It seems that you're using an outdated browser. Some things may not work as they should (or don't work at all).
We suggest you upgrade newer and better browser like: Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer or Opera

×
Activity Feed • Gameplay Stats • Personalization


UPDATE: We've added a new option to the Privacy settings in GOG Profiles - from now on you can turn off your profile on GOG entirely, so no one can see any kind of information that is shown on the profile page. This also means that when you turn off your profile, you won’t be visible on your friends’ friends lists, even if they decide to keep their profiles visible.
The option to enable/disable your GOG Profile can be found in your account „Privacy & Settings” options, under „Privacy” tab.



We just introduced a new feature on GOG.COM: User Profiles – a social way to share what you and your friends are up to. See what your friends on GOG are playing, achieving, and sharing across four sections – Feed, Profile, Games and Friends.

Your Feed is the centerpiece of your Profile. Here, you’ll see which games your friends have been playing, all sorts of achievements and milestones, as well as general thoughts, screenshots, and forum activity. You can dispense your approval at whim and share your own stuff as well!

Your Profile is all about you and your gaming accomplishments. It's a summary of your activity, like the time you've spent in your games , your latest achievements (and just how rare they are among other users), as well as a glimpse at what your most active friends have been up to.

If you want to know more about your Games, you need to hit the the third tab. It contains a list of all the games you own on GOG, together with stats like time spent in-game and your progress towards unlocking the achievements. Sort the list, compare stats with your friends, and get some healthy competition going.

Finally – your Friends: get a general summary of their achievements and hours played. Here you'll also see which games are the most popular among your friends right now, so you can join them in multiplayer or find something you might enjoy yourself.

Of course, your profile comes with some sweet personalization options, choose a wallpaper from your game collection and share a few words with the world.

User Profiles are available for all GOG.COM users. Your personal gameplay stats like achievements, time played and milestones depend on GOG Galaxy, but if you’re not using the optional client you can still use the feed, post in it and interact with your friends.

Launching profiles also means adding new privacy settings on our end. You'll find three new Privacy options in your account's „Privacy & settings” area. These settings allow you to set the visibility for your profile summary, your games, your friends, etc.
So what are you waiting for? There's so much room for activities!
avatar
elcook: It's for both. If you disable your profile, it won't show up on your friends' list in the Profile tab (short list of recent active friends), nor on the Friends tab.
avatar
HypersomniacLive: Any chance for a reply to this post of mine? And in case it doesn't link correctly:

Does a disabled profile also exclude one from friend recommendations? And if not, shouldn't it? Otherwise the friend recommendation feature, which is based on non-mutual friends of common friends, defeats the purpose of all the above, doesn't it?
The visibility setting does that. Profile disabling is about disabling the profile functionality.
low rated
people are still at this
1. gog can do what every they like since it's there company
2 gog didn't have to do this
3. they where kind enough to add a private option
4. you actually have no say on public/private profiles since your using there system/company so accounts and everything belongs to pretty much gog..

also for social means

adjective
1. relating to society or its organization.
synonyms: communal, community, collective, group, general, popular, civil, public, societal

noun
1. an informal social gathering, especially one organized by the members of a particular club or group.

so yes forums could actually fit there since it's a community of people since we talk about gog, tech, off topic stuff...

also i recommend people reading these https://support.gog.com/hc/en-us/articles/212632089-User-Agreement & https://support.gog.com/hc/en-us/articles/212632109-Privacy-Policy just so they know what they signed up for
high rated
avatar
KnightW0lf: people are still at this
1. gog can do what every they like since it's there company
2 gog didn't have to do this
3. they where kind enough to add a private option
4. you actually have no say on public/private profiles since your using there system/company so accounts and everything belongs to pretty much gog..
I mean....
1. Being able to do something doesn't mean you should do it.
2. They didn't, but they did.
3. They were, but it was/is poorly-implemented.
4. This is part of the whole reason people came here instead of Steam and other companies, to get away from companies who just do whatever to you, so it's natural that this group of people would be pissed.
high rated
avatar
KnightW0lf: 1. gog can do what every they like since it's there company
They are bound by EU laws so no they cant.

avatar
KnightW0lf: 3. they where kind enough to add a private option
(I dont believe it was "kindness" which made them add it.)

avatar
KnightW0lf: 4. you actually have no say on public/private profiles since your using there system/company so accounts and everything belongs to pretty much gog..
Whether it "belongs" to GOG or not - they are not entitled to make personal information publicly available - see the point about EU laws.

avatar
KnightW0lf: also i recommend people reading these https://support.gog.com/hc/en-us/articles/212632089-User-Agreement & https://support.gog.com/hc/en-us/articles/212632109-Privacy-Policy just so they know what they signed up for
In EU TOSs/EULAs and similar stuff have limited power. They also have cool quotes like "We respect your right to privacy" in there so no - this did not at all tell us that GOG would suddenly show previously private information to the public.
0
avatar
mike_cesara: Of course it should be fixed. The Paygate would be enough to prevent bots from down/uprepping accounts but I'm not going to start that war again ; p
avatar
gamesfreak64: True... and war is never fun ( maybe only in a game)

I found this video on youtube while looking for old fallout 1+2 videos :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amtsN-NRqwM
Why Fallout Isn't Fallout - 20th Anniversary Analysis | Interplay vs. Bethesda's Fallout

(...)
Thank you for the link gamesfreak64!
Very good video I can tell you. Personally I always considered first and later Fallout's as completely different games. I had much more fun playing first two than F3 (which I started twice and never finished the story..). I believe changes were made to bring more customers (money) to the title and because of the first person view and limitation of the engine, weren't very fortunate.. From what I saw I am not interested in the latest title at all.
I'd add to the recommended titles under the video Planet Alcatraz, sadly not yet available on GOG.

We are at war here all the time. We were at war when Galaxy happened, when pm changed to chat, when friends shows up and so on.. I can understand someone want to keep their gaming life in secret, however, making a very bad publicity because of that seems very shortsighted, very.. Changes are necessary, otherwise we're stuck in bbs times and GOG isn't only for the very few who can manage ; p Since we want more games, we need more publishers and we can get them only if we have more customers around. I don't like the Harrison Bergeron idea but is not that bad yet, is it? ; ) I only hope we never get such a mess like on the other gaming platform..
So, GOG, no trading cards! Can you hear me?
A suggestion for the guys who are in charge of the profile/social/galaxy stuff on GOG: if someone disables achievements or playtime tracking in the galaxy client, than those things should not be displayed on his/her profile page (game list tab).

Or, at least, there should be an option to remove them completely from the profile, without making it private. I mean, it makes sense. I may want people to know what games I own, but not how much I've played them or just not if I've completed them.
Post edited May 17, 2018 by user deleted
avatar
mike_cesara: 0
avatar
gamesfreak64: True... and war is never fun ( maybe only in a game)

I found this video on youtube while looking for old fallout 1+2 videos :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amtsN-NRqwM
Why Fallout Isn't Fallout - 20th Anniversary Analysis | Interplay vs. Bethesda's Fallout

(...)
avatar
mike_cesara: Thank you for the link gamesfreak64!
Very good video I can tell you. Personally I always considered first and later Fallout's as completely different games. I had much more fun playing first two than F3 (which I started twice and never finished the story..). I believe changes were made to bring more customers (money) to the title and because of the first person view and limitation of the engine, weren't very fortunate.. From what I saw I am not interested in the latest title at all.
I'd add to the recommended titles under the video Planet Alcatraz, sadly not yet available on GOG.

We are at war here all the time. We were at war when Galaxy happened, when pm changed to chat, when friends shows up and so on.. I can understand someone want to keep their gaming life in secret, however, making a very bad publicity because of that seems very shortsighted, very.. Changes are necessary, otherwise we're stuck in bbs times and GOG isn't only for the very few who can manage ; p Since we want more games, we need more publishers and we can get them only if we have more customers around. I don't like the Harrison Bergeron idea but is not that bad yet, is it? ; ) I only hope we never get such a mess like on the other gaming platform..
So, GOG, no trading cards! Can you hear me?
I have seen videos of planet alcatraz.
Fallout 1+2 are my favorites i got tactics ( retail cd) aswell cause i played a demo years ago.


Back to war : just like the voice over in fallout said.... war never chances .... ( its the guy from Hellboy and SOA (sons of anarchy).
About trading cards: i always wondered: what is the use of trading cards? i dont need any, just like online achievements , i dont have any social media account , no twitter no facebook, i do like to reply and talk about games and reply in general topic part of forums, i use email but thats because you need it to create an account and to receive information like pw and login name, but thats about it: forum , email and a dumb steam client only to get the games.

I always look for Steam games i can zip/rar and play without the client.
If i buy agame that needs steam 24/7 to run, i 'blacklist' the dev/publisher in a note pad document to prevent buying from them: BigFish games is one big drm hugger every game published by BFG no matter who developed it, needs Steam to run to play the games so no BFG for me...



avatar
KnightW0lf: 1. gog can do what every they like since it's there company
avatar
Zrevnur: They are bound by EU laws so no they cant.

avatar
KnightW0lf: 3. they where kind enough to add a private option
avatar
Zrevnur: (I dont believe it was "kindness" which made them add it.)

avatar
KnightW0lf: 4. you actually have no say on public/private profiles since your using there system/company so accounts and everything belongs to pretty much gog..
avatar
Zrevnur: Whether it "belongs" to GOG or not - they are not entitled to make personal information publicly available - see the point about EU laws.

avatar
KnightW0lf: also i recommend people reading these https://support.gog.com/hc/en-us/articles/212632089-User-Agreement & https://support.gog.com/hc/en-us/articles/212632109-Privacy-Policy just so they know what they signed up for
avatar
Zrevnur: In EU TOSs/EULAs and similar stuff have limited power. They also have cool quotes like "We respect your right to privacy" in there so no - this did not at all tell us that GOG would suddenly show previously private information to the public.
regarding : " They are bound by EU laws so no they cant."
yes and no.... with EU you never know what direction the wind blows :D
just wait until EU = superstate ....... :D for now things look okay... but wait 5-10 years , then you can reply again on this dicussion ... its too early yet :D
Post edited May 17, 2018 by gamesfreak64
avatar
Zrevnur: In EU TOSs/EULAs and similar stuff have limited power. They also have cool quotes like "We respect your right to privacy" in there so no - this did not at all tell us that GOG would suddenly show previously private information to the public.
It's the same in the U.S. Landlords and just about any other contract you sign often will include clauses which are unenforceable by law. It just shows the ignorance of "the Internet" that people seem to think if it's written into a contract that somehow makes it law. The flip side is that too many people somehow believe that even a minor breach of a contract clause makes the entire contract invalid which isn't the case either.
avatar
Zrevnur: In EU TOSs/EULAs and similar stuff have limited power. They also have cool quotes like "We respect your right to privacy" in there so no - this did not at all tell us that GOG would suddenly show previously private information to the public.
avatar
RWarehall: It's the same in the U.S. Landlords and just about any other contract you sign often will include clauses which are unenforceable by law. It just shows the ignorance of "the Internet" that people seem to think if it's written into a contract that somehow makes it law. The flip side is that too many people somehow believe that even a minor breach of a contract clause makes the entire contract invalid which isn't the case either.
Landlords ? thats people who rent rooms/space to common 'people' ?
This happens everywhere if landlords can get a better 'deal' they will force the current tenant(s) to leave a give them x time to leave , happens even in European countries.
Lol, activity feed bubble today despite having turned off my profile back when they started giving that option.

I get the impression it's not going to go away unless I turn on the profile and go to the activity feed
Post edited May 18, 2018 by Pheace
high rated
I got a response (already some time ago) on my request to know what falls under the term "GOG services" mentioned in the privacy section of the terms of service.

The answer goes as follows:

- Yes, classic installers are part of the GOG services, so they would like to have the right to track what you do with them
- But they don't (currently). They only monitor download attempts of the classic installers and nothing beyond, unless you use Galaxy.

Now this sounds reasonable, and I would like to believe my usage of the games and classic installers is completely private and is not tracked by GOG beyond download attempts. On the other side, their behavior with the GOG profiles was so abysmal (in my eyes), that I'm not really convinced. They may change their behavior and start tracking players behavior also for users of the classic installers. Only if they would explicitly exclude this in their privacy terms I would actually believe it.

Not sure what that means for my future buying behavior on GOG. The whole thing destroyed my trust in them. I guess what I will do is giving them some probation time and if they do not screw up during that time, maybe they will be worth my trust again.

And, oh man am I happy that I never used Galaxy.
Post edited May 22, 2018 by Trilarion
avatar
Trilarion: And, oh man am I happy that I never used Galaxy.
Me too. That was a case of mistrust well placed. But at least they seem to have finally listened to customer feedback finally and have replaced the Galaxy-infested installers with a 'Try Galaxy' button with the clean classic installers being the default again.
high rated
avatar
Johny.: The visibility setting does that. Profile disabling is about disabling the profile functionality.
Has the visibility setting finally been fixed? Venom said it's broken, and he also said that GAG was working on a fix, but that was already a month ago, with no reply to our follow up on it.

Having said that, please take a moment and think about the last part of my post. Picture one's friends list as a room, adjacent to other rooms on three sides, one free side, and windows on all four walls. Each room is dark, and each friend has a spotlight over their head. There's a control panel with a main kill-switch for each friend, and a separate switch for each spotlight. The spot lights of those with a disabled profile are switched off by default, but only when one looks inside from the window on the free wall - both the main kill-switches and separate ones are off. When one looks inside from any of the other windows, then everyone's spotlight's on, even though the main kill-switch is off. And in order to prevent that, those with disabled profiles need to go to the control panel and actively switch their spotlight off.

My point is that certain aspects/parts of these social features are interlinked, and treating them as if they were completely independent makes no sense, and only leads to (more) conflicting user privacy settings; when one disables their profile they should be left out of the "let's all be friends with random people" game by default without having to fiddle with more than one privacy setting. Anything else is poor design that introduces more points of failure both at the implementation and at the user action level. The question is if all this is actually that hard to see, or if nobody thought/realised it during the design and implementation stage, and GAG's not ready to admit it, and correct the oversight.

I've already said it, I get that GAG wants these social features to succeed, but that should happen based on people willingly embracing and participating in the social game. The way they've been communicated and implemented at least hints/implies that GAG's not all that confident, and counting on people sitting on the, chosen by GAG, default p̶r̶i̶v̶a̶c̶y̶ publicity settings.


I'm probably talking to deaf ears, given the following.

When the setting to disable one's profile was introduced, I got a follow up to my support ticket, pointing me to elcook's post here. I replied to that email, and got the following respond a couple of days ago [emphasis added by me]:
Hello

Thank you for getting in touch with us regarding the new GOG.com User Profiles feature. We understand there has been a bit of commotion when the feature was launched and some confusion about how it all works under data protection law, so let us explain it:
User Profiles are intended to extend GOG users experience by adding a social way for friends to see what they are playing, achieving and sharing, help GOG users find gamers with similar tastes and more generally to build and reconnect the GOG user community. It was requested and awaited by a big part of GOG community. More details about what the feature introduces can be found at https://www.gog.com/news/introducing_gog_profiles.

With our default settings you cannot find a GOG user through an external web search (like a Google or Bing search) and there is no “search for user” function on the GOG.com website accessible for those who are not logged in.

User Profiles are totally optional. You can turn off the visibility of your User Profile at any time in your Privacy settings, which means no-one can see your profile including any information regarding your activity on GOG.com (but it also means you won’t be visible on any of your friends’ Friends List, even if they decide to keep their profiles visible).

User Profiles are part of GOG developing its services and allowing GOG users to see how they and their friends are using GOG.com, share their activity with their friends (if they choose to do so) and to connect with other GOG users. We explain more about this in our forthcoming revised Privacy Policy (you can find the English version here - http://files.gog.com/new_policies/Privacy_Policy_GOG_EN.pdf, see e.g. section 10.1).

A quick word about GDPR, which as you may have heard is a new EU data protection law coming into force soon. The User Profiles feature is compliant with GDPR since GOG is acting in what is known legally as a ‘legitimate interest’ in developing its services and making the feature available as a part of GOG.com. Therefore, it’s not legally required for users to give opt-in consent to User Profiles, but like we said it’s important that we value user choices so we have included the new Privacy settings mentioned earlier.

In short: User Profiles are a new social feature which is part of the whole GOG.com experience, it is totally optional and you can turn off the visibility of your User Profile at any time, there is more info in our Privacy Policy and it complies with GDPR data protection law.

I hope that helps and thank you for reaching out.

Regards
redacted
GOG.com Support
Remember all that forwarding of our support tickets to the appropriate department? Well, apparently it has spoken, and this is GAG's official (canned) reply/stance on the matter - it all falls under "legitimate interest", so public is the default, and whoever doesn't like it can opt-out after the fact; simple, isn't it?




avatar
Trilarion: I got a response (already some time ago) on my request to know what falls under the term "GOG services" mentioned in the privacy section of the terms of service.

The answer goes as follows:

- Yes, classic installers are part of the GOG services, so they would like to have the right to track what you do with them
- But they don't (currently). They only monitor download attempts of the classic installers and nothing beyond, unless you use Galaxy.[...]
[emphasis added]

Is this GAG's actual response, or are you paraphrasing? If the latter, I'd be interested in the exact wording regarding the part I highlighted - is it "they'd like to have the right", or "they have the right, just don't act on it (yet)"?
Post edited May 23, 2018 by HypersomniacLive
high rated
avatar
HypersomniacLive:
Very well stated, thank you.

I am amazed that GOG can say this:

'it’s not legally required for users to give opt-in consent to User Profiles"

The users in question are not even informed that they have a profile and that it is, to all intents and purposes, public. It is so easy to create a GOG profile that saying that only logged-in users can see the profiles is just a cop-out, but clearly a nice legal loophole they have found.

I have been inundated with emails from companies regarding giving my consent to various things in view of the GDPR laws, but never received any official notice from GOG, presumably because I am not subscribed to their emails.
Think of the hundreds or thousands who don't even know about this profile and that their information is on public display.

And even if GOG are right, and this is legal, it is not moral or ethical, and they know how their core users feel about it.

Not impressed with GOG's attitude at all.
Post edited May 24, 2018 by ZenWan
avatar
ZenWan: I am amazed that GOG can say this:

'it’s not legally required for users to give opt-in consent to User Profiles"

The users in question are not even informed that they have a profile and that is is to all intents and purposes, public. It is so easy to create a GOG profile that saying that only logged-in users can see the profiles is just a cop-out, but clearly a nice legal loophole they have found.

<snip>

And even if GOG are right, and this is legal, it is not moral or ethical, and they know how their core users feel about it.
Not being a lawyer but: I dont believe GOG is correct here. Simple reason being that they are bound by all (for the respective customers only though) national EU laws. Many of which differ obviously. So even if that is compliant with the new EU law then it can still easily run afoul of one or more national laws.
And: Based on my (limited) knowledge anything misleading (their quotes about respecting my privacy but then making my profile public by default without even notifying me properly if at all) does not hold up in EU. So even if it holds up to privacy laws it may still run afoul of ToS/EULA laws.
(And obviously they are never going to express any doubt whatsoever about the legality of their own offerings or actions.)


Edit: Just to make clear: I also dont believe what they are doing is compliant with the new EU privacy laws.
Post edited May 23, 2018 by Zrevnur