Chatting enable in .FI - It works like this.

[:Act]

I read HxF a lot, and in recent years have not posted much (as you can probably tell from my dated siggy and profile pic) - but this news story kind of made me feel the need to respond. /startrant

Firstly, the fact that the most basic thing about a social networking chat site, the actual speaking part, is going to be severely moderated/banned through a list of approved words as opposed to a list of banned ones (ie the bobba filter) shows an incredible sense of 1984, big brother, communistic style leadership. It makes me feel as if I am not trustworthy enough to speak for myself. The amount of work into creating a list of APPROVED words shows a vast amount of dedication to have total control over language. It's not about the words that are not allowed, it's about the ones that are. That is so very backwards and controlling it worries me.

Secondly, more than 99.9% of Habbo users were completely innocent in this, and although the odd insult/swear word will be thrown around, there was a distinct lack of numbers of users who actively fit the scary paedo profile the media seems to portray of the users. Thus, it's more than slightly unfair to subject the rule-abiding users to an almost month long mute for the sake of a tiny tiny minority. Furthermore, this minority of users have no attachment to the game. They most likely create an account, go to a room and see what they can get. These are not dedicated members of the community, nor do they bring anything to the game. They care not about it. So why should the rest of the users who devote a lot of time, effort and money into the game be punished for the actions of a tiny minority that use the game perhaps 5 minutes a week?

Another point that really worries me is the fact that the staff seem to be taking no responsibility for these matters. The staff's responses to the fiasco have been one of 'not my fault', passing the buck, and knee-jerk reactions. The fact that they simply do not trust users to even speak shows that they are taking no blame themselves, they are blaming ALL USERS. They are tarring everybody with the same brush, the accusation that all users are potential paedophiles, groomers, sexaddicts or whatever, when infact the reality of the situation is that through their budget cuts, reduction in staff involvement in community, and a distinct lack of proper moderation, they have singlehandedly destroyed in mere months what it took a dedicated team of people a decade to create: a safe, well moderated community that had the freedom to speak and do as they wished, and were trusted to do so. They need to acknowledge this because this is the reason why the hotel has gone down the tubes lately. There's a reason why they merged the hotels. Why they got rid of staff. Why they cut moderation. They wanted more money. It's simple greed.

They compromised the safety of young, naive, impressionable children and teenagers for the sake of saving a bit of cash on moderation. It's akin to the government withdrawing funding from child-protection services so that they can take an extra bonus at Christmas.

There is a reason why people call the days of Jibbi, Callie, Ione and Lost_Witness the good old days because that is exactly what they were: good. They were fun. There was a great sense of community, where you felt like you were part of something. How many people will look back on these days with fond memories? The mute, the scandal, the endless changes, the budget cuts, the destruction of a decade old community.

They can save as much money as they want, but it will not bring back that community. Doing that takes trust, respect, and hard work, and unfortunately for Paul LaFontaine, Sulake, and the other staff, those are not traits that you can buy, no matter how much cash you have.



/endrant. Sorry it's long x

[Fifty-Six]

Completely agree with you, :Act. Seems like the majority of the blame has been placed on the "pedos" and users engaging in sexual activities, when in fact Sulake is as much at fault for allowing it to continue.

[Abdicators]

Nothing 1984 or big brother like here, Paul has announced that users will be able to 'earn' ("unlock") the ability to have free speech. This is a positive thing, not only will it limit the amount of trolls that consistently sign up on new accounts, but it will protect new users from immediately experiencing sex by not being able to respond to it. Which I did they might add, users were not ignored if they participatied in this activity. I've been banned for even mentioning a boob. Users just made new accounts.

Anyone wanting to break the Habbo Way by engaging in cyber or propositioning sex will have to unlock the ability to use free speech first. That seems like an awfully painstaking thing for theoretical paedophiles to have to do over and over again when the account they're using inevitably gets banned for sexual propositioning.

They're not blaming the entire community either. The UK alone attributes to 300,000 monthly Habbo users, do you think it's safe for them to continue to be able to talk whilst this fiasco has happened? Surely the proper approach would be to ensure the users have a safe environment to interact with. If it takes muting the millions of teens that use Habbo until this new system is implemented, then so be it. Sulake have to follow several guides lines when it comes to the moderation of young teenagers, they have to put those people first. The game is not primarily aimed at 18 year olds.

They're currently employing over 225 moderators. There is 11 different Habbo hotels, that's appropriately 20 moderators per local language, that's also 205 more moderators than Moshi Monsters has. Sulake started to implement measures to help moderation well before this report surfaced; Habbo Guides were in talk and development months before the report appeared.

The days of Jibbi, Callie, Lost_Witness and even ione were no different than today, to think they were exemplifies yournaivety, there still existed the type of rooms that Channel 4 are pulling Habbo up on, they've existed for years. Numerous peadophiles have been charged due to their activities on Habbo Hotel. Staff may have had more user-interaction then, and the competitions may have been frequent (which, need I remind you only a small proportion actively participated in). Other than that, nothing has changed.

Sulake did not pass the blame, they even thanked Channel 4 for bringing to attention the incredibly bad moderation that exists in this media, and they're doing what they can to fix it.

Habbo is not aimed, at 18 year old users who have used the game for 5 years+. They cater for you, because you do still use it. Their audience is young teens, they need to ensure safety for those first, they are not as bright, or aware of the dangers of the internet as you are.

[DPS]

I dont blame anyone but Habbo/Sulake for not finding out sooner and doing something about it.
Lets all be honest.. they knew it was going on, but just didnt act.

[e5]

Well, I do hope sentences aren't all blocked off part way through. Why don't they just let us talk how we want, and force everyone to have the filter enabled again rather than the option to disable it? :S

---------- Post added 22-06-2012 at 11:00 AM ----------

I agree with you whole heartedly. If they didn't cut back in moderation and weren't so layed-back about it, we wouldn't be in this situation we are in now. It's ridiculous. It did use to be a safe community, where foul mouthers were banned in an instant. Now, when we report, all we get in "Use the mute tool" which isn't effective enough. I liked the days where the moderators actually attended a room to show their presence and users actually behaved with them around. I am dissappointed that as a long term player, Habbo has turned out like this.

I read HxF a lot, and in recent years have not posted much (as you can probably tell from my dated siggy and profile pic) - but this news story kind of made me feel the need to respond. /startrant

Firstly, the fact that the most basic thing about a social networking chat site, the actual speaking part, is going to be severely moderated/banned through a list of approved words as opposed to a list of banned ones (ie the bobba filter) shows an incredible sense of 1984, big brother, communistic style leadership. It makes me feel as if I am not trustworthy enough to speak for myself. The amount of work into creating a list of APPROVED words shows a vast amount of dedication to have total control over language. It's not about the words that are not allowed, it's about the ones that are. That is so very backwards and controlling it worries me.

Secondly, more than 99.9% of Habbo users were completely innocent in this, and although the odd insult/swear word will be thrown around, there was a distinct lack of numbers of users who actively fit the scary paedo profile the media seems to portray of the users. Thus, it's more than slightly unfair to subject the rule-abiding users to an almost month long mute for the sake of a tiny tiny minority. Furthermore, this minority of users have no attachment to the game. They most likely create an account, go to a room and see what they can get. These are not dedicated members of the community, nor do they bring anything to the game. They care not about it. So why should the rest of the users who devote a lot of time, effort and money into the game be punished for the actions of a tiny minority that use the game perhaps 5 minutes a week?

Another point that really worries me is the fact that the staff seem to be taking no responsibility for these matters. The staff's responses to the fiasco have been one of 'not my fault', passing the buck, and knee-jerk reactions. The fact that they simply do not trust users to even speak shows that they are taking no blame themselves, they are blaming ALL USERS. They are tarring everybody with the same brush, the accusation that all users are potential paedophiles, groomers, sexaddicts or whatever, when infact the reality of the situation is that through their budget cuts, reduction in staff involvement in community, and a distinct lack of proper moderation, they have singlehandedly destroyed in mere months what it took a dedicated team of people a decade to create: a safe, well moderated community that had the freedom to speak and do as they wished, and were trusted to do so. They need to acknowledge this because this is the reason why the hotel has gone down the tubes lately. There's a reason why they merged the hotels. Why they got rid of staff. Why they cut moderation. They wanted more money. It's simple greed.

They compromised the safety of young, naive, impressionable children and teenagers for the sake of saving a bit of cash on moderation. It's akin to the government withdrawing funding from child-protection services so that they can take an extra bonus at Christmas.

There is a reason why people call the days of Jibbi, Callie, Ione and Lost_Witness the good old days because that is exactly what they were: good. They were fun. There was a great sense of community, where you felt like you were part of something. How many people will look back on these days with fond memories? The mute, the scandal, the endless changes, the budget cuts, the destruction of a decade old community.

They can save as much money as they want, but it will not bring back that community. Doing that takes trust, respect, and hard work, and unfortunately for Paul LaFontaine, Sulake, and the other staff, those are not traits that you can buy, no matter how much cash you have.



/endrant. Sorry it's long x

[Kardan]

People that are saying, 'Why don't they just introduce the filter again' and 'It's better to have disallowed words than allowed words' are just wrong.

That's what Habbo employed before, a filter, and it didn't stop the problem. If 'sex' got filtered, people just said '5ex' and then when that got filtered, they'd say '5e><', the same with 'cam' etc. People can always avoid the filter, and it won't solve any of the problems that Habbo now need to avoid.

Putting in a whitelist of allowed words is definitely the way forwards, no matter how annoying it may be to most of the community.

[Caziono]

One thing just to point out, Channel 4 had contacted Sulake before their investigation was made public and they did infact respond but that was it, they did no measures until it was made public.

[.DnB]

Oh my god... what about people who use shortened words... what about all the different slang in england america canada australia etc... what about habbo bwabys??? How can this possibly work!?

[Xedia]

Oh my god... what about people who use shortened words... what about all the different slang in england america canada australia etc... what about habbo bwabys??? How can this possibly work!?

It wont

[Chippiewill]

so much for .com being the pilot hotel

They wanted low numbers of people talking so that moderators could handle it and any bugs, and so everyone could be hands on deck and provide additional attention to everything without an ensuing **** storm.