Planet Partner Avatars - "PROHIBITED" Neverdie announced today on his forum that he will not be able to interact with us like he has any longer. I was also informed that the sponsoring for new player events, the flea market, and sweat purchases from new players(something I would never be able to afford on my own) will no longer be possible for fear that some of those regulations would trickle down to me and the other volunteers. This was the most exciting summer I have had in game, the ability to personally interact with new players and help them get started and excited about the game. Sure I had done plenty of mentoring and small things in the past, but I will likely never get the opportunity to participate at this level again. I understand the reasoning and fears that drove these events into occurring, but I am deeply saddened at the way they took place, the spirit in which it was done, and how it ended up. I realize that I am just one person, who is looking at the whole thing from a different angle and hold no hard feelings. Just deep sadness. narfi
Sure it might be sad to see NEVERDIE go, he has done some good stuff in the past for this game, but he knew about this since he has seen the planet partner agreement. These rules are there, I assume, to get rid of any appearance of conflict of interest, not saying he took advantage of it, but the appearance was there. Isn't there any way to make the NEVERDIE avatar an official one?
whatever the partner agreement, it would have been the same since he went in business as a developer and released Rocktropia. theres no reason to suggest the agreement has change, and nothing to suggest anything in has been broken. none of us have seen it to know otherwise. this is a reaction to the "community" pressure bludgeoning some trivial points over the poor release of NI. For years people have said they would love to be involved in a planet themselves, or that the developers should get more involved in day to day game. now the partners are to retreat inwards to become less involved for fear of any accusations that might be fired at them. well done community.
Well according to ND's post on the rocktropia: "It has been brought to my attention that the Planet Partner Agreement strictly Prohibits Planet Owners or planet Partner Employees from Playing Entropia universe with private Avatars..." So it is in there alright, just not enforced by MA. And I'm pretty sure that that rule is there to avoid stuff we have seen the last few weeks with all the COI discussion.
probably, but no one cared until NI. whats the difference between NeverDie as a private avatar or NeverDie as an official avatar? from the OP it seems he is removing his involvement in the day to day game, something that could be done with an official avatar. and the the irony is, it doesn't effect the percieved conflicts anyway. just means the developer becomes a little more remote from the game.
the difference is that with his NEVERDIE avatar he can make money, with an official one you can't, so there is no gain if he knows anything about the game that we dont
There were concerns prior to NI. Just that the NI thing really pushed the envelope. And about sweat buying support... That part of RT is just plain fucked up. RT is not a complete and ready planet, there is no significant use for sweat on the planet that can be supported by the planet. (what drops tp chips?). Yea sure it's in bp ingredients, not a significant usage. RT supposed to have beer cans to collect and some purpose for them, but they aren't here yet. ND had to do the things at RT just to make the planet work and then maybe got a little carried away at NI. But.. He was forced to do it because MA don't got their shit together. I don't know this for sure about the cans, but I believe it is true, and we know it is true that MA is not ready for planet partners on bp's for sure. I wonder what else? So really this whole thing is MA's fault for not having a full product ready for partners, forcing them to have to do certain things so that their planet can be successful. I really hope that future planets refuse to come on line until the partner features are ready.
I am pretty sure that MA can recode avatar NEVERDIE to be an official avatar like the ones with a star above the head. If that is what he wants. I guess it can be done in some database table.
I actually find this really sad too, Personally I know I'd find it very very difficult to say goodbye to my avatar to develop a planet when it was my avatar that has sparked my love for the game. Surely they could just ontroduce some kind of official parameters around avatars of developers where they have been an avatar first, maybe soemthing along the lines of not being able to withdraw any more than is put into the character in the last 6 months or something like that (Yes I know this suggestion isn't perfectly fair but it's something I'd be happy with). Mostly I guess everyone complaining about the conflicts of interest have got their way now.
wheres the faceplam smiley... he makes money from owning the planet and the LAs. which cost alot to purchase in the first place (in dev time if nothing else). this is not at you personally Razer, but alot of people seem to be missing a wider picture and focusing on the personal avatar. ND has presumably invested a great deal of money in to a business and wont be seeing a return by playing an avatar as normal, with or without inside info. the only conflict of interest are between his planet and his studio's clients, not between him and the rest of the player community.
Indeed. We have a winner and the winner is Entropia Universe. Because the ethics that are common sense in business and beyond all over the world are applied to EU too. This adds a little bit of the respectability and the professionalism that is badly needed. Also I can't see how those rules would prevent event sponsoring, market support and such. It just means those activities have to be performed with official avatars.
This sums it up perfectly. I don't see how anyone can claim there is no conflict of interests between working (or owning) for a planet in an RCE game and operating an avatar that can make money and make withdrawals from that game. The MA business model means that any money a participant makes is coming from other players, and it is pretty obvious that inside information provides many opportunities to use your knowledge to make money on the community's expense. I am not saying ND or any of his staff did take advantage of this, but any serious company cannot leave this decision in the hands of its employees or partners.
ND knew about this the first time he saw the planet partner agreement (assuming it was already in there back then), so he could have taken action then by selling or giving away his stuff or by not building the planet. It is one of the sacrifices you need to make if you wanna build your won planet. Sure it is hard to abandon an avatar you have played so long with.
I`d say it`s about time. It was`nt right from the beginning. And worse that MA never bothered to enforce it like so many other "rules" they have. At least until they are forced to. Like children that skirt the rules and only relent when they are caught red handed. But Neverdie has done ALOT for EU and continues to do so. It would be great if he could be converted to an official avatar and I`m sure he`d be happy to have his avatar reincarnated. I`d almost say the game needs it. His avatar will always be a part of EU history and that history started as a player that interacted with other players. I think it should continue that way but now in a different role. As for the other issues like events and market support it is sad but we all know that it is MA that is supposed to have full control of the economy. And it should stay that way.
Nothing against you personally tass, but that is the problem with the entire "witch hunt" and debates that have been going on. http://www.neverdie.com/neverdie-studios/4274-rocktropia-systems.html They have not been given the ability to run actual events, they have not been given the ability to give real prizes. Blueprints, the beergarden, everything that hasn't been implemented yet etc.... People have been making accusations both emotional and intellectual without bothering to learn the full picture and facts. A lot of assumptions have been made, some of which are not true. MA has crippled rocktropia from the start, and now you the community have removed the one make-shift tool that was in place to try and soak up the bleeding. narfi
I can´t think of any make-shift tool powerfull enough to stop THIS bleeding so the only hope remaining for the current EU planet system is that MA learns their lesson till new planets arrive. The (virtual!) NEVERDIE is dead now and the (real!) ND studios are most likely dying due to lack of income (players).
Well Narfi it is not the community that caused ND to need to abandon his avatar if you ask me. The fact that he can't have an avatar IF he is the owner of developer of a planet is in the rules (according to his own post on RTF). So as I said before he should have known from the start. It is MA that didn't enforce those rules which caused this to go on a bit longer then supposed to and I even think they kept one eye shut until ND had sold CND. Now that he has he needs to play by the rules again. The fact that there is now a bit of a problem on RT when it comes to sweat sale and doing events is a different story and a different discussion if you ask me.
If it was in the agreement, then fine but I still do not understand why he cannot have an avatar that does not make money?? If you own a casino, you cannot gamble in it since you can have an inferred or real influence on the game but these individuals still can walk the floor can't they? They can still comp the players when they want to, right? How is that a violation of any ethics agreements?
Beyond issues of ND`s avatar and sweat I think what saddens me most is that Rocktropia was one of the planets that I felt I would be at home on and be able to have the most impact and contribution since music is what I do. The potential is huge just as is the whole EU platform. But it`s growth is hampered by the business plan of MA and what they feel planet partners can get away with or how much they can offer participants. MA is the deciding factor in all this. They control the economy as their needs and desires dictate. Which brings me to my initial impressions of the whole planet partner feature. To me planet partners are about the same as an affiliate of say adult sites like web cams and theaters. Where the affiliate builds the front end and gets a cut anytime someone pays to go through it. Only at a much bigger expense since you need a whole professional web team to produce and maintain the front end. And the planet partners are also supplying the content. But once past that front end customers no longer have anything to do with the affiliate nor can the affiliate capitalize on the customer beyond recurring income. They build the facade to lure business for a cut and that is the extent of it. In the same way a planet partner builds the facade, the front end, but once they have interacted with it MA controls everything else. The economy, the needed income and the return. Planet partners are`nt there to enhance the economy beyond bringing in more people. It was a brilliant move on MA`s part. Have others(planet partners) do the work and concentrate more on reaping the benefit of their system. The core business model.
