Xie

It may not seem like it but it's Vindictus related, it's a story of a girl and her demon. I'll be back later if I could grab a screenshot.

Memories

I remember the day
It was the same time of year.
That I met him here

As I ran, he held out his hand,
"I can offer protection
from those who scarred you"

Hesitantly ... I took his hand,
“Just ... for a little while … then I must go ... "
The demon gently smiled.

It was a long journey,
Before long, days become years
Time became a haze,

During that time, we grew
Just as the moon phases
Our skills waxed and waned

I hope that even when time ends
and the world grows cold
In Erinn, our journey continues

... my Demon

West IGN: Jaexin

A continuation of my previous post.

Fansite Supporter's perspective:
It's not just about Sanitee, it's also about the deep-seated dislike that Nexon has for Fansites that goes way back. There were some speculations that the cause of Sanitee's ban was based from Nexon's resistance to Fansites. Whether or not the dislike of Fansites was related to Sanitee's ban, I'm not sure, only Nexon can answer that.

As much as they want Sanitee unbanned, the people from this group also wants Nexon to allow the creation of resource Fansites that helps other players and give accurate, up-to-date sources for the community to use. This is why the mention of Fansites was brought up; it was thought that Sanitee's Fansite was the reason that got her banned. The overall information of the game is severely lacking and nearly all of the databases for this game are either currently out of date or shutdown. Now, the two most accurate and up-to-date databases being kept by players are gone unless if Nexon finally gives the community the permission to create the long needed resourceful Fansites that had been denied for so many years.

Neutral's Perspective:
There is also another perspective to this matter. Most of the people in this group doesn't know Sanitee or never heard of her until now. In my opinion, I think they have the most unbiased opinions, but at the same time, most of the information in their comments are inaccurate due to inaccurate knowledge about Sanitee, "the history of Nexon NA and the old community," and unawareness of Nexon's dislike for Fansites.

Some people think that the sites should be passed on. My response to that are in the paragraphs below.

(Optional) My opinion for the Fansites closing:
I think the site owners' decisions to shut down of the fansites was reasonable. I am also saddened by the loss of two great fansites but the site owners are not obligated to keep the databases up nor is community entitled to have the site owners keep their databases up for the community. To find information, maintain, and update their databases is something that they've chosen to do as their hobby, it is not their job. If you were suddenly severely punished for doing your hobby, would you want to continue doing your hobby?

There was also an argument of having the site owners pass on their databases to another person. But then the question is, will that next person have the programming skills to update and maintain a database? ... But also willing to risk getting banned if Nexon is still against having Fansites and/or datamining? Not to mention the site owners also have to pay real money to keep the sites up and running. Keeping a domain up is not free and it can be expensive, so I don't disagree with their decisions to close down if they're possibly being punished for doing what was right for the community.

I know that they know what the consequences will be for doing this but I don't think this is the right way to end things. Please at least let Sanitee know what she had done, please don't just say "once one is unbanned, one cannot be unbanned again," because she truly doesn't know what she did. If you say that I'm being played then I strongly disagree because I talked and played with her ever since I was a new player, three years ago. I will stand by what I said in my free will.

Conclusion:
As for my perspective on this, this is getting a little out of hand, I know it's impossible to make it so that everyone is happy so I just want this to end with everyone content. There are three important questions that needs to be answered to resolve these issues and clear up any gray areas to prevent future disputes, all of it can be answered by Nexon.
1. What's Nexon's position datamining? Is it allowed or no?
2. What's the current Nexon's stand on Fansites? Are they allowed or not? If not, what's the reason?
3. What program was flagged that lead to Sanitee's ban? Only Sanitee needs to know.

I hope this post brings some light to things. If I am wrong on some things, please let me know either here or in private so I can correct.

tldr:
Nexon is just following the rules. Nexon does not like Fansites. Some of the old community knows this and suspects Sanitee's ban is because of Nexon's dislike for Fansites. Does Nexon not allow us to make resourceful Fansites and/or datamine? Please let Sanitee know the program that accidently got her banned. There is a thought that's flying around, "If it is not a program that caused her ban, then it must be Nexon's dislike toward Fansites that got her banned."

inb4 No one reads any of it cause it's too long...

** Sorry, this is a long post so I've split it into two chunks so it's easier to read. The tldr and conclusion is in the second post below.
** It's pretty much a summarization of all the discussions related to this that I've seen so far and trying to tie all the pieces together.

I've been keeping watch over all of the discussions ever since this issue started. Both in forums, outside of forums, and in-game. There were some disccussion outside of forums that others weren't present for or had missed that had lead to some confusion and spawning many different perspectives on the situation. So far, I think there are four main perspectives on this situation coming from many different directions. I will try and summarize the perspectives from all sides the best I can though it may not be completely correct, but I hope it comes close.

Nexon's Perspective:
For Nexon, they're just following the guidelines or the rules. They don't give anybody special favors nor do they know who the distinguished players of the community nor what they do. So, they're not really sure why the community is acting this way.

(History) Some background on Nexon's view on Fansites in the Pasts:
I've been around for three, nearly four years now, so I've read, participated, and watched many discussions come and go on forums over the years. One of the discussions that I've seen many times over the past few years is Nexon's dislike for Fansites. They can't control what happens in Fansites if something goes wrong. But with the new Nexon employees and ... possibly some new management? I'm not sure if the current Nexon is still against Fansites.

** Two questions that I think needs to be cleared up from Nexon are "Is Nexon still against Fansites?" and "What is Nexon's position on datamining?" I think these two questions are important so that the community knows the boundaries.

Some things about datamining:
When someone's datamining, they're just reading then closing the data. There are no manipulations nor tampering. If there were tampering, then you would have a hacker or modder on your hands, not a dataminer. A dataminer just reads then closes. Whether it is to accurately get a list of titles without having to spend thousands of hours trying to get a title only for its descriptions, or just gather information on an object and what its purpose.

If you really want to put a dataminer out of a job then there needs to be a reliable and up-to-date database, which is something that this playerbase wanted and needed years ago and also the main reason why players datamine. Helpful players only do it to build a reliable database of information; a dictionary for other players to use in-game.

As for the other perspectives on this issue...

Sanitee's Supporters' perspective:
I think this group is mostly composed of West and a little bit of East. The players in this group knows Sanitee on many levels. They've all hung out, talked, and played with Sanitee and just want to support her. She has a large group of friends, a lot more than you guys think, nearly all of the old veterans know her. She never asked anyone for help. Yes, she posted a notification on her site about her status but it was to raise awareness that she is gone and can no longer update the website so that people don't go around asking, "where did Sanitee go?" Though I cannot speak for her myself, I just want to emphasize that Sanitee did not ask for any of this.

A lot of the community just want to voluntarily help her in return for all of the help that she's given them for the past six years. They just hope that Sanitee gets unbanned one day, but if not, then they hope that she finally recieves the answers to the question that's been on everyones' minds; "was the ban just or unjust? And what program had triggered BlackCipher?"

MistyBerry wrote: »

As you can sense from the posts, players tend to lean towards a lack of faith for the measures Nexon NA undertakes for Vindictus.

So, the straightforward way to help bring this issue to light for some is to provide evidence for how Sanitee got banned. I'm sure the good people behind BlackCipher have implemented some sort of logging system for the staff to read in case any offense is made. Otherwise, it would be harder to debug the entire program in what it does and be accurate in its duties.

As the other argument stands, Sanitee was not using any sort of tools that could instigate BlackCipher's wrath when she got autobanned.

All you have to do is provide irrefutable evidence to that. You can satisfy the playerbase, find out what the incriminating process was so we can avoid using it, and close the issue in one fell swoop with just one action. You can make Vindictus better by cooperating with us. Please show us the logs.

I've been thinking through about this situation for a while, of all of the solutions that would satisfy Nexon, Sanitee, and the close-knit community. In the end, it all came down to one solution and I agree with Misty here.

To be honest, I think this is an issue between Nexon and Sanitee. The problem escalated because she's a vital member to our small close-knit community and the result of the ban had indirectly impacted the community too, in the generous six years of selfless work that she provides for the community. Previously, SasoriTetsu was banned but the reaction from the community was completely different. Sasori knew the full details and result of his ban so he accepted the result and so did the commiunity.

What was different this time was Nexon never told Sanitee the full details of the ban. Yes, she could no longer be unbanned because of the policy. But what was the program that triggered it? I think if Nexon would just let Sanitee know what program was flagged by Black Cipher then all of this would be over. Was the program actually suspicious? If it is, then the ban is justified. But if the program was not suspicious, then the ban was unjustified and the appropriate action should be taken. I don't think the community needs to know what program it was, only Sanitee. Once everything is justified, all of the reactions and drama from the community (that's related to this) will come to an end.