Dear Alan,
It appears that I have managed to piss you off so badly that you have lost any and all professional dignity you had left.
I am aware that it must have been very confronting to be pointed out that you are a continuous failure at the lousy job as a helpdesk dicky. It must be tough being amongst the artists and programmers at the office, while you yourself are only trusted to misguide people who contact the helpdesk and work at weekends uploading content to the downloadstation.
After my banishment from the forums I thought it a good idea to help you out a bit and started pointing out some of the problems with the software. I was of the opinion that Auran is a company that values its clientèle and its opinions. My opinions are free and I am always very willing to share them ... especially when I feel a bit robbed ... yes ... robbed, that is actually the correct word for the manner in which you Alan and the company you work for ( or volunteer, I am still waiting for an answer to that question ) treat your customers.
The last five years Auran deliberately and purposely robbed its customers from their money with sets of half-finisheds products and empty promises; even blatant lies are part of the deal. Complaints are simply ignored.
In the middle of this we find Alan Yeomans ... let me introduce you to the wonderful world of the Auran helpdesk:
17th Aug 2008, 10:20pm by Zwabberaar:
Session info lost in TC3
After loading a saved session in TC3 the session "info" button is not available anymore and the session is basicly lost unless you memorized the "goals" of the session.
When will this be fixed?
26th Aug 2008, 06:38am by Alan Yeomans
Hi,
This is functioning as intended.
Regards,
26th Aug 2008, 09:23pm by Zwaberaar
Screw Loose?
The person who designed that should be locked up. Finally the "save" bug was fixed and now you have made it useless because the necessary info is not saved, or can not be loaded anymore.
I can understand a "bug" but actually designing it like this is truly beyond me. What is the use of the save function when you drive a two hour Plus session and you can not load the session's goals anymore?
With me ALL tc3 users would appreciate it if this is changed.
30th Aug 2008, 06:10am by Alan Yeomans
Hi,
I thought it has always been like this. When was it ever fixed?
Regards,
1st Sep 2008, 04:27pm by Zwabberaar
Now that was evasive
Does your statement mean that whenever something has not functioned before that it is acceptable?
It should be possible to save a session and have the connected "info" saved as well. I use the word "fix" because in my opinion the product you sell is broken when such a function is not included in the product.
But let me re-phrase my question: When will TC3 save the session info that is included with the session?
3rd Sep 2008, 08:13am by Alan Yeomans
Hi,
I'll pass your report on to the programmers.
Regards,
The above is just one of quite a number of "conversations I have had with Helpdesk Dicky Yeomans. After first having encountered the stupidity of both Tony Hilliam and Chris Bergman I have now met the third idiot working for Auran. I no longer wonder why the products of Auran fail time-and-again. How could they not when the likes of Tony, Chriss and Alan.
Come back soon when I have more examples of my encounters with Alan and his ultimate "revenge!"
Tuesday, 30 September 2008
Friday, 5 September 2008
Suitable content - Auran style
When you have a look on the Auran DLS you will notice that I am starting to build quite a selection of extreme high quality content.
It is my goal to keep flooding the download station with all kinds of goodies. My latest piece of art was a fantastic re-skin of a billboard. Shall we look at it one more time?
Brilliant! if I may say so myself. Of course then it was time to come up with some true art and I found a great painting with an even better looking canvas. This one:
When I had everything ordered in the config and all the necessary pictures added and eventually all was saved into a CDP file, it was time to upload it to the DLS. As we all know the people at Auran are art lovers. Just look at the wonderful lay-out of their sites for instance. Just amazing quality!
It is for that reason I was utterly devastated when I received this e-mail notification this morning:
"Hi Zwabberaar,
Thanks for the contribution to Download Station. Unfortunately, your content 'Zwabberaar_Billboard_02_Cubs' cannot be uploaded due to the following reasons:
unsuitable for our target audience.
Please do not hesitate to let me know if I can be of any further assistance.
Cheers,
Auran"
Read that again: unsuitable for our target audience
What on Earth is unsuitable about a pretty woman used as a canvas for a work of art? Is a painting by Rubens or Brueghel unsuitable as well?
Of course I have send a message to the helpdesk asking for an explanation. Because it usually takes a couple of days before they wake up there I have made a new billboard which I think has to be suitable for the TARGET audience. Lets face it ... guns and weaponry are suitable for young customers ... art isn't. Just type in "Panther" on the DLS and you will be presented with 16 different version of this awesome killing machine. THAT is suitable content and therefore I made this billboard especially for the target audience of Auran:
Without a doubt: To be continued.
It is my goal to keep flooding the download station with all kinds of goodies. My latest piece of art was a fantastic re-skin of a billboard. Shall we look at it one more time?
Brilliant! if I may say so myself. Of course then it was time to come up with some true art and I found a great painting with an even better looking canvas. This one:
When I had everything ordered in the config and all the necessary pictures added and eventually all was saved into a CDP file, it was time to upload it to the DLS. As we all know the people at Auran are art lovers. Just look at the wonderful lay-out of their sites for instance. Just amazing quality!
It is for that reason I was utterly devastated when I received this e-mail notification this morning:
"Hi Zwabberaar,
Thanks for the contribution to Download Station. Unfortunately, your content 'Zwabberaar_Billboard_02_Cubs' cannot be uploaded due to the following reasons:
unsuitable for our target audience.
Please do not hesitate to let me know if I can be of any further assistance.
Cheers,
Auran"
Read that again: unsuitable for our target audience
What on Earth is unsuitable about a pretty woman used as a canvas for a work of art? Is a painting by Rubens or Brueghel unsuitable as well?
Of course I have send a message to the helpdesk asking for an explanation. Because it usually takes a couple of days before they wake up there I have made a new billboard which I think has to be suitable for the TARGET audience. Lets face it ... guns and weaponry are suitable for young customers ... art isn't. Just type in "Panther" on the DLS and you will be presented with 16 different version of this awesome killing machine. THAT is suitable content and therefore I made this billboard especially for the target audience of Auran:
Without a doubt: To be continued.
Tuesday, 2 September 2008
Instant Karma Police - revisited
A few weeks ago, when I was still involved in my attempts to educate parts of the Trainz community, I wrote a blog entry on the trainzdev site about karma.
The staff of the developement site in question: www.trainzdev.com didn't find it very interesting apparently because none of the usual spokesmen spoke. The Karma system was also not changed and my numbers kept dropping ... I don't know how far actually. The last time I noticed it the score was something like -69. Two days ago something peculiar happened. A young kid, Tyler Bishop, started complaining on the forum of tranzdev that his karma was negatively influenced by other members. Not me of course as I was already banned for some time and I would lower this kid's karma anyway because he is apparently the only other person on the entire suck-up board that dares to speak up a bit about the ridiculous "look how popular I am within the community vote".
Anyway ... Chris "I am always right and you are not" Bergmann must have thought he had another Zwab on his hands an warned Tyler in an interesting way:
"Just a quick word of warning. We won't tolerate repeated troll/spam posts on these forums. Everyone here is welcome to their own opinions, and are welcome to express them, but repeated posts which are off topic and inflammatory will result in a ban. I've only had to do that once so far, and it's not something I particularly like to do because it removes someone who may otherwise be quite a nice or helpful person from the community information source which is trainzdev.com, which hurts everyone.
Please have a think about this before you start down the same road. It's also worth thinking about why your karma is low. Several people have obviously disagreed with your previous comments or tone enough to mark you down. Like I said, you're welcome to have whatever opinion you want and to express disagreement with other peoples opinions. Just stay away from the ad hominum attacks, especially something like this where you don't even have a point to make."
In a later instance I might invest some more time in analysing this piece of wonderful prose by dear old Chris. For now I just advice him to stick to code writing because any other writing from his hand is ... hmmm ... shitty?
Very well. This wasn't the full end though because a day later Tyler actually requested the disabling of the karma system and to my utter suprise Chris "ad hominum" Bergmann replied:
"Done. I'd like to keep a karma system because they can be useful, but I agree that the fireboard one is pretty pointless. Will reenable it if/when the web guys have a chance to clean it up.
I've also toggled a few other options while I was at it.
chris"
HE ACTUALLY DISABLED IT! ... but also: "... they can be useful," WHAT? For what is this kiddies popularity vote useful? Can somebody answer that for me please, because I don't have a fucking clue.
I did find a picture of Chris Almighty however:
What my thoughts were, and still are, on the subject can be read here:
Instant Karma Police
The powers that are have humoured us with a whole new popularity voting system here on Trainzdev.com: Karma! It is not easy to explain the concept of Karma and without an explanation from the site owner it is quite possible that lots of people here mis-understand it and start treating Karma like, what I like to call, Chimp food.
Chimp food is the reward you get when you do exactly that what is expected from you, and what is withheld when you don't.
Example?
The moment the CEO posts a poll on the Auran forum all the chimps flock to the topic and start 'voting', again and again and again. They keep pushing that button until their faces turn green. People push that button because they [i]hope and or expect[/i] their reward will be part of the new product.
They however forget that the info they give is used by the CEO to figure out what part of the product he needs to emphasize to the public in order to make the most money out of it ... not because he likes the people on the forum's opinion that much. The result is that many people will be disappointed because they assumed they increased their Karma by pushing the button but instead didn't receive their Chimp food when the new product is finally released.
Complex indeed.
Whole libraries are filled with books about Karma and its meaning. I don't expect anybody to read all of that ( I also don't expect this from myself ) but I feel that the following definition from "Thesaurus" covers the basics of Karma pretty good:
karma - (Hinduism and Buddhism)
the effects of a person's actions that determine his destiny in his next incarnation.
Hinduism:
a body of religious and philosophical beliefs and cultural practices native to India and based on a caste system; it is characterized by a belief in reincarnation, by a belief in a supreme being of many forms and natures, by the view that opposing theories are aspects of one eternal truth, and by a desire for liberation from earthly evils.
Buddhism:
the teaching of Buddha that life is permeated with suffering caused by desire, that suffering ceases when desire ceases, and that enlightenment obtained through right conduct and wisdom and meditation releases one from desire and suffering and rebirth.
I am afraid that when the "karma" system here on this forum was installed with the software it didn't come to mind of the owner that Karma is this difficult a concept. I am afraid that the Karma points sytem, as it has been implemented here, is just a "fun" way to see who is popular among the masses and who is not. The powers that are have apparently overseen how blatantly insulting this is for people of the Hinduism religion and or Buddhist teachings.
I wonder what would happen if the popularity of members were to be determined by, lets say, an in- or decreasing number of Hail Mary's or at which level of Hell your posts will get you. So far it seems there aren't even enough levels of Hell to put me in because of my minus twelve karma points, although I do not know how many karma's points you need for one of the seven heavens of levels of hell. Perhaps the CEO can explain the exchange rate between levels of Hell and Karma points?
It becomes even more difficult because there are actually two popularity system installed here on this site. One is the karma system and a second Chimp food system is used for these blogs ... you can press a "favourite" button. Again it is not explained how many favourite are needed for one Karma point. I would like to trade my four favourites from my "Tony Hilliam, I want my money back"-entry for some minus karma points i collected in the forum.
Another thing that alludes me is the reason why this sytem hasn't been implemented on the, far larger, Auran Trainz forum. It could spark a true Karma Fest and the karma economy will blossom into full bloom and everybody will gather around the camp fire and sing Kumbaya ... and TRS2009 will be ALL we ever wanted from a train simulator [i]because[/i] we have given karma to the right people many times already. Haven't we?
Many of us have given Instant Karma when TRS2004 was released and again when TRS2006 hit the shelves. Then quite a few people gave even more Karma to add SP1 to their TRS2006 Karma. Yet again we gave Karma with TC1+2 and very recently TC3 ... but it is not enough.
We all keep hitting the Karma button that is Auran's bank-account ( me included ) with the expectation that our hard-earned Karma points have been worth investing and that the order of the Universe is balancing out, but it isn't. We chimps are fooled ... fooled into believeing we live in a righteous world where a business CEO spreads the gospel of Instant Karma for all of us, when in reality he only spreads the gospel of greed.
I think that all buyers of the before mentioned Trainz versions should have a free ride into the next incarnation ... because THAT is what Karma is about and people have paid enough Karma already. Karma is about the balance of choices and behaviour. We do have an influence on the Karma of Auran but have not left the trees yet for the promises that the plains offer.
Let us ALL climb down the trees and conquer the plains and be again like those first apes that took that road. We, as customers, can decide how much Karma Auran deserves. Spend it well.
Instant Karma police, arrest this man, he talks in maths
He buzzes like a fridge, hes like a detuned radio
Instant Karma police, arrest this girl, her hitler hairdo, is making me feel ill
And we have crashed her party
This is what you get, this is what you get
This is what you get, when you mess with us
Instant Karma Police's gonna get you, gonna knock you right on the head
You better get yourself together, pretty soon youre gonna be dead
Instant karma Police's gonna get you, gonna look you right in the face
Better get yourself together darlin, join the human race
How in the world you gonna see, laughin at fools like me
Who in the hell dyou think you are
A super star
Well, right you are
Zwab
The staff of the developement site in question: www.trainzdev.com didn't find it very interesting apparently because none of the usual spokesmen spoke. The Karma system was also not changed and my numbers kept dropping ... I don't know how far actually. The last time I noticed it the score was something like -69. Two days ago something peculiar happened. A young kid, Tyler Bishop, started complaining on the forum of tranzdev that his karma was negatively influenced by other members. Not me of course as I was already banned for some time and I would lower this kid's karma anyway because he is apparently the only other person on the entire suck-up board that dares to speak up a bit about the ridiculous "look how popular I am within the community vote".
Anyway ... Chris "I am always right and you are not" Bergmann must have thought he had another Zwab on his hands an warned Tyler in an interesting way:
"Just a quick word of warning. We won't tolerate repeated troll/spam posts on these forums. Everyone here is welcome to their own opinions, and are welcome to express them, but repeated posts which are off topic and inflammatory will result in a ban. I've only had to do that once so far, and it's not something I particularly like to do because it removes someone who may otherwise be quite a nice or helpful person from the community information source which is trainzdev.com, which hurts everyone.
Please have a think about this before you start down the same road. It's also worth thinking about why your karma is low. Several people have obviously disagreed with your previous comments or tone enough to mark you down. Like I said, you're welcome to have whatever opinion you want and to express disagreement with other peoples opinions. Just stay away from the ad hominum attacks, especially something like this where you don't even have a point to make."
In a later instance I might invest some more time in analysing this piece of wonderful prose by dear old Chris. For now I just advice him to stick to code writing because any other writing from his hand is ... hmmm ... shitty?
Very well. This wasn't the full end though because a day later Tyler actually requested the disabling of the karma system and to my utter suprise Chris "ad hominum" Bergmann replied:
"Done. I'd like to keep a karma system because they can be useful, but I agree that the fireboard one is pretty pointless. Will reenable it if/when the web guys have a chance to clean it up.
I've also toggled a few other options while I was at it.
chris"
HE ACTUALLY DISABLED IT! ... but also: "... they can be useful," WHAT? For what is this kiddies popularity vote useful? Can somebody answer that for me please, because I don't have a fucking clue.
I did find a picture of Chris Almighty however:
What my thoughts were, and still are, on the subject can be read here:
Instant Karma Police
The powers that are have humoured us with a whole new popularity voting system here on Trainzdev.com: Karma! It is not easy to explain the concept of Karma and without an explanation from the site owner it is quite possible that lots of people here mis-understand it and start treating Karma like, what I like to call, Chimp food.
Chimp food is the reward you get when you do exactly that what is expected from you, and what is withheld when you don't.
Example?
The moment the CEO posts a poll on the Auran forum all the chimps flock to the topic and start 'voting', again and again and again. They keep pushing that button until their faces turn green. People push that button because they [i]hope and or expect[/i] their reward will be part of the new product.
They however forget that the info they give is used by the CEO to figure out what part of the product he needs to emphasize to the public in order to make the most money out of it ... not because he likes the people on the forum's opinion that much. The result is that many people will be disappointed because they assumed they increased their Karma by pushing the button but instead didn't receive their Chimp food when the new product is finally released.
Complex indeed.
Whole libraries are filled with books about Karma and its meaning. I don't expect anybody to read all of that ( I also don't expect this from myself ) but I feel that the following definition from "Thesaurus" covers the basics of Karma pretty good:
karma - (Hinduism and Buddhism)
the effects of a person's actions that determine his destiny in his next incarnation.
Hinduism:
a body of religious and philosophical beliefs and cultural practices native to India and based on a caste system; it is characterized by a belief in reincarnation, by a belief in a supreme being of many forms and natures, by the view that opposing theories are aspects of one eternal truth, and by a desire for liberation from earthly evils.
Buddhism:
the teaching of Buddha that life is permeated with suffering caused by desire, that suffering ceases when desire ceases, and that enlightenment obtained through right conduct and wisdom and meditation releases one from desire and suffering and rebirth.
I am afraid that when the "karma" system here on this forum was installed with the software it didn't come to mind of the owner that Karma is this difficult a concept. I am afraid that the Karma points sytem, as it has been implemented here, is just a "fun" way to see who is popular among the masses and who is not. The powers that are have apparently overseen how blatantly insulting this is for people of the Hinduism religion and or Buddhist teachings.
I wonder what would happen if the popularity of members were to be determined by, lets say, an in- or decreasing number of Hail Mary's or at which level of Hell your posts will get you. So far it seems there aren't even enough levels of Hell to put me in because of my minus twelve karma points, although I do not know how many karma's points you need for one of the seven heavens of levels of hell. Perhaps the CEO can explain the exchange rate between levels of Hell and Karma points?
It becomes even more difficult because there are actually two popularity system installed here on this site. One is the karma system and a second Chimp food system is used for these blogs ... you can press a "favourite" button. Again it is not explained how many favourite are needed for one Karma point. I would like to trade my four favourites from my "Tony Hilliam, I want my money back"-entry for some minus karma points i collected in the forum.
Another thing that alludes me is the reason why this sytem hasn't been implemented on the, far larger, Auran Trainz forum. It could spark a true Karma Fest and the karma economy will blossom into full bloom and everybody will gather around the camp fire and sing Kumbaya ... and TRS2009 will be ALL we ever wanted from a train simulator [i]because[/i] we have given karma to the right people many times already. Haven't we?
Many of us have given Instant Karma when TRS2004 was released and again when TRS2006 hit the shelves. Then quite a few people gave even more Karma to add SP1 to their TRS2006 Karma. Yet again we gave Karma with TC1+2 and very recently TC3 ... but it is not enough.
We all keep hitting the Karma button that is Auran's bank-account ( me included ) with the expectation that our hard-earned Karma points have been worth investing and that the order of the Universe is balancing out, but it isn't. We chimps are fooled ... fooled into believeing we live in a righteous world where a business CEO spreads the gospel of Instant Karma for all of us, when in reality he only spreads the gospel of greed.
I think that all buyers of the before mentioned Trainz versions should have a free ride into the next incarnation ... because THAT is what Karma is about and people have paid enough Karma already. Karma is about the balance of choices and behaviour. We do have an influence on the Karma of Auran but have not left the trees yet for the promises that the plains offer.
Let us ALL climb down the trees and conquer the plains and be again like those first apes that took that road. We, as customers, can decide how much Karma Auran deserves. Spend it well.
Instant Karma police, arrest this man, he talks in maths
He buzzes like a fridge, hes like a detuned radio
Instant Karma police, arrest this girl, her hitler hairdo, is making me feel ill
And we have crashed her party
This is what you get, this is what you get
This is what you get, when you mess with us
Instant Karma Police's gonna get you, gonna knock you right on the head
You better get yourself together, pretty soon youre gonna be dead
Instant karma Police's gonna get you, gonna look you right in the face
Better get yourself together darlin, join the human race
How in the world you gonna see, laughin at fools like me
Who in the hell dyou think you are
A super star
Well, right you are
Zwab
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