Last login information

[gonger]

Greetings!

During the last Dev meeting, I started a discussion about the possibility to see the last login times of players.
The idea behind is to show to others whether they just happened not to play at the same time as their friends, or whether the friends have been inactive. Unless you are in the same guild, this information is not
available for players right now, even though it is stored in the database.
Several people seemed to like the general idea, but concerns were raised that this might make (too) private information available.

So let us discuss this idea here:
* What do you think of the general idea?
* Do you share the concerns about privacy? Please consider also that this information is already available for people from the same guild. Which - at least in bigger guilds - means that also people who are not
necessarily your friends can see it.
* If many people are concerned about privacy, this information might be made available to certain people only, for example those on your buddy list.
* As an alternative, only vague information might be given: From "Has been on recently" to "Weapons are rusty, and the robe is eaten by moths" (and several messages in between).
* A second alternative proposed was to adjust the colours in your buddy list, like dark red for "long time gone".
* Is there some more information that might be given? And which might be the privacy concerns for them?

Thank you for listening, and please keep your opinions coming.

Travel safely.

Gonger Xaraha, of the Bounty Hunters

[karnath]

http://umbraps.tk/utils/last_seen

Testing welcomed. Bugs are there.

[Candy]

It would be a useful feature, but players should be able to choose whether they want people to see when they've been on.

[helios21]

Hi!

I do not really like that and have privacy concerns. For me its a difference whether I can see the information in game with my planeshift login or whether anyone - whether involved with the game or not - can see it on a public webpage. What I like that at least the players name needs to be entered, but I really do think this is best placed within myplane as an *opt-in* feature like most other stuff in there. (And player names can be extracted from myplane so someone make quite a log of online presence without even logging in to planeshift.) In game without parsing and counting my logs I can also only see last login time not last five login times.

Yes, it can be argued that one can get the information by having an alt logged in all the time and parsing logs and anyone can do it. But this kind of argumentation for my just doesn´t work regarding data protection and privacy concerns. Anything can be circumvented and collected unless I choose to not login to the internet at all or in some cases encrypt stuff. But there are rules on whats approbiate and what is not approbiate for a reason.

Begin able to get the information in game at least adds some accountability. If someone is known to abuse that information, his account could be banned. Having the information on a public webpage is quite something different for me.

I am a bit sad too that a member of our guild left the guild in an reaction to this. I think he overreacted somewhat, but still, I prefer discussing something like this *before* its implemented. And thus can understand some anger about it.

Thus, I kindly ask you to remove the page, Karnath, until after it has been discussed.

I also think its better done as an opt-in feature to myplane.

I remember the dev q&a where Gonger raised this issue and I remember some planeshift developer being quite reluctant about it due to privacy concerns.

Thanks,

[karnath]

Done. Access removed to everybody.

P.S.
I have to point to the fact all known GMs and known devs were hidden by default and there was easy way to remove oneself from visibility described in the comments to the page.

[helios21]

Thanks, Karnath.

My suggestion would be:

1) Have it opt-in

2) Have it password protected for Planeshift players.

Thus I think myplane would be perfect fit, cause password protection already in place there.

Just to make clear that I am not against the feature in general.

Goodnight and dream well,

[karnath]

Suggestions denied in case of Umbra's script.

You should talk to developers and try to convince them to allocate time to write this simple script from now on.
I really should not be the one who contributes to PS. Take care.

[LigH]

Is it just me, or does that sound rancorous?

[Bonifarzia]

Sure, privacy is important, but anyone could parse and mine such data from
http://planeshift.subhosting.net/index.php?page=char_stats,
which is a public (and useful!) site, so I don't really see the problem.
And yes, there was a button that allowed to hide yourself. *shrug*

[Sen]

I fully agree to helios21's first post. You can also figure out when I leave my home and am back, but that knowledge is nothing that I'd like to have made publicly available at the town hall.

The consequences differ vastly, but the issue is the same. Information about myself and my habits is not public. There are enough weird people - also in ps - who try to make unwanted use out of such information as ingame times.

Opt-in per char could be a solution indeed, because opinions about privacy differ also because of different cultures in this world-wide game.

[helios21]

Sure, privacy is important, but anyone could parse and mine such data from
http://planeshift.subhosting.net/index.php?page=char_stats,
which is a public (and useful!) site, so I don't really see the problem.
And yes, there was a button that allowed to hide yourself. *shrug*

Yes, that came to my mind now, too.

What I was pointing out at was the leak of *in-game* information to the whole internet community. But yes, such a leak is already happening, and its even displaying all players and does not require to input a player name. So I think it would be consequent to

1) Either put above page behind a password protection that only lets registered players see it. Or change it to "nr players online" with link to such a page within myplane.

2) Allow other such pages as well, such as Karnath´s one.

I tend to option 1 at the moment. I prefer my online times better not be accessible outside of the game. All instant messaging systems I know of work in a way that online status can only be seen by people I allow it to. I believe that this is for a reason.

Thanks for pointing this out. I think I will raise this issue on the next dev q&a or in a wish report.

Still I am sad why such a page could not be discussed, without someone leaving a guild and another one possibly becoming bitter. And I still think its good to discuss it before implementing it. Just "I could implement seeing last five login times for the given player name. How about it?". So no investment in time, before some kind of agreement is reached.

I appreciate Karnath´s effort to try to contribute to PS, but still believe discussing it is perfectly valid.

Regards,

[Bonifarzia]

Sure, discussing things in a constructive way makes sense, and those points raised here are valid, e.g. Sen's points of view also makes sense to me. Pages that display the character names currently logged in are just convenient because you can instantly look up whether a buddy is online without entering a password first (yeah, my laziness again).  Yet it makes sense to do this via myplane, which offers more functionality (e.g. buddylist). In the privacy settings page it would certainly make sense to add another row about last login info, given the designers of the page find the time for that.

[Sadie]

My suggestion would be:

1) Have it opt-in

2) Have it password protected for Planeshift players.

Thus I think myplane would be perfect fit, cause password protection already in place there.

Just to make clear that I am not against the feature in general.

This I think could work...
 

[dadela]

Klyrosh loves to read. She reads a lot. Not everythime in the library. Sometimes she wonders why some dwarves put long lines on sword how to use it. Dwarves may be have no time doing anything better. May be they don't. But other day she saw lemur without hand complained to dwarf that he expected something other. May be great magics. Don't know. May be it has something to do with no lots of stupid dwarves runes on the handle. I read them all. Who knew I should put sword in sheath to safely wander with it around? Not expected. At all. I should read these things more if I see them. Or may be Klyrosh should not be using a swords, who know.s  Wise dwarves may be.

[cdmoreland]

As a dwarf, I know many that are very wise. We live to be very old, about 150 turns. With sword I am very good and love to run between a maulbernaut's legs and wack 'em from behind. Being very short can be an advantage, like the view when following the females.