Majora Requesting Pardon for my Permanent Ban

Good evening everyone,


I am writing this message to touch base with the staff team and most importantly to pardon for the ban on my account that has come up around 1 month ago. The last few weeks have felt like an eternity for me because I have been given very limited pieces of information regarding the reasoning behind why the ban was put on my account. After making several attempts to reach out to different members of the staff team I was left in the dark for a seemingly long time about this.


I want to open up by letting you all know how passionate I am about my account, and the relationship that I have with the site. I’ve created a lifelong bond with many people on here, and have made amazing friends through this site. With that being said, its very important for me to use this as a platform to address all of my friends and my customers who have been wondering what’s been going on as well. Through what I’ve collected from @video , my account had been reassessed due to a number of reports that have gone on over years and years of using the site. After some discussion, a few members on the staff team decided to permanently ban my account because they did not agree with the way that some old reports had been resolved. @video was able to send me a list of the reports, which the majority of them were around 5 years old and had been dated from before I was most recently Pardoned. Some others were reports that were falsified due to lack of compliance with the correct template, or not containing appropriate information or proof, it also seems that a couple reports were made just to spite me or troll with me. The most recent report against me took place nearly one year ago where a few users had lost their display names due to negligence (I will explain this in further detail as the report goes on). Last years report was dealt with very urgently and was resolved right away. I always put a priority on ensuring that my account is in good standing and that the market remains a safe and worry free trading space for all rare name customers, and when reports come up, I put a priority on making sure any affected users are taken care of right away.


I want to go into more detail about the most recent report on the list and explain to all of you exactly what happens behind the scenes when these names get taken. Here is a link to the report so that you can get familiar with the report context first. [Resolved]


The report opens up with Zwei Siegen stating that he had concerns because I was selling an account name that he had lost. Because the report is resolved and Zwei’s customer may be playing on an account with this name now, I won’t be mentioning the name in question. To make this easier to follow, let’s call the name “Bob”. Zwei expressed his concern because he noticed that I was selling “Bob” which is the name he had lost when experiencing internet problems during a name transfer. The name was open and available for a significant amount of time (minutes) which left the name ready for anyone to take on their account. The name that is in question is a relatively high in demand name as it fits into a category that many name customers would be interested in. Because the name was so desirable, many people can be keeping an eye on this name by adding it to their ignore list to see what happens with the name, if it ever changes or jagex releases the name due to inactivity etc. As someone who’s been in the market for a very long time I’ve picked up on some tricks on how to take usernames in a way that does not compromise the execution of other users’ trading (explained later). While I was playing the game I noticed that “Bob” had been changed two times, and an unknown amount of minutes had gone by that it was available. I had no idea about how long it really was available but I do know that it was available for at least the amount of time it takes for me to register an account on Runescape.com, then sign into account management and navigate to the change character name page and type in the username. I watch names manually through the in game friends list feature because taking names “by hand” is the simplest way for me to prevent running into problems or interfering with other trades that are going on. To give some folks who aren’t very familiar with the name transfer process an idea - If you are transferring a name and it’s available for more than 5 seconds, something would have had to go extremely wrong. This means that for me to spend a few minutes registering an account and taking a name, it would be a very certain way to me to take a name that a user intentionally changed off of their account because they simply didn’t want it anymore. Of course there are cases where technical difficulties come up, In Zwei’s case, he admits that his internet had issues during the time that he transferred. And as I mentioned previously, there’s no way to prove how long it was available for, but I’m estimating that this was at least 3 minutes available. When Zwei expressed his concerns about “Bob” and how i was selling it, I had resolved this with Zwei immediately and it was taken care of within an hour and before any of the staff had got involved with the report. I took it upon myself to return the name to him, even though I picked up the name fair and simple while it was available. When it comes to situations like this, I always take the most “human” approach to it. I could have fought Zwei for who rightfully should own the name, however due to the fact that the name came at virtually no cost to me, and that I actually do care about what happened, I chose to return it to him without asking many more questions. I also want to clarify that at no point in time did I know who owned this name, and at no point in time have I ever asked Zwei what names he had for sale. I had no idea the name was being traded and was only looking at the name on my ignore list because it fits into a highly demanded category of names that would be highly profitable if I were to register it and sell it myself.


I’ll be honest in telling everyone that I do pick up names like this on nearly a daily basis. There are a lot of words out there which can sell even for very low amount of money, and if they ever sell even for $5 after a year of holding onto it, its pure profit for me. I’ve found that there is a return on my time investment If I sit back daily and keep an eye on thousands of names to slowly accumulate inventory to safely sell out to my customers on the market. The process is extremely manual because I need to sign into the game, monitor account names and their previous names to see if people change their names due to a change of interest in their respective name, or if the name fall off of association with the accounts due to inactivity or being set as the previous name for too long. After doing this for years I have established a few tricks to make it easier and more organized for me to track which names were changed and on which date etc, but I do assure you that all of this is done in a manual way, and almost all of my names that I take now have proof that I’m registering them from my iPhone through an iphone screenshot or screen recording of the registration on my phone, the odd name here or there I will register manually from my computer. I take these extra measures most particularly because these previous reports have come up and I want to make it crystal clear that there is not bot in the operation and that my intent in to do this is a safe way to prevent buyers from running into problems with their account or having other users question them about owning a name that may be considered as “Stolen” when in reality that isn’t the case. All of these extra steps bring a lot of added work and time into what I do - but knowing that my customers feel secure and safe while buying from me is a priceless perk to doing business and it’s why I have a large pool of regular customers who choose not to purchase anywhere else.


On the resolved Zwei report, you will also see that Beast came forward about another name which he lost in a similar way. @BEAST will also admit that his name was available for at least multiple minutes worth of a time window, however with this being so long ago he can’t recall exactly what happened and how long it was available for, but will admit that it was open for a window of time which is minutes. I took the decision to return @Beast’s username to him as well in fairness because of how I handled the situation with Zwei. I do want to clarify that Beast and I did have a conversation before this report regarding his lost name, and he was under the understanding at that time that the name was picked up due to legitimate loss of the name (leaving it available for too long). Beast didn’t make a report regarding it because I assume that he understood that the name was available for too long and simply anyone could have taken it - in his case, I picked it up.


I know the explanation above is quite extensive and it can be hard for someone unfamiliar to wrap their head around, but due to the shear number of names that I pick up, it’s bound that one of the names that I take can somehow be linked to another member of the forums as these names are known to have a long history of ownership from multiple users. I have made it clear through prior reports that I always consider the feelings and well being of other members on the site. I have always done whatever I could to make sure the afflicted users are taken care of immediately even without needing direction from staff telling me to do so. In the previous situations, the names were rightfully mine but I did what I could to bring peace to every situation in consideration for other users involved, as well as my image, and the reputation that I have in the market. I’ve been in the display names market now for nearly 2 decades (Sythe wasn’t my original platform for this) and I still learn new things every day. I’ve learned lessons on how I can do business in a way that does not affect other users on the site in a negative way, and I’m proud that I can say with confidence that what I do everyday is done for the best interest of my community of customers, and the Sythe community as a whole.


For any staff members who want to reach out to me, consider this an AMA (ask me anything). For any sensitive matter, I urge you to reach out to me privately on Discord. I will be happy to answer questions that any of you have for me regarding anything.


For now, and hopefully for the last time, I want to respectfully ask for your support in Pardoning me and allowing me to partake in regular interactions on Sythe.org once again.


Thank you,


Aaron

 

The offenses that were reviewed (these include previous reports that you have pardoned for):

24th Aug 2018 @zwei siegen & @BEAST: [Resolved]
1st Dec 2017 @QBD: Private Report
Oct 17th 2017 @xJumpman: Reporting Folt for sniping my name while I was moving it & Request to Reopen these Folt Reports
Sept 28th 2017 @Alice: Naughty Folt :3 (Name Sniping Report)
June 19th 2017: @Away & @EikNauxi: Folt selling a RSN he sniped
June 26, 2016: @Josh: Glare -- Sniper/Proof of "Purchase"
April 11, 2016: @Glare: https://www.sythe.org/posts/15772343/
July 20, 2014: @Xier0: Reporting FOLT for knowingly buying stolen goods/name sniping
July 18, 2014: @Just: Folt
July 15, 2014: @Taylor: Folt is a thief

This was discussed when the report from @zwei siegen came in. Being involved in names myself, I am also aware that names expire and its a natural process of the names market. However, there are a few issues with what was mentioned. There was no reasonable explanation given as to why the names of several active name market Sythe users were on your lists to be watching. There are hundreds of thousands of names that can be considered rare and its peculiar that these few names end up on your list and manage to be intercepted during transfer.

This plays with the definition of name sniping, when you notice a name switch to a previous, its safe to assume it might be transferred. There is no real reason why you would be going after names like this as your claim is that you go for names that expire off. These names are protected by a 30 odd day previous name hold so one would assume you would only consider these names after 30 days have passed.

 

The names that I picked up which belonged to fellow Sythe users were not picked up because I was targeting names that other users were selling. The names that I “target” are names that have been changed in game that some people refer to as names that are “last known as”.


After a certain amount of time, the “last known as” names can become available because:


1. Jagex automates expiration of those names based on how long the user had them set for. Meaning that eventually the name will become available for anyone to take provided that a user “abandons” their old name.

2. Some People choose to change their names due to a change of interest, forcing their last known name to become available.

3. Some people hold 2 rare names on their account at a time (called juggling), and sometimes they can forget when they need to change back to their previous name, this results in automated expiration kicking out their last known name and forcing their old name to be available. This typically happens after around 35 days. A user juggling their names typically have to change them at least every 34 days or sooner.


I watch over a very large bucket of names that fall under the “last known as” criteria so the chance of possibly picking up a name that once belonged to a Sythe user does exist. At any point in time, there can be somewhere between 300-600+ usernames in the “last known as” status at any given time across the population of the entire game (Who knows which of these belong to sythe users). To give some context to the situation, I’ve picked up thousands of names this way over the years, and have documented at least 2000 trades across this site and multiple other sites (+ many more have even gone undocumented). With this volume the chance of an event occurring where I have registered an account name that has been associated with another Sythe users name has come up a couple of times. This event is inevitable because the Sythe community is probably the largest community for name sales. Because of my comprehensive understanding of what I do, I’m aware that there is a marginal chance of this happening, and I have always made sure that I’ve returned the names to any users involved whenever this rare case occurs, even though sometimes the names are actually lost due to negligence from the other user (refer to number 2. and number 3. possible outcomes above).

If you were to take a percentage of the amount of names that I’ve taken and sold and then compare it to the amount of times there has been an event where it overlapped with a Sythe user owning that name, you will find that it is under a 1% chance of the outcome. You will also notice that in this rare chance of it possibly happening, 100% of the time I have always showed good will and returned the name back to the person who was affected by it.

I want to clarify that I take names using this method because at the point in time when names become available, they are up for grabs for anyone to register. My intentions when taking these names are nothing but good intentions as I just want to be able to provide the community with a safe outlet to buy quality names without the intention to steal or intervene with anyone else trading names on the market. I also want to emphasize that I never reach out to other users asking them what names they have for sale, meaning that I don’t have any idea which names are actively being sold on the market.


I wanted to share this link because I’m sure many of you haven’t seen this

faith in humanity

The above report has a user explaining that he lost a name due to his friend pulling a prank on him and changing his name to something silly, forcing his 2 letter name to become available. This username had a LARGE VALUE. I managed to pick up the username as it fell into the category of “last known as” names that I look at all of the time, and suddenly it was available to pick up after being available for an extended period of time. There was no report created by this user at all, nor did he have the intent to make a report against me for having ownership of his old name. However he did reach out to me on Skype because he found out that I had it for sale. I was open ears to hear about what happened on his end with it, and his story might not have even been true - He was understanding in knowing that he lost his name and probably would never own it ever again, however I chose to take the decision upon myself and returned his name to him. I did the good deed with no intention to get anything in return, not even a vouch, but I did find it flattering to see that he decided to share the story publicly.

 

This is what will be discussed. There are several reports above that show names being sniped while transferred. We are aware there are some cases where names expire off or users just simply abandon them. Neither of these were the case in the reports above and it was clear that they were being transferred as they were changed to the same current name to release the previous name.

Moving forward, we've heard your reasoning here as well as on the other reports. This can be moved to voting, results can take up to two weeks and when a verdict is reached, your name will be shown in this thread.

Until then, please remain patient, thank you.