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Data Harvesting From a Developer's Perspective
Posted by
Soulskill
on Sun Jul 13, 2008 11:15 AM
from the line-in-the-sand dept.
from the line-in-the-sand dept.
cliffski raises some questions about the need for game developers to have some amount of data from the users who play their games. He says,
"PC Games connecting to a central server to send information (outside of MMOs) have gotten a (deserved) bad reputation in recent years. The huge outcry about Mass Effect and Spore are evidence enough of that. But in gamers' hurry to prevent intrusive DRM systems and dubious privacy-breaking data harvesting, are we throwing out the good with the bad?"
Clearly, some aspects of games could be improved by having a better knowledge of average PC specs or knowing which parts of the games are more entertaining to the users. Input from customers helps to improve almost any product, as indicated by the usage of countless surveys and focus groups. But where do we draw the line between being inquisitive and being intrusive? What can game developers do to prove that the collection techniques or the data themselves wouldn't be abused?
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Spore, Mass Effect DRM Phone Home For Single-Player Gaming 900 comments
Tridus writes "The PC version of Mass Effect is going to require Internet access to play (despite being a single-player game), as its DRM system requires that it phone home every 10 days. Sadly, Spore will use the same system. This will do nothing to stop piracy of course, but it will do a heck of a good job of stopping EA's new arch-enemy: people playing their single player games offline." Is this better or worse than requiring a CD in the drive to play? Update: 05/07 17:17 GMT by T : According to a message from Technical Producer Derek French (may require a scroll-down) on the Bioware forums, there is indeed an internet connection required, but only for activation, not for all future play. Update: 05/08 04:10 GMT by T : Mea culpa. As reader David Houk points out, the 10-day window is in fact correct as initially described, so don't count on playing this on any machine without at least some Internet connectivity.
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How about *asking* the user if they want to share? (Score:5, Funny)
Shockingly, new studies suggest that people may be able to make decisions all by themselves without a company or a government or anything!
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Re:How about *asking* the user if they want to sha (Score:5, Informative)
Speaking from experience I can tell you that an "opt-in" program would never collect enough data to be useful.
I'd suggest an "opt-out" system along with restrictions on *what* data was sent. At least I'd say that nothing personally identifiable can be sent, there's no need for it. There may be other restrictions I can't think of right now.
IMHO, this issue is about what data gets sent, not that data gets sent at all. It should be clear and verifiable what data is being sent, so that users who are that way inclined can check to ensure that nothing untoward is being sent to the developers.
Parent
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Maybe that should tell you that most people *don't* want to share with you with no compensation?
Re:How about *asking* the user if they want to sha (Score:4, Interesting)
Precisely the point.
At our local mall, there's a survey and opinion company in the corner. They ask mall-goers for surveys based upon demographics and other information told by their clients (like Coca-cola, Pepsi ola, and others).
I've been asked about 8 times. I cannot discuss what was reviewed by myself, because of NDA. However, I received payment from 25$ to 75$ for said reviews. I also provided accurate demographic information, along with the proper write-ups.
I sold my privacy for a pretty penny. In some cases, I later bought some nice hardware for my computer. Why should I give it away when it is seeked and compensated for fairly?
Parent
Re:How about *asking* the user if they want to sha (Score:4, Informative)
> Not even my employer has any right to demand that I keep a secret
No one can demand that you keep a secret: you can decline when they offer to pay you money to do so.
> ...especially if one day I might be in court to testify about something that happened
> in the workplace.
No contract keep you from answering any questions you are ordered by a court to answer nor can it penalize you for doing so.
> NDA is meaningless.
A properly drafted and executed NDA is an enforceable contract.
Parent
Re:How about *asking* the user if they want to sha (Score:5, Informative)
Valve would disagree.
http://www.steampowered.com/status/survey.html [steampowered.com]
http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/52707 [shacknews.com]
1,728,662 Steam users have voluntarily agreed to participate in their semi-annual hardware survey by having detailed specification of their PC hardware cataloged.
Parent
Re:How about *asking* the user if they want to sha (Score:4, Interesting)
Glad you brought this up - I only dropped into this thread to point out the rather excellent Valve Hardware Survey.
The fact it is self-selecting does make it a shade biassed towards the high-end, but it is amusing to see the sheer amount of laptop hardware out there with Steam installed.
It is always funny to smirk at the glacial pace of Vista migration too.
Parent
Re:How about *asking* the user if they want to sha (Score:4, Interesting)
Is data from over a million and a half samples [steampowered.com] not useful?
Seriously though, Steam's hardware survey is the first thing that came to mind when I saw this story. It's non-intrusive, it clearly asks you before sharing any information, and it keeps the summary information available for all to see. I probably wouldn't mind sharing technical information if it worked similarly to this.
Parent
Re:How about *asking* the user if they want to sha (Score:5, Funny)
Is data from over a million and a half samples not useful?
Who's the wiseguy that sent in the half a sample?
Parent
Re:How about *asking* the user if they want to sha (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
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No not really.
If you for instance get invited into the community theres a big button telling you press here to enable this feature. No where does it explicitly tell you that hitting that button will add all sorts of tracking information to your account freely available to any one else - and no way of opting out again. (This might have changed after I pointed out to them that their practice was in fact illegal and I would take it up with local consumer agencies if they failed to remove this information for m
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The problem with an opt-in approach is that you'll only hear from the vocal minority. Most of the time, that's the *worst* demographic to make decisions based on. Blizzard has done an excellent job of not falling into that trap as compared to, say, SOE.
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Blizzard has done an excellent job of not falling into that trap as compared to, say, SOE.
Well ... I'm not sure what you mean by "Blizzard has done an excellent job of ...", but a number of months ago, my WoW client, which I run under WINE, started crashing right after an update. I went to their forums to discover that many others running it under WINE were crashing after the latest update. Blizzard's rep basically toted the company line that they don't support running WoW under anything other than Windows and Macintosh. Fair enough.
After poking around for while, I discovered t
Re:How about *asking* the user if they want to sha (Score:5, Insightful)
They usually mention such things in the license agreement. Do you read the license agreement?
That's not asking is it? That's telling someone after they've purchased the product that aspects of their system will be monitored. Of course you can take the product back but that's inconvenient. Technically everyone should read the licence agreement but the plain fact is that nobody does, and while that's obviously got no legal standing, if the developers don't want to be hated by everyone using their product they should cut out the sly bullshit and ask in plain and simple English. If the developers really do just want certain info regarding gameplay or system specs I'm sure that enough people would say yes to get a representative sample of users.
Parent
Re:How about *asking* the user if they want to sha (Score:5, Informative)
Of course you can take the product back but that's inconvenient.
It's more than inconvenient, it's usually impossible. Most retailers refuse to take back computer software, especially opened software, as a matter of course. And you would have to open the software to get into the installer to read the EULA (Which, in some cases, you "agreed to" before even seeing it, with phrases on the CD case like "By opening this package you agree to be held liable to the End-User License Agreement contained therein", a so-called "Shrink-wrap" license).
So saying that 'taking back software is an option' is, for most cases, wrong.
Parent
Re:How about *asking* the user if they want to sha (Score:4, Interesting)
I believe that shrink-wrap licenses have been found to be nonbinding in some jurisdictions, though I don't remember the court cases that back that up.
Perhaps, or even probably, but that's not the point. Companies offer money back guarantees and mail in rebates because they know most (or at least a statistically significant proportion of) consumers don't find it worth their while to bother. Hiring a lawyer and loosing time off work (or just plain opportunity costs) for a sixty dollar game isn't worth it. Of course you are assuming that the consumer even believes he can get his money back. In the era where laws and information campaigns are constantly reminding consumers that their rights take a back seat to that of the copy right owner, I doubt if too many (consumers) would even consider the law, much less attempt to try and enforce said law. It's not so easy to just call the police and tell them to press charges against a software company because their EULA or business practices are illegal. Believe me I've tried :)
Chances are however that if you call up the actual game company and they have some reasonable customer service rep on the line then they may refund your money if you pay to have the disks, etc sent back to them. Maybe, maybe not. It's your bet. In the end it's still a hassle. It's often easier to buy something than to return it.
Parent
Re:How about *asking* the user if they want to sha (Score:5, Insightful)
the problem with relying on people to make decisions is that people might not do what I want them to.
There. Fixed that for you.
And I don't consider that a problem. If such a small amount of people do say yes then all that's doing is clarifying how many people you're potentially pissing off by forcing such decisions on users. And to be perfectly honest if you word the question correctly and explain how it can help development I think you could get considerably more than 1% of users to accept. It would still probably be a very small proportion of users, but it should be enough to gather useful stats on the kind of information TFA claims developers want.
Parent
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While we're talking about opt-in and opt-out systems, how about a preferences system for Slashdot which allows you to decide whether you'll allow morons to post mangled quotes of your posts followed by inane phrases like "fixed that for you"? There could be three options: "no", "yes", and "yes, as long as he acknowledges that by doing this he is a complete asshole."
Good Times (Score:2, Funny)
There. Fixed that for you.
Re:How about *asking* the user if they want to sha (Score:5, Funny)
I like it when my quotes are used out of context!
There, fixed that for you.
Parent
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It however is a problem, somewhat of a different kind. If you want to collect some stats, you're interested in as representative a subset as possible. The fact that someone has to explicitly express their content to be taken into account means there's a bias being introduced, since these people are not exactly representative of the whole field.
With surveys (as opposed to automatic data collection) it becomes even worse since people tend to say what they believe they are/do or want to rather than truth. To u
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Re:How about *asking* the user if they want to sha (Score:4, Insightful)
Remedy:
Promise that amongst everyone who shares their system info, once a week/month/year someone wins a prize (no need to ask delivery info in advance, just that "If you win, you'll be notified via this program and then asked to enter delivery address"). The price can be anything cheap and token-ish (eg. in games, some bonus freebie item), as long as there's something.
Parent
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Come again? I didn't get that last part...
Does Steam do this right? (Score:3, Insightful)
Jonah HEX
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"I wouldn't expect Valve to collect personal data, implement in-game advertisement or the like, especially with private servers, but it's always a concern in the era of online games."
Not up on your history, I take it?
"Valve Pens In-Game Ad Deal for Counter-Strike [slashdot.org]" from right here on /. !
Opt-Out and Aggregation (Score:2, Interesting)
I have no problem with software collecting data that is aggregated and not kept in an individually identifiable format.
There should also be a way to opt-out with no negative repercussions (feature disabling).
Those two simple guarantees and I'm comfortable. The problem is I don't trust a corporation to be honest and forthright with the handling of customer data.
Just Ask (Score:4, Insightful)
Seriously? Ask us first. Tell your users exactly - EXACTLY - what's being monitored, and 98% of the problem goes away. Users are sick and damn tired of being misled and lied to about stuff like this for our own good.
Maybe from the Developer's perspective having an intrusive all-seeing eye installed on everyone's computer which either can't be turned off or only via a default-selected checkbox in the disused lavatory tab of the options menu sounds like a good idea, but to anyone else it really doesn't. Don't do it.
Be honest with your users or they'll hate you whatever you do.
Better games but no counterintelligence? (Score:3, Insightful)
You know, I'm not a big fan of cops, but it never ceases to amaze me, how software engineers on ./ rant and rave about everyone collecting information on other people, but make every exception for themselves.
IF civil rights is that important, that you want to go on and rail about Obama's FISA betrayal and horridly fill out online donations to the ACLU over the idea of your government collecting information to aid in counter-intelligence against not only the "terrohistas", but also the Chinese, Europeans and anyone else who might have their information collected by their governments, then that's worthy.
But, I would like to know, what exactly about a video game, shopping experience or some other fluffy adventure that entitles you as a software developer to violate people's rights to privacy, for your own ends, when you would deny that same efficiency to everyone else? You aren't elected to represent anyone, but our government is.
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I think you may be stereotyping inappropriately. AMong developers, there is no doubt a schism of ideals over this issue as there is every other issue.
It looks as though you are saying that ALL developers are against collecting data on users and you are wondering why, then, that they are willing to write code that collects data.. So you are calling all software developers hypocrites.
I think that's rather short sighted. Surely not every software developer feels that data acquisition is immoral. Surely not eve
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But, I would like to know, what exactly about a video game, shopping experience or some other fluffy adventure that entitles you as a software developer to violate people's rights to privacy, for your own ends, when you would deny that same efficiency to everyone else?
Can we start with not being able to put anybody in jail, torture, or ruin their reputation and/or credit rating? The corridors of societal power are a completely different context than game company marketing and conflating the two is just lazy
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What would I store as a developer?
1) program ID, not associated with IP address or any other registration database. Hash it if need be before I collect it if my company insists on some form of registration database so I don't get involved with Legal's problems.
2) other usage stuff involving ONLY the game.
3) *maybe* some hardware and OS info. (OS version & patch level, ActiveX version & patch level, what settings user is playing on).
4) relevant game info - maps preferred, settings, etc., that can't b
It's simple (Score:2, Interesting)
A good example is popularity-contest [debian.org] in Debian and I think it was Winamp that also asked if you wanted to let it send anonymous statistics.
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That's what he said. He meant that developers should respect that people are capable of making their own decisions and offer them the chance to do so.
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This is already being done... (Score:3, Insightful)
Average Specs From Non Average Sampling (Score:2, Insightful)
Clearly, some aspects of games could be improved by having a better knowledge of average PC specs
PopCap's tracking of casual gamers says the average system has a fourteen year old Intel integrated graphic chipset and runs Windows 3.1. This completely confirm's PopCap's choice to go after low end systems.
Crytek's tracking of Crysis players says the average system has eleventy billion GeForce 14000s in SLi mode and eight quad core processors, running 64bit Vista. This completely confirm's Crytek's choice to only worry about high end systems.
Alternatively, when you're testing something that your product a
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Well, at least if you scroll down on the w3schools page they come right out and tell you that the statistics are off because of their target demographics...
They don't know where to draw the line (Score:3, Interesting)
Easy answer. (Score:5, Insightful)
That's easy. Just give me a checkboxed list of all the data items from my computer that you propose to send to your server. Then provide an "UNCHECK ALL" button so I can still maintain my privacy.
Now there's someone that doesn't get it. (Score:4, Insightful)
That game developer has no clue about privacy.
First, if the game has online registration, that's the one time to collect, with the user's permission and knowledge, basic system configuration info. That's useful to have if they call for support. It doesn't require a continuous connection to a server.
Second, if more data is required for game tuning, that's what play testers are for. Or free beta users. It's reasonable to have a free beta that sends back play data, if the developer is up front about it. It's not reasonable to have it in a paid product.
Third, if you can't meet basic EU privacy regulations, your market is much smaller.
Make data harvesting a feature, not a bug. (Score:4, Insightful)
Companies like Valve and Microsoft have already adopted this mentality — they don't just capture information about how you play the game, they store it in an online profile, and let you unlock achievements, compare your data with others, or view a chart of your own scores to monitor your improvement.
Ironically, by making this kind of data public, you'll cause players to start putting less value on their own privacy. It's the Alcoholics Anonymous effect in action — when other people disclose private information, you're more likely to disclose private information too.
Of course, this doesn't mean that you as a developer should be collecting any sort of truly private data. If you can't explain to players in detail what data you're getting and why you want it, you shouldn't be collecting it.
Also, provide a simple way for players to provide spur-of-the-moment feedback on your game. For example, add a simple text box to the game's pause screen that lets users zip off a note to the game developers, along with data about where they are in the game and their current status. I can think of a hundred times when I would have given the developer feedback but was stymied by the hassle of finding the proper web site, setting up an account, explaining the situation in detail and not even knowing that anyone on the development team actually read the message boards. A quick message system built in to the game would be much handier to players, would collect raw off-the-cuff impressions, and best of all, would be entirely opt-in.
That process already exist - it's called Beta (Score:3, Insightful)
How many crappy games are released today because they are unfinished, bugged and unplayable? Of course data mining is the better economic plan since it allows to collect money by releasing the game early and pretend you care about your customer base instead of beta testing your product (This actually cost more money and delays the production cycle).
Data mining is flawed: It collects data about what we like. The result is a massive amoung of clone games with very little creativity other than mind blowing GFX. Focus on something new instead, something we havent seen yet, something original, something that will be a surprise instead of the version 65 of a "well selling title".
Beta test your product, (data mining isnt a cheap way of doing it) Ask for feedback if you like (There is plenty of discution forums the gamers will be happy to contribute). Funny part about this, most gamers have the impression you never read those since you rarely answer them, yet you pretend you want to collect data using a sneaky method while you ignoring most of our suggestions/feedback on discussion boards. Makes me wonder about your real motives
Don't be evil. (Score:4, Insightful)
We have lots of cases where companies have collected this information and then done Evil Things with it, so people are reluctant to provide it.
So --
-- stop being evil. Start using information only for benign purposes, and then people will trust you in time. ... in time. You screw people over, you have to *stop* screwing them over first, and only then figure out how to regain their trust.
Thank ESET (Score:3, Interesting)
As for how companies should approach information gathering, I'm with most everyone else here. Simply explain to the users exactly what information is being collected and give them the option to opt out. I say exactly because a lot of it depends on how you ask. If I'm greeted with a simple question like "Allow Mass Effect to send anonymous usage statistics to Bioware?" I'll probably click no, because I have no idea what "anonymous usage statistics" entails. Ask the same question and give me a list of exactly what information will be sent out, how often and to where, then I'll be more inclined to agree to it. Best case scenario, actually show me the information being sent and let me click the send button. Just don't do it so often.
Companies think they have to sneak this phone home stuff in because people don't like it, they don't realise that most people don't like it precisely because they try to sneak it in. The rest just don't like it at all, so let them opt out. Everyone's happy.
One small step (Score:5, Interesting)
Echoing through the cave, you hear a voice in the distance call out "I before E except after C".
Actually there are only 3 important things (Score:3, Insightful)
1. Ask. Simple as that. Ask. Don't just go "and now we'll transfer your demographics to our maker, hit ok", or don't say a thing altogether. People love the feeling of being in control. And they will much more readily provide you with information if you take the time to tell them what you need it for, i.e. making the product more suitable for your customers.
2. Let me review the information before it is sent. Let me see just what information you want from me. I'm uneasy when I'm asked to let a program gather information from my computer and send it to you. Let me see what information you want, if you want to be sure I let it pass, give me a reason why you want information aside of my hardware specs, because I can't see how my name, the number or ID of connected machines or the directory structure of my hard drive(s) could possibly help you develop a better game.
3. Don't wrap it in legalese junk. KISS is the key here. If you want to cram license agreements down my throat that require me to get a law degree and read for three hours, I will not send you any information whatsoever. State that the information is going to be used anonymously, that you will not store the IP address it was sent from, that you won't bombard my mailbox with junkmail and that you will not distribute the information. After all, you only want it to improve the games you make, right? So it should be no problem for you.
You can without a problem do all this as part of your installation routine, completely automatized, and if someone doesn't care about any of those things he can easily bypass the agreement, the list of information gathered and the terms of usage for the data collected. If he cares about it, he can read it.
Where's the problem with that?