Well, if EA really do kill the whole CC creating community they are dumber than Dan Quayle and Miss Teen USA 2007 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEP7uti0PDw) together. New stuff - sofas, beds, tables, clothing, hair, make-up, trees, cars, whatever - is what keeps the game going, and EA's own creators don't have a chance in hell of keeping up with the demand for CC. Without the possibility of adding new stuff to the downloads folder the interest for Sims 3 is going to seriously dwindle very quickly.

Guess we'll all just have to go back to Sims 2, won't we. 

Exactly. They really shouldn't worry about getting into trouble here. I mean, the guy they're passing this on to is known as 'The Pirate King'.

Gotta say I prefer non-cc Sims 2 sims to non-cc Sims 3 sims. Haven't really seen anything to turn me onto Sims 3. I guess this thread isn't helping either. 

Here's more rum for the party. *Puts bottles on the table*

Paden, why don't you get your friend to send the data to Pescado with an indication of where the keylogger code can be found? I'm sure The Pirate King will put that kind of proof to the right use.

I'm guessing since Johan himself accepted that the tool had been decompiled that would mean its EULA has been waived in this case and there should be no legal obstacles to forwarding what came out of it.

Karu, thanks for the effort. Unfortunately I still can’t see your picture. Don’t worry about it, though. It’s probably something silly on my computer that I’m too dumb to know how to turn off.

Missbonbon, I think Johan was probably provoked by the statements exactly because he was not involved in the scheming and therefore thought they were untrue and maybe this time around he had time to enter properly into discussions. I also think that we pretty much agree here and that calls for celebration. Here, RUM for everybody!

(And then let’s get back to talking about the leaked list. KatCat’s right. That’s much more interesting than Johan’s motives for coming here).

I can't help wondering: Do all textures in Sims 3 have to look that bad? Because in that case I'm definitely glad that I'm sticking to Sims 2.

Karu, I don't know why, but I can't see any of your pictures. And this is one I really want to see!

Just for the record:

I wasn’t TSR that started charging for downloads. I believe Mall of the Sims (MOTS) was the first paysite, and there was another one whose name I don’t remember that put up the infamous Paypal button quite some time before TSR did. Back then nobody barked at paysites - in part because bandwidth really was expensive at the time.

The split in the community began way before and was not related to paysites. It had to do with downloads that for various other reasons were ‘unavailable’ to a great many players. These downloads began getting passed around informally and that later led to the inclusion of pay files. That’s basically were the Sims File Vault came from.

PMBD was a countermeasure to all paysites. Not specifically TSR.

Excellent post, Missbonbon, and well said. You just saved me from typing up a long post saying exactly the same.

However – for the record – I do disagree on two minor points. I really do believe that Johan does not know the details of a lot of the scheming that is going on at TSR – including all the scams that his brother gets up to. My guess is it would be half because he doesn’t want to know about it and half because those involved don’t want to include him in it.

I don’t think Thomas sent Johan here. He doesn’t come across as that much of a puppet. Besides, Inge said on the previous page that she had encouraged Johan to come here because he was complaining that the statements made here and on MATY were untrue. Johan came here of his own volition to try to sort things out.

As for those saying he’s just trying to do ‘damage control’, well, I guess you could call it that. If people in a forum – virtual or real life – were saying things about me that I felt were untrue I’d definitely show up too and try to dispute their statements. I suppose you could say I was trying to limit the damage to my reputation – be it personal or professional – and thus doing damage control.  Personally I don’t really see what’s wrong with that.

Zillah, why on earth would Johan show up here at any time besides when he felt compelled to it? It’s crystal clear that the general sentiment here is that nobody from TSR is welcome at any time whatsoever.

And there you have one very[/u] good reason why Pescasdo would be right in his analysis of your/the situation.

You deal in facts and technical stuff. Others – like your brother and every single FA and SA you have at TSR – deal in stuff like creativity and artistry. Things that are intangible and emotional and – especially – that can’t be controlled. And with intangibility and emotions come intrigue and political manipulation. But you would never get into that sort of thing, would you, because what you handle and is good at is all the practical, tangible and non-emotionally stuff.

Therefore, you would have a hard time imagining the manipulations and the desperate measures some people take because of sheer emotion. The manipulative ‘artist’ people around you know this, and therefore nobody would ever tell you that they had done such things as completely illogical hackings. Because they know you just wouldn’t understand.

Instead they leave you with only the factual, tangible knowledge – the one that can be proved by logs etc. – and they know you’ll go out into the world and defend that. Because you are loyal and you have integrity.

But they will never tell you or try to explain to you the games and intrigues that go on behind the scenes. Because they know you probably aren’t interested in it and because you most likely wouldn’t believe half of the stuff that people actually do to each other in the name of creative or artistic pride.

I didn’t have an awful lot of sympathy or respect for you up until now, but after that remark I understand a lot more. In real life I’ve always had one leg in the ‘technical’ camp and one in the ‘artist’ camp. Which means I’m good at neither one, but that I understand both. Feel free to PM me or send me an email if you want to know more. My email should be in my profile somewhere.

For one thing: Awta can’t slip under your radar. Never mind IP and background checks. There are plenty of other ways to recognize somebody. Language, artistic expression etc. Do you really believe that nobody in TSR knew they were dealing with Atwa when Carpediem showed up?

Well, it was fun having him around. Especially when you started talking to him, Pes. 

So, where did Johan go? 

I concur. Wholeheartedly. That reply makes it pretty impossible - not to mention ridiculous - for anyone to deny that there has been shady dealings inside TSR.

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.


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.

Okay, have read. Will answer quickly.


No, I damn well do not know that these things exist. And if you do, then you obviously have access to information that the rest of us don’t know about. If you want to call what I’m doing ‘playing both sides of the fence’, then you have a lot to learn. I keep asking for more information, because the information currently available is not enough to convince me – and probably many others – about this case.


I’m not discrediting anything. I will, however, continue to ask questions until I get the answers I need. If you bothered to read my previous posts then you will see that I have happily accepted both Cala and Pes’ statements and explanations as sufficient and reliable. Here’s a little tip: There is a very, very big difference between actually having seen something or just having been told about it.

Damn right, I am digging and will continue to do so. You be happy that there are people like me in the real world who will keep digging and not just take anything for an answer.



You also need to read Pescado’s posts. He explained earlier that one indication that TSR was behind the hacking was that Bluesoup probably used her TSR password for the petition and they pulled that out of their database and used it to get in. Hacking the petition otherwise would have required super skills in the hacking department, and TSR doesn’t have that. Pes explains it much better than me. Go back and read.


Right. Okay, now we’re getting somewhere. This is good information. Anybody else remember something about this?


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. Or the petition could have been sent to EA and the information could have come from there.

ETA:
Pes, no, no, no. When I say a similar list I mean a similar list. Not an exact copy of this list, okay.
Now will you tell us what you know about the hacking and how you know it?