Recent Changes

[Imeriel]

For varying reasons, mostly due to Privacy and some Database Performance concerns, the following changes were made to the board:

1 -- Guests are no longer able to view member profiles.
2--  When viewing a Member Profile and checking "Member Statistics" a history of the Member's posting times is no longer viewable.
3 -- Members may no longer be tracked across the site in real-time via use of the "Last Click" feature in the Who's Online Block

Techie folks and Exec folks are in talks about the above changes, and they are not "set in stone" at the moment.

If there's anyone that objects to the above changes, please list your thoughts below ... we'll take them into consideration.

Thanks!

[Namae Nai]

Please, please please, restore #3! I use that feature a lot! 

<-- Snoop

#2 I'm not so sure about. Some folks might not care, I think most don't realize the level of information this board tracks on people.

#1 should stay. Guests never should have been able to do that anyway. I'd like to point out that #1 would have gone undetected if #3 wasn't in place! Free #3!!

[Lyrima]

Uh. Lotsa privacy is gooood.

Thank you for catching this.

/tries not to be paranoid about what is not being caught

[Namae Nai]

Lemme see if I can explain them so people don't panic.

#1 was something I noticed the other night while viewing the board and looking to see what topics everyone was seeing. I noticed a Guest account was browsing my profile. I thought, hey! what if my email address was public or what not? Turns out that the email address part is protected, so no worries about people stealing your email, but other stuff you might have listed on your profile could be viewed. So, probably a good thing if folks at least have to bother to sign up before they get to see our info.

#2 is actually a neat feature of the board, actually.. but it could be turned to evil. There's a system on the boards that tracks when you post, and makes tallies to show you where you like to post a lot. But it also lets people make inferences they probably shouldn't, especially with the more frequent posters. You could look at the information and tell when you went to bed every night, and when you went to work every day (assuming you aren't a post-from-work'er) because they almost never posted at those times. I dunno if anyone should panic about this, but it can be a concern when combined with issue #1

#3 was cool ! It let you track down where everyone online was viewing posts at any particular moment. Thus you could see someone jumping online to check there Play-by-Post character, see when someone was writing you back a PM, or updating their blog. It only told you what they were doing at that moment, so it didn't create a history. It was a kind of 'look around the Saga board and see what's happening' system. I liked it quiite a bit. If you don't like someone knowing what you're working on, there is supposed to be an option to make yourself invisible.

[Imeriel]

To clarify.

The changes were not "catches", per se`.

Back in July when the very first development discussions were occuring, no harm was seen in allowing Guests to view profiles, as users could hide their email address if they wished.  Reasoning behind this was potential recruits and visitors making sure that say, someone they knew from WoW as Bobbydoo was "Joebob" on the boards.  A concern was brought up about it recently, so it was turned off.  You now must register.

For the second, the site collects historical statistics, as all sites do.  This particular site allowed for anyone viewing  a profile to see what forums a person frequents more (this remains) and at what time a person posted their posts in a table (this was removed).  A concern was recently brought up about the Guest + Times combo, thus, the times portion of the combo was removed.

For the third, a querying function is performed to find out where on the site a user or guest is at any given time, and the query is real-time.  For sites that actively prune their forums it isn't a big deal.  We do not.  It, is honestly, a very small drag on the system, but a concern was raised about the comfort level of knowing Someone Could be Watching You, even if said person was a registered member, as anyonce can "register" if they want.  Ergo, it was turned off.  I typically, when setting these things up, turn it off from the get-go, and add it back in later if specifically requested by the owner.  During my Month of Pneumonia, it was something I forgot and finally got around to doing.

In all cases, the option of going into your Personal Profile and hiding your online status has always been there.

Personal CP --> Account Related Settings --> Show Others Your Online Status

Make sure it is unchecked and you are classified as "Anonymous".

Except to those with Admin status.

[PinkRose]

I would however like to ask that you do not make yourselves anonymous.
If you feel uncomfortable with people here, let me know.
I would much rather take care of any problems, then people to hide themselves here in our Home.

That's my personal opinion and just a request.
I like knowing who is around, and how they are doing.
I'm sure others do as well.

[Noa]

yes.  i'm in agreement with nam and love using #3.  specifically if i noticed someone of interest was on that i was waiting a response from.  i could see if they were even reading the topic or if i should just check back later.  that make sense?  *shrug*  i liked the last click and have no probs with people watching where i'm going.

[Imeriel]

Good lord ...

Am I the only person around here that feels that me watching other people from moment to moment feels like I'm being inherently creepy and wrong?  I used the tool sometimes, but more as a performance deal ... query takes blah number of minutes and so forth.  *shrug*  Just the way I was brought up, I guess ...

To be honest though, the Last Click tool was not permission based.  Anyone in the whole wide internet could track you using it.  Therefore, me turn it off.  I personally don't care who watches ~me~ but I know that others have different comfort levels.

I ~could~ try to figure out a way to have it there and it be permission based.  So that only people belonging to certain group levels could access it.  Dunno how long that will take, though ... and I do have more pressing project requests to get completed.

edited to clarify:  I don't think anyone else is creepy if they use, I just feel that I am if I do ... which is why its never occurred to me that others might find it useful.

I need coffee.

[DeeCaudill]

I'd rather leave it off unless people can specifically opt out of it without setting themselves as completely anonymous.

[Namae Nai]

Good lord ...

Am I the only person around here that feels that me watching other people from moment to moment feels like I'm being inherently creepy and wrong?  I used the tool sometimes, but more as a performance deal ... query takes blah number of minutes and so forth.  *shrug*  Just the way I was brought up, I guess ...

To be honest though, the Last Click tool was not permission based.  Anyone in the whole wide internet could track you using it.  Therefore, me turn it off.  I personally don't care who watches ~me~ but I know that others have different comfort levels.

I ~could~ try to figure out a way to have it there and it be permission based.  So that only people belonging to certain group levels could access it.  Dunno how long that will take, though ... and I do have more pressing project requests to get completed.

edited to clarify:  I don't think anyone else is creepy if they use, I just feel that I am if I do ... which is why its never occurred to me that others might find it useful.

I need coffee.

Hmm.. that is true about the permission base. I do think that permissions are worked in on some level however, because I remember the tool would not show me what officers where doing when they were on officer only boards, or when admins where working with the database. All it would say was (for example) Webninja is doing something you cannot see...

I look at it as the board is room. The 'Online Users' dialog box already tells you who's in the room in the last 5 minutes. The 'Last Link' feature told you what they're up to. It's no more intrusive to me than looking around a room to see what people are doing. Are they writing a message? Are they reading something you wrote? Are they creating a new topic?

It's not like the 'Last Link' feature let you read a PM or post before it was finished, or steal any information that you couldn't see normally. It just let you know what was happening in the Saga board. Without it, I kinda feel disconnected. I can still see people are awake, but I have no idea what they're doing so I just have to assume it doesn't involve me somehow. If I PMed someone, and I saw them come online, I used to know to wait for their response if they were sending a message. Now I can't.

Does any of that make sense?

[Imeriel]

It was permission based and it wasn't.  Permission based via forum, not via user.

For example .. If XO was posting on a thread in OOC/OT then it would tell you what exact thread he was posting on.  If, however, he were posting on a thread in one of the officer's forums, which you do not have access to, then it would tell you that he's doing something you cannot see ... because you cannot see that forum.

And I feel for you folks that used it and have it as some sort of integral part of your forum experience.  I do. 

However, I can prolly spend the time needed to work it so that only certain usergroups can ~use~ the tool.  That does not account for the folks that do not wish to be seen by the tool ... but yet do not wish to be classified as "Anonymous".  It is a balancing act of making everyone happy.  As it stands right now, whereas I could cobble up a way that only certain groups can ~use~ it, I cannot make it "selective" as to who is seen.

That would require far far more time than I am willing to volunteer. 

Come to a consensus that everyone is happy with, and I'll work with that.

[Namae Nai]

Question: If I was a Guest, could I see what the members are doing on the member-only boards? In other words, was that same  protection working on a regular member level? If it was, then I don't see how you need to do much work at all. Guests can use the tool, but anytime anyone is in a members only area, they'd get no info as long as you weren't posting publically. They could also see when members were typing a PM, but not who it's going to.

That's not very invasive at all, I should think? If you're posting something publically, you should expect that it was going to be seen by everyone. I mean, if you wanted to, you could set it up so Guests can't see people PMing each other but I should think that's all you need to add.

[Imeriel]

Question: If I was a Guest, could I see what the members are doing on the member-only boards? In other words, was that same  protection working on a regular member level? If it was, then I don't see how you need to do much work at all. Guests can use the tool, but anytime anyone is in a members only area, they'd get no info as long as you weren't posting publically. They could also see when members were typing a PM, but not who it's going to.

That's not very invasive at all, I should think? If you're posting something publically, you should expect that it was going to be seen by everyone. I mean, if you wanted to, you could set it up so Guests can't see people PMing each other but I should think that's all you need to add.

All of the above is not relevant because of the below ...

I'd rather leave it off unless people can specifically opt out of it without setting themselves as completely anonymous.

And you're not getting my point, Namae.

I ~can~ make it so only certain usergroups can use it.  And that doesn't take much work at all.

I ~cannot~ make it so that people can opt out of being "seen" by that tool specifically regardless of who uses it and when without making themselves Anonymous across the board.

[Namae Nai]

I understand that.

What you're saying is you cannot come up with another layer of anonymous that protects you from 'Last Link,' but doesn't hide you totally. You said that here:

However, I can prolly spend the time needed to work it so that only certain usergroups can ~use~ the tool.  That does not account for the folks that do not wish to be seen by the tool ... but yet do not wish to be classified as "Anonymous".  It is a balancing act of making everyone happy.  As it stands right now, whereas I could cobble up a way that only certain groups can ~use~ it, I cannot make it "selective" as to who is seen.

What I'm pointing out is that the tool already has protectons on it from certain user groups viewing us. You might not have to even bother modifying it at all. It already stops guests from seeing anything they shouldn't.

[Imeriel]

What I'm pointing out is that the tool already has protectons on it from certain user groups viewing us. You might not have to even bother modifying it at all. It already stops guests from seeing anything they shouldn't.

Again, you're missing the point.

Until it can be agreed upon ~which~ usergroups should be able to use the tool and which shouldn't ... which usergroups people feel comfortable being watched by and which ones not ... it remains off for all.

It has never been about anyone "seeing" anything they "shouldn't".  Even at its base level, no one ever has. 

However, it ~does~ involve comfort levels.  Not everyone that uses this site has had the benefit of knowing each other for years, and even if then, may have a personal "thing" about "being watched". 

How do you balance the personal driving need to watch against the personal driving need to not be watched ... even if its by people you care about?  For example, my mother loves and trusts me ... but she feels mighty uncomfortable if I sit and stare at her watching her every move.

The only way to balance that is to be able to develop a means by which people can "turn off the watcher".  And that exists in a base form by the Anonymous tag.  But what if they don't ~want~ to be anonymous?  Maybe they want to be seen in the basic Who's Online at the bottom of the forum ....  but at the same time, they don't want to be "tracked" on what they do every minute.

Those people have just as much a right to browse this site in that comfort as others have to track them.

As it stands now, I cannot develop the solution.

That being the case, it remains off ... unless exec management tells me otherwise.

[Gwenae]

I do understand what Imeriel has been trying to get across.  Personally, I do not like being tracked.  Though, I know I am on some level.  If we can leave it off, I'd be happy with that and I don't think guests should have many privileges at all.  But that's just me.

[PinkRose]

That being the case, it remains off ... unless exec management tells me otherwise.

And the XO has said leave it off.

[Namae Nai]

K, you're the boss.

I like it, used it, and I don't think it's as intrusive as it's been made out to be. Without it, I find the board is kinda lonely and it feels like there's no one on it. I guess I'll find someplace else to hang out late at night.

[Lyrima]

Namae!

*snuggles*

I always love to see how many folks are on the forums when I am.  I've the habit of looking to see who is on the same forum as I am. 

[Namae Nai]

*snuggles*

Hiya Lady Kiaria!

Hmm... that actually is an idea. All of the info about where people are is already on the site. It's just listed in the individual forums and threads, not in one place anymore. Ime, do you think it would be possible for me to script something that just requested the top page from all the individual forums, then use that data to open up each thread on the forums until it found someone? It could be like a personal version of Last Link....

It wouldn't get the PM's though. Blah. But that's workable, I think. 

I think I might try it, just to see if it can be done.