru abused their moderator powers, they would lose that power. But no Guru has ever done so, and I fully support their individual opinions as to whether a particular thread should be closed or not.

Regarding specific issues:
eLicense: The eLicense software has a lot of capabilities, just like most good software. That doesn't mean that I necessarily use all of those capabilities. eLicense provides a great variety of different ways to control or track licenses. In fact, the 90-day auto-expire license is a capability that they specifically added to their software because of zMUD. Before zMUD, they didn't handle the concept of software that has free upgrades. They have been *very* cooperative in adding features to their software so that it would work in the way that I wanted it to for zMUD. But remember that eLicense is used for lots of other software, and some very large companies. All of their customers need slightly different features.

So, you are making a huge assumption by just going to their web site and reading their "features" page and then assuming that zMUD is using all of those features. It does not. I get no usage reports what-so-ever. We don't do any tracking of users of any kind. All I get from them is a report showing the number of new licenses each month and a bill for what I owe them.

As I have explained many times, your copy of zMUD expires every 90 days. After it expires you have to click a button to check with the remote eLicense server to see if your reg code is still valid. If it is valid, your license is reset to allow another 90 days of use. If the license is not renewed, it is marked on the eLicense server as "reuseable". This allows a license on a copy of Windows that was reformatted to be reused in 90 days, avoiding the problem of licenses getting lost forever. By checking your reg code with the eLicense server, I can disable the license of people who have obtained refunds.

This is all the information that is exchanged with the server. It doesn't report any usage information at all. Since zMUD only contacts the eLicense server every 90 days, there is no way for me to track any usage. There other types of licenses supported by eLicense that *do* track usage and require contacting the eLicense server each time you run the program. But zMUD doesn't use this license type. So again, just because eLicense supports that kind of license doesn't mean zMUD is using it.

So, keep your posts on topic. This particular thread is totally off topic for what these forums are intended for, but I'm going to leave it unlocked for now. But if any of the Moderators feel that it has strayed too far from supporting zMUD and helping zMUD users, they are free to lock it and I'd have no problem with that.

(and see what you've done! That's 10 more minutes of my time spent answering silly forum threads instead of working on zMUD bugs)
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Vijilante
SubAdmin


Joined: 18 Nov 2001
Posts: 5182

PostPosted: Wed Oct 29, 2003 3:45 am   
 
Actualy I have finally taken exception to the word 'nazi' as that regime turned (quite literally) a perfectly good symbol in a bad one. If anyone feels further need to rant, there is a topic that quite nicely says it is about nothing in particular floating around.

Just so no one say Kjata locked this topic...I did.
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