Topic

Staff Topic

New: Our Community Guidelines

Here they are...still warm from the presses, our bright, new, and shiny Community Guidelines! We’ve had questions from many of you over the past months about ethics and appropriateness in Glitch, and what they all seemed to boil down to was this: "What should I expect from others playing this game, and what’s expected of me?"

The health of the community is critical to Glitch, so we took our time trying to strike the right balance in our answers and think through some of the more subtle issues at play. But, this is a living, breathing document and will evolve to reflect what we see going on in the game. As members of the community, your feedback is welcome.

You can read the Community Guidelines here, and a link to them is now in the footer of each page on the site. There are also two new FAQ entries drawn up for the occasion: “What are the Community Guidelines” & “What happens if someone breaks the Community Guidelines?

Posted 14 months ago by Blanky Subscriber! | Permalink

Replies

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  • @Lara - Gypsy Lore Society was formed waaay back in the 19th century when, slur or not, it was okay to lump everybody of Roma, British Traveler, and Irish Tinker cultures into one overarching group, and it's largely run by white scholars, as it has been since its foundation. It's got lots of valuable information, but much of it is from an outsider perspective. It also has a lot more to do with Travelers than Roma. It's worth keeping in mind, as well, that Native Americans, whatever their people, were called Indians for a long time- a similar conceit behind lumping all superficially-related itinerant cultures into one category.

    All of these groups get mixed together for a few reasons; it's easier to get awareness of the plight of such groups out there by founding a "Gypsy Society" when uninformed or unaware people view all such people as the same thing; you're gonna be harder-pressed, believe it or not, to get support for a "Roma Society" when many people don't understand what that is, that it even is a culture rather than a romantic lifestyle choice, how it is distinct from the Tinkers and Travelers, and that there are real and serious problems that go largely unrecognized by the world at large facing all these groups. Consequently, there are many more "Gypsy Societies" than "Roma Societies", but that still rankles many of the people they've been founded to help.
    Then there are the overly romanticized stereotypes that follow us everywhere, the "free-spirited children of the earth" crap that most people use to justify throwing the word around. Being Roma doesn't mean you're a car-thief, a pick-pocket, a skimpily-dressed dancer, or a mysterious, inscrutable fortune-teller of vast cosmic powers with one good eye, a magic Tarot deck, and a pet raven. People latch onto that sort of thing and fail to recognize, for whatever reason, that it affects us as negatively as any other stereotype applied to any other ethnic group, and that it's just as offensive and obnoxious. The fact of the matter is that the Romani people and cultures (we aren't homogeneous) are very marginalized one still enduring institutional racism in many "progressive" European countries, as well as the US and Canada; the stereotypes, "good" and bad, get divorced from the facts, which hurts any activism undertaken to raise awareness about what exactly is going on. Like Sarkozy's mass deportations in France, violence against us in Italy, relegation of Romani children to special-ed schools and general segregation in the Czech Republic, baby-theft (from the Roma, I'd like to stress) in Greece, persecution in Turkey, the UK's "pre-screening" for eastern European immigrants based on ethnicity, and the shady council land deals that have left more than a few British Roma without recourse. It's a disservice to see your entire culture, one that survived the Holocaust, get boiled down to some "Hunchback of Notre-Dame" silliness that paints a pretty ridiculous and factually inaccurate picture. 

    We aren't Halloween costumes.
    Posted 14 months ago by Djabriil Subscriber! | Permalink
  • To answer the original question: we don't have a specific policy about use of the word "gypsy". As an aside, this is definitely a new one for me. I grew up in Canada (this might be more better different for Europeans?) I've never known it to have any negative connotations and always imagined that was the same for most English speakers.

    The only Romani (Roma) I've ever actually heard speaking in reference to themselves used "gypsy" (this was in France, though we were speaking English) and googling around it seems like "gypsy" is the standard word in English, not for denigrating anyone, but for picking out a group of people (used in more or less the same way that people might use "Poles" or "Polynesians"). I couldn't find very little that indicated that there is controversy about the term or that it is considered offensive (and, indeed, several articles had comments from Romani saying that it is not offensive).

    Indeed, for the launch party we are planning now, I specifically wanted a "gypsy jazz" band and everyone knew what I meant (whereas, though I know it is also called "manouche", that is much less frequently used outside of France). There was obviously nothing derogatory intended (it's one of my favorite types of music!)

    Anyway … re this: "I hardly think being ignorant of the full connotations of a word one throws around and why others might take issue is an excuse, either- if you're going to use a word, you need to know what it means. That's your responsibility, not anybody else's." I would disagree (the only way most people know how to use words is how they are used by everyone else who speaks the same language and if almost everyone who speaks English uses "gypsy" in the way I've always imagined they do, how could anyone "take up" that responsibility?)

    But, whether you're right about that or not, I don't think someone referring to a skirt as "gypsy style" or saying "Django Reinhardt was a gypsy" or "I like gypsy jazz" qualifies as hate speech in the sense that we were talking about in the guidelines. In fact, people can say plenty of hateful things while using correct descriptors — like "Romani" or "African" or "German" or "Chinese" in the sentences.

    Anyway, I hope I don't come across as obtuse: I just am just learning a new thing :)
    Posted 14 months ago by stoot barfield Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Djabrill: Interesting.  I didn't know any of those stereotypes at all.

    - snip -

    EDIT: I'm obviously too slow, stewart replied before me ;)
    Posted 14 months ago by Lara Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Blanky for president!!
    Posted 14 months ago by emdot Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Moved to a different thread.
    Posted 14 months ago by Djabriil Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I would like official word on the Mule accounts, are we allowed them at all? We asked before and got the ok to have more than one account, but now i'm confused, i do have more than one, but they are all molly and not used in any underhanded manor, so is it still ok?
    Posted 14 months ago by ~Annie~ Subscriber! | Permalink
  • anne215, it's pretty clear.

    "• Using bots, mules, or other hacks to gain significant and unfair advantage in the game is not allowed"

    Are you using the mule to gain a significant advantage? I guess significant is tricky. I have a hard time conceiving of a way to get a significant advantage of players that doesn't violent the rule below. Or at least swapping back and forth between the two accounts quickly.

    • Multiple accounts controlled by one person playing at the same time is not allowed."

    This is the important one. They even underlined the important part.
    Posted 14 months ago by Lord Bacon-o Subscriber! | Permalink
  • anne216, the guidelines say, under the Playing Fair subheading:

    • Using bots, mules, or other hacks to gain significant and unfair advantage in the game is not allowed.
    • Multiple accounts controlled by one person playing at the same time is not allowed.
    Pretty clear that you cannot have both your characters in the game at the same time. 

    Pretty clear that you can have a mule as long as that doesn't provide you a "significant" AND "unfair" advantage. 

    If someone thinks your mules are giving you an unfair advantage and if they report that to staff, the staff will make a judgment call as to whether you're actually gaining anything from having the two accounts and if those gains are "significant" and "unfair".  They're not going to be able to provide any more explicit directions than that.  If you're truly worried that what you're doing isn't going to be considered "playing fair", then you might want to send staff a Help request outlining how you use the two accounts and ask for guidance.
    Posted 14 months ago by WindBorn Subscriber! | Permalink
  • All I do is the play the game, same as my main account, There is no advantage to my accounts except I enjoy doing different things in different accounts, they are all self sufficient and i by no means gain advantage, it actually slows me me down lol.
    And why anyone would play with 2 accounts and mine or whatever at the same time is beyond me, why would you do that? Seems more work than fun and something i have never done or nor do I plan on doing so.
    Posted 14 months ago by ~Annie~ Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Lord Bacon-o:
    If I'm playing 1 "main" and even one other alt, I can use my main to do whatever I want and the alt to mine or make food and funnel all of that to the main account. I wouldn't have to be flipping back and forth from one to the other to do it, either.

    @anne216:
    If you're playing them as separate characters, trying out different things, and not having them interact with each other any more than they're interacting with any other character, that's probably ok under the guidelines, but if they're mailing stuff back and forth with each other a lot, you might be getting into a gray area. If you're worried that it might be a problem, then that might be a good indicator that it might look bad to someone else.
    Posted 14 months ago by EnnuiStreet Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I may be wrong, Ennui, but I still don't see a significant advantage. Yes, you can specialize with one you mule... but you still need to do the work. But I also agree with your second point.

    If you want to be super safe, don't have your two accounts interact. Don't have them exchange goods.
    Posted 14 months ago by Lord Bacon-o Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Short, sweet, complete. thanks Devs. Keep it fun and safe for all.
    Good work! :)
    Posted 14 months ago by Fstra Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I would like more specifics on the mule account thing too.

    Two people live here and we both have accounts, we have one computer that we both use and I have a little 10.1" notebook too but don't really use it for glitch since the inventory gets cut off if I try. Anyway, as we both use glitch on this one computer we have different browsers that we each use to keep things tidy. But since we are two different people with different accounts we like to frequently exchange or give things to one another, sometimes to the advantage of one person, sometimes to the advantage of the other (the other person likes cubimals for example, so i toss any I find their way and they toss duplicates my way and repair any items for me).

    Often if one of us isn't here at the same time the other will check in quickly to contemplate their emblems or water a tree etc for them. We also got our houses because we know how well we work together (one swamp house, and one 15k cottage for the trees, though it was a bit disappointing to find out that we couldn't share our gardens). Sometimes we'll both be sitting in front of this one computer switching back and forth and discussing what we each need and are working together. But as we're both there it probably doesn't look like we actually communicate with each other a lot in glitch. They even bought me a few credits to help with my wardrobe when I started. There have been a couple of times where we've both been on that I've just followed their glitch so we don't have to keep switching to get to the same place, such as when we go the glitch train achievement, and once when they accidentally dropped their bag in the ancestral lands just before getting kicked out (and oh was that stressful, they had to quickly follow-teleport me to the closest point and I had to rush to where they got kicked out hoping that the bag hadn't been taken yet).

    My point is that from a technical standpoint without knowing that there are in fact two people behind our accounts it does in fact look like one person with a mule. I would hate for either of our accounts to end up being deleted or something because it was thought to be a mule going against these guidelines D:
    Posted 14 months ago by Sunburst Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I deleted my second account because it was getting to be really hard to determine what was and was not against the guidelines.  Which are worded as 'guidelines' and not rules in the first place.

    My impression is that it is wholesale muling and account farming that is disapproved of, but because I was uncertain, I just got rid of the second account entirely.

    I do have a spouse who plays the game as well, often concurrently on a separate machine on our common NAT router.  I hope there won't be an 'enforcement' regime imposed that challenges our practices.  It sure doesn't seem like there will be at this point.

    On another game, Faunasphere, in the past, multi-accounts got totally out of hand and were completely tolerated by the game operators.  At one point some people had 20-50 accounts.  I am glad that guidelines have been given here to prevent that sort of thing.
    Posted 14 months ago by Parrow Gnolle Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Ya something like 20-50 accounts would definitely be unfair and significant advantage. But the line where something is a significant advantage is very vague and even unfair is vague in that other people can easily have an alt. 
    Posted 14 months ago by Nirosu Subscriber! | Permalink
  • The problem is that at the moment we're really just speculating on what unfair and significant advantage means, how mule accounts would be identified, and how specific 'at the same time' is (as in does it mean two games open in two browsers on one computer, two computers each with the game open? A game that is/is not in AFK status?) etc.

    As mentioned here we have two people on one computer, but I guess even a person with an alt or mule would still have to put the time into learning a skill and gathering resources. So it isn't as if they're getting stuff for free, the main advantage I could see would be them doing tasks together? (like mining etc). The 20-50 accounts mentioned would certainly be excessive though.

    We've had a few other dev responses to questions in this thread so far so I hope we'll get a response to these ones.
    Posted 14 months ago by Sunburst Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Without getting into specifics, in Faunasphere multiple accounts had advantages that are not in affect here in Glitch so I don't think there is the same incentive.
    Posted 14 months ago by MaryLiLamb Subscriber! | Permalink
  • To clarify: Playing *simultaneously* in two different browsers for the purpose of using your alt to give your main account an advantage over players who choose not to do so - that's what we're talking about in that clause. Also, by "muling" we mean alt accounts used to give the main account an advantage that would not be possible within the normal limits of gameplay as it was intended (one person per account).

    The gist of it is: if you couldn't do it without help from your alt, then it's probably not ok. But, we didn't want to clog up the Community Guidelines with stuff that's better explained in the Terms of Service.
    Posted 14 months ago by Blanky Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Thank you :D

    I'm guessing our accounts wouldn't accidentally fall under that then, since our accounts are as individual as we are, only they have an advantage since they started before me :P But we exchange things equally, it isn't all going one way so I don't think there would be any mistaking us for mules.
    Posted 14 months ago by Sunburst Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Thanks Blanky!! Good to know, pheww i'm safe then :)
    Posted 14 months ago by ~Annie~ Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I use my mouse to make macros, is that against the rules?

    edit

    Like I can make a click macro that clicks a hunid times. or I can make a 'roll' macro that rolls all of my blue dice by having it go to x,y coord and clicking. Things like that. I'm always attending when using my macros.
    Posted 14 months ago by Mr. Dawgg Subscriber! | Permalink
  • Here's my 2 currants worth on the subject of mules:
    If you are a player who loves his/her friends but hates depending on them for anything,one mule account tied to one main account should be acceptable,as one supports the other but does not create a significant advantage over other players,as the account holder is still doing all the leg-work him/herself,and for him/herself.Some people simply are loners,while others are at their best when working/playing within a team.Both have their advantages,neither is wrong.
    It is a whole different matter if/when a player has mule accounts for the sole purpose of exploiting them,such as,for example,getting items you can only get once (either for a minute fee or for free) when you first start out playing the game,but then instead of using it to continue the game, either transfer said item to the main account,or simply sell it under the mule's identity,and this can be repeated ad infinitum ~and for a tidy profit to boot!
    Posted 14 months ago by ~Scilly~ Subscriber! | Permalink
  • @Djabril

    (from Stoot Barfield) To answer the original question: we don't have a specific policy about use of the word "gypsy". As an aside, this is definitely a new one for me. I grew up in Canada (this might be more better different for Europeans?) I've never known it to have any negative connotations and always imagined that was the same for most English speakers.

    Born and raised in Canada and feel the same as Stoot stated above. I had no idea that the term was offensive.
    Posted 14 months ago by Breezy Meadow Subscriber! | Permalink
  • One thing I didn't see is the issue of campaigning for your pet cause here in Glitch and how to address it. I don't want to be barraged with animals endorsing a political candidate or deal with tons of notes telling me that meat is murder or to go green. Can you guys add a clause within the guidelines about not using Glitch to proselytize for your own RL cause or political campaign in the physical world itself? Something like "Animal names and notes are not to be used to promote political, social, or religious causes". Chatter in global or the groups is fine and that's addressed in the guidelines.

    I bring this up because near my house in Salatu, there were several streets where all the animals were named things like "STOP THE WARS - JOE SCHMUCK 2012". We're talking  30+ animals over at least 3 streets. I got overwhelmed renaming them all and brought it up on live help. They said that they knew about it and were on it. Yay! But next year is the big presidential election in the US and I can see an animal naming war getting ugly as the election year goes on and it really doesn't belong in Glitch, where I'm trying to escape all of that for a little while.
    Posted 14 months ago by Griselda Subscriber! | Permalink
  • I think Griselda touched one important issue. Very relevant in the context actually. Can we call public pigs Muhammad, Jesus Christ, Buda, Moses or George Bush? And should we? Or/and, shouldn't we?

    @Griselda I would like first to say that I really understand you, but I have difficulties to agree with that. Consider that we, all the players here, are real people with real lives, so it's too difficult to separate what is real and what is not. Behind each little blue, green, yellow, grey glitchy there's one person worried about the world, or not at all caring about it, or only caring about this or that, etc. We are all different.
    And thats why I have some points:

    - The importance and protection of freedom of speech;

    - The importance and protection of creativity;

    - The importance and protection of open minds;

    Political messages, religious, public, private, surrealist, whatever, it doesn't matter...
    If one person writes something that can be re-write over and while all the flow of interactions and creativity happens, our minds open for new perspectives, while as well freedom of speech is put in practice.
    I wrote before in other posts about tolerance and respect and friendship within the community. But all resumes in the end to one single thing: People have to use their brains, to use a bit their common sense and understand the naming a piggy, for example of "Muhammad", will be understood as "offensive" on the eyes/mind of a muslim person. But whether if it is or not intentional, in this case it doesn't matter much (or shouldn't at least), because all the option when talking about freedom of speech should be free.
    While this on the opposite side the muslim person has to understand that this is a community, with people that have maybe different perspectives. In a place with lots of open minds (thanks Giants for that) and with free speech, there's the always right to criticize dogmas. If he or she doesn't like that has always the option to leave it, or else simply write over the damn message. It's so simple!

    There should exist actually three important rules:
    #1- Don't take things too seriously;
    #2- Have fun!;
    #3- Have fun!;

    Anyway I leave this to TS to decide what to do. If someday they believe that censorship will be better for the future of their game and the company who am I (Mr nobody) to say whatever else? Despite being "our game" they have the control. :)

    Emotional Hugs!
    Posted 14 months ago by Kul Koba Subscriber! | Permalink
  • - Put here some [x] button to delete repeated messages. ;)
    Posted 14 months ago by Kul Koba Subscriber! | Permalink
  • As for not taking things too seriously, you can't say that too someone in any fairness. If I'm offended by the slightest thing (and I am), you can't tell me my fellings are invalid. The true nature of most of the things I have problems with IS the problem. The fact that discrimination is so commonplace and widely accepted is the problem. It's often the LITTLE things that are the problem and add up to a much greater concern.

    I have fun, but I also call crap out when I see it.
    Posted 13 months ago by Cerulean Subscriber! | Permalink
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