EVE General Discussion

You don't really get it. But that is okay. It is good you got money for your contest. It is the real motives behind the giving (on Somer's part) that are in question here. For those of us who think they are just trying to cover their behinds so they can get away with RMT while looking all spiffy - it's called influence peddling. SOMER's giving is well documented (as they want it to be, for just this sort of incident) but it actually, in the end has nothing to do with the current issues.

All we can do is await CCP's response. The questions they have before them:

- Do they take punitive action against SOMER blink? If so, to what extent?
- How do they prevent their employees from making foolish conflict of interest decisions in the future? (This isperhaps the most important question to be fair.)
- How do they, moving forward, insulate EVE from the destructive influence of third parties who are looking to monetize/make a business out of the game the game.

As for SOMER, if they are not banned, you should have no fears. If they were able to pull in roughly $50k a year by offering 200m isk bonuses, they should not have any problems paying for their server costs. All they need to do, honestly, is cry to those who believe in them, or who are addicted to them, that they are desperately in need of cash, and they will sell plenty of GTC's without a bonus. I would not be surprised if they are able to still manage at least $25k a year.

Will that being running a "business"? At what point does running an in game corp to promote GTC referrals constitute a business? That is for CCP to decide I guess.

What I suggest to your SOMER supporters, is to demand transparency from them before you 'donate' to their server costs. It'd be interesting to know how much they made since they upped their ante on the GTC sales.

why, you think they'll forget or something?

They did. Though, instead of getting rid of the bonus credit banner, it says "GTC Bonus Inactive (at CCP's Request)"

My guess is that they're hoping the heat will die down so they can quietly start RMTing back up again.

Interesting how they are still tracking purchases for 'future promotions'.

Kind of like saying "Keep buying your stuff through us and maybe we'll find a way to give you stuff in the future."

Gotta give Somer points for creativity when it comes to walking the fine line of the rules.

How very Wall Street of Somer. Now **** them, there's a difference between running an honest business/capitalism and whatever the hell you want to call this.


CCP, ban them and zero their wallet! Nobody figured it was RMT until recently, you can honestly claim ignorance, but allowing them to cash out as much as they can like this makes you look worse, you'll lose more face by letting this continue than shutting down a site you once supported.

The reward for that special part of the game would have to be an out of game reward. If you had a GTC exclusive area, which allowed you to then goi on to win special isk and in-game items, it would clearly be a way around the ruling and therefore bannable.
Remember, this is not an automated system that you have to trick, and it's not a law where you can find legal loopholes. CCP have the full rights to shut you down for any reason, or even no reason if they want. All in game items are their property, and Somer can't claim against them if CCP chose to ban their accounts. So doing something that can obviously be seen as a way of sidestepping the rules would not end well.

A thread full of gamblers complaining that the people they give their ISK to are bad and need to be banned.

Has it occurred to any of you that if you could get your habit under control, you would have no reason to complain about Somer since they would have folded a long time ago?

Blaming others for your own failing is not a new strategy and entirely expected. But until you come to terms with your addiction, you will be the fools and sites like Somer will be the people taking advantage of you.

Mr Epeen

I'm not a gambler.

Sort of. CCP gave everyone 10 days grace time to get their sites in order. Somer just chose to accelerate it. While I don't agree, I can understand why CCP let that one slide, since it both made them more profit, and would have been a lot of hassle to go back on the 10 days. I imagine further deliberate breaches of the rules would result in swift action, and if it didn't it would certainly result in me posting a ticket and a forum thread every 10 minutes until an official made a statement. They would have to ban me to make me shut up, then that would be that.

I actually think I want to be banned, since it would force me to actually get a bit more of my life back :p

Another way to look at the time they were given to stop is that in several countries, a change in contract must be given a reasonable length of time to be reinforced. The main reason I think this could be a factor is that it was a change in contract between a company and a reseller. None the less, Somer used that time to skirt at the very thin gray line as they have been before.

Then again, I may be remembering details of several laws wrong.