The EULA and Data Farming

[Tuzmaal]

So? As long as there's enough data, I don't mind whether it's 50% or 1% of users feeding it.

Well, as feeder you either:

- are Robin Hood trying to help those without 3 working braincells and new players who have no clue ( yet ), then kudos to you
- not realising that every leecher sitting on this tool means faster drying out routes, then I feel sorry for you

If I would be Slopey or any other host of equal tools I would atleast make sure that every user has to put in a certain ammount of data every few days to be able to access data himself but as I said, I have found my route on my own so do what you like...

 

[Lasse B.]

This was a PM I have been given permission to share.



We should know soon enough whether its a matter of protecting the content, or the game client process itself. But it seems like it's the process that they want to protect and the content is less so an issue - which seems most reasonable since they plan on releasing an API anyways.

Something is off here. Either Mr Brooks is up to his ears with work confusing a thing or another, or he was given false information to begin with. Otherwise he would have told you that the stability issues with the game client that he mentioned were not caused by OCR, but by accessing the game directly, which was not OCR at all. OCR stands for Optical Character Recognition, and there's nothing optical going on when poking and prodding another process' memory.

It's still cheating really though, isn't it, taking advantage of knowledge your in-game pilot shouldn't have access to? I was sure that activity like that is known as insider trading IRL and frowned upon...

It's also cheating when you use better computer equipment and / or peripherals. It's taking advantage of superior hardware. Btw, insider trading (or anything that you can possibly do) isn't what's frowned upon, it's getting caught that gets you into trouble. Not getting caught is what makes you an outstanding pillar of society and a decent human being. Conscience is just a concept taught to the masses so they're more easily put in their places.

 

[ggpwnkthx]

Something is off here. Either Mr Brooks is up to his ears with work confusing a thing or another, or he was given false information to begin with. Otherwise he would have told you that the stability issues with the game client that he mentioned were not caused by OCR, but by accessing the game directly, which was not OCR at all. OCR stands for Optical Character Recognition, and there's nothing optical going on when poking and prodding another process' memory.

I think he meant the reason why the EULA was changed was because they wanted to protect the game client from invasive memory scanning because it was causing problem with the client itself. You are correct that the OCR does not interact with the game process itself (which I don't think he was implying that any of them were doing that). HOWEVER, the changes in the EULA imply an incredibly broad range of protection, and due to the wide net it casts, OCR may be an unrealistic breach of the EULA. Thus, the EULA should once again be amended.

 

[ggpwnkthx]

Well, as feeder you either:

- are Robin Hood trying to help those without 3 working braincells and new players who have no clue ( yet ), then kudos to you
- not realising that every leecher sitting on this tool means faster drying out routes, then I feel sorry for you

If I would be Slopey or any other host of equal tools I would atleast make sure that every user has to put in a certain ammount of data every few days to be able to access data himself but as I said, I have found my route on my own so do what you like...

Slopey disagrees.

Go and give me a specific example please. I have market data going back over 6 months, and for the last 2 months, I know where people have been updating prices from (which is where they are) so I can see if anyone has "swooped" in and trashed a trade route.

In my experience, and I'm not saying you're wrong, it hasn't happened, even when we only had 55 systems to play with, and in that case, FD themselves artificially changed prices of progenitor cells to make it *the* most profitable run ever, with virtually infinite stock.

But according to my data, what you're describing never ever happens. For example, the BPC has tracked 1718 jumps into Eravate in the last 24 hours - I don't see the forums raging there's no profit to be made there.

But if you can find a new route, upload it to the BPC, then let me know and I'll monitor it for the next 6 weeks.

 

[Armour]

It's also cheating when you use better computer equipment and / or peripherals. It's taking advantage of superior hardware.

Not really the same thing, is it? You still have to be able to control your ship/power/heat/loadout effectively, hit and not get hit, regardless of your PC setup and controllers. Even with a Rift you're not able to see stuff you shouldn't be able to, as a human in a cockpit.
If you hacked your client to allow external views, or to bypass heat-based visibility to be able to target those using silent running, or if you are using some kind of aimbot to make combat a doddle, and I was sticking to the rules? That would be a bit different. That's cheating. But technical limitations are not the same thing as in-game, lore-based ones.
Getting better equipment to alleviate the former is part and parcel of being a gamer.
Subverting the latter by using data you shouldn't have is akin to hacking your client, really. It's cheating, because you are bypassing the restrictions designed in to the game (as it is now, anyway).

Btw, insider trading (or anything that you can possibly do) isn't what's frowned upon, it's getting caught that gets you into trouble. Not getting caught is what makes you an outstanding pillar of society and a decent human being. Conscience is just a concept taught to the masses so they're more easily put in their places.

Maybe for you, Mr Wolf of Wall Street. For those that such attitudes screw over on a regular basis, it's frowned upon. Otherwise there would be no penalty for getting caught. Well, that does seem to be largely the case in reality, but the laws make it clear what we would like to be the case. (If it were up to me, those Goldman Sachs guys would have all been hanging from lampposts back in 2008, but that's a different argument entirely...)

 

[Tuzmaal]

Slopey disagrees.

Well, the trade route I had for my own ( according to system traffic report ) for a week collapsed as soon as 1-2 Type 9s found it and the demand went from high to medium in 2 days, while I was alone in my Type 7 nothing changed for a week.
I would also think that it would be very bad coding on FDs behalf if an army of Type9s run the same route and it wouldnt make a difference.

 

[Gremlin]

And yet they have banned scanning process memory.

Its fine to ban it - detection is problematic though as memory scan is indistinguishable from another memory hog process running, say a VM.. (I have plenty of CPU/Memory available), and any APIs that disable process shared memory can be intercepted. It just turns into an arms race.

memory scan is the heart of a 'bot, I believe (hand waving all the complexity involved in acquiring said data and/or processing it to turn it back into keyboard/mouse events, that is).

 

[Lasse B.]

I think he meant the reason why the EULA was changed was because they wanted to protect the game client from invasive memory scanning because it was causing problem with the client itself. You are correct that the OCR does not interact with the game process itself (which I don't think he was implying that any of them were doing that). HOWEVER, the changes in the EULA imply an incredibly broad range of protection, and due to the wide net it casts, OCR may be an unrealistic breach of the EULA. Thus, the EULA should once again be amended.

Sure thing. I just don't want to end up with something like "OCR is forbidden" when that decision was made thinking OCR = memory / process access.

 

[buellpilot]

Some people know how to play Monopoly, they open the box, read the rules, set out the pieces and play the game.

Other people throw the money around the room pretending they are rich and play with the little car making vroom vroom noises.

Both sets of people are having fun, both are playing 'with Monopoly' but only set of people are actually playing the game Monopoly.

Just because you don't like the rules of game or wish things where done differently doesn't mean that changing them to suit yourself is OK.

In my opinion, Trading Tool ⇔ Aimbot ⇔ Cheat

You're implication was that if they didn't want it, it wouldn't exist at all. And my point was it does exist at least to a degree. I'm certainly not arguing in favor of 3rd party apps that ignore in-game physics.

But you are, currently in-game physics don't permit faster than light transmission or insta-transmission of trade data to all points of space. Yet that is what a high level of crowd sourced trade data effectively provides.

The rights and wrongs of why that data isn't available is irrelevant, people will argue that the Kill Warrant Scanner 'proves' that data can be transmitted instantly across the galaxy. Of course they are missing the point, you can't 'prove' anything as no data gets transmitted as it is just a game, it is the same as arguing that ships shouldn't bleed speed in a vacuum. Plenty of nonsensical paradoxes are created in this artificial world on he alter of gameplay.

So I still say it is at the very least morally cheating, regardless of what any EULA does or does not say.

'You've let me down, you've let your school down, you've let your parents down, you've let your friends down. But most importantly you've let yourself down'.

 

[Armour]

In my opinion, Trading Tool ⇔ Aimbot ⇔ Cheat

Agreed.

people will argue that the Kill Warrant Scanner 'proves' that data can be transmitted instantly across the galaxy

Each ship's crime log is apparently a self-policing tattletale using some kind of WORM (write once read many) memory, so nothing there needs to be transmitted via FTL. Otherwise, bounty tickets would be ridiculous.

 

[ggpwnkthx]

you can't 'prove' anything

On the contrary; we most certainly can. Although moral objectivity is perhaps difficult to argue in the real world, it's not hard to argue in a virtual world. All we have to do is ask the developers of that world, rather than sit and wonder.

I've compared the posts of the Executive Produce with the EULA and pointed out incompatibilities. As such, Michael Brookes is looking into what are clear inconsistencies with the intention and the wording of the EULA.

Since an API is planned (and this has been confirmed), a moral argument to not aggregate in-game data is moot.

What you are doing is creating your own rules and expecting others to follow them. Or more likely, just subjectively interpreting ambiguous rules and applying them objectively.

The "rules" are not clear. However, we will soon have a better understanding.

 

[Armour]

Since an API is planned (and this has been confirmed), a moral argument to not aggregate in-game data is moot.

Can you show me where the API spec is, so I can see that crowdsourcing of data is it's purpose? I haven't seen an API spec or a decent description of it yet. Geniunely curious to see what it allows.

 

[Lasse B.]

Not really the same thing, is it? You still have to be able to control your ship/power/heat/loadout effectively, hit and not get hit, regardless of your PC setup and controllers. Even with a Rift you're not able to see stuff you shouldn't be able to, as a human in a cockpit.
If you hacked your client to allow external views, or to bypass heat-based visibility to be able to target those using silent running, or if you are using some kind of aimbot to make combat a doddle, and I was sticking to the rules? That would be a bit different. That's cheating. But technical limitations are not the same thing as in-game, lore-based ones.
Getting better equipment to alleviate the former is part and parcel of being a gamer.
Subverting the latter by using data you shouldn't have is akin to hacking your client, really. It's cheating, because you are bypassing the restrictions designed in to the game (as it is now, anyway).

Is it really not the same thing? I can get an Arduino and program it to fly all kinds of maneuvers and even make it so a maneuver can be interrupted if the need to do so arises, just because I lack the skill to fly said maneuver cleanly myself. Or maybe something that flies evasive maneuvers while I'm in the sub-targets screen. Maybe write a couple mouse-macros that work as third and fourth equipment activator buttons. I could also get a 120Hz screen and a 120FPS setup and have my input commands sampled at 6 times the rate compared to someone who's content with playing the game at 20FPS, granting me much finer granularity thus speedier response times to the inputs I make.

Maybe for you, Mr Wolf of Wall Street. For those that such attitudes screw over on a regular basis, it's frowned upon. Otherwise there would be no penalty for getting caught. Well, that does seem to be largely the case in reality, but the laws make it clear what we would like to be the case. (If it were up to me, those Goldman Sachs guys would have all been hanging from lampposts back in 2008, but that's a different argument entirely...)

Oh no, I'm not part of any of that, nor do I want to be. This is just based on what little insight I do have. Bad behavior and crossing the law is of course frowned upon, but only if found out. And most of the times, if something is found out about someone, it's one guy putting the spotlight on his competitor's wheelings and dealings to get rid of him. Laws are for you and me to abide by. Those who can bribe, intimidate and cut deals around it are doing just that. (You're not wrong with the Goldman Sachs guys, but I wouldn't stop with them. Someone is responsible for allowing what they were able to do.)

You can't get greed out of the hearts and minds of people any time soon.

 

[MagmaiKH]

The purpose of section 3 d) is to prevent reverse-engineering of the game protocols and disallow sniffing of real-world data (that might be used to track down the actual real computer or real person).

It's legal intent is not to make it a contract-breach to use twitch.tv
Further it clearly says 'unauthorized software' which means they must explicitly call-out information sharing tools as unauthorized before it's a EULA breach.
By your interpretation if I say to my buddy over TeamSpeak "There's a great trade in LTT 480" I have violated the EULA.

You have grossly over-interpreted the EULA and the law to support your attempt to control how people play the game.

If we are going to get political the cause of blame of the mortgage crisis has two root causes.
1) Incompetent legislation.
2) Indoctrination of fractional-reserve banking.

Only the politicians could possibly do anything to actually solve the problem.
If you make up new, artificial, fake rules and expect everyone else to follow them then you are controlling and controlling people get ignored and lied to and deserve it.
Buy by all means ... blame the players not the game.

[COLOR=#555555][FONT=Arial][B]3. Licence Restrictions[/B]
You are not permitted:[/FONT][/COLOR]
[COLOR=#555555][FONT=Arial](a) to load the Game on to a network server for the purposes of distribution to one or more other device(s) on that network or to effect such distribution;
(b) except as expressly permitted by this EULA and to the extent expressly permitted by applicable law, to rent, lease, sub-license, loan, exploit for profit or gain, copy, modify, adapt, merge, translate, reverse engineer, decompile, disassemble or create derivative works based on the whole or any part of the Game or use, reproduce, distribute, translate, broadcast, publicly perform, store in a retrieval system or otherwise deal in the Game or any part thereof in any way;
(c) use cheats, automation software, hacks, mods, or any other unauthorized software designed to modify or defeat the purpose or experience of the Game;
(d) use any unauthorized software that harvests or otherwise collections information about others or the Game, including about a character or the game environment;
(e) use any robot, spider, scraper, or other automated or manual means to access the Game or any Online Features or copy any content or information from the Game or any Online Features;
(f) probe, scan, test the vulnerability of or breach the authentication measures of the Game or any Online Features;
(g) violate any technology control or export laws and regulations that apply to the technology used or supported by the Game or any Online Features.
[/FONT][/COLOR]

 

[ggpwnkthx]

Can you show me where the API spec is, so I can see that crowdsourcing of data is it's purpose? I haven't seen an API spec or a decent description of it yet. Geniunely curious to see what it allows.

You raise a good point. No specs have been made public, to my knowledge. Only that they want to have one.

So, for example, commodity data may not be something they want to allow access to. It could very well be just a local API that only allows access to your ship's statuses. In that case, since there aren't any in-game guilds or player create-able corporations, I could see people sharing their location data with one another in a 3rd party app.

Another option would be something similar to their iOS web API that is already in production, but is not licensed for use outside the iOS application.

Regardless, if an API is available, no matter what kind of data is made publicly accessible it could be aggregated for useful causes.

 

[ggpwnkthx]

You have grossly over-interpreted the EULA and the law to support you attempt to control how people play the game.

Perhaps, and hopefully so. Although, it was enough to raise at least one of Michael Brooke's eye brows. If the EULA were more appropriately written, the mistake of over-interpreting it wouldn't have happened.

From what I understand from talking with Michael, the purpose of section 3 of the EULA was to stop people from writing programs that invasively probed RAM. The reason being that it inevitably caused people to submit support tickets to FD for software bugs they didn't write.

Either way, the intent should match the wording.

 

[Armour]

Doesn't this bit from the EULA

software designed to modify or defeat the purpose or experience of the Game

describe crowdsourced trading tools pretty well?

 

[ggpwnkthx]

You'd first have to define the:

purpose or experience of the Game

 

[Armour]

You'd first have to define the:

Well, it would seem pretty obvious that you are a pilot in a spaceship, and you as the player have access to whatever that pilot has access to in terms of data, and that's about it. I don't see the whole metagaming thing listed in any official synopsis of the game that I've read thus far, but maybe I haven't interpreted the texts in the right way to justify it...

I'm not actually against having access to other people's trade data, if it's in the game. I proposed selling pricing data to Galnet a while back. Subscribing to their feeds at a subscription fee? All for it.

If it's not there, however, it's either 1) not meant to be, so doing it is (IMO) going against the

purpose or experience of the Game

, or 2) something to be added in an update later on, in which case bypassing that restriction is (IMO) still going against the

purpose or experience of the Game

as it currently stands. I don't think that's unreasonable at all.

If people want to do it, that's up to them, but it's up to those of us who disagree with their actions if we want to group them together with exploiters, hackers, and other cheats. Sound fair?

 

[ggpwnkthx]

Well, it would seem pretty obvious that you are a pilot in a spaceship, and you as the player have access to whatever that pilot has access to in terms of data, and that's about it.

That is a premise, not a purpose. I think you would have a hard time arguing any single objective purpose of this game.

I don't see the whole metagaming thing listed in any official synopsis of the game that I've read thus far, but maybe I haven't interpreted the texts in the right way to justify it...

Neither was it listed as something in WoW, LoL, Hearthstone, or any other game. Heck, even physical sports have meta. It's a natural part of gaming because it's strategy that happens out side of the game itself. If you don't want to be a part of it, don't be.

If people want to do it, that's up to them, but it's up to those of us who disagree with their actions if we want to group them together with exploiters, hackers, and other cheats. Sound fair?

Absolutely, but I think those who want to call it cheating hold the burden off proof, no? You have to explain how it's cheating and the whole "it's not in the game yet" argument holds little weight. It's the sort of purist attitude that does nothing but stifle innovation. I've seen 3rd party developers make apps that ultimately make their way (if nothing more than conceptually) into a game. But if that developer hadn't made it in the first place it would never have been on the road map.

How does working together, i.e aggregating data, constitute cheating? It's a multiplayer game. Although playing with others might not be your "purpose" in playing, but it is, with out a doubt, other peoples' purpose.

Working with others to achieve a common goal is a farcry from cheating. Analyzing statistics isn't cheating, it's strategy.