Pink Poogle Toy Forum

issit? my apologies then.
anyway, right now, it seems many players, including those at neochats seem to think that poor Dana has a malicious intent for starting this "day of action". yes, all of us have managed to live with unfair freezings, glitches, lags, frequent site downtime and thus see no reason to support this campaign at all. however, say if (a rather big if) this Day of Action is going to acieve its objective, i guess all of us would benefit from it.

LoopyLauren, I don't think Dana is a brat at all--and, honestly, you shouldn't be bashing other players. Isn't that a no-no here on PPT? I mean, really, who is really acting like the 8 year old in this case?

I just read her article on Neoextreme. And, there is nothing spoiled nor bratty about it. In fact, it is extremely well written. I applaud her for having the nerve to actually do something. Most of us just come on PPT and complain about the glitches and problems. She, at least, is suggesting that we take action instead of sitting on our duffs.

And, honestly, Dana has taken an idea that has been used effectively for years and years and modified it to fit Neopets. This is, in essence, a strike. And unions strike all of the time--for better pay, for better benefits, for better working conditions. If people hadn't participated in strikes in the U.S. in the early 1900's, little kids would still be working for pay, there would be no 40 hour work weeks, no overtime pay, and very poor working conditions.

Perhaps you weren't around for the 60's but I was--and the peace demonstrations and sit-ins and walk-outs against the Viet Nam War had a major effect on the American public. As did the marches in the 60's for Civil Rights.

Making sponsors aware of problems does work. Just ask Ralph Nader. And so what if it doesn't cause Neopets to shut down. At least, it is taking a stand on what you believe in.

Dana isn't forcing anyone to do any of it--only suggesting that by taking some action, perhaps Neopets will remember that we, the users, are Neopets.

I had no intentions of doing this Day of Action boycott until I read the letter. And now, I am doing so just out of general principle. But, I also hope that every one who does boycott Neopets spends their time writing Neopets to let them know that they are indeed boycotting the site and why they are doing so. And, hey, why not drop a line to McDonald's or your favorite sponsor while you are at it. Otherwise, Neopets will just think you are on vacation.

For those of you who can't find the letter, try neoextreme.com.

And, Loopy Lauren, regarding your "brighter note"--that 1/2 price day will be much easier for restocking because of the boycott--Let's hope you don't lose all of those restocks to a glitch. Because that would be real irony, wouldn't it?

EDIT: And, I had to add, you all seem to be missing Dana's point about the sponsors. It isn't a protest because of number of sponsors' ads on the site. It is a protest because Neopets doesn't have decent customer service when it comes to glitches and wrongful freezings. Targetting the sponsors with letters is a great way to get the attention of Neopets. If the head of McDonald's gets enough angry letters, he might want to take it up with the head of Neopets and then, perhaps, the bigwigs in Neopets will change their customer service policy.

DOUBLE EDIT:


Phibby, obviously you don't play the game very much and you must not regularly visit PPT to hear of the glitches that have hit people. There have been umpteen glitches in the past year. Glitches for freezing people due to cheating at flash games. Glitches involving giving people access to your password and email address. which then allowed them access to whatever accounts they wanted to plunder. Glitches that take away items. The infamous trading post glitch from last November. Glitches that rolled back the history of 1/6th of all accounts. Glitches that take away your shop and sometimes don't return it. Where have you been? And, to correct you, the glitches aren't "taken care of" in a few days or hours. The missing items are never, ever, ever returned. And, in my opinion, the glitch isn't "taken care of" until the lost item or nps is returned. And, ask anyone who has been on PPT if they don't know of at least one person who has been hit by a glitch--I've been hit by many and I know of others who lost even more than me.

You're right that I don't visit PPT very often. *shrug* That might explain my post count. But anyway.

I know about the glitches. I play the site, I visit the message boards, I hear rants about them nearly everywhere I go. I know the flash game glitch for sure - I almost thought I was a victim of it once. That April glitch, sure. I stayed far away from Neo that day. Item glitches I've heard about less. Trading post glitch - check, and I'll agree that that one should have been dealt with much more quickly. Rollback glitch: heard about it vaguely. Shops one I've heard about, along with avatars disappearing and petpets being thirty-four years old.

Most seemed, to me (a person who's either lucky or knows when to take a break on glitch-crazy days, though I'll admit some did affect all users, no matter where they were, as I've never had problems personally with any of them), to be dealt with as quickly as possible. Hours, a few days - I thought most were fixed. As for items and NP not being returned, I know many people who've lost a million, a rare item to glitches. I think that it's horrible they have to lose some of their accomplishments, making some of the time they put into the site wasted, but, to me, when a glitch is dealt with, or taken care of, as I said in the post you quoted, is when nobody can become a victim of it again. That's just how I think of it, I guess. But I'll agree, there are glitches that aren't, even by my idea of it, dealt with and have been around for a good while. Lab ray and the game glitches are what come to mind for me.

I know glitches are pains and are frustrating to deal with, even though I'm not a direct victim of one. But at the moment, what can we do about it? Sure, send in reports and write letters to Neo and sponsers asking what the deal is and that we're dissatisfied with how some aren't dealt with, and that's a fine thing to do. It's just, about this Day of Action, I don't know how many people are actually going to *do* that instead of leaving the site for a day, sending no letters, and going back the next day with, "Well, that was fun. Oooh, restocking!" thoughts on the brain. Sending in mail politely (don't know how much that can be stressed) accounting your bad experiences is fine, and if that was originally the point of the Day of Action, seems many (mainly the people on the chats supporting the boycott, and not for half-price day reasons) have forgotten it.

But that wasn't the point I was originally trying to make. I was saying, "What do glitches have to do with sponsers? How does how long it takes to fix a glitch have anything to do with McDonald's and Disney?" You'd think McDonald's and Disney would help, providing Neo with sponser money they could use to hire new employees to help fix problems or better programs that glitch less. Now, I don't claim to know how Neo spends its money or how much they even get, so maybe I'm way off base there, but blaming glitches on sponsers doesn't make sense to me.

I agree with you about the letter-writing. I do hope that any one who decided to partake in this follows it up with a letter. Otherwise, the staff will think they just went on vacation or went shopping that day instead of playing Neopets.

And regarding the sponsors: if enough users complain to the sponsors about the lack of customer service that Neopets had, perhaps the sponsors can say "Look, fix this problem or we will pull our ads." All I really want is compensation for glitches and advance warning or downtime when the site is being screwed with. The technology exists to be able to track errors made when an item doesn't make it to its destination--it's just a matter of Neopets wanting to invest in that technology. If the head honchos of Neopets won't listen to us, maybe they will listen to the the people that pay their salaries, the sponsors.

And, hey, nothing personal, OK?. You aren't the only one to never experience a glitch. My daughter has never experienced a glitch. My husband was hit with the cheating at flash games glitch that happened about a year ago--but has never gotten hit with anything else. I, on the other hand, have had many, many glitches hit me and have lost over a million in total in the past year. Except for the password and lab map glitches, I have had every other glitch imaginable hit me. I do a lot of moving of items around because I earn my nps by reselling (buying from people's shops and then reselling for a profit), so maybe I experience more lost item glitches because of that. And, ever since the first lost item glitch that hit me a year ago, I keep a close eye on my items and nps. So, maybe others are experiencing glitches but aren't aware of them (for example, they think they had 5 codestones in their SDB but only see four--so they figure, it must just be forgetfulness or their imagination). Or, hey, maybe I am just a magnet to those glitches. Like someone from higher up is saying "Stop playing Neopets and do something more worthwhile with your life" and keeps giving me glitches to deal with until I get it.

And yet, I keep on playing the game (except for tomorrow). It's a great game and hard to walk away from, you know?

Exactly. As a friend on another site pointed out, how does a low number of pageviews for one day let them know people are upset with customer service? Maybe the same number of low pageviews for a couple of months or a year, but one day? They might just get the impression people are off visiting relatives early for the Fourth of July or various other reasons, like you pointed out. Letters are the key to making this Day of Action work. I'll still be playing the site on the third (that is, if I can make it to the computer), though I don't disagree with the idea of taking a break from playing to inform Neo of your opinions.



I see that, and I agree that Neo could certainly cover glitches or inform users about them in a better way than, say, have Adam post on the Battledome chat and nowhere else, but blaming sponsers on glitches is what got me confused. Sponsers don't create the glitches, as there have always been glitches and also unfair freezings even when there weren't many big contracts with insanely huge companies. Informing sponsers is fine (if done politely), but putting the blame on them just for a place to put it is absurd.



Sorry to hear about the many problems you've had (and sorry about your husband's game glitch troubles), and it's great to see that they don't get you down enough to quit. Even though I haven't been hit with as many glitches as you have, I do keep an eye on my items just because I've heard about all these problems. You'd think I was paranoid with how I deal with my password sometimes (that's half because I have had problems with lost passwords in the past, though I'll admit it was all my fault and got great help very quickly). Hopefully your daughter's good luck with avoiding glitches stays with her, and maybe some with rub off onto you.

It's definitely hard to walk away from, no question there! I spend most of my days on the chats and working on my gallery now, but even just those two things keep me on for hours a day. (I always take a break with a good book or computer game, though. Long stretches of playing make my head spin.)

No, I don't blame the sponsors for anything. My point, and I believe the point of the person who originally wrote the article regarding the Day of Article, is that one way to get to Neopets to clean up their act is to go to the sponsors to complain about the way Neopets conducts its customer service. The sponsors pay to advertise on the site and may not want to pay for advertising if they feel that the people who visit the site are dissatisfied. And, of course, doing so politely and with respect. As the old saying goes: You can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.

I do think, however, that the McDonald's promotion created a lot of new Neopets users, which in turned, caused the computer system to glitch. But, that isn't MdDonald's fault--Neopets should have anticipated a certain number of new players due to the promotion and should had had sufficient computer space reserved for these new players.




Thanks for the concern about my husband. He got his account back--but only after writing a letter about it. And, even then, he was lucky. I know of others who suffered from the same glitch who never did get their accounts back.

And, as my friend Tonu can attest to, I have gotten so upset that I have quit--twice. The last big one was about 2 weeks ago when I had 3 different glitches hit me in about 24 hours--disappearing gallery, 99999 lost when I tried to buy a better than you plushie, and my secondary account set back two days (which mean I lost all profit I had made in those two days). Like I said, I am a magnet. Others had it worse than me. It just felt hopeless.

But, I did come back--today, in fact. It is hard to stay away when your fellow family members play and when it is a good enough game to play despite the glitches. And, as my daughter says, the good deals I find by being a reseller even out the glitches I experience.

But, it would be nice if I didn't have to worry about them at all.

Well, today is the Day of Action. Anyone here going for it? I am.

I definitely am. Let the letter writing begin!

I know you don't blame them, but the post of mine you originally quoted was a reply to a post where that seemed to be the poster's problem with sponsers.



I can see why you felt that way! Three in one day, and none of them being dinky little problems either. Glad you're back in the game, even after all that.