|
|
Post by pinkerdlu on Jul 29, 2018 14:29:39 GMT -5
Do not let the persuasive, well-thought out, completely rational and logical arguments of 'qwerty' sway you, my brothers. We must continue this premeditated, outright, steady paced, determined smear campaign, that we have so carefully carried out via shadowy meetings in dark discords and hushed PMs passed between nefarious posters.  |
|
|
|
Post by jcarter on Jul 29, 2018 14:42:43 GMT -5
So because a vote bot attempt was not performed well it therefore must have been some ne'er-do-well that is out to sabotage Arm, rather than an overzealous player/staffer that set a timer variable wrong? What can I say. Everyone can believe what they'd like to believe.. The moderators of TMC and TMS, with access of the logs and any other real data, believe this was done to injure Arm's reputation.
lol. so let's go over what actually happened, compared to what you claimed happened. this vote fraud went completely unnoticed until an Arm staffer contacted the MUD connector about it. the moderator didn't notice anything. then more people complained about it, and then he managed to find something. What was it you said had happened? Use of vote inflation bots isnt new. And it may be that some muds use them already. But they do it subtly, a slow inflation that does not flag anyone down. That ... was not what happened. right, so that wasn't what happened at all. people on here/discord/reddit noticed something was suspicious first. In fact, two seconds of googling shows this post on February 10th on reddit complaining aoout it (and reiloth defending it, surprise surprise), whereas the link you presented stated was that Arm staff contacted them in March. so let met get this straight. i am supposed to believe that some shadowy figure is trying to ruin the reputation of armageddon mud (because it wasn't piss poor before) by designing and implementing a vote bot so subtle that a web administrator specifically looking for it is unable to detect it, in the hopes that they'll frame Arm for obvious manipulation? and that this puppetmaster is also trying to strike out at Armageddon MUD by posting positive threads threads and commenting on them with multiple accounts on reddit, TMC, and whatever other sites to get good publicity for arm, but posting so much that it mildly annoys people and they get sick of hearing about Arm? wow yeah that totally sounds like a valid theory. |
|
|
|
Post by shakes on Jul 29, 2018 14:55:26 GMT -5
I can go either way. Someone here did it, as a number of you have stated your intention is to destroy Armageddon. Or some pro-Arm techhead did it, as they have already demonstrated technical proficiency and deviousness with that pixel tracker stunt.
Since it can go either way, it's neutral in my head. Just another strange event in an increasingly sketchy situation. Not something I'm spending a lot of mental time on.
|
|
|
|
Post by jcarter on Jul 29, 2018 15:05:45 GMT -5
I can go either way. Someone here did it, as a number of you have stated your intention is to destroy Armageddon. does that really make sense to you? that someone tried to "destroy Armageddon" by developing an undetectable vote bot which they hope may be detected...so that its position as 5th place on a top 10 list nobody ever checks is removed? you guys have some pretty wild imaginations. |
|
mehtastic
GDB Superstar
Armers Anonymous sponsor
Posts: 1,699
Member is Online
|
Post by mehtastic on Jul 29, 2018 15:24:59 GMT -5
Not only is it representative of a wild imagination, it's the logical conclusion to the Armageddon community's complete failure to motivate its members to vote. "We did all we could to get us to vote for Armageddon but then a voting bot came! It must be their fault!" What would the Arm community do without the shadowboard as its bogeyman?
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 29, 2018 15:25:21 GMT -5
Dude. During the vote. Armageddon hit #1 and had thousands of votes it never had. And that number jumped by hundreds every hour or two. It was beyond likely. Beyond natural. The amount of votes there, a MUD couldnt achieve even if the entire MUD community voted.
Similar thing with TMC. It wasnt subtle. Which explains why the issue got complained about multiple times at the same exact time by different people. The Mod just couldnt track the origin and method at the first passing glance. But the numbers it was jumping were glaringly obvious.
If the bot creator was actually hoping to help the game. They would've limited themselves to say 50 votes extra a day, and that would probably kept the Mud on #1 forever, without a single person complaining. But when it began going in hundreds and thousands, not a single person in a right mind would've thought it wasnt a bot.
I am trying to find a post about the TMS. I swear I recall a similar post about it, as there was for TMC. But it's hard to do searches on the phone, or this weird mini laptop that I've got going for me. Once I get back to a normal computer, I'll do it properly.
|
|
|
|
Post by shakes on Jul 29, 2018 15:28:45 GMT -5
My understanding is that it was spamming constantly. I mean, Arm had like a thousand votes to everyone else's 30.
If that was the case, it was only undetectable by an incompetent web admin. I can roll through an IIS or Apache log in about 5 seconds and find that. Heck, there's TOOLS which do that for you. I literally do this every day at work.
If it was a very slow crawl, the numbers still should have caught someone's attention.
Why have the sites decided to leave Arm off at this point, or is it permanent?
|
|
|
|
Post by lyse on Jul 29, 2018 15:30:17 GMT -5
I just like how we’re all out to destroy Arm and we’re all actively conspiring to bring it down. Yet, many of the positive changes the game has enjoyed over the last few years can be attributed to this very board.
It’s just funny to me, because many people that post here or did post here still play. It’s kind of like shooting yourself in the foot. Never mind that staff knows who a lot of us are and treat us like shit. But we’re the bad guys.
Arm logic for you.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 29, 2018 15:31:51 GMT -5
They cant really block the bot. TMC changed their voting rules so that only accounts that made a few forum posts are eligible to vote. TMS do not have account system at all. It's all traffic. They're simply unable to block the bot, short of banning an entire country, I guess.
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 29, 2018 15:37:39 GMT -5
I just like how we’re all out to destroy Arm and we’re all actively conspiring to bring it down. Yet, many of the positive changes the game has enjoyed over the last few years can be attributed to this very board. It’s just funny to me, because many people that post here or did post here still play. It’s kind of like shooting yourself in the foot. Never mind that staff knows who a lot of us are and treat us like shit. But we’re the bad guys. Arm logic for you.
And I'm not describing 'all' of you. Mostly Mehtastic. Who as an account was created strictly for arm damage. Just read his post history and count on your fingers the posts he made that were not somehow related to the premise of "Armageddon must burn"
I'm certain he's got another forum handle where he's a normal person. But Mehtastic forum handle itself, the profile on these forums and others, is strictly single-purposed.
|
|
|
|
Post by jcarter on Jul 29, 2018 15:39:39 GMT -5
Dude. During the vote. Armageddon hit #1 and had thousands of votes it never had. And that number jumped by hundreds every hour or two. It was beyond likely. Beyond natural. The amount of votes there, a MUD couldnt achieve even if the entire MUD community voted. Similar thing with TMC. It wasnt subtle. Which explains why the issue got complained about multiple times at the same exact time by different people. The Mod just couldnt track the origin and method at the first passing glance. But the numbers it was jumping were glaringly obvious. If the bot creator was actually hoping to help the game. They would've limited themselves to say 50 votes extra a day, and that would probably kept the Mud on #1 forever, without a single person complaining. But when it began going in hundreds and thousands, not a single person in a right mind would've thought it wasnt a bot. I am trying to find a post about the TMS. I swear I recall a similar post about it, as there was for TMC. But it's hard to do searches on the phone, or this weird mini laptop that I've got going for me. Once I get back to a normal computer, I'll do it properly. so if the vote manipulation was so obvious, shouldn't Arm staff have been involved in contacting TMC and TMS earlier? shouldn't they, the people who are most vested in noticing and keeping track of votes, be the most aware and conscientious of it behaving oddly? and yet there's a reddit post from someone else calling out an oddity and staff sending a quick e-mail to check up on it. hmmmm. and doesn't it seem counterintuitive that someone with the intent of making an obvious vote manipulation to frame the stellar reputation of Armageddon MUD would go through the effort of making it difficult enough to detect that an administrator staring right at the votes looking for fraudulent votes couldn't track it down? correct me if i'm wrong but the only way i could see it not being blocked so easily would be from paying a botnet to vote, in which case why not just pay for a botnet to DDOS Arm's server if you're looking to "destroy" the game? |
|
|
|
Post by shakes on Jul 29, 2018 15:40:37 GMT -5
I just like how we’re all out to destroy Arm and we’re all actively conspiring to bring it down. Yet, many of the positive changes the game has enjoyed over the last few years can be attributed to this very board. It’s just funny to me, because many people that post here or did post here still play. It’s kind of like shooting yourself in the foot. Never mind that staff knows who a lot of us are and treat us like shit. But we’re the bad guys. Arm logic for you. I still play. There's not a better game that I've found out there. Granted I haven't tried them all, but I hit a bunch of the free ones. Either they didn't interest me or they didn't seem better. Not everyone here is out to destroy it, but are you denying a few have stated that as their intention? I don't see how you can deny that. Those posts are on the first page. If someone wants to build a better game, I'm ALL for that. I'll play it if I find it to be truly better. People just want to destroy with lies or vitriol, I'm not down with that. All I'm saying is that I'm here, I'm listening to arguments and I've got a relatively open mind. Someone wants to have a dialectic, let's do it. But I'm not down with strawmen, false arguments, and namecalling. I just ignore those. |
|
mehtastic
GDB Superstar
Armers Anonymous sponsor
Posts: 1,699
Member is Online
|
Post by mehtastic on Jul 29, 2018 15:44:17 GMT -5
Yeah, go ahead and look at my post history. You'll see in my dastardly, mustache twirling plot to destroy the game, I have:
- Commented on the possible reasoning behind the class change and how to fix the classes going forward.
- Commented on the differences between whistleblower's and Kronibas's sexual harassment cases, in a way that was sympathetic to Kronibas.
- Encouraged people to write truthful reviews of the game, regardless of whether they happened to be negative.
- Commented on staff work ethic.
- Commented on how the Armageddon community handles griefers. (It doesn't.)
- Explicitly mentioned I don't hate Armageddon, but want the game and innocent members of the community to stop suffering for Armageddon.
That's just the past month or so. Obviously I also released the game's code, thanks to a staff friend who likes the game but agrees it needs a kick in the butt. But yeah, that's what I do, old destroying-the-game Mehtastic. Fuck off.
|
|
|
|
Post by shakes on Jul 29, 2018 15:47:41 GMT -5
Two problems here ... The first paragraph I'd say yes, they should have gotten on top of it better. But ... well ... from an outsider's perspective, Arm staff has the same problem that is evident in game. People in a few positions hog ALL the power and do little with it. To the second, how do you hire a botnet wrangler? It's a criminal activity to DDOS in some states, even something like a game. Because the same server or network which hosts Arm might be in someway related to ecommerce, even if it's just in a server room beside someone whose website sells ankle bracelets made out of yarn. That's a federal crime which now brings the heat of the FBI on you. Just because someone has the technical skills, doesn't mean they have the acumen. There are threads here and on the GDB where people openly talk about their mental illnesses. I'm not expecting intelligent, rational decisions from someone who is actually willing to go through with such a bot mechanism, either anti-Arm or pro-Arm. Knuckleheads abound, I'd say. YOU trying to break down how YOU would do it better has no bearing on how some irrational dude may have done it. Or why. |
|
|
|
Post by lyse on Jul 29, 2018 15:50:26 GMT -5
I just like how we’re all out to destroy Arm and we’re all actively conspiring to bring it down. Yet, many of the positive changes the game has enjoyed over the last few years can be attributed to this very board. It’s just funny to me, because many people that post here or did post here still play. It’s kind of like shooting yourself in the foot. Never mind that staff knows who a lot of us are and treat us like shit. But we’re the bad guys. Arm logic for you.
And I'm not describing 'all' of you. Mostly Mehtastic. Who as an account was created strictly for arm damage. Just read his post history and count on your fingers the posts he made that were not somehow related to the premise of "Armageddon must burn"
I'm certain he's got another forum handle where he's a normal person. But Mehtastic forum handle itself, the profile on these forums and others, is strictly single-purposed.
Yeah, but that’s the thing. Even if he is trying to actively destroy the Mud, so what? He hasn’t nuked the server or made the game unplayable. I’m talking about the idea that people that post here are somehow shit in staff’s eyes as a knee jerk reaction. When we’re the same damn people that play the game. It’s just that you can’t discuss what needs to be discussed on the gdb and they know that. So somehow it’s one person, allegedly trying to bring down the game... it’s a conspiracy? |
|
