Gamefront has banned half the world!

[Frontiergame]

sure if you enjoy downloading at 2kb/s

great "solution" you came up with.

Can you please stop it with the negativity. We really don't want a repeat of what happened a while ago with you in the Artwork thread. Remember: if don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all. We're trying to stay civilized here.

[General Brewster]

Vengur doesn't make sense, Dutchland should have been blacklisted then too so that's not it.

[King Sama]

Nice catch Brewster, didn't think twice of it.

@Frontiergame
Now I have to delete your post for being off-topic!

[General Brewster]

That's promoting illegal activities you should delete that post. Fast.

[General Brewster]

Sneaky man

[The Despondent Mind]

It's not his fault that the site (proxy) exists .

[wangrin]

Using proxy isn't an illegal activity itself.
Gamefront is not blocked due to judicial decision. Moreover, Gamefront only tell that they are available in a limited number of country but don't explain why.

A: Game Front file downloads are not supported in all territories. Below is the list of all of the countries that can download from Game Front. If you’re not in one of the below territories then, unfortunately, you will be unable to download files from our site.

They even didn't explicitly tell that downloading from a specific list of country is forbidden (unable and forbidden didn't means the same).
So, in this situation, I cannot understand why using a proxy would be "illegal" and would be against TWC ToS.


I fear you are over-interpreting Gamefront position as well as TWC ToS.

[General Brewster]

Using proxy isn't an illegal activity itself.
Gamefront is not blocked due to judicial decision. Moreover, Gamefront only tell that they are available in a limited number of country but don't explain why.




They even didn't explicitly tell that downloading from a specific list of country is forbidden (unable and forbidden didn't means the same).
So, in this situation, I cannot understand why using a proxy would be "illegal" and would be against TWC ToS.


I fear you are over-interpreting Gamefront position as well as TWC ToS.

As it's used to go over a blockade it is, which is the thing making a proxy Illegal. I rather not see people banned for this that's why I said it. Over interpreting is better then under.

As you can see someone else his post is deleted for the same reason.

[wangrin]

Gamefront never explicitly said that they block nor forbid downloading, they only speak about "service unavailable".

So, I prefer, as you said, "under-interpreting" than over-interpreting because over-interpreting lead to censorship, and censorship and moderation are not synonyms.

[General Brewster]

That's debatable, as this site holds US law I cannot talk about stuff legal in the Netherlands, Germany , France etc cause it's not legal in the states.

And and are also censored. Not illegal words either.

[wangrin]

And and are also censored. Not illegal words either.

But they are considered as insults.

Here, we speak about a technical solution that is not illegal in its essence.
And this had led to delete a post and maybe (I hope not) to a warning.

In the present case, nor Gamefront nor judicial decision forbid access to Gamefront from countries concerned. The service is unavailable without more explanations and this is the only fact.
If Gamefront nor judicial decision forbid access but only "technical" problems, using a proxy, in my mind, can be considered as a legitimate solution if it work.

What is important is facts.
So, If you think that's illegal, please provide text from US law or Gamefront Terms of Use that explicitly forbid the use of proxy in the present case.
It will be better to provide law than Term of Use, those being often considered as abusive (at least by Europeans courts).

[Frontiergame]

But they are considered as insults.

Here, we speak about a technical solution that is not illegal in its essence.
And this had led to delete a post and maybe (I hope not) to a warning.

In the present case, nor Gamefront nor judicial decision forbid access to Gamefront from countries concerned. The service is unavailable without more explanations and this is the only fact.
If Gamefront nor judicial decision forbid access but only "technical" problems, using a proxy, in my mind, can be considered as a legitimate solution if it work.

What is important is facts.
So, If you think that's illegal, please provide text from US law or Gamefront Terms of Use that explicitly forbid the use of proxy in the present case.
It will be better to provide law than Term of Use, those being often considered as abusive (at least by Europeans courts).

We're modders/gamers, not lawyers. A team member has made his decision and that is final.

[General Brewster]

It don't care it's illegal, I said it so he doesn't get banned or warned at all.

It's unclear why they did it. the fact remains they restricted access from the countries in question, Bypassing such a blockade is illegal. thus by posting proxies here you promote illegal activities even if that's not your using a different IP which could lead to breaking the TWC impersonation.

Quoting your law, My law or the US law the ToS "rules" this site we cannot do anything against it.
European courts are not goint to say if it's legal on this site or not lol, GED could tomorrow say only Belgians can join this site and the facto nobody could do something against it.

@Frontiergame thank you.

[wangrin]

First, and I will repeat it one last time, using a proxy is not an "illegal activity".
Second, I have the feeling you didn't understand the text I've wrote above. When I refer to European courts about Term of Use, it's to focus that laws are more truthful and legitimate than Terms of Use.
Third, I've read ToS one more time and I cannot find any stuff relate to proxy use.

Promoting Illegal Activities (1, 4, or 8 points)

Posts that promote violation of the law are not allowed. Violation of the law includes, but is not limited to:
Substantial use of copyrighted material without permission. Examples of acceptable uses would be brief quotes, fan art, signature/avatar images, brief video clips (e.g., YouTube), screenshots, or reasonably limited decorative images in a mod. Unacceptable uses would include entire songs, long videos, large collections of images, altered game executables, pirated operating systems, unmodified game files (except those released by the developers themselves, for example converted .bin files released by CA for M2TW) that are not essential parts of modifications or anything that competes with the work you're copying (i.e., people might just download your copy instead of buying the original). The exact threshold of substantial use will be decided on a case-by-case basis ― if in doubt, ask a Senior Moderator or Administrator.
Obtaining or providing ways to circumvent copy protection. This includes no-CD hacks, key generators, hacked ROMs, etc.
Cheating in online games, or otherwise violating license agreements.
Possessing, distributing, or using drugs in a way that would be illegal in most jurisdictions (e.g., owning marijuana).

"Promoting" illegal activity includes, but is not limited to:
Asking for someone else to commit an illegal activity (e.g., asking for a cracked game).
Assisting someone else in an illegal activity (e.g., linking to a site that distributes cracked games).
Encouraging or advocating an illegal activity, or portraying it as normal or acceptable (e.g., casually mentioning that you have pirated games/smoked pot/etc. as though this were normal and acceptable). Exceptions will be made for threads that are devoted to serious discussion of illegal activities in an abstract sense (e.g., about whether copyright law should be relaxed or marijuana should be legalized), on a case-by-case basis.

What exactly qualifies as illegal depends on jurisdiction. When jurisdictions differ on whether something is legal, moderators will decide on a case-by-case basis which jurisdiction to follow.

Moreover, IP is not use to identify user, it's the login process (login name / password) that is in charge of identifying them.

So, if you want to accuse me of "promoting illegal activities", please provide a legitimate basis and not assertions of axioms of your own.
Moderating didn't means total arbitrariness.
It's not the moderator who can judge itself what is legal or not, a moderator had to refer to "texts" that he had to apply, like any judge.

[General Brewster]

First, and I will repeat it one last time, using a proxy is not an "illegal activity".
Second, I have the feeling you didn't understand the text I've wrote above. When I refer to European courts about Term of Use, it's to focus that laws are more truthful and legitimate than Terms of Use.
Third, I've read ToS one more time and I cannot find any stuff relate to proxy use.

using a proxy to bypass blockades is considered a illegal activity.

Moreover, IP is not use to identify user, it's the login process (login name / password) that is in charge of identifying them.

This is not correct, GED and other admins can see anyones IP this way multiple accounts are traces and second acounts for people who are banned. In this case you would violate this:

Promoting Illegal Activities (1, 4, or 8 points)

Posts that promote violation of the law are not allowed. Violation of the law includes, but is not limited to:

• Substantial use of copyrighted material without permission. Examples of acceptable uses would be brief quotes, fan art, signature/avatar images, brief video clips (e.g., YouTube), screenshots, or reasonably limited decorative images in a mod. Unacceptable uses would include entire songs, long videos, large collections of images, altered game executables, pirated operating systems, unmodified game files (except those released by the developers themselves, for example converted .bin files released by CA for M2TW) that are not essential parts of modifications or anything that competes with the work you're copying (i.e., people might just download your copy instead of buying the original). The exact threshold of substantial use will be decided on a case-by-case basis ― if in doubt, ask a Senior Moderator or Administrator.
• Obtaining or providing ways to circumvent copy protection. This includes no-CD hacks, key generators, hacked ROMs, etc.
• Cheating in online games, or otherwise violating license agreements.
• Possessing, distributing, or using drugs in a way that would be illegal in most jurisdictions (e.g., owning marijuana).

"Promoting" illegal activity includes, but is not limited to:

• Asking for someone else to commit an illegal activity (e.g., asking for a cracked game).
• Assisting someone else in an illegal activity (e.g., linking to a site that distributes cracked games).
• Encouraging or advocating an illegal activity, or portraying it as normal or acceptable (e.g., casually mentioning that you have pirated games/smoked pot/etc. as though this were normal and acceptable). Exceptions will be made for threads that are devoted to serious discussion of illegal activities in an abstract sense (e.g., about whether copyright law should be relaxed or marijuana should be legalized), on a case-by-case basis.

What exactly qualifies as illegal depends on jurisdiction. When jurisdictions differ on whether something is legal, moderators will decide on a case-by-case basis which jurisdiction to follow.

In this case a local moderator already said it shouldn't be discussed, and deleted a previous link.
then kicks in that this can't actually be discussed outside moderation commentary thread in Q&S.

Then comes that in the hypothetic manner someone could use this same proxy to impersonate someone else which is forbidden by this :

Impersonation (1 or 4 points)

• Falsely claiming to be another specific message board member or other known individual or holding a rank to which you are not entitled (moderator, administrator, Creative Assembly employee, or any type of staff member), or sockpuppeting is not allowed.
• Impersonating others by claiming their intellectual effort as your own is prohibited, as is failing to properly reference it. As such, all material must be sourced with a link and/or tags.
• While the use of alternative accounts is permissible, the misuse of such accounts (such as but not limited to self-repping, multi-voting in polls et.c.) will carry an additional penalty commensurate with the offense (loss of rep etc).

Moderators may use discretion in enforcing this against impersonations that are clearly not serious and so unlikely to fool anyone.

So, if you want to accuse me of "promoting illegal activities", please provide a legitimate basis and not assertions of axioms of your own.
Moderating didn't means total arbitrariness.
It's not the moderator who can judge itself what is legal or not, a moderator had to refer to "texts" that he had to apply, like any judge.

So if you want to claim I'm accusing you of promoting illegal activities I'd go back and read my posts again. And yes moderation discretion is allowed.

['Gunny]

Let's just stop this silliness, eh?

[Gigantus]

Let me put a damper on this: waiving the 'illegal' flag isn't going to be of any help in this discussion. If you want to discuss TWC rules and procedures, do so in the Q&S thread.
Mentioning proxys as a way to access websites can hardly be considered assisting in illegal activities, considering the wide spread knowledge about it - providing detailed instructions however will be a sure way to attract further attention from admin.
Feel free to discuss the (somewhat misleading) OP. Blocking is not banning in case you wonder what I mean.