I got very interesting pop-up while playing Mafia Wars today. The Zynga Terms of Service has been updated. If you clicked "Accept" before you actually read the TOS page, have no fear, as I saved the
link for you.
What I found interesting is they don' say anything about javascript and weather it is a TOS violation. It seems they are focusing on buying and selling virtual goods and accounts. They also stress that you shouldn't be making false claims to Customer Support in an attempt to be compensated. I reviewed the new TOS and found that it states "you can not use cheats, exploits, automation software, bots, hacks, mods or any unauthorized third-party software designed to modify or interfere with the Service, any Zynga game or any Zynga game experience". As far as I understand it, bookmarklets don't seem to violate this clause. Hopefully th experts will comment and give us some insight into the very gray area of bookmarklet use and Terms of Service.
Um...your understanding is flawed. The use of any of the bookmarklets are designed to interfere with and modify the service. Just because they don't go after the bookmarklets doesn't mean they aren't violating the terms.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteLOL, keep dreaming
ReplyDeletethe fact that they don't particularly mention the word 'bookmarklets' doesn't mean it's ok.
it's still a cheat,
& it's still third party 'software' designed to to modify or interfere with the Service....
not to worry though, nothing much wont happen because they depend on people who spend money & those just happen to be the people who use bmlets :p
I hope they don't start cracking down on bookmarklets, but there should be a review of people who are getting banned so we know whats safe to do / safe to use and hopefully prevent our accounts from getting banned.
ReplyDeletebookmarklets don't modify or interfere with the service they just automate it and they aren't a cheat as well...still they are automated software at least they got that right...but as to terms, usage of them is definitely violating the terms, but let's face it, Zynga doesn't want people to use them only because they want people to spend as much time as possible with MW (for obvious reason of having as much time as possible to consider buying RP) and bookmarklets cut down the time we spend with MW as a priority and not a background service...
ReplyDeletec. You shall not have more than one Account, per platform or SNS, at any given time, and shall not create an account using a false identity or information, or on behalf of someone other than yourself;
ReplyDeleteg. You shall not use your Account to advertise, or solicit, or transmit any commercial advertisements, including chain letters, junk e-mail or repetitive messages (spim and spam) to anyone;
i. You shall not rent, lease, sell, trade, gift, bequeath or otherwise transfer your Account or any virtual items or virtual currency associated with your Account to anyone without Zynga’s written permission;
@ jelmer you are 100 percent wrong. Bokmarklets dont modify anything. I have the stamina to use bookmarklets arnt modifing it. Yes they may be againist the tos. If they started banning for them they know they would plugment from no one playing as its their top people using them.
ReplyDeleteDepending on what the bookmarklet does, it can fall into any one of several of the categories listed: automation software, bots, hacks or mods. They typically don't modify or interfere with the service or the Zynga game, as that suggests that it's changing the way Zynga's servers are processing the game commands, but they do modify the game experience.
ReplyDeleteBy not having to manually click for every fight, job, or whatever, that does change the game experience and does violate their TOS according to the way it's written.
Does it mean that they will start disabling accounts that are determined to be using bookmarklets? Maybe, maybe not. But, if they do, they're well within their right to do so.
I admit, I was trying to read them so they would fit my style of play. What do I know about computers? I just found out 5 minutes ago that javascript is software. I thought it was if you had to download it. But is is a good sign that it wasn't included in the reminders on our pop up, right?
ReplyDeletei don't mind if zynga start to banned user who use bookmarklet or hv another account (energy account). i played long enough (since 2007 - 2008). i still played the game till now (addicted). but someday if zynga banned me, farewell mafia wars, i definitely not gonna force myself to create a new account n play it again.
ReplyDeleteTotally agree! I will use bookmarklets and if Zynga ban me I don´t mind, I´ll just find another online game...
ReplyDeleteAnyway automation is not cheat, and I don´t care what TOS says, that´s why computers were invented, to simplying your daily tasks...
Well said Anonymous!
ReplyDeleteTOS covers pretty much all gray areas. Zynga can, at any time, refer to TOS if trying to snuff bnlets...they are not doing this, I believe...I have personally been working with a couple people at zynga...the main concern is tracking down people who are using exploits to beef up skill points on characters...in nutshell new accounts are created and loaded with skill points than sold...they are also wanting to cut back on the selling of loots (that I do not care about)...some area reading the TOS and saying they are trying to hunt down traders...that is NOT correct...they have worked hard to make trading easier and realize it has its place//Patterson, you might want to watch any linked updates since you have outside advertisers...but I doubt you have anything to worry about...Thanks, Patterson!
ReplyDeleteInterestingly, Zynga has given themselves the option to ignore the use of third-party tools (possibly including bookmarklets). Section 1.9.r states that Zynga "may, at its sole and absolute discretion, allow the use of certain third party user interfaces." Although, what constitutes an acceptable "user interface" is left an open question.
ReplyDeleteAutomation is cheating. Plain and simple.
ReplyDelete"Automation is cheating. Plain and simple."
ReplyDelete... talking out of context, if that should be the case, ... then all giant factories all over the world that use softwares for production automation is a form of CHEATING?
Compare "Production Factories" to JavaScript automated procedures is ... dumb.
ReplyDeleteOk, but I can actually compare it.
Playing MafiaWars is intended to be HAND-MANUFACTURED, so hand-played! You have to do everything with you hands, every click and every action. If there should be aome automated procedure, our "Production Factory" named Zynga hast given us some machines to produce more products.
There are companies which advertise with that to satisfy their customers with a hand-made top quality product, mostly watches and every kind of art. If you are level 3000 in MW and never used any automation/bookmarklet, you can compare it to that companies, your MW account is fully hand-made and a high level top quality product.
And now lets get to company which produces 10000 more products of the same style as the hand-manufacture company with not even 5% of the working power(employees). The quality may be good, but no one can say, that every watch(f.e.) is checked to make sure that the quality is ok, so this check is mostly dropped, while the hand-manufactured watch is checked all the time.
So good watch costs 300$, bad watch 10$.
You may see the difference and what I'm up to. If we were allowed to sell our MW accounts legally, I would set up 50 accounts, let them get good stats fully automated and claim that all accounts are hand-made and sell them for 300$. I had almost no working hours for maximum profit.
So don't you think that this some kind of cheating?
Any now you can guess, why they are fighting product piracy and why most of the hand-manufacture companies are seen by most people to have a top level quality.
1. Zynga changed the game to encourage fighting.
ReplyDelete2. Players loaded up on stamina.
3. Once people got to thousands of stamina points they start using brawler or similar.
4. Take away brawler and at some point they will quit playing the game because leveling will become so tedious as to not be worth it.
5. To solve, restore some balance to the game, A)give better weapons to those who develop energy and do jobs. They got screwed when Zynga changed the focus to fighting.
B)eliminate old city help and instead raise reward XP ratio and the stats on the loot in the upper levels of those cities. You won't have to practically beg people to do the jobs then and players will have to develop more energy. Since jobs consume as much as 300 energy a pop, there will be fewer clicks
Just my two cents worth