SE: Please copyright takedown FFLogs.

[The_Last_Dragoon]

So I wondered what the big deal was and went to FFlogs for the first time and looked up my username. It does seem to be true that they take very basic information from Lodestone and make a profile for each character, but what seems to be neglected in the conversation is that FFlogs will hide your info by request to make it unavailable to the public. So even on the rather ridiculous claim that your damage output numbers are "personal information that can be used to identify you as an individual," you can still hide said data. I would also recommend looking over the FFlogs privacy policy since it goes over a lot of what you guys are talking about.

FFlogs Hiding characters

FFlogs Privacy Policy

We can all agree at the very least that a copyright takedown would not only be unsuccessful, but would only garner bad publicity for the game and it's developers. The thumbnails in question are so small and as someone stated on the first page, could easily be replaced by something else. It would literally only end with SE losing long term fans and players.

EDIT: Also, can we maybe stay on topic? I don't see how EU laws on data processing have anything to do with the OP calling for a copyright strike to take down FFlogs.

[ForteNightshade]

I'm 100% sure Yoshi P is aware of this website since a long time

He is. They've watched Twitch streamers who have parsers displayed on their screens. Yoshida has also outright stated he understands people like to track data and provided they don't talk about it in-game, they don't really care.

[HyoMinPark]

But that is like exactly the problem.
"Data protection and online privacy" laws apply "whenever information directly or indirectly identifying you as an individual is stored or processed".

Then why are you not applying this argument to what the game itself is doing? The game is the entity that collects and publicizes this data without any help from FFLogs—it does it all on its own to every person who plays it. You can’t just selectively apply your argument to FFLogs without also applying it to the game itself. The game is the source of all of the information of that website. Which is still not personally sensitive information. None of it gives anyone any clarification on who you are as a person. The only things it tells us are information directly related to your virtual avatar—which you do not own.

And like I've explained a few times, (indirectly) identifying someone doesn't necessarily mean having any other personal information about them.
Being able to say "that is one person and that is another" is enough.

This is a flimsy definition of “identifying someone”. I highly doubt that’s the intention of the law you keep quoting.

This game a third party software?

This argument isn’t even about third-party software anymore. If you read who I responded to, they are talking about processes that collect data. There is no clarification of “third-party” in their statements—just process that collect data, and then the entire argument about “personally identifying information”.

The game collects all this data with no help from any third party. It even saves it locally for those of us who play on PC. It is also data that no one but Square Enix owns, so we cannot claim any sort of “personal breach of security” with regards to it, making this entire argument silly. There is no privacy being breached here unless SE deems it so. And, as I have said many times, considering this website has been around for 4+ years now...

[LiteBrite]

Then why are you not applying this argument to what the game itself is doing? The game is the entity that collects and publicizes this data without any help from FFLogs—it does it all on its own to every person who plays it. You can’t just selectively apply your argument to FFLogs without also applying it to the game itself. The game is the source of all of the information of that website. Which is still not personally sensitive information.

This game a third party software?

[aiqa]

"personal information that can be used to identify you as an individual,"

That is a nice try, but these sort of things all hang on the details.
It's not "personal information that identifies individuals", that would get you into the discussion again about what is personal, etc.
It is any information that can be used to indirectly identify you as an individual, in other words stuff that differentiates you from everyone else.
Character names do that perfectly fine, character A is that person character B another person.
This looks like a very simple concept to me, but it seems many people have difficulties to grasp what it means.

I would also recommend looking over the FFlogs privacy policy since it goes over a lot of what you guys are talking about.

For any data that is covered by EU data protection and privacy law, you (the entity storing or processing it) have to get explicit approval.
Opt-out is not good enough, it has to be opt-in.

[LiteBrite]

Then why are you not applying this argument to what the game itself is doing? The game is the entity that collects and publicizes this data without any help from FFLogs—it does it all on its own to every person who plays it. You can’t just selectively apply your argument to FFLogs without also applying it to the game itself. The game is the source of all of the information of that website. Which is still not personally sensitive information. None of it gives anyone any clarification on who you are as a person. The only things it tells us are information directly related to your virtual avatar—which you do not own.



This is a flimsy definition of “identifying someone”. I highly doubt that’s the intention of the law you keep quoting.



This argument isn’t even about third-party software anymore. If you read who I responded to, they are talking about processes that collect data. There is no clarification of “third-party” in their statements—just process that collect data, and then the entire argument about “personally identifying information”.

The game collects all this data with no help from any third party. It even saves it locally for those of us who play on PC. It is also data that no one but Square Enix owns, so we cannot claim any sort of “personal breach of security” with regards to it, making this entire argument silly. There is no privacy being breached here unless SE deems it so. And, as I have said many times, considering this website has been around for 4+ years now...

Hmmm this thread is about a 3rd party software that is being allowed, when in the terms and service does not allow it. If the devs want to change that, rewrite the terms and service, not cherry pick them. Try to spin it any way you like... Again this game is not a 3rd party software, parsers and FFlogs are

[Melichoir]

This game a third party software?

The third party software youre having issue with is just transcribing visible information in the game. FFLogs takes combat log information and just organizes it to be more readily readable. It's a tool that stream lines a process that anyone can do manually. I could sit here and transcribe that information myself and still achieve the same results. Youd have a possible argument if the combat log in game didnt exist. But it does, and it records combat of everyone in the party, which you can read and, if youd like, post.

Because combat log exists and is public, the argument it's private falls apart.

If youre argument is about what the ToS states, well then thats a losing battle too. They can enforce the ToS as they see fit. It's their ToS. You agree on a personal level that you wont engage in certain things and be given access to the software. However, it's up to SE to decide whether or not to punish you if you violate it. And how they punish you is also up to them. It's built into the ToS to give them flexibility. Especially in this case - They want the parser to exist because it is a community benefit overall, however they understand that a small few of players will abuse it and be snobs. They can use the ToS to get rid of those players under that guideline. It's a selective enforcement policy that is at the discretion of SE.

You want a real world example of this, think about cops: They can pull you over for speeding and let you off with a warning, even though they could get you on that ticket. It's at their discretion.

[aiqa]

Then why are you not applying this argument to what the game itself is doing? The game is the entity that collects and publicizes this data without any help from FFLogs—it does it all on its own to every person who plays it. You can’t just selectively apply your argument to FFLogs without also applying it to the game itself. The game is the source of all of the information of that website. Which is still not personally sensitive information. None of it gives anyone any clarification on who you are as a person. The only things it tells us are information directly related to your virtual avatar—which you do not own.

You agreed to what ever Square wanted you to agree with to be able to play the game, which did not include fflogs storing and processing data.

This is a flimsy definition of “identifying someone”. I highly doubt that’s the intention of the law you keep quoting.

It's not about identifying "someone" specifically.
It's about data collection and processing with the possibility to indirectly identifying someone "as an individual".
That last part is super important, that means it applies to any data collection where data isn't fully anonymized.
And yes, this law was made for exactly that.

[LiteBrite]

The third party software youre having issue with is just transcribing visible information in the game. FFLogs takes combat log information and just organizes it to be more readily readable. It's a tool that stream lines a process that anyone can do manually. I could sit here and transcribe that information myself and still achieve the same results. Youd have a possible argument if the combat log in game didnt exist. But it does, and it records combat of everyone in the party, which you can read and, if youd like, post.

Because combat log exists and is public, the argument it's private falls apart.

If youre argument is about what the ToS states, well then thats a losing battle too. They can enforce the ToS as they see fit. It's their ToS. You agree on a personal level that you wont engage in certain things and be given access to the software. However, it's up to SE to decide whether or not to punish you if you violate it. And how they punish you is also up to them. It's built into the ToS to give them flexibility. Especially in this case - They want the parser to exist because it is a community benefit overall, however they understand that a small few of players will abuse it and be snobs. They can use the ToS to get rid of those players under that guideline. It's a selective enforcement policy that is at the discretion of SE.

You want a real world example of this, think about cops: They can pull you over for speeding and let you off with a warning, even though they could get you on that ticket. It's at their discretion.

Cherry pick the rules whatever. My biggest issue is, ps4 players are not allowed to use parsers and PC players are, giving them a huge advantage. Then the ps4 player's numbers are put up on FFlogs, not even knowing are numbers are selves, and being judged by them. So it makes it much more difficult to improve said numbers. But that's none of my business I guess...

[Oscura]

Can we seriously drop the legality and EU thing? Not only is it absolutely ridiculous, it would never hold up in court. If was so contentious that it was a sure deal that it is illegal in europe, FFLogs would just block the entirety of europe from accessing their website. FFlogs is not even the only form of damage logging for MMOs that are also available in europe, and those sites still persist.

Please just stop wasting everybody's time arguing semantics about nothing you know about. Armchair attorneys are just annoying.