morozco420: Just checked, feeds aren't up.. for me anyways.
Ok.. instead of answering individual posts and stuff.. to make an even larger wall of text, I'm just gonna write stuff here.
In my opinion (this is based off what I've seen other users say they liked and didn't like), it would make more sense and be easier if the new tool bar was at the top of the page. Like in the space between the avi and towns map. Why there? Because instead of clicking to another part of the site just to get to it, it'll be at the top all the time. THEN they could get rid of some of the other links and make it so NOT pointless. Plus I think people, especially the ones looking to see the "cute little icons" back, happy as well. Instead of giving off a "we didn't know what to do with this, so we'll shove it down here" look.
Also, I know a lot of people have talked about customizable skins.. a good idea, but probably not gonna happen for a long time. You keep talking customizable.. "It'll be great when we can!" but I haven't heard or seen any of the mods affirm this. So until that time, I can't find you creditable and agree, You're argument is pretty much invalid. :/
Customizable, yes, I agree with you full 100%, things SHOULD be. But I don't think they will be, at least.. not anytime soon. Yes.. they should work on making the site better and easier to navigate so it'll attract more 11 and 12 year olds, that's fine. But while before they even add new things, they should make sure at least some of the bugs from the last thing they updated are fixed.. Or at least, know that your newest update is gonna work and people actually like it before throwing it out there.
-shrug- Just my opinion.
What I feel people are upset about is that they're gonna be watched without an option to stop it, Yes, YOU don't have that problem, but how many people on here can you honestly say don't add friends like you do? I can guarantee you, not that many. What's more, why would they make an update to the site that's not even working yet? PLUS the option to have it turned off isn't even integrated into it all yet. Where's the sense of security there? I can see why a lot of people are angry about that.
I'm gonna go out on a limb here.. I think it would be a good idea to take thread subscriptions, guild subscriptions and put it there on the My Gaia page. Awesome, so it'll all be there on one easy to access page instead of looking all over for them. (Which you don't really have to do anyways.. but we'll just say here for the sake of argument.)
Now for the feeds, instead of seeing what your friends are doing on a continuous loop of creepy stalker-isms, why not... I dunno. Actually I can't think of anything that NEEDS a feed. Problem is, if you do a marketplace feed, they're hardly accurate all the time. We have people botting, hacking and scamming, that use the market place to get their gold to different accounts. We also have people purposely making items increase in price for a day or two just to screw with people.
So why have a feed of inaccurate details?
Maybe a feed of threads? But then that would get the question, what threads? We have CB, GD, ED, ect ect... unless THIS is customizable, it would also serve no purpose and just show a random jumble of confusion.
You keep saying the point isn't copying... well then, if there's no point to it, why do you think so many are upset? There's a way to take an idea and make it your own, without taking the exact idea and making it look exactly like someone else.