TSR: In Ur Accounts, Deletin Ur Stuffs!

[Paden]

Johan, you using the phrase witch hunt is comical and rather stupid, considering what your company has done in the past in concert with other websites. Your business has gathered the names and data of people even just suspected, not proven just suspected, of sharing files for a goddamn video game and then distributed it to other paysites. This is illegal and damning. I've seen the screen shots of where it was done in the early times when it first started and know damn well they weren't faked. I have screen shots of it and know who was there as it was going on, so I have no reason to doubt coconut at all when they claim that it still happens.

You are just here to make an expression of trying to reconcile with this part of the community in order to make the latest scandal die down and try to muddy the waters again. Time and again, shit happens that smears your faces with eggs and time and again, here you come charging in like some knight on a quest to save the damsel. News flash for you, hero, we don't need or want you around. We don't need the hand-holding or thought control that your company represents and we sure in the HELL do not need you people telling us lies like you have in the past.

Trying to control everything is a pattern with the kind of people that you are; from the sites they go to and clear to the kinds of topics that they can discuss to the content that is family friendly. In case you aren't aware of it, TSR smothers real creativity, discussion and decency with heavy-handed tactics designed to keep their customers, and yes that is what you view the downloaders as, in line and ignorant of anything other than the world of paying for content which ought to be free.

The company that OWNS the game put out a nice little document that you have to agree to before you can install it on your computer, which you would have seen had you actually been a player of the game. It says that you are forbidden from making a profit from their materials. The package file is theirs, not yours, yet TSR is raking in money hand over fist and will do anything to keep on doing so. If that includes screwing with people's information, it has been a time proven pattern that your people will let nothing stand in their way of doing just that, not even human decency. That same agreement on the software says that items can be created and shared for free, so tell me, who lives up to that better? The freesites that follow that kind of logic or the ones that demand money before they can access certain files?

The days of donating for bandwidth are over because websites don't cost that much to get going and keep running so you can't claim that you use the money for that. Paying people to create files is just sick because while meshing is a bitch, recolouring isn't that damn hard. Selling recolours is also just sick because lots of people only do items that the company provided, so where is the challenge in that? Sure, SimPE takes some figuring out, but hey, it's a free tool! Wow, who would have thunk it? Free will donations keep plenty of sites going just fine, they don't need to scream, "Pay me or you don't even get to see what we haz!!! EINZ!!"

Seriously, you've come to the wrong place to try and make amends because people aren't likely to believe you after the company known as TSR has established a pattern such as it has. Atwa gets hired, goes batshit with or without approval, does illegal and immoral shit, she gets fired, Thomas has you over here trying to cover the damage control angle and it all goes into a mudslide of bullshit. Save it. We're tired of the song and dance. It's been proven that no one from your side of the fence can be trusted. We'd be fools to start. There are others involved in this that shouldn't be trusted that we don't know about, I don't doubt, but coconut is on the side that CAN be trusted.

So, again, take your show on the road because no, we won't be fooled again by your trying to present an attitude of reconciliation and civility, lulling us and others into a sense of false security just for your people to try and plunge the knives into unsuspecting backs. People are tired of dealing with it, tired of people like TSR doing shit that is patently illegal and getting away with it. If this time they take action, more power to them and I hope you and yours get what is deserved at long last. If you work with such people that pull such crap and in fact you condone it, then you ought to get scorched with the rest because you deserve it, too. And so does everyone that knows what's going on and does nothing to stop it or speak against it.

[WedgewoodBlue]

Hmmm, so Johan disagrees with my wording of questionable business practices. In a letter TSR wrote to Pescado's ISP, it is claimed that TSR has their "own" version of the EA EULA, in which the and I quote:
"I have since visited EA in Redwood Shores and had numerous meetings with
the web and legal teams there. As a result, the EULA was changed in August
2007 to remove any references to Non Commercial sites from the Custom
Content EULA. EA no longer has an opinion on the distribution of Custom
Content on Free/Donation/Pay sites. They clearly continue to support and
encourage all constructive fan sites in the community."

Odd, I have ALL of the game expansion packs, and ALL of the stuff packs, the EULA is the same on ALL of them and there is NO such omission.

On the "official" site, and I use that term loosely, this was posted:

"Over the past several months, we've received questions about the
End User License Agreement (EULA) that is in our games for The Sims 2
regarding custom content. Below is a statement from our Sims team.
While there is no change to our End User License Agreement,
we hope this clears up any confusion you might have regarding the EULA."

Right there is irrefutable proof that TSR lies. The person posting this at the BBS, as far as I know is not a lawyer, and the posting is nothing more than a simple request for co-operation between creators. However, the BBS is hardly a fair or impartial site.
EA has never, and will never enforce their EULA, why is anyone's guess. They will NEVER appear in public, with their legal team and make a statement to address this issue. TSR cannot prove that their version of events took place, and yes this IS something they need to prove.
The simple fact is that they got caught revealing personal data that under any circumstances is just wrong. Whenever they decide to release such information, they always claim they have legitimate reasons for doing so. There is NEVER a legitimate reason for indulging in this practice.

Another big IF....IF this site is in fact illegal, then why does TSR send letters from the site owners and not a team of lawyers?
Why have not the proper authorities shown up at Pescado's door, (despite that fact that his whereabouts are unknown) to shut this site down? They haven't because this site does nothing wrong by releasing pay files. In fact, "Team Pescado" tears apart the TSR files they get, and any harmful crap is removed before it is then released.

EA has NEVER, nor will they EVER make a public appearance to address this issue. For all the posturing that TSR does, the fact of the matter remains that EA doesn't give a rats ass about this issue. IF the day ever comes about that EA publicly comes out in support of TSR, I will burn ALL of the EA products that I have. However EA will not do that because they will not risk the support they have from the free community.
ALL that TSR is managing to do is to look like the "Big Bad Wolf", from "Little Red Riding Hood". They run rampart all over the net, huffing and puffing. And then they come here, to the brick house, and they just can't succeed in blowing us down.
They are the ones who mislead the community by their false statements, they are the ones who have been proven to use illegal practices to discourage the sharing of the truth. (ie-releasing personal data)
What I see when Johan comes here in a vain attempt to do damage control all I can see is a little impotent man screaming, "You can't do this to my site."
I don't know about the rest of you, but whenever I picture this scenario, I have no choice but to laugh.

I think that since he claims that Atwa somehow managed to "sneak" in, yet again, that I am going to allow my puppy access to the internet. I'm pretty sure if Atwa can do these miraculous things, then my puppy can do some amazing things on the internet as well.
Then again, my puppy can be trained, Atwa, not so much.

[No No No]

  Paden and WedgewoodBlue

[Witchboy]

I have no respect for Johan whatsoever coming here and saying that shit and doing damage control at all, it looks to me like the first stage of trying to fool the community into thinking they are going to change their ways and then stabbing us in the back with something new.

Kinda reminds me of all the times Neptune Floozy would come over to PMBD to try & appease the pirates. Ahhhhhh The good ol days

[SnarkyShark]

Atwat managed to sneak in, Johan?  What kind of site you running...oh, wait....  Roll Eyes  You guys don't even check something as simple as IP addresses, email addresses, or anything before hiring your artists?  Every forum admin in the community knows how to do that.  Geez! It is called screening an employee and is a normal business practice.  

You'd think, huh? Pair this little gem -

She recently managed to sneak in as CarpeDiem and without us knowing it was her she managed to become a select artist.

 - with their encryption debacle and, any way you look at it, TSR comes off looking pretty fucked up. They're either desperate liars or hopelessly incompetent idiots.

[Moune]

However, if it can be established that the petition was hacked and that the list could only have come from the hacking, then you have a completely different case. Especially since according to Pescado’s information it is likely that TSR is behind the hacking. So now they are suddenly guilty of three things. 1) Hacking. 2) Distributing information that has been obtained illegally. 3) Distributing personal information with or without malicious intent. That’s quite a different ballgame and a case that any authority would have a harder time dismissing. I will almost assure you that the Swedish police will listen to a complaint of that order – and it wouldn’t matter one bit if it came in an email from a foreigner.

So all of a sudden if the list was hacked TSR is guilty, even without any sort of evidence?
All Pescado's been doing is telling stories about how he knows hacking and that we're too stupid for doing proper hacking but have some kind of leverage.
He have been asked to present such evidence on several occasions (both now by you and i've asked him in the past) but he have failed to do so.

I’ll correct that. It was wrongly worded and should have read:

“So now TSR seems to be involved in and should be investigated for three things. 1) Hacking. 2) Distributing information that has been obtained illegally. 3) Distributing personal information with or without malicious intent.”

Either way you’re in the shits.

No, the information clearly came from the petition, but it didn’t necessarily come from a hacking. Think WitchBoy! There are plenty of possibilities. Bluesoup could have given it to them, for instance.

The Soup has been missing for months, and this scenario is not particularly plausible in any event.

Why is it so unlikely that Bluesoup is involved in this? It seems to me that apart from WB possibly remembering that the petition was down for a while, so far we only have her word that the petition was hacked – and that it was never sent.

I don’t know. One of those TSR-friendly Maxoids – Drea’s one, isn’t she – could have gotten hold of it.

[Witchboy]

Ok i have done a lil digging around & found the original threads on the Soups petition.

Here is the 1st page of the thread at Sims Cave...
http://www.simscave.com/index.php?topic=7328.0

With the explanation of it being hacked on page 7.

Reply #91 on: March 20, 2009, 03:08:50 pm »
My petition has indeed been hacked - by who, I don't know.

It would not surprise me IN THE LEAST if TSR had hacked into my petition. We all know they are fully capable of such a devious and dirty-handed trick, and they are the only ones, besides EA Games, who stand to lose from my petition being printed and mailed.

Under threat of the privacy of all signers being revealed here on the BBS, I've decided to close the petition to new signatures. The five signers we've gained since the petition was re-opened were already deleted from my view, proving this "hacker" is still actively stalking the petition. I don't want to compromise anyone's privacy, and most especially not to TSR, since I am well aware of what sort of damage they have no compunction whatsoever about causing.

Thank you to everyone who signed this petition. As stated previously on the BBS and in various other forums, I will be printing and mailing my letter to Electronic Arts in Redwood City, CA. I will be adding an addendum to my letter outlining the details of my hacked petition "adventures" and just how many signatures we received. If you would like to do more, I urge you to do one of two things: 1) write your own letter and mail it to EA Games, or 2) Copy/paste my letter and mail it to EA Games.

Electronic Arts
209 Redwood Shores Parkway
Redwood City, CA  94065

Attn: Nancy Smith

The petition was re-opened to new signatures - I'm not sure how or even WHO reopened it, since I haven't received any email from the petitiononline people - but I closed it again. I simply don't want to risk the privacy of anyone who signs. It sucks, but I'll definitely be sure to emphasize this happening in my letter!

So it seems the online petition was closed by the Soup. It was then re-opened by someone else or so the Soup says and then re-closed by her again. It was not restored by the online petition site as i remembered or thought. I've also checked to see when Blue was last active on the Cave. She was last active October 06, 2009, 08:53:58 am

Then there is a few explanations as to Blues whereabouts here starting on page 3...
http://www.simscave.com/index.php?topic=12174.30

Here is the open letter to EA by Blue Soup posted on the TS2 Official site on Mar-02-09 05:53 PM GMT including the link to the petition for people to sign, responses from all the peeps who said they supported or signed the petition & the explanation of it being hacked.

http://bbs.thesims2.ea.com/community/bbs/messages.php?&openItemID=item.2,item.43,item.61,item.104,item.41,item.127,item.23&threadID=f56f1a1ad7f72664d6e5e4a708ae8a0e&directoryID=2&startRow=1

Edited to add...

Ok did a lil more digging. This is from Black Pearl Sims. Blue states here on page 8 that...

http://blackpearlsims.com/showthread.php?t=23824&highlight=petition&page=8

03-10-2009, 06:11 PM
Something happened to the petition. I did not close it, but it is closed and all the signatures are gone from the excel list it's supposed to generate. I've sent a support email and hopefully they'll be able to restore it, but I really have no idea (and didn't receive any email) as to what's happened.

And on page 9 she states...

03-18-2009, 04:12 PM
3 emails to them have gone unanswered so far. I'm nervous about the names and email addresses that are now who-knows-where. Because of that, I'm a little leery about starting another petition.

Then Katija posted a few threads down...

03-24-2009, 12:31 AM
I've checked and petition is back and running!!!

So the petition was down from around 3-10-2009 until it was restored on or about 3-24-2009.

[Sarafina]

Johan, I have a question for you.  Does your company pay taxes?  Are you legally set up as a business?  Do your artists report their earnings and pay taxes on them?  I ask this because from day one you guys have presented yourself as more than a fan site, but as a business, and as one I hope you are doing everything legally and out in the open.

I have a suspicion that you do not, because if you did, you would investigate your employees (FA) a lot more carefully and would know who they are exactly.

[Paden]

Oh, TSR is a division of a legitimate business from what they've all been saying, but so far they refuse to tell us if the people they employ pay taxes on the money they get paid to churn out the pixel creations.

[WedgewoodBlue]

Seems to me Snarky that they are both, hopelessly incompetent and desperate liars. Why would anyone confess that they had NO idea how someone managed to sneak back onto their site, and then without knowledge of who that sneak is, they then offer this person a position as an SA. Oh wait....... that's right, anyone who is particularly bad has an excellent chance of becoming either an SA or an FA. If you chose to believe Johan's version of events concerning Atwa, she should be the next James Bond. She haz teh suprah powerz!!
I am almost tempted to feel sorry for Johan, I'm sure it was not his intent to show us how incompetent TSR is. If he's not kicking himself, he should be. And the sad truth is TSR will never apologize to anyone for releasing their personal information, not that an apology will do any good. This is not a practice that they are likely to refrain from doing. They will continue to share this kind of sensitive information any damn time they please.

[Witchboy]

Oh, TSR is a division of a legitimate business from what they've all been saying, but so far they refuse to tell us if the people they employ pay taxes on the money they get paid to churn out the pixel creations.

If the FA's at TSR are hired as Independent Contractors then it would be up to each individual FA to report & pay their taxes on any income they receive from TSR.

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/128977/basic_taxation_for_the_independent.html

[Paden]

Well, then, Satan will be skating to work in a pink tutu before any government sees a bit of money from TSR wages, huh??

[johan]

Regarding atwa/carpe diem
It's not strange at all that she managed to hide using a different name. We have no reason to run background checks on all artists.

@WedgewoodBlue
We were told by the ones we talked to at EA that they were going to change the EULA for the next expansion pack. As it turned out that never happened but we were not deliberately lying.

@Moune
Have you seen any kind of evidence for our "history of hacking" that i assume is what makes it likely that we hacked the petition? More than just Pescados stories that is.
If not, what makes it likely he would be telling the truth? Isn't it in his interest to make us look guilty considering what PMBD stands for?

@Sarafina
I don't want to be rude but that's not something i want to discuss with you or anyone else here.

[Witchboy]

Well, then, Satan will be skating to work in a pink tutu before any government sees a bit of money from TSR wages, huh??

Now that would be a sight to see! You know, that would make a great book title "Satan will be skating to work in a pink tutu".  

[ShanOw]

@Sarafina
I don't want to be rude but that's not something i want to discuss with you or anyone else here.

Is that a "I don't want to discuss because you don't need to know" or a "I don't want to discuss because we don't want to be found out"