Reclamation of Inactive Housing announced

[Catwho]

Just an FYI that they will send the player emails before they demolish their house. It will not just suddenly be gone one day. You will get a few warnings first.

Won't they also send an in-game notice for the "oops I forgot to go into my house last month" crowd?

SE's track record with not getting mistaken for spam has improved over the years, but most people get flooded with so much junk may that a notice may still get lost in the press.

The two main groups I see affected by it are 1. The inactive players with a house on long break now who aren't even paying attention since they're not playing 2. Current subbed players with a house who had planned on un-subbing in the future. #2 is the only one we're really hearing from because, again, #1 doesn't hang out on forums. But #1 is the one who'll get hit with a nasty surprise if SE's emails get marked as spam.

In the same sense that "2 minute inconvenience" is somehow deemed enough of a commitment to keep one's home by those who are in favor of it. What is YOUR actual point? I was pointing out that it's an arbitrary decision that has no impact on a.) how much a player actually uses the functions of their home, and b.) SE's bottom line, which is 100% guaranteed what they care the most about with this change. It seems like a restriction solely for the sake of placing a restriction.

It's a decision made from a database standpoint. Educated guess: The neighborhood is an "object" with data (as in it in object oriented programming.) Anyone can go onto anyone's lawns, since the object is public to all accounts. Attempts to alter a lawn if you don't have permissions are denied at the time of the request to the server, and those probably aren't logged for more than a few days because it's useless noise data. The inside of the house is a separate object. When a character enters the house, it does a permission check at the zone entrance and grants permission access based on the house settings and assigns privileges at the time of access (rather at the time of request like the lawns.) This leaves a date/time stamp on the interior of the house object, unlike when someone steps onto your lawn and may or may not attempt to modify the settings.

Could they design it better? Absolutely. But it's not an arbitrary decision. It was the decision based on the easiest call to the database - when was the last time someone with privileges associated with the house object stepped inside it?