FooPets

Happy FooSummer Everyone!

FooCrew Suggestions Procedures

We have had a lot of members asking for updates and announcements lately, so we thought we would break down the procedures we use so that you understand we are not ignoring you.  We love our members and their suggestions, we are just somewhat limited in how we respond sometimes and we wanted you to know why. This is the way it works:

FooCrew may or may not decide that we agree with the members suggestions. If the FooCrew decides a feature should be brought back, it then moves to the list of things to be done. Since our engineers never know what hiccups they will run into, we never announce things until they are done for the most part. The Meebo replacement was announced because we wanted you guys to know that we cared about replacing this feature for you based on the outcome of the survey, but most of the time you will not see announcements until we are ready to release things:).  The engineers cannot even give us times most of the time, therefore we cannot give you ETA’s either. We are here and we are listening, we just don’t announce things and get you guys excited until we are close to going live or live already. We wanted you to know why we cannot give you timelines or sometimes even announce things(as they may not be do-able), we hope this helps you understand that we are not ignoring your requests for public updates.  

FooCrew Site Status Report

As far as an update, we are still working on the Meebo replacement tool for you and we hope to have that done soon and we are not sure how much longer it will take.  When we took over the site we promised to focus on the following: 1) keeping site performance fast, 2) fixing bugs that frustrate you, and 3) ensuring that FooPets continues to be a sustainable business.  This means that we are spending most of our time keeping the site running, and since Sundays have proven to be an issue we are now focusing on fixing that in addition to replacing Meebo as our top priorities, so we really appreciate your patience!  Some things you can do to help (temporarily until this is fixed), is play later in the day on Sundays if you can so that you don’t get frustrated and so that there are less players pulling from the servers.  This will help the players that need to feed their pets do so a little faster, at least for now:).  

The ledger delays seem to be getting much better, unless you guys are not reporting them we have not seen near the problems that we did.  The following are still on our list of things to look at:

1. FooStudio/Decorator/FooFoto issues
2. Arcade
3. Friends list/Meebo issue

FooMart Special Announcement

Things are going well in the FooMart!  We have a special announcement from our FooMart Manager about items that are being used on other sites.  FooPets always checks for copyrights before adding images to the FooMart.  If it passes copyright checks, we then will consider the item.  If that item is being used on other sites, regardless of whether it is copyrighted we will most likely skip over these items because we prefer artwork that is currently not being used on other sites.  This means if you have submitted artwork to several sites, FooPets may ignore that piece of art just to be safe as we are not sure of the agreements members have made with other sites as far as rights of use. We have been testing pricing still and items to see what you guys want more of and what you do not like, so thank you for your voicing your consumer preferences through your purchases (This is how many real world economies work as well, if stores cannot sell something they will discontinue it so you have this consumer power in the real world as well).  We are keeping track of popular items and non-popular items so we appreciate your participation in the FooMart and we are glad you are enjoying have user submitted art back in place.

Very Important Rule Change:  Zero Tolerance for Bullying

We have had some issues with bullying and antagonizing in the forums.  This was already against the rules and it has become an even greater issue in the forums lately.  Please remember that this is very much against the rules of our site and against the law in some areas.  Bullying and ganging up on others is a very real problem not just in our forums but also in the real world, so lets do our best to help each other avoid this.  Sometimes you do not realize you are coming off as a bully, so be very careful as our ambassadors are being told to have zero tolerance for this type of activity.  There are laws going up all over the world about this, for resources on your state laws in the US you can visit http://www.stopbullying.gov

For the intents of FooPets and our site, we are adopting the following definition as stated by the US Government:  Bullying is unwanted aggressive behavior that involves real or perceived power imbalance.  The behavior is repeated, or has the potential to be repeated over time.  Bullying includes actions such as making threats, spreading rumors, attacking someone physically or verbally, and excluding someone from a group on purpose.  The following are also listed as forms of bullying:  teasing, name calling, inappropriate sexual comments, taunting, threatening to cause harm, leaving someone out of a group on purpose, telling children not to be friends with someone, spreading rumors, embarrassing someone in a public forum, among other things. Please note the updated section 12 of our current Rules of Conduct:

12. Zero Tolerance Policy

Immediate suspensions from the forum can result from any of the following: bullying, posting of images, text, or links that are obscene, harmful, threatening, abusive, hateful, and/or offensive.  
This also includes presenting FAKE or FABRICATED screenshots, online or in support.

Please know that 90% of what we do with our thin crew is just keeping the site running, this means that upgrades will continue to come slowly but we are working just as fast as we can.  We hope you are having a great year so far, and as always thanks for playing!

The FooCrew:)

Filed under: Uncategorized | Comments Off on FooPets Summer Update

Happy FooDay Everyone! 

We know you have been patiently waiting to hear the big news, and we are so sorry about the delay.  We ran into some glitches on the admin side of the mart that are now resolved.  We won’t keep you in suspense:

USER SUBMITTED ART IS BACK!!!  

If you would like to submit art, please go to http://www.foopets.com/art and make sure you are following the guidelines or your art may be rejected:).  As you all know we do not have an artist on staff yet, so this is the next best thing until then!  

Now here is a recap of where we are with things:

-Instacare All is finally fixed thanks to our diligent engineers who worked tirelessly to get this fixed, this took a long time and we know you guys were really patient so thank you to all of you!  We have seen some instances where FooBabies who are not bonded are showing red bars as well as FooPets who need Flea Treatments so please make sure neither of these is the case if your instacare all is not working and please let us know in support if you have troubles.  

-FooMart is fixed 

-Kennel Issues – were related to instacare all issues and seem to be fixed as well

-Recent Forums Post Button  – was turned back on yesterday due to popular demand

-Things we are still working on (See August FooNews for details)

1. Ledger Issues
2. FooStudio/Decorator/FooFoto issues
3. Arcade
4. Friends list/Meebo issues
5. Play page error codes
6. Conception acceleration issues

The last two months have been very busy, but very positive for our FooCommunity.  We have had lots of new members, and our members on the East Coast survived the big storm as far as we know; however everyone please keep those still without power in your thoughts.  We had some major server issues on the East Coast due to the storm and we want to thank you all for your patience while we were doing the best we could to keep things running smoothly!

Google Chrome has been the recommended browser for FooPets for a long time, with that being said we are still saying this is the best browser, however when the new update came out we are hearing of some issues so hang in there or try another browser if you have troubles.  We are hoping Google will release a patch for whatever is causing these issues very soon.  As always, clearing your cache and history regularly will help:).  Adobe Flash also released an update recently, so be sure you are updating that as well if you are having issues with your browser(Google Chrome updates this automatically when you update Chrome).

We are still hearing complaints of flagging being abused, just a reminder to make sure you are using that appropriately.  

We also have had high demand for an adult only forum lately, we want you to know we welcome members of all ages here in our FooCommunity however having all ages makes it challenging to keep things child appropriate.  We hear you when you ask for an adult only forum, however at this time that is considered a feature request and we will not look into this until the issues are fixed.  We are not saying yes, we are not saying no, but we are saying not now:).  Hope that helps clear things up at least for now!

Now, questions have been asked as to where we are heading and what our goals are as far as FooPets Management.  For right now, our goals are to fix the site and all the glitches as they have been since March.  We are not focusing on Facebook applications or mobile sites until this site is up and running very smoothly.  At that time we will regroup and discuss what our members want and how we can best fulfill those needs.  Our goal is to be here for you guys, to listen, to react, and to provide a better place for all – children and adults alike!  If we start focusing on where we are going before we fix the site, we would be essentially building our house on the sand instead of a solid foundation.  That being said, please keep your suggestions coming in the forums and know that we are taking notes and making lists for when that day comes.  For now though, as we have stated before, feature requests and upgrades will remain a list until we can get things fixed and running smoothly.  We have also learned it is not a good idea to announce changes – until those changes are ready to be released as you can all agree with I am sure:).  Again, thank you for your patience for this big news and rest assured we will always be listening and working hard to make this a great place for all our members!

Have a great weekend everyone, we cannot wait to see your art and get some new things in the mart!

Filed under: Uncategorized | Comments Off on November FooNews

Well it is back to school for some of you, we hope you are off to a good school year!  We have made some pretty big changes at FooPets this month, two big changes by popular demand:

• Opened up the Mart
• Lowered the FooTax to 25%

Initially, some helpful reminders especially with all the changes.  Please remember to clear your cache and history regularly, as FooPets has heavy graphic content this becomes really important so if you are having issues make sure you try this first.  Also, Google Chrome remains as the best browser to use with FooPets because it automatically updates your Adobe Flash when it updates.

Just now, Dr. Ron has posted the new Rules of Conduct so be sure you review those!  The biggest change will be the pet limit, you are now only allowed to trade for up to 10,000 FooDollar resale.  The reason for this is that some members were abusing the site to obtain FooDollars to obtain their dream pet because of the prices skyrocketing so we are hoping this cuts down on the abuse of the site to obtain their dream pet.  This will also put dream pets into the realm of possibility for those who may not otherwise have a chance at buying their pets.  So if you are trading for more than 10,000 FD resale, you will get two warnings before your social features are suspended for a period of time.

Offensive language, you will only get one warning for this so be careful and watch what you say:). Please remember we are not out to get anyone you guys, we only want to keep the site safe for children.

On to more exciting news!  The FooDollar glitch we were concerned about is now fixed thanks to our wonderful engineers.  If you are doing a trade and it sounds too good to be true, please double check with support on duplicate item trades especially if those items have purchase limits we are still investigating the abuse of this glitch but you should be able to resume normally unless it seems wrong, go with your gut and double check with support in that case.  

Also, as of today FooAmbassadors will consider resetting flags on posts for you on a case by case basis.  This is due to popular demand because we have some flagging fairies out there harassing some members.  If you are in a situation where you need to edit your post in the forums, please contact an Ambassador.  They are very busy and will consider it, it is entirely up to them which ones they would like to help with.  Please do not abuse this privilege and only contact them if necessary.  Please remember to flag appropriately, this is against the rules and we have our ways of finding out who is doing it.  Your current list of Ambassadors are:

Parrotlady  

MissX-tine

Remsie

Rozzy22

Sophiemom1 

We should have some more news for you to come, the big announcement we referred to is still in the works, so hang tight and everyone enjoy bonfire weather!

Filed under: Uncategorized | Comments Off on September FooNews

We hope you all have had a very good summer!  We know you are wondering what is going on, so here is an update for you:)

First of all, some things that we have worked on and fixed since we took over in March:

-The ledger was not viewable some times, some times you only saw one days transactions – fixed

-Some members were experiencing negative FooDollars – fixed

-Bonding Badges were glitching and going away for no apparent reason – fixed

-Unicorn Room – this was our mistake but it was addressed and resolved

-Gifting Glitch was abused and we caught several members cheating and fixed this

-Site crashes – we had database issues and server issues that were addressed and still having some database errors but it’s getting a whole lot better:), servers have been responding great for months now:)

-Bonding bars were not refilling

-Ambassador changes

-Care history not showing at all – fixed

These are just a few of the things we have addressed, this does not include day to day individual support issues and individual engineer requests.  So now here are some things we are working on now:

-Instacare all – seems to be working but taking longer than it should, this is a big fix that is tied to lots of code throughout the entire site – so we are hoping that with the other fixes the issues will be resolved.  

-Ledger Issues – sometimes not adding correctly but the totals are correct eventually, seems to be a delay there have been a few instances where it did not credit correctly but very few members are experiencing this if you look at the totals they seem to come out alright:)

-FooStudio, Fotos, and Decorator Issues – these have been going on since FooMojo days when they linked the decorator to the play page so this is very old code and we are working on many issues with these areas and we welcome your feedback on the forum thread here: http://www.foopets.com/topics/show/2346709?forum_id=6&page=1

-Arcade – we are having some issues with yarn barn, very few reports but if you have any feedback for us please contact support.foopets.com

-Meebo Friends lists – we are in communication with Meebo about this, sometimes not all friends are showing up on list

-FooMart – We currently do not have an artist on staff, and we are a thin crew – so we are working on getting some new items released from the mart however this is a time consuming project so thank you for your patience we know you are excited!  

Those are the big items we are focused on for now.  We always welcome your feedback and suggestions at support.foopets.com, however we are hoping to fix these items before we start adding new features:).

With all of this being said, we do have some good news!  We are actively in communication with a new engineer as we are releasing this announcement, a very talented coder who will hopefully be jumping in to help our engineers get some of these items fixed for you guys!  We are here to help you all, and we are excited to see what comes next!  Have a very happy FooDay, and as always thanks for playing! 

Filed under: Uncategorized | Comments Off on August FooNews

What a fast four months!  This summer has brought many new members, puppies, and kitties.  We would like to let you guys know you have been absolutely amazing through the first half of this year with all the glitches you have made the choice to be positive and we appreciate your patience and kind words of support:). 

We want to recognize the following blog as being such an inspiration to us in support, to hear the kindness spreading in the Random Acts of Kindness Blog just makes us smile.  It is because of this spirit, that FooPets will continue to grow and be a positive place for everyone to come and play.

Dr. Ron and our engineers continue to work on instacare all as well as the ledger delays/addition problems and we have been trying to identify the issues with the FooStudio and Decorator so please add your comments if they have not been noted on this blog already!  The problem with instacare and the ledger issues, seems to be a very large coding issue that could take a long time to fix.  We understand you are really hoping to have this fixed soon, and we hope it has at the very least been working much better.  It will still have its moments and times of high traffic so thank you for your patience!

In conclusion, we hope you and your pets are staying cool out there!  This heat has been dangerous to pets across the country so as a reminder we wanted to share this fantastic article from the ASPCA on how to protect and care for your pets in this heat.

Thanks for playing, and don’t forget our daily contests in the forums, this is a great way to make some extra FooDollars as well as make new FooFriends.  We have really enjoyed getting to know you guys through these contests, and special thanks to your ambassadors for making these contests happen!  If we had tails, we would be wagging them for you!

The FooCrew:)

Filed under: Uncategorized | Comments Off on FooNews and Random Thoughts for July

Hi Everyone!

We hope all of you are having a great month so far! We wanted to say that the FooCrew has had an interesting May so far, and we are so thankful to all of you who played fairly. You have helped us to make sure that glitches like the gifting glitch do not get abused and mess things up with the FooCommunity or FooEconomy again. We especially want to thank all of you who realized why we had to do this, and supported us along the way. We also would like to point out that we noticed the cheating was also bogging the site down tremendously, and actually caused the site to crash a couple of times while we were working on it. That being said, on to new and positive topics!

Good news! We are working on some old user submitted items, and we are hoping to release some very soon to the FooMart. We are listening, and we are very excited about bringing some new items back! We released a couple of items a few weeks ago, only to find out that those had glitches as well. It has been a lot of work to research items and make sure they are ok to play with so we don’t disappoint you with new but broken items. For those of you who bought the cozy living room and sandy beach, they should now be working for you:).

We would also like to update you on the latest issues and some advice for now. Although the list is still very long of things we need to fix, instacare all is still on our radar. For now, please continue using the individual instacare buttons next to your pet lists on the play page until we can correct this. We know we have been saying we are working on it for a very long time, and it is frustrating for you all to hear this over and over again. It is a massive script, with lots and lots of ways to work on it, and lots and lots of other things that affect it so please know that this could take quite a while to fix completely and we are still working like crazy to get it fixed for you all!

Another big issue is the ledger calculations, this is another huge script that could take some time as well. Please know it is our hope to have both of these things fixed just as soon as we can but it is very complicated to fix, test, fix, retest, fix, and on and on and on. As always, checking your ledger is a good idea, and be sure and refresh the page when buying multiple of the same items. If you did not get charged or were over charged, support is there to help you with it at support.foopets.com

There are lots of other items on the list, we are listening and we are here to help. Thank you again for your patience, we care about you all and we hope you will be as excited as we are to see some new items released from the FooMart soon.

We hope you all have a really good Summer! As always, thank you for playing – we love you all!

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