This is the absolute perfect summary, and one everyone should read and understand. Particularly the point that while it was offsite, it was also against Discord guidelines and you know - illegal

Link: https://www.sylestia.com/forums/?thread=105585&page=26#253 Author: Fleurallily Time Posted: 3/25/2023 at 11:41 AM Krin, Thank you for opening up the comments section to give the community the option to comment questions or concerns. I have one concern and one question: The Concern: My last concern I will put on this thread publicly regarding this announcement is that I believe this thread is getting away from its intended purpose. At this point, 25+ pages in, there are fewer and fewer questions and more and more arguments/discussions between players taking place. And of the questions being asked, many are repetitions in some way or another of questions that have come before. Because of this, I think you should close the comment section sooner rather than later. In the warning posted to the forums back in December regarding bullying and harassment (https://www.sylestia.com/forums/?thread=104725), that thread was locked because it's purpose did not require further commenting from the community, due to it being a one time warning. I believe this announcement and the comments that have followed have served their purpose. I believe the best course of action going forwards is to prevent prolonged discourse over the bans, as they have already been enacted. It is my belief that the original purpose of this thread has been served and that further comments discussing the rightness or wrongness of the ban are counterproductive to the long term health of the community. The Question: In the event that you do decide to lock this thread, will you be open to creating a new announcement thread where players with concerns or questions going forward will be given the opportunity to publicly ask them? Thank you, Fleura

I support the idea of locking the thread. I apologize if I got heated with my posts, I know emotions are running high for a lot of people right now, which includes myself.

This is a post I very-much would like both admins to read as it concerns safety.

I am going to preface this by saying that my post is WHOLLY my own opinions and my perspective-- which could be coming from a place of misunderstanding or otherwise-- of a 32-year-old Adult with a lot of life experience in a lot of different fields (including this one) and also the perspective of a very mentally ill, vulnerable, and LGBTQIA+ person-- as well as the perspective of someone who has literally only been here a month.

I have a lot of trauma when it comes to these types of dramas and as such I have ZERO tolerance for letting ANYONE color my opinions-- nor try to Manipulate them or how I perceive others. I have ZERO tolerance for bullying, stalking, doxxing, or harassing. If these people are lurking they are going to learn really fast-- I am NOT their ally.

Please be patient with me as I have literal brain damage and severe executive dysfunction and am bad at reading or communicating tone. I am trying. A post like this one takes a lot of my energy and yesterday I had a very. Long. Bad. Day. Maybe one of the worst days of my life. Which is great. Because I came home to This. (Not the fault of Krin at all, gonna hecking throw That one right on out there to disappoint a lot of lurkers.)

First lets have a small emotional reaction; Wow. I just. Got back from the worst back-to-back news of my life and was going to come just ... maybe do a tiny baby vent and ask for advice on here. But then I see this. I am still trying to absorb it all.

Now I am mortified because I was approached by several people acting ~nice and welcoming~ to the site when I was breaking down on bad mental health days. It gave me the impression that this community was genuinely welcoming and kind. Several of those people are now gone. Self explanatory. I feel unclean and Scared for my safety as an extremely vulnerable mentally ill person. I feel manipulated and betrayed (by them). I don't know what any of them, specifically, have done, but the fact that they were involved at all feels bad enough due to my trauma and history with these kinds of situations.

My emotions-- which are of course subjective-- feel like that in the end it is one more confirmation that no person will ever actually genuinely like me for me and that once again (and this has happened consistently for 20 years) people only buddy up to me when they want something or intend to use me--- or are fishing for information to doxx and harm me. Now it feels like that here on Sylestia, it has happened again. That another handful of people have built me up manipulatively for their own selfish game.

I feel hollow. And hurt. And other worse things. Especially after the conversations I had with my doctor, yesterday, where he already had concerns about my mental health and what I will do to myself. We agreed I cannot afford any treatment. So I do not know what will happen, now, that Im afraid I have once again lost one of the only communities I felt accepted into.

Moving on from Subjective to Objective.

I want to be fully transparent for the sake of Krin knowing how deep this ditch runs (I am pretty sure he already knows, having been an admin myself), to a new player, and say that I have been approached by several people who were suspicious.

(Un)Thankfully enough, I have been in many such dramas (re: admin) and I did not take the bait. Perhaps some of these people were sincere, even those who were ultimately involved, but after what I have been through I do not trust anyone attempting to coerce me or point fingers at others without real evidence and even then evidence is a grain of salt to me because most people who throw screencaps at me are fabricating them or taking the deliberately out of context for the explicit purpose of doing direct and severe harm to others. That particular kind of issue is a very deep and clearly biased wound of mine and it should be taken as such.

But to further underline my concerns and what I wish to convey to Krin about these people is that I have felt tormented by some players on this site in ways I don't think those people can comprehend. My activity on Sylestia dropped off, even though I loved it and was finally getting the hang of it, because after a week or so-- once I made my presence known in the forums in a big way-- it was every. Day. I was getting hounded with messages. Several from people with suspicious and/or concerning things in their bio, which immediately raised my eyebrow.

It was incredibly suspicious for starters, but it also felt like psychological warfare against me that I could not just sign in and play my pretty pet game without one person or another blowing up my DMs even though I thought I made it clear that such a thing is actually a PTSD trigger for me. Maybe I didn't. I don't pretend to speak for others comprehension of the things I say and do. But even messages that are sincerely meant to be helpful end up triggering me because of past traumas. Unfortunately, that isn't something I can help At first I was open to it because they seemed genuine and sincere (and some still are!) and it made me feel more at ease. Then the others rolled in and undermined All of It.

I come to this site to get away from my life-- which is a living. Freaking. Nightmare. I came here to ESCAPE. I just want to click my pretty pets, understand the mechanics, and enjoy a forum site because as a 90's kid I have desperately wanted back into the forum format. It works best for me and capitalism has eaten them alive.

But I cannot do that when every. Single. Day. I feel DREAD, worrying about if I will have a DM to read or answer. In the end it makes me avoid signing in at all. Especially because those DMs turned from reading as places of concern for my well-being to... "I need you to follow me off-site." Which I understand in some cases is because giving any clarifying information at all in circumstances of bans would be against ToS, and they are (allegedly) concerned for my safety, but still: concerning.

Now. Several people seemed sincerely kind, but I have no way of knowing for certain their intentions or sincerity. The ToS also clearly states that the behavior in the Discord screenshots is highly bannable offense. The whining about monitoring makes me roll my eyes. Have I made it clear enough to these people I am not their ally?

I actually have a reputation that precedes me. Until this happened, I had a lot of public information stated plain as day here on Sylestia. I had a link to my ToS which also detailed the kind of behaviors I don't do service to, and it would have really clued them in that I am not a sheep for them to pick out of the herd. I do not know what they expected---- Except I do and it Disgusts me.

To be frank, I feel targeted by these people because I am easily perceived as a helpless unstable mentally ill person who probably, from the surface, seems very easily to manipulate and take advantage of. A quick look at my public ToS should have told them otherwise. My mental health bad days are not. My personality. Sorry to them if they lurk. I am a lot tougher and smarter than you think I am. I did not get elected into multiple admin positions for being incompetent, and I still hold one to this day.

Sorry if I seem like I am harping on it, but I really want to make it clear to these people that I cannot be recruited into their nonsense. I do not care if they are right, wrong, or indifferent.

I was approached as recently as yesterday by someone (who I believe is now also gone as well) speaking on the behalf of one of the banned players who was being ~sweet~ on me, trying to coerce me into speaking offsite. I have been told there are people in this thread defending that person specifically, but also that it was implied that there was a distinct reason that they were banned as well. You can see why it's now extremely difficult to trust anyone. Without transparency of who and why, I feel further pushed away.

Moving right along. I have seen this before on Flight Rising (specifically in Arcane Flight)-- So I Declined. Look up 'The Celestial Senate, Arcane' if you wish to draw your own opinions. I was a Dominance Leader and Forum Runner. The Celestial Senate coerced me off-site so that they could have against-ToS convos that led to actual cheating and cyber-bullying.

I became a victim to their cliquey terrorism when I disagreed with their behavior and refused to fall in line, which actually led to manipulating people very close to me in my personal life.

And, frankly, to make even more enemies. If Stormlight Workshop actually did take initiative to monitor these off-site chat-rooms then maybe they could weed out the dangerous predators from their website. I know some of their mods saturate these places. They are part of the cliques. I was forbidden from blocking a mod on there who targeted me on those peoples behalves for fluffs sake. In MY opinion-- Krin taking initiative makes ME feel Safer.

These people banned from Sylestia for conspiring and/or being complacent in the face of abusive behavior will never find warmth in me.

I see some people are salty in this thread for reasons that I, a 32-year-old, believe are naive and short-sighted. I do not claim nor pretend to know these people and I will not point them out. For all I know they are minors and do not know better. I don't mean for that to sound condescending but I don't know how else to put it and I'm gravely sorry. I am a concerned adult for them and wish them to stay away from these kinds of dramas-- but I cannot make their choices for them. Know that I think you should step away and let us adults handle these kinds of bad actors.

In case lurkers want more reason to hate me, I have nothing but deep respect for Krin for opening this line of dialog. Places like FR refuse to have Any discussion whatsoever or reflect on their own staffs behavior, anything. You just get insta-perma-banned with no appeal. They never want to hear any ideas but their own. Even though users used their site to do irreversible and life-threatening damage to me, the staff refused to action them. In fact some of the staff was in their pockets. That you opened this thread and are hearing people out once again cements my choice to prioritize this site over other pet sites like it. The maturity goes a long ways.

I am running out of brain juice. I am. Hurting. Emotionally and physically. I am hurting so badly. I have cried, and cried, and cried all day yesterday and today. Then I come online and cry some more at this.

I know I did not leave a good first impression on anyone. I am going through. A. Lot. It is not any of your faults that I had the reactions I did at first. I am easily overwhelmed and I am very self-aware. My struggles with site mechanics and understanding has zero reflection on my opinions of the admins or user behavior. Those are mutually exclusive.

I am conscious of bias and how it colors things-- going both ways. But despite that, with everything going on in my life, all Ive wanted was to just. Lock myself in my room here and log on to play Sylestia. Only to find that a bunch of people I thought were replacing the vast emptiness of betrayal in my life might just be predators who just tried to prey on me.

Within my scope of functionality I-- OR my PoA, you can contact them directly-- am open to the idea of talking to the admins about this situation. I don't know if staying here is safe for me, anymore. I have already begun to remove my posts from the forums out of concern for the retaliation these people will have against me for being in support of this actioning and my very plainly written reproof of their behaviors.

I. Am. Not. Okay. And I don't. Know. What. To. Do. I feel. I can't say it.

I hope that things smooth out. These people's behaviors should never be tolerated. If any user has any legitimate concerns about how a site is being handled there are other more mature ways to go about that. And if not-- like in the case of Flight Rising-- cut your losses.

I also want to say that the loss of Sylestia Extension 2 means I am going to drop off this site, too. Unfortunate though it may be to say, this site is severely lacking in the accessibility department. That tool was the only thing that made nurturing possible for me to do at all. Could Krin please consider color coding the nurture buttons all different, very distinct colors to make them visually well, distinct? It's a simple image swap and cache clear, I think. (As I said in a prior post, I do not claim to know your back-end. Sorry if I speak in arrogance, it is not my intention.)

With my disabilities it's very, very hard to tell the buttons apart, I have involuntary muscle movements/twitching, and no working memory. Until I got that extension I couldn't do nurtures, which cut me off from most of the game. Now I cannot play the game, anymore.

Now I am heartbroken and mortified to have to remove and report it. I reported the extension to Mozilla with the evidence provided showing that they intended to use it for malicious purposes, and I encourage others to do the same. This is a crime and should be treated as such. (Just look up the GShade drama and you will know how serious this is.)

Finally, and probably the most ~spicy take~ in my loooooooong reply.

Re: players WHINING about "WAH DON'T REMOVE PETS OUR ECONOMY WE WON'T GET TO BR

Broskies. Block me.

I apologize if THAT is way too bold to say plainly, but let me be REAL frank with you. THE SAFETY OF A HUMAN BEING IS ABOUT A HUNDRED THOUSAND TIMES MORE IMPORTANT THAN YOUR DIGITAL PET OR MONEY. Please try putting more value on human life and safety please and thank you, it makes me VERY concerned for your overall quality of character and makes ME feel VERY unsafe.

Sorry. If that ruffles your feathers. Literally. Block me. I don't wanna be near you.

Apologies to the Admins if anything I have said is against ToS I have soup brain and even when squinting at the code of conduct I feel a little wanting. For clarification. I do not intend to break any rules or offend anyone who uh. Actually is a decent person. To put it shortly. Which I think includes the admins, if that wasnt made apparent yet.

You have my total consent to remove problematic parts of this post as long as you do not also modify/add things that misrepresent me. Thank you very much for your time, patience, consideration, thoughtfulness, concern, hard work, and most of all Transparency.

In light of all this, I no longer feel safe using this site. The block system leaves one wanting, and this concern has been raised before and you have already seen them. I need a better blocking system. I need a better way to protect myself. Admin-to-Admin, YOU sincerely need to investigate a method to make it so that Forum Posts and Profiles are no longer Public and available to search engines like Google by default.

I really hate sounding accusatory, but the privacy here is severely lacking especially when you know that these kinds of behaviors are ramping up and becoming more prominent here. Any abusive person who has been blocked or banned? They can still stalk and harvest information from people and that should never be a thing in the modern age. You can still see their posts. You can still see them on User Spotlight. You can still see their profile and pets for sale. It is a very. Bad. Environment. For any survivor of abuse and anyone targeted by bullying. Which I am.

I realllly need to see your willingness to investigate a way to private my profile and limit visibility of forum posts to signed-in users (making it so banned people can no longer have any avenue to harm others), as well as adding accessibility to things like nurturing (color coding is a very easy fix). Until a time where that can come to pass I kind of feel like I have wasted my fleeting cash as I dont. Feel. Like I can stay here, anymore. Until these two things are addressed. And that. Really hurts.

I really loved it here until this all exploded and took my functionality add-on with it.

I really want to play. But. I dont know if that will ever be possible at this point. I suppose I will check in once in a while but if it isnt made clear to me real fast that my concerns will be taken seriously I am just gonna lose interest and stop checking. Which. Sucks. Alot. For me. Bc I love this site and you guys tbh.. Sigh. Sorry this has. Drug out.

Be safe, everyone. I really do care about you.

- Astral

Link: https://www.sylestia.com/forums/?thread=105585&page=26#253 Author: Fleurallily Time Posted: 3/25/2023 at 11:41 AM Krin, Thank you for opening up the comments section to give the community the option to comment questions or concerns. I have one concern and one question: The Concern: My last concern I will put on this thread publicly regarding this announcement is that I believe this thread is getting away from its intended purpose. At this point, 25+ pages in, there are fewer and fewer questions and more and more arguments/discussions between players taking place. And of the questions being asked, many are repetitions in some way or another of questions that have come before. Because of this, I think you should close the comment section sooner rather than later. In the warning posted to the forums back in December regarding bullying and harassment (https://www.sylestia.com/forums/?thread=104725), that thread was locked because it's purpose did not require further commenting from the community, due to it being a one time warning. I believe this announcement and the comments that have followed have served their purpose. I believe the best course of action going forwards is to prevent prolonged discourse over the bans, as they have already been enacted. It is my belief that the original purpose of this thread has been served and that further comments discussing the rightness or wrongness of the ban are counterproductive to the long term health of the community. The Question: In the event that you do decide to lock this thread, will you be open to creating a new announcement thread where players with concerns or questions going forward will be given the opportunity to publicly ask them? Thank you, Fleura

I would like to voice my support for closing the thread.
There do not seem to be any more questions and it has really turned into arguments that further divide the player base.
I also would like to see a public forum to express concerns. Player concerns should, of course, go directly to Krin, but minor concerns that others may also have would be good to ask & answer publicly.

For example, with the end of the sylestia 2 extension, I am concerned with the lack of disability accessibility. Im dyslexic which makes nurturing very difficult - the colored buttons help me pair them right. I also have joint issues where my hands end up super stiff and achy, which makes every single click cause pain. Sure, I could stop playing, but this is a game I enjoy. I would love to see at least a comment on possible accessibility features for disabled players like myself. I would be happy to talk privately about possible features that may help myself and others :)

As far as the extension goes, I actually pm'd Krin about this. He said that he'd like to add some of the things the extension did as permanent, official parts of the site. No ETA, but things should start becoming more accessible without needing to rely on an unofficial add-on soon.

Link: https://www.sylestia.com/forums/?thread=105585&page=26#253 Author: Fleurallily Time Posted: 3/25/2023 at 11:41 AM Krin, Thank you for opening up the comments section to give the community the option to comment questions or concerns. I have one concern and one question: The Concern: My last concern I will put on this thread publicly regarding this announcement is that I believe this thread is getting away from its intended purpose. At this point, 25+ pages in, there are fewer and fewer questions and more and more arguments/discussions between players taking place. And of the questions being asked, many are repetitions in some way or another of questions that have come before. Because of this, I think you should close the comment section sooner rather than later. In the warning posted to the forums back in December regarding bullying and harassment (https://www.sylestia.com/forums/?thread=104725), that thread was locked because it's purpose did not require further commenting from the community, due to it being a one time warning. I believe this announcement and the comments that have followed have served their purpose. I believe the best course of action going forwards is to prevent prolonged discourse over the bans, as they have already been enacted. It is my belief that the original purpose of this thread has been served and that further comments discussing the rightness or wrongness of the ban are counterproductive to the long term health of the community. The Question: In the event that you do decide to lock this thread, will you be open to creating a new announcement thread where players with concerns or questions going forward will be given the opportunity to publicly ask them? Thank you, Fleura

I support locking the thread as well. It has served it's stated purpose.

Understood! Thanks for the response. That is highly unfortunate, but it does make sense

Link: https://www.sylestia.com/forums/?thread=105585&page=27#264 Author: Oiseau Time Posted: 3/25/2023 at 8:39 PM [quote=2699354] I would like to voice my support for closing the thread. There do not seem to be any more questions and it has really turned into arguments that further divide the player base. I also would like to see a public forum to express concerns. Player concerns should, of course, go directly to Krin, but minor concerns that others may also have would be good to ask & answer publicly. For example, with the end of the sylestia 2 extension, I am concerned with the lack of disability accessibility. Im dyslexic which makes nurturing very difficult - the colored buttons help me pair them right. I also have joint issues where my hands end up super stiff and achy, which makes every single click cause pain. Sure, I could stop playing, but this is a game I enjoy. I would love to see at least a comment on possible accessibility features for disabled players like myself. I would be happy to talk privately about possible features that may help myself and others :)

It might make sense to make a separate thread about the extension - what features people are mourning and why (and how they worked and why that was of benefit) + other accessibility & QoL folx would find useful? I say this because a public discourse would potentially gather the most information possible about where the gaps are as well as put it all in one place if someone new wants to make a new extension.
And while I know it's best and most secure if such things are baked into the game itself Krin and co have limited time and energy and it seems plausible doing things through the backend may require more programming resources than creating an add on. (I am venturing guesses here I haven't touched code in ages)

Despite my account age, I've only been playing for roughly a month, and it's just so unfortunate to see this kind of thing come to a head so soon after starting to play actively.

To be clear-- I do agree with the admins' decision here regarding those who were banned. There is a place and time where uncompromising action needs to be taken, and this feels like that time. While we'll likely never have the entire, full context of just what led to the decisions that were made, it doesn't strike me as something that was done lightly or with haste. I feel somewhat sympathetic for those who did seem genuinely kind and helpful (as well as their friends), and I've also bought from some of those who are now gone, but those defending them or declaring privacy concerns have to consider how easily and widely this sort of thing festers if left unchecked. I've seen it happen all too often. Whether it was due to the actions of concerned individuals bringing things to the admins' attention, or their own investigations, there's a point where "jokes" and healthy venting become something a lot more insidious and toxic, and that's saying nothing of the multiple claims of on and off-site harassment. This is not the sort of discussion that can safely remain private, when it bleeds over into negatively affecting the site and its player base.

I just hope the community, and the site itself, can come back stronger in the wake of this. This sort of conflict can fracture a community, but it's clear that these attitudes have been festering for a while now, and sometimes a clean slate is the only way to move forward.

I think this is probably a good time to lay the discussion to rest, but I'm glad to hear that the accessibility features of the extension are being considered for official implementation.

This situation has been on my mind ever since it dropped. I haven't been here long but I'm no stranger to seeing bad dramas happening on pet sites, that's for certain. With that being said, this has a very particular level of maliciousness to it. Not just the economic manipulation, but everything.

My best friend and I joined not too long ago and they've been more active in the forums than me for certain and what is crazy about all this is almost every single person who spoke to them was banned. Some of them tried to lure them off-site, onto Discord. My friend did not take the invitation of course because it made them suspicious. Needless to say, I am very glad that those red flags were going off.

In particular, I am kind of wowed that Ive seen comments against these bans in regards to breeding of certain pets no longer being accessible. You can always make new breeding projects, that is so little in the light of all this.

I'm very glad to see transparency here from the site Admin, that is such a welcome thing compared to other places Ive been. Not all may agree but I think he made the right choice in with this action. I hope all who had crossed paths with them are okay. It just really leaves a bad taste in my mouth knowing that some of them tried to get chummy with my friend, that's just not okay.