View Full Version : Why do popular sites prune inactive donators?
CaptainCanaduh
06-17-2009, 07:17 PM
I was a member (among others) to Blackcats Games and PiSexy, both to which I've thrown well over $100 each in donations over the years, just to have my accounts pruned from their servers for inactivity while I was moving and didn't have internet. I also had positive rations at both with over 500GB uploaded.
Other sites, like Oink (when it was alive), Waffles, What, etc. that I have also donated plenty to, have kept my account.
Why are the people that support these sites and literally pay the bills getting this kind of treatment?
I frequent my torrent sites on a regular basis, but while I was moving, did not have internet, etc., I had no real choice, and I was not about to go to the local library to try to get through their firewalls to a bittorrent site to keep my account from being pruned.
I think all sites who accept donations should have more respect for those that donate...
1000possibleclaws
06-17-2009, 07:21 PM
I think giving donators immunity to pruning would be a step forward to sites, even if it's temporary for however long donator status lasts. It's not giving donators an edge ratio-wise but you guys do keep the site alive and having a sense of permanence to your account would seem completely fair.
The tracker I've donated the most to does this, but I visit it multiple times a day so it's not really something I need.
realityhd
06-17-2009, 07:43 PM
Try to speak with staff on irc, it worked for me once based on my long history as a good member + many donations.
You were obviously not a donator when the system pruned your account.
Donations only last for a month, doesnt matter how much you donate, so if you donated 3 months previously, then your not a donator anymore, so if you didnt sign in for 2 months (which you must not have done) then the system will prune you auto.
Villalltheway
06-18-2009, 06:03 PM
Have to say i sympathis with ur case, i dont think donars should ever have their accounts pruned for inactivity unless they have been away for a crzy amount of time like a year or so. Without donare these sites would not be about at all.
But why should someone that donated 25p (yes people have donated that and less to BCG) get immunity from pruning for 1 year or eternity.
Yes the donation helped pay for the server whenever it was they donated, but if that was 6 months ago, its no good now is it, sorry to be blunt, but come on.
Villalltheway
06-18-2009, 06:12 PM
Well its about showing appreciation anyone can seed, but it takes something else to give away ur cash. I bet the majority of people who are on trackers never donate.
That's mean stoi :yes: .Pruning shouldn't be encouraged at all and especially for people who aid in footing server bills.
In many trackers and am sure BCG isn't exempt in this,there are certain usernames that just can't be touched,some of these people haven't used their accounts for years but their accounts still stand(and dare i say some of them even run exempt from the ratio system :P)so if trackers can go to such lengths for friends then i don't see why the same can't be done for friends with benefits.
Only VIPs who are hand picked by the staff, and staff are immune to pruning on BCG.
No one is immune to ratio (VIPS and above are, but if we see them taking the piss, i will demote them personally)
even our best uploader, bambacha is not immune to ratio or hit and runs, when he was uploader he had 100 hit and runs, I Pmed him politely saying it was not on, and he should clear them, if he did not i would demote him myself, which would mean he would have gone into KL. well he cleared them.
I dont even have a freeleech account, the bonuses I get are the same as a normal user, apart from I cant go into KL, but I still follow the rules as a normal user should. I dont even get donation benefits.
My philosophy is, if I expect you to do it, then I should bloody do it as well.
kukushka
06-18-2009, 08:56 PM
anyway i believe the rules of the game are well known, so can't see no point of whining about things that were predictable.. and yes, account parking and warning staff before going offline also could helped...
Cabalo
06-18-2009, 11:31 PM
Apart a few honourable exceptions, sites don't give a shit if you donated or not. They want your money and they want you to STFU about it. You get a few perks, but the most important one, the one that is about honour, they don't give you. and the pruning rule is one of the complains i could have.
because if you donated to help keep the site alive, the site should look back at you and help you keep your account alive. It's the least, the very least they should do.
Furthermore, they are not even being intelligent when disabling a donor. It's one less chance they have of seeing him donating again, after he already shown in the past he is willing to help the cause.
sites (most of them) have no loyalty to their users (some call them members, and those are where share and care walk side by side).
Do not agree at all.
We prune everyone, but if they know they are going to be away for 2 months or more, we have a staff message box, IRC channel etc, where they can come in and tell us, we may just promote them to VIP to avoid the pruning of their account, but if they dont tell us, how the fuck are we supposed to know.
and sorry i dont see why we should code extra shit into a tracker to keep someone that donated 25p 3 years ago on the site.
1000possibleclaws
06-19-2009, 01:12 AM
If the donation doesn't seem sincere I wouldn't even give them donation status. 25p is pretty much a slap in your face. If someone is so tight on money they can't even donate $10, then they are in no position to be donating to a tracker in the first place.
Cabalo
06-19-2009, 01:30 AM
Do not agree at all.
We prune everyone, but if they know they are going to be away for 2 months or more, we have a staff message box, IRC channel etc, where they can come in and tell us, we may just promote them to VIP to avoid the pruning of their account, but if they dont tell us, how the fuck are we supposed to know.
and sorry i dont see why we should code extra shit into a tracker to keep someone that donated 25p 3 years ago on the site.
you're taking it to the 25p extreme. i'm talking about a "regular" donation, that the site asks for.
besides, usually when people lose internet access for some kind of reason, many times it's unexpected. so, going to a staff box and warning you is not the first thing they'll probably think of.
but if they are regular donators, surely they would login if they donated.
btw i have just put the pruning up on BCG to 4 months unparked and 6 months parked.
wont help the op much, but then we do have 122,000 referrals in the system atm, so he has every chance of getting back in.
Cabalo
06-19-2009, 03:00 AM
you see, deep down. you're one of the good guys. ;)
all this donation talk has gotten me irritated, because once i was disabled from a tracker that i donated to, and was an excellent standing member during over 2 years, just because the owner saw i'm a member here. go figure.
so, it's a lack of respect for the members and in my opinion what most trackers really care is to elevate their donors %. sad, but true.
not saying that it's what happens to your tracker, as you've said before you paid for it for years over years.
what i'm saying is that no matter how good of a member you are, and do everything by the book, if one day one staffer wakes up in a wrong mood, and goes disabling you for shit's sake, you go and think that it was a waste of time invest money and time in a tracker, as nothing of that will be taken into accounting.
but once again, you're still one of those old school guys, with a positive philosophy toward membership. you have all my respect for that.
Submission
06-19-2009, 08:50 AM
from a business perspective its really stupid.
in other words... dont donate.
cinephilia
06-19-2009, 09:12 AM
stoi, don't be so matter-of-fact; obviously, the guy has donated over 100$ to BCG and whatever you may say, that's a valid reason to take his request into consideration..
1000possibleclaws
06-19-2009, 09:55 AM
Well you don't know if the guy is grossly exaggerating because he feels cheated, I mean he is not reputable on this forum. He should have parked his account or informed staff. Sure you may lose your home internet without notice, but connection is so widely available you'd have a chance to park at some point anyways, and in his case he was only moving. Not sure the old limit on parked account but surely it's not less than the time it takes to move.
I don't see stoi in the wrong, and don't see this as his responsibility. The OP was careless and should have taken precautions, but hopefully if and when he finds a referral he will be more careful with the account. The new pruning code is more than generous and won't leave an excuse for this happening again.
The_Martinator
06-19-2009, 10:11 AM
Most sites do prune donators. But there are some that don't. iTS is an example.
Want a better one? When you reach PU at UG or BG you can never get pruned.
Sure, some sites are about the money, but like someone mentioned, these rules are known. C'mon, you're able to log in once every 2 months if you leave in a ''normal'' country, right?
If you can't then you either have too many accounts at trackers and can't manage them all, or internet access is a real priviledge in your country.
Yoann64
06-19-2009, 10:14 AM
Apart a few honourable exceptions, sites don't give a shit if you donated or not.
honourable ? There were some sites which let traders because they donated (against their own rules ), wasn't it? :whistling
Money can't (shouldn't) buy everything ...and for example, i don't think that pay to get some invites (or get some GB of UP) is good.
Inactive ?
As kukushka said :
account parking and warning staff before going offline also could helped...
My philosophy is, if I expect you to do it, then I should bloody do it as well.
Your philosophy is better than:
"Do what i say ...but don't do what i do "
apextwin146
06-19-2009, 10:51 AM
One more point i wanna bring to your attention is that not everytime u can predict the duration that you are gonna be away for .. FFS if i am shifting into a new house do u think i would come to the IRC and explain the situation to you and then send you a message on the forum just so that i can keep my account .. All these community bullshit trackers are just for namesake or wat? If u trully have a mature community do u think that that they wont understand that you have a life outside internet too? Cmon man throw that high handedness away .. If i am not active then is 1KB taking too much space on your servers disk or wat?
Markociv1
06-19-2009, 10:57 AM
It's amazing. Somebody complains on here about something that was his fault and stoi already changes something on his site.
apextwin146
06-19-2009, 11:17 AM
^ More spastics joining the parade
Well i have been thnking of changing that for awhile, for the simple reason that we get 500 new members in a month, but we loose 1200, so the membership always goes down.
it was just coincedence/the push that i needed to do it from this thread.
as for the 1kb of space, thats not really the point, we have had 350,000 members through the doors since dec 2006, so it is best to get rid of those that do not use there account, tbh whats the point of keeping them.
apextwin146
06-19-2009, 01:14 PM
i meant just about donators not the entire 350k army that u have built :P
cinephilia
06-19-2009, 01:16 PM
I don't see stoi in the wrong, and don't see this as his responsibility. The OP was careless and should have taken precautions, but hopefully if and when he finds a referral he will be more careful with the account. The new pruning code is more than generous and won't leave an excuse for this happening again.
i didn't say it wasn't OP's responsability, i'm just saying that this kind of mistake can happen to anyone. maybe he was busy with something important or maybe he simply forgot about his account, no matter what was the reason of the account loss, no one is infaillible and we're talking about something virtual that it is absolutely normal to forget about when you have an active life-style...
on the other hand, stoi is able to reenable his account just by snapping his fingers and that's what he should do, knowing that the guy has donated a certain amount of money to his site (which means he's very attached to BCG) but he obviously won't do that, preferring to act like a rigorist without an ounce of humanity...
hmm actually i cant re-enable his account, its gone into the wilderness.
so i am not acting like a rigorist (stoi goes to check dictionary.com lol)
Markociv1
06-19-2009, 01:36 PM
^ More spastics joining the parade
Thank you for your marvelously contributing comment
apextwin146
06-19-2009, 01:39 PM
^ More spastics joining the parade
Thank you for your marvelously contributing comment
And thank you for presenting us with this opportunity .. bty i really cudnt tell if u were being sarcastic there .. But i guess thats inherent in your spastic nature isnt it ?
You guys expect that you can remain inactive forever just because you donated $5? Oh man...
Markociv1
06-19-2009, 01:49 PM
Thank you for your marvelously contributing comment
And thank you for presenting us with this opportunity .. bty i really cudnt tell if u were being sarcastic there .. But i guess thats inherent in your spastic nature isnt it ?
Well, I can see why somebody like Cirno dislikes this site so much. I haven't met many users on here, but if the majority is like you then I come to understand his reasons for it.
BTW did you see me twitching? Or how is that "spastic" explained?
pro267
06-19-2009, 11:48 PM
The answer to the original question is rather simple: on most sites, pruning is done automatically by a script, without the intervention of staff. It's nothing personal, there is simply no code in place on most sites to distinguish between donors and other members when it comes to pruning inactive accounts.
There is, of course, the principal question of whether a donor should be getting a preferential treatment on a tracker or not, but that is a totally different question.
wwwpsp
06-20-2009, 01:47 AM
why is bcg so hard to get in? do they ever open regs anymore?
no never
but we do have 122,000 referrals in the db just ready to use, problem is, only 500 of those get used a month.
members are very picky who they get in.
wwwpsp
06-20-2009, 02:22 AM
no never
but we do have 122,000 referrals in the db just ready to use, problem is, only 500 of those get used a month.
members are very picky who they get in.
tell me about it, i spent hours trying to get one in irc with no luck:ermm:
andy316
06-20-2009, 03:12 AM
getting bcg is quite easy...i got 4 chances to join,but refused all of them...heard that speeds suck most of the times
Cabalo
06-20-2009, 03:15 AM
getting bcg is quite easy...i got 4 chances to join,but refused all of them...heard that speeds suck most of the times
*sigh*
man, it's all about the contents, the speed is quite relative, though on the fresh releases it is quite enough to max out my poor connection.
wwwpsp
06-20-2009, 03:21 AM
not the first time you were warned about this... have some sense man.
-T
1000possibleclaws
06-20-2009, 03:27 AM
getting bcg is quite easy...i got 4 chances to join,but refused all of them...heard that speeds suck most of the times
*sigh*
man, it's all about the contents, the speed is quite relative, though on the fresh releases it is quite enough to max out my poor connection.
Well if all he cares about is speed for new releases then there's no point wasting an account on him cause he won't appreciate it. Love the site, it has practically every pc game I'd ever think of playing archived, and that's most important to me. The speeds on older torrents are generally still faster than on 0day sites IF the torrent has even been kept alive on them. It's got everything in one place and you can count on the releases too work and if something's weird with the torrent the comments are generally more helpful than your typical warez sites 'thank yous'.
getting bcg is quite easy...i got 4 chances to join,but refused all of them...heard that speeds suck most of the times
lol so if someone told you to jump off beachy head (a famous suicide spot) because it was a liberated feeling, you would.
never listen to what others say, i bet you dont for movies or games, so why for this, try it yourself, i think you will be surprised, i max my 20 meg connection, most of the time, and thats even on 2 year old torrents.
IdolEyes787
06-20-2009, 01:32 PM
The only thing that I could change about disabling accounts is some consideration given to long term members.
If someone has stayed on a site for say a couple - three years as a contributing member ( talking activity here ,not donating) I think the they should be rewarded with some leniency.Maybe after staff contacting them and determining if they still wish to be involved they could be awarded the equivalency of tenure.
Just a thought probably bs as usual.
CaptainCanaduh
08-04-2009, 08:06 PM
But why should someone that donated 25p (yes people have donated that and less to BCG) get immunity from pruning for 1 year or eternity.
Yes the donation helped pay for the server whenever it was they donated, but if that was 6 months ago, its no good now is it, sorry to be blunt, but come on.
I hear you on that, but if that was the case, and no one donated 6 months ago, the site wouldn't be here now would it...
Not that I want to start a flame war or anything, but I mean hear me out.
I had a flood in my apartment due to the idiot above me turning off his rad and the pipes bursting. I lost all my electronics period. Insurance wasn't at replacement value so I got peanuts back in comparison. I then went on to lose my grandma due to nursing error, and shortly after my job and apartment. This was all while I was away from my home town trying to attend college.
I had no access to a computer or the internet to log in and "park" my account, and frankly with all the other crap, it was the last thing on my mind.
The fact of the matter is, I was an active, donating member. Due to things beyond my control, I was unable to upload / sign in / whatever for a little while, and upon returning, all my accounts were pruned.
I can't speak for BlackCats, as so much has changed, I'm not sure how I'd go getting ahold of them on IRC or anything, and I doubt Stoi wants to assist at this point (I don't blame you), but I did try for PiSexy, and they either didn't care or raised the bs flag on me.
Powered by vBulletin® Version 4.2.3 Copyright © 2024 vBulletin Solutions, Inc. All rights reserved.