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Concerning the Recent Allegations of Developer Misconduct

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Author	Topic
CCP kieron	Posted - 2007.02.07 04:16:00 - [1] Our goal is to provide the best possible game, gaming experience and development process possible. In light of that, we would like to address the recent allegations of CCP employee misconduct. CCP has taken these charges very seriously and since they surfaced we have launched a thorough investigation consisting of an examination of character histories ranging back to their creation as well as into any connected characters owned by the developers involved. This examination was performed by the same internal division which is also tasked with standard periodic audits of all developer and volunteer accounts. Areas of investigation include, but are not limited to: messaging history, financial and transactional history, combat and corporation logs, item and cash transfers and IP logs. As for the allegations themselves, they consist of two parts. The first part involved a case that happened seven months ago when a CCP employee’s identity became public knowledge within his corporation. Per company policy, the incident was investigated and actions taken where appropriate, including the removal of characters whose identities were compromised. The second part of the accusations stem from a leak of information pertaining to an in-game event arc. Due to the amount of time that has passed since the planning and execution of the event arc, we have not been able to confirm nor deny the veracity of these allegations. In both cases, these accusations were recently brought forward when a player revealed the identity of numerous CCP employee characters. Since these play characters are known to belong to CCP employees, they will be removed from the game. Many of them have been around since the creation of EVE and it is most unfortunate that these developers are now forced to end their relationships with their in-game friends, but that is our policy when the anonymity of staff members has been compromised. Last summer, CCP implemented stricter monitoring procedures and audits on all CCP employees’ EVE accounts. We are confident that our rigid procedures and protocol will prevent any misconduct or, at least, allow us to quickly discover it, should such an unfortunate scenario arise. As the community knows well, we at CCP enjoy not only playing EVE Online, but improving EVE and interacting with our playerbase. We feel EVE benefits from the developers playing EVE as any other members of the community do, and to impose artificial limitations -- such as no access to Tranquility or special flagging on a developer’s player character -- would greatly hinder the development of EVE. CCP is very passionate about EVE Online and is committed to its continued growth. We hope that this statement will put this issue behind us once and for all and allow us to continue moving forward with the support of our community.
CCP kieron	Posted - 2007.02.07 04:17:00 - [2] I will leave this thread open for discussion. Please keep comments and replies on topic and constructive.
Anila's Delight	Posted - 2007.02.07 04:36:00 - [3] ~~Second!~~ FIRST It is good to see that CCP are taking these allegations seriously and i belive i speak on behalf of the players of eve when i say i hope this investigation is concluded quickly. The real first poster just posted "first, your the first with content , so your the new first poster, congrats - Ductoris
JForce Minmatar	Posted - 2007.02.07 04:37:00 - [4] Thanks K. I'm sure you're aware that no matter what you say or do you probably can't win this one with everyone...that's normal I suppose. There are a number of allegations about coming from the information revealed by whatshisname, whether real or fabricated, and they extend beyond the "2" you mentioned. If someone was to take the time to formalise them in a coherent set of statements/questions, would you investigate those? And if so, would you like those sent to you or posted here? I guess what I'm saying is that did you merely conduct a broad enquiry based on the presence of information, or on the specifics of each piece of info? Did anyone email/post/petition anything specific? Or did you guys just see the stuff and start looking into it?
Rabbitgod Veto. Veto Corp	Posted - 2007.02.07 04:40:00 - [5] If this is the official "end of subject move along people" post about what has transpired over the last weeks all I can say is, not sufficient. The community is owed a lot more detail, and a few more options.
arkarsk Viziam	Posted - 2007.02.07 04:43:00 - [6] Originally by: Anila's Delight ~~Second!~~ FIRST I demand CCP launch an investigation into the deletion of my first post. Anyways, what of the T2 BPO's?
CCP kieron	Posted - 2007.02.07 04:44:00 - [7] Originally by: JForce If someone was to take the time to formalise them in a coherent set of statements/questions, would you investigate those? And if so, would you like those sent to you or posted here? I guess what I'm saying is that did you merely conduct a broad enquiry based on the presence of information, or on the specifics of each piece of info? Did anyone email/post/petition anything specific? Or did you guys just see the stuff and start looking into it? If there are more concerns that have not been addressed, please forward them to me. I will ensure they are thoroughly investigated. As for the recent investigation, I do not know anything more about it than what is in the above statement.
Samirol Love is Hate	Posted - 2007.02.07 04:44:00 - [8] Edited by: Samirol on 07/02/2007 04:41:25 so were blueprints made and given to bob? a sabre one comes to mind, not sure about the others but there were a couple ship ones in there
Merciless1 Death of Virtue MeatSausage EXPRESS	Posted - 2007.02.07 04:45:00 - [9] Edited by: Merciless1 on 07/02/2007 04:53:20 While I'm sure it's being looked into I see no information on the current situation. In matters such as this openess and honesty are key if you wish the matter be put to rest. Providing examples of past instances along with , basicly, "we're looking into it and doing stuff" will do nothing more than cause more specualation, accusations, conspiracy theories, and turmoil. IMHO it needs to be spelled out, what happened, what effect did it have on the game, and whats going to be done about it. I love EVE and CCP is a great company, I'd hate to see it's image tarnished by sweeping this under the rug.
Jon Lucien Black Omega Security Pandemic Legion	Posted - 2007.02.07 04:55:00 - [10] I agree with the above posts. You need to open the cans of worms that the rumors have created. An official statement of "we're looking into it" is a good start, but if you don't release information about what happened and how it affected the game then people aren't going to let it rest.
Farrellus Cameron Sturmgrenadier Inc Gentlemen's Club	Posted - 2007.02.07 04:59:00 - [11] This post: http://myeve.eve-online.com/ingameboard.asp?a=topic&threadID=429130&page=4#112, indicates that this is not "we're done, move along, nothing to see here"-post. It is a post to give us some more information and reassure us that they have not sidelined the issue. Obviously us EVE players are always chomping at the bit for more information and can get impatient when no news is bestowed to us from the Ivory Tower of Iceland. So personally, I am very glad to hear some more from them on this issue. I was initially a little disappointed in the vagueries of the post made in the Corporations & Alliances forum. I had faith that CCP takes such issues very seriously but I am glad to have it explicitly confirmed.
Pellaeon DuGalle Caldari Deep Black Industries House of Mercury	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:04:00 - [12] Poor Dev. One mistake and he loses everything. I'd shoot somebody if I had to do learning skills again
Laendra Universalis Imperium	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:07:00 - [13] It's a God Damned shame that a couple of *******s feel the need to try and ruin the game for others. That goes for people revealing CCP characters to others, and to CCP employees, if allegations are true (I hope it isn't), cheating.
Sinze	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:13:00 - [14] Nobody cared that developers were in Band Of Brothers, kieron. People cared about the free handouts such as the Sabre BPO. Whats the status of those, anyways? Were they removed? Have BoB been fined? Was it a non-issue? You haven't given us any information aside from "we had an investigation and found stuff." We need specifics. We are, after all, paying customers.
JForce Minmatar	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:13:00 - [15] From Kieron's post I'd say the investigation is over. This is not an "update", it's a "we're done and found nothing, but are removing these characters as people now know they're devs".
Merciless1 Death of Virtue MeatSausage EXPRESS	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:16:00 - [16] Edited by: Merciless1 on 07/02/2007 05:15:04 Originally by: Laendra It's a God Damned shame that a couple of *******s feel the need to try and ruin the game for others. That goes for people revealing CCP characters to others, and to CCP employees, if allegations are true (I hope it isn't), cheating. I'm speculating here, but there's no way that I'm aware of that would allow sombody to find out who a dev is unless the the dev did somthing stupid like tell sombody or use thier "dev magic" to the point where it became obvious or suspicious. If thier behaving as they should then they should just blend in with the rest of us mere mortals.
Par'Gellen Gallente Tres Hombres Psychiatric Hospital Uno Chica Loco	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:17:00 - [17] Thanks for the info. It left a little to be desired though. Mainly, what is being done about the free T2 BPO handouts? Some of us have played the terribly borked lottery game from day 1 and got squat while things like this go on in the shadows. These are the things we want to know about.
FGxHalsey Battlestars GoonSwarm	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:21:00 - [18] Please address the blueprint issue. Also may I suggest that CCP employees should be forbidden from becoming part of the leadership of any major corp or alliance in the game. I think that goes too far into removing their objectivity and tempts them too much to abuse their position. Thank-you P.S. CCP, this is still a great game.
mazzilliu Caldari Sniggerdly Pandemic Legion	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:22:00 - [19] CCP have not nor will not discuss GM decisions with third parties - Cortes
Sephiraa	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:23:00 - [20] Edited by: Sephiraa on 07/02/2007 05:40:52 I get the feeling we'll all be reading more about this in major gaming magazines soon, considering the real issues here have clearly not been dealt with. BoD were given 10 T2 BPOs by one person, who worked for CCP, before he was forced to leave. He must have been REALLY REALLY lucky in the BPO lottery. Merely deleting the characters is not enough Kieron. "I was sworn to absolute secrecy by XXX"
Iraf Thaiberd GoonSwarm	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:23:00 - [21] Edited by: Iraf Thaiberd on 07/02/2007 05:26:40 Originally by: JForce From Kieron's post I'd say the investigation is over. This is not an "update", it's a "we're done and found nothing, but are removing these characters as people now know they're devs". To say the least. 1) It's been less than a year and a free mothership from what was admittedly a compromised event remains in game. 2) "We've been caught so the specific people caught will have those specific characters removed, but everything else is fine and don't worry we're policing ourselves absolutely correctly. Devs participating at the highest levels of PvP alliances is fine and dandy and obviously no inappropriate advantage is gained therein, no matter how tangentially." This is a whitewash of Nixonian proportions, and an insult to the general player base. I shudder to think how many people I have encouraged to play this great game will chose to not do so when they realize the playing field is anything but level. I'm going to eat a corp fine to post this, and I don't care, because this is simply unacceptable. snip, Please read your email - Ductoris
JForce Minmatar	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:24:00 - [22] CCP have not nor will not discuss GM decisions with third parties - Cortes
Anonymous Coward Gallente Panopticon Citadel	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:29:00 - [23] Edited by: Anonymous Coward on 07/02/2007 05:25:29 Originally by: Iraf Thaiberd To say the least. 1) It's been less than a year and a free mothership from what was admittedly a compromised event remains in game. 2) "We've been caught so the specific people caught will have those specific characters removed, but everything else is fine and don't worry we're policing ourselves absolutely correctly. Devs participating at the highest levels of PvP alliances is fine and dandy and obviously no inappropriate advantage is gained therein, no matter how tangentially." This is a whitewash of Nixonian proportions, and an insult to the general player base. I shudder to think how many people I have encouraged to play this great game will chose to not do so when they realize the playing field is anything but level. I'm going to eat a corp fine to post this, and I don't care, because this is simply unacceptable. I completely agree, this is utterly ridiculous. I was really hoping that CCP would actually try to better their policies, but, I guess that's too hard for them. Quis custodes ipsos custodiet?
XirtamVotf Vengeance of the Fallen CORPVS DELICTI	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:42:00 - [24] Can we have a reply from the you about the T2 BPOs?, the same characters had given those BPOs to BOB , and the same characters have been removed ? Is BOB going to still hold the T2 BPOs? and a dev having that many T2 BPOs that early in the game ? I think we should have at least a full answer on what is happening. Thx Xirt
Ogdru Jahad Amarr Timetravel Enterprises Interstellar Alcohol Conglomerate	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:42:00 - [25] Edited by: Ogdru Jahad on 07/02/2007 05:39:21 Edited for readability reasons. I was told by a trusted member of bob from the BOB alliance has or had 4 x demios bpo's and my understanding they traded one for a zealot bpo. IF the Demios bpos were gained from said devs in bob they should be removed from the game like the chrs you have done to. very least resseded into the r&d agent lottery. god knows how many more bpos they have of the T2 Kind... CCP what you going to do about this?
Sinze	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:44:00 - [26] Edited by: Sinze on 07/02/2007 05:40:22 Originally by: Merciless1 Originally by: JForce CCP have not nor will not discuss GM decisions with third parties - Cortes It's begging to seem like CCP won't discuss anything with anyone. If they refuse to answer us, we can just quit. I won't play a game in which the developers of the game cheat so they can let their "favorite alliance" get to the top. Thanks to Iraf Thaiberd for this sig. I'm sure it will become increasingly popular.
Cringeley Deep Core Mining Inc.	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:45:00 - [27] Kieron, you seem to think that you're the police, or a dictator, and all you have to do is stave off discovery and keep everyone in the dark, and everything will be ok. This is customer relations. You can treat us like customers and get our money, or you can treat us like mushrooms and get a big stanky box of rotten mushrooms to eat while you wait for an unemployment cheque. But you can't keep us in the dark and feed us !@#$ and expect us to pay for the privilege. I have never been a major proponent of this whole dev misconduct outrage. I agree that devs should be allowed to sample the game, both for their benefit and ours. But this answer you have given is just ridiculous. Devs have played with an in-game alliance, and revealed their identity to their allies. They have done so selectively, and they have delivered major financial benefits to their in-game friends. Worst of all, some CCP employees seem to be able to get away with this, while others who have made contact with other alliances have been brought up short for doing so. Now whether or not there was any formal cheating involved, you have a major conflict of interest problem on your hands, and you haven't even taken the first of a thousand steps towards solving it. When you were investigating I assumed that things would come out for the best, but this answer has struck my faith in CCP really, really low. Now I'm just waiting to see if devs take in-game reprisals against those who brought the issue to public attention.
Anonymous Coward Gallente Panopticon Citadel	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:48:00 - [28] I used to be able to feel completely fine about recommending this game to my friends to play. Now... well, I really don't think I will unless MAJOR changes are made.
Par'Gellen Gallente Tres Hombres Psychiatric Hospital Uno Chica Loco	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:50:00 - [29] Edited by: Par''Gellen on 07/02/2007 05:49:05 I'll tell you what. I'll consider this topic over and done with if you (CCP) will put T2 BPO's on the market. I don't even care if they cost 500 billion isk. At least they would be ATTAINABLE BY PEOPLE THAT WORK HARD TO GET THEM! Edit: Or at least make the things needed for invention available on the market.
Bellum Eternus Gallente Death of Virtue MeatSausage EXPRESS	Posted - 2007.02.07 05:56:00 - [30] The most disturbing point about all of this: Most companies like CCP have various security levels with access levels increasing exponentially at the upper levels. I'm sure that 90% or so of CCPs employees have almost no access to the game when compared to a regular 'civilian' player like we are. What this means is that the people responsible for these infractions (which basically amounts to outright cheating if the rumors are to be belived) are very high up in CCP's infrastructure. The people who have enough access to the game to actually achieve an impact on this scale and level are not some newly hired twenty year old geek junior GM or customer support rep or something. Or even a higher level programmer for that matter. Of course I'm just guessing and making extrapolations based on other firms I have experience with, but the number of employees that have the level of access to the game that these stunts would require I'm betting is not the majority of the employees in the company. More like the other way around: a very limited number of senior employees. So getting back to the point: if senior employees think it's ok to behave like this, just how much control does CCP's management have on it's other senior employees, and how will it be possible to screen out future problems once junior employees get promoted and their access increased? Or maybe this type of thing is just ok with CCP's top managment and they simply look the other way and pay us lip service and tell us what we want to hear to make us shut up and go away. Anyone want to make bets as to how long this post's lifespan is?

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