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Add a "Terms of Service" rule that forbid "False Advertising"
Elikal
Member UncommonPosts: 7,912
False Advertising is a crime in the European Union, due to the European Court of Justice, as confirmed again 2011. It is also a crime here in Germany and for good reasons.
False Advertising is, when a person pretends to be a private person and is in fact paid by a company to spread advertising, masked as "just personal opinion". I do not know if that is legal in the USA, but I think it would be good if MMORPG.com adds a clause in their ToS, that people who work for game companies must not do paid advertising and pretend just to be a private person. Such habits ruin the trust in this forum, so it would be helpful for a good atmosphere of discussion if we know, anyone found as paid troll or paid advertiser gets a Permaban.
Such things must be persecuted. It is bad enough to deal with "private" trolls, we don't need trolls paid by any game company to fan the flames!
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
Comments
I dunno how they ever wou8ld find out if someone is just a fan or a paid advertiser...
And i have a feeling that is beyond what most companies would do, but I wouldn't complain if they put in the rule... After all is marketting in itself no problem but we should know what is a paid commercial and whats not.
But I fear that the worst "advertisers" are just huge fans... Remember Zorndorf who used to post here a while back, who was sure Blizzard would rule the world and that Wow would be the largest MMO forever? No paid advertiser would go that far.
I was just watching the" Military Channel", an ad came on from a drug company selling a prescription for,"Shingles", which appears to be an affliction of dire consequences. A man with a grave face described a life that must make him beg for a swift death, like a piano falling on him. At the end of the ad there were animated blood cells wiggling, reminiscent of the Umbrella Company's "T Virus", and a warning in stark letters," You May Already Carry The Shingles Virus". Like those poor people in ,"Walking Dead" just found out they already carry the Zombie Virus. I don't even have Shingles, and I wanted me some of that medicine now. My point is this, don't hold your breath waiting for corporate honesty in advertising.
Ballerinas are always on their toes. Why don't they just get taller ballerinas?
I understand that finding and proving that is difficult. But we don't make rules or not because it is difficult to prove. We make rules because they are right. And it can at least send a signal.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
We do ban 'shills' if we uncover them. However, figuring out who is a shill beyond any doubt isn't always easy.
With that said, if you suspect some foul play is going on with a particular user, please get in touch with me privately about it and provide me with any evidence of your claims you can. We'll look into it and take any action we deem necessary.
I know right that commercial is pretty funny. I had Shingles 5 times before I was 18. No one knows why but I sure am not dead from it.
Thanks, that is good to know. I would never suspect someone, that just is not my nature. It is more a spirit of "play fair" I wish for. But it is good to know this is already the policy.
You know, what really angers me about this, is, I really never suspect people of ulterior motivations. Call me naive, but I rather believe someone is stubborn or dumb than believing in "shills". The very idea someone says an opinion because he is paid makes my stomach twist. I know little can be done, because prove is very hard to nigh impossible maybe. It just makes me both sad and angry to think people do that, partially because I feel so helpless to counter such a thing.
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
It's an unfortunate reality that such 'shills' do exist, but users do tend to jump to conclusions far too quickly and so we aren't going to just go ahead and ban someone on someone's suspicion. All we can do is promise to look into it and if we find enough red flags we'll take action. We do take this sort of thing very seriously though.
This is as good as it is possible. I understand such ideas can lead to witch hunts, which is probably worse. Thanks for taking the time to elaborate. ^^
People don't ask questions to get answers - they ask questions to show how smart they are. - Dogbert
In the U.S. Corporations have the same rights as individuals, and then some. In the U.S. false advertising is defined as making false claims. What you are describing is deceptive advertising and is not the same thing. This site does have rules for Game Attacks, Advertisements, and Multiple Accounts. All of which should be sufficient to combat shilling.
I myself have be accused three time of being a shill, I am not. As a result I have taken to adding statements that I am not a paid employee or any way associated with any company or advertiser, when making statements that may come across as shill.
We now live in a day and age of viral marketing, be assured that it will have lawyers behind it.
For a time I suspected that some, if not all, posts Looking For Games (LFG) to play were shill.
Posts that included the phrases "See You At Launch", "They Have Time To Fix It", or "This Is Not The Game You Are Looking For" may have been shill, but probably not.
Any post demanding "Proof", or "Links" to statements sounded like "Lawyer In The Bullpen" shilling.
This happened during my WoW days. I'm a fan of Sci-Fi (J.J. Abrams) and YouTube, so I posted links to YouTube videos to "Cloverfield". And asked if anybody heard about it or knew anything. I was banned for advertising. When "Dollhouse" was on I was a fan of the line "There are three flowers in a vase". So I made it into a macro, with no outside links, and said it to zone chat ever time I finished a quest and turned one in, from 5 to 10 times and hour. I was banned for spam. At no time was I shilling, I was simply a fan.
Boy: Why can't I talk to Him?
Mom: We don't talk to Priests.
As if it could exist, without being payed for.
F2P means you get what you paid for. Pay nothing, get nothing.
Even telemarketers wouldn't think that.
It costs money to play. Therefore P2W.
I caught myself jumping to this same conclusion several times in the past few weeks, as the updates and announcements for Guild Wars 2's "pre-purchase" program went live.
Now that the hub-bub is mostly over (knock on wood), I'm discovering that the "hype" and "fanaticism" trends-- whether good OR bad--- tend to follow every game that has any sort of official announcement.
I guess I missed most of the drama over pre-release of SW:TOR, but it sounded like these forums were alive with the same sort of vitriol as that loomed closer to release as well.
I notice that some of the more obscure titles of late manage to find a flicker of new life, however brief in these forums, just as some new content or feature is being implemented.
I've been trying to determine whether or not it's because of the diligence of a TRUE fan, or some "shill" has injected the forums with a shot of free publicity, like this thread here.
have MMORPG staff found companys doing this on there site? and if you you guys have what companys where they?