Cancelling my EA account, part 3.

Kapil's working late.

I've just had another reply. It again COMPLETELY IGNORES almost the entirety of my previous mail. Then it contradicts what has already been said. Then it asks me for information I have already provided.

Hello again Governmentyard,
Thank you for Contacting Electronic Arts.
If you want then we can disable your account but you have to verify the gamer tag linked to it so please provide us the name of the gamertag associated with it. Then we will disable your account manually from our end.
NOTE: We can not delete the account permanently but we can disable it.
Should you have any further questions, please take a moment to review our Knowledge Base site at http://help.ea.com or do let us know.
Sincerely,
Kapil
Electronic Arts – World Wide Customer Experience

I'm looking for replies to this one - in my position, would you

A: Tell them my gamertag. Again. Let them 'disable' the account and hope that that guards me from fraud and removes me from any obligation towards their Terms of Service, or...

B: Find some other means of contacting people within EA.

Please explain your reasoning in the comments section below. My brain doesn't work anymore.

Cancelling my EA account, part 2

I have received a reply within a couple of hours this time. Sadly, it makes no sense whatsoever and the standard of English has slipped somewhat.

Hello Governmentyard,
Thank you for Contacting Electronic Arts.
I am sorry but as the date of birth is still not matched, So we are unable to delete your account without verify the account.[sic] If you still wish to delete your account permanently then in this case I only suggest you to please contact privacy_policy@ea.com for further assistance.
Hope this information help you to resolve your issue.[sic]
Should you have any further questions, please take a moment to review our Knowledge Base site at http://help.ea.com or do let us know.
Sincerely,
Kapil
Electronic Arts – World Wide Customer Experience.

The interesting thing here is that privacy_policy@ea.com is the address I was asked to write to some three messages ago. The response I got last time I contacted that address was from.... guess who? I'm, now convinced that Kapil is a fairly shady character, certainly not the sort of person I've ever kept working for me for long when employing people with access to personal data. As such I have penned the following response:

Kapil,

I am becoming increasingly irritated with your evasive responses to my reasonable requests. You are asking me to contact privacy_policy@ea.com but this is the email address I was asked to contct originally. I did so and the response I got, together with all responses since have been from you, Kapil. From this I can conclude only two things... either you are trying to wash your hands of my case, or you are not in fact working wherever the email address privacy_policy@ea.com is supposed to go and have somehow intercepted my correspondence. I shall assume the former is the more likely of the two, despite EA's poor record for data security in recent times.

I must insist, Kapil, that you now attend to the following points, which I will number to ensure you can methodically work your way through them as you have demonstrated yourself to be either incompetent or unwilling to reply to the whole of an email, ignoring at each turn some significant part of my correspondence, presumably in the hope that it will become someone else's problem.

1:  EA have inaccurate information stored about me, as you have confirmed. This is a breach of the Data Protection Act 1998. This must be corrected by EA as a matter of legal obligation. As the person within your organization notified in regard to this matter, you must take steps to ensure the correct information has been recorded. This may involve finding out who is in charge of such matters and forwarding the correct information to them. You could tell me how to do this once you've found out, however it would take the same amount of time to do this without bothering me further so I suggest that is the course of action you take. It does not involve ignoring the issue, just so we're clear on that.

2: Does EA acknowledge that I do not agree with the Terms of service as detailed on your website and as such should not be forced to continue in a relationship with EA, particularly given that I am not a customer, have formally requested that you cease providing any service to me and have no intention of using your companies products again.

3: I require the contact details for your head of department, specifically their telephone number, postal and email addresses. I do not expect to be fobbed off with a generic phone number, physical address or email address.

I look forward to your prompt, complete and legally compliant response to these points.

Governmentyard 

I think we can safely assume that this is probably going to end up with me making a subject access request under the DPA, can't we?

Are you or anyone you know employed by EA? Are you or they a reasonable person, and able to help me get this sorted somehow? I just want to cancel my account and protect myself from fraud. I am unemployed and can't afford to be the victim of financial crime, even if monies are returned to me in the end. I would even be satisfied with unlinking my XBox account from me EA account. Of course, there's no option to do this either.

Finally, would you say this situation was more Faustian or Kafkaesque? I really can't decide.

Cancelling my EA account

I am trying to cancel my EA 'account' which serves as a profile for various online gubbins. It is not proving easy. In recent times they have altered their terms and conditions so that one can seemingly only use their games in any kind of online capacity if one agrees never to take part in a class action lawsuit against the company. This comes as no surprise.

I bought Battlefield 3 last year on the basis of the promise it held. Battlefield's online multiplayer is by reputation second to none, indeed I was able to get a good few weeks entertainment out of it before the multitude of annoyances, bugs and poor performance by EA servers led me to sell this title and reconsider my involvement with the company.

Having sold Battlefield 3, I went to the 'Battlelog' website to delete my profile, as I like to keep a tidy internet presence and not have any details logged with any organisation whose services I do not use. I quite like my privacy and despair of how much these companies feel they need to know about me before they'll let me use their service. For example, they always want to know my date of birth. I, like half the internet, give them 1/1/19somepointintimethatmakesmeblatantlyanadult on the date of birth selection form. We'll come back to this point in a paragraph or two. Needless to say, they don't need to know my precise birthday because it's not relevant in any way shape or form so I don't tell them it. I get birthday emails all year from various websites. It's vaguely amusing, for spam.

I go onto the Battlelog website, which collates and presents all the stats about how crap I am at online FPS games and puts them in a pretty pie charts and so on, looking for the 'my account' section. You know the drill, log on, go into settings, find the 'delete profile' or equivalent option, click it, get the 'are you sure?' dialogue warning that if you delete your account, it'll not be there anymore, click yes, get taken to a page explaining why having an account is super awesome, scroll down, consider the benefits very carefully, click 'Yes, definitely delete my account', read the next 'are you sure?' dialogue, click yes, receive confirmation email regarding account deletion, make tea, get on with life. It's a dance to which we all know the steps.

There's no option to delete my account. 

I go onto the Origin site, the EA store from which I've never bought anything. There is no option to delete my account.

I go onto the EA website. There is no option to delete my account. 

I look in the EA terms of service and am told:

10. Cancellation of your Account

You have the right to cancel your Account or a particular subscription to an EA Service at any time.  If you do not agree to the terms in this Terms of Service, your sole remedy is to not use EA Services and to cancel your Account or applicable subscriptions.  You understand and agree that the cancellation of your Account or a particular subscription is your sole right and remedy with respect to any dispute with EA, including any dispute related to, or arising out of: (1) any term of this Terms of Service or EA's enforcement or application of this Terms of Service; (2) the Content and Entitlements available through EA Services or any change in Content or Entitlements provided through EA Services; (3) your ability to access and/or use EA Services and/or any Content or Entitlements thereon; or (4) the amount or type of fees, surcharges, applicable taxes, billing methods, or any change to the fees, applicable taxes, surcharges or billing methods for EA Services and/or any Content or Entitlements thereon.

Contact EA's Customer Service Department at help.ea.com, support.popcap.com (for PopCap products) or swtor.com/support (for Star Wars™: The Old Republic) to cancel your Account.  EA reserves the right to collect fees, surcharges or costs incurred before you cancel your Account or a subscription to an EA Service.  You are also responsible for any amounts owed to third-party vendors or content providers before your cancellation.  Any delinquent or unpaid fees and other unresolved issues with EA Services must be settled before you establish a new Account.

So off I pop to help.ea.com. There's no clear instructions for cancellation that I am able to find. Maybe I'm just thick, but that doesn't preclude my right, as stated there in section 10 of EA's ToS that if I don't agree with their terms of service, which I most certainly don't, I am to stop using the service and cancel my account. Fuck knows, I've tried. I eventually end up raising a query through their support system about Battlefield 3. In it, I put the following:

 I no longer own Battlefield 3 and am informing you that I do not want an origin or battlelog account. I can find no option to delete these accounts on either the origin or battlelog website. In your terms of service I am referred to help.ea.com and cannot find any such option on this site either, nor am I able to find an email address by which to instruct you to remove all my personal details from your systems. 

Please now cancel my accounts on both sites and notify me that this has been done within the stated 24 hour period. 

Many thanks, 

Governmentyard

So far, fair enough, yes?  No. I get this back:

Hello Governmentyard,

As it turns out, the issue you contacted us related to our EA games. I’ve created a case for you with our Customer Experience department, case number <*******> and you should be receiving assistance from one of our game advisors shortly. You can also check out our FAQs, chat live or contact us by phone by going to help.ea.com.

Sincerely,

Carol

Electronic Arts – World Wide Customer Experience

Awesome. I can't wait for my confirmation that my unwanted account with the terms of service to which i d not agree has been cancelled.  But wait! Whats this? Oh, tits...

Thank you for contacting Electronic Arts.

I apologize for any inconvenience. We do not delete any EA account. We can only disable the account after verification. If you want to permanently delete the EA account please contact at "privacy_policy@ea.com". Please be informed you won't be able to access any game/codes/persona linked to that account after account deletion/disabling.

If you agree and want to continue disabling your account, please verify us the following info:

EA account e-mail:

Date of birth listed on above EA account:

EA ID/Persona (Xbox or PS3) listed on EA account:

If you have any additional questions please let us know.

Regards,

Sandeep

Electronic Arts – World Wide Customer Experience

At this point I go into my www.ea.com/profile and look at my information to see what date of birth they have written down. They haven't got one there, at all. Ho hum, must be something they started asking for after I signed up. Not to worry, here's my reply:

Sir,

Following an email from 'Sandeep' (no other name supplied) from your 'Worldwide Customer Experience' department, I hereby formally request full deletion of my account and removal of all my details from your systems. As directed by Sandeep, I enclose the following information to support you in the swift completion of this task:

EA account e-mail: *******

Date of birth listed on above EA account: There is no date of birth listed on the above account so far as I can see from the 'About Me' page.

EA ID/Persona (Xbox or PS3) listed on EA account: ******

I have now fulfilled your stated criteria for account deletion and expect this to be completed promptly.Please notify me at the above email address when this task is complete.

Yours faithfully,

Governmentyard

And then it begins...

Hello Governmentyard,

Thank you for Contacting Electronic Arts.

First, please accept my sincere apologies for any delay in responding to your query but please know that due to high volume of contacts we were unable to provide our level best to get back to you as fast as possible. I believe you would accept my humble apology for the same.

Please note that verification is required to make any changes into the account so if you want to delete your account then you need to provide the date of birth listed on it so that I can help you further in this matter.

We look forward to your reply.

Should you have any further questions, please take a moment to review our Knowledge Base site at http://help.ea.com or do let us know.

Sincerely,

Kapil

Electronic Arts – World Wide Customer Experience.

Not happy. My response:

Dear Kapil,

As per my original email, looking into my EA account profile at https://www.ea.com/profile there is no date of birth listed, so how am I able to tell you what date of birth you hold for this account?  Naturally I enter a date of birth that reflects my adult status, as most websites require one to do but I am very unlikely to share my actual date of birth for such purposes, specifically because I do not wish to hand such personal information to organizations that deliberately obfuscate the removal of my personal data from their systems, as appears to be the case with Electronic Arts.

As this is now the second email that I have sent regarding the absence of any date of birth information being listed on my profile, I suspect that I am communicating with a first-line customer service department and as such will receive stock replies to whatever correspondence I send your way. I now require direction on how to escalate this problem within your organization should I fail to be satisfied with my response to this email.

Let me be clear on what will be a satisfactory response - cancellation of my account, including a removal of any link to my XBox Live user profile 'GovernmentYard' and confirmation that I am no longer party to your terms and conditions, to which I do not agree.

Yours faithfully,

Governmentyard

And today, I get this back:

Thank you for Contacting Electronic Arts.


lease note that when ever you create an account with EA then you need to put the Date of birth on your profile so I request you to provide that date of birth which you have entered while creating this account. 


If you are unable to provide the date of birth then its not possible to assist you further in this matter. Please accept our apology for the same.

Hope you understand the situation and our support boundaries.


http://help.ea.com or do let us know.

Should you have any further questions, please take a moment to review our Knowledge Base site at
 

Sincerely,

Kapil

Electronic Arts – World Wide Customer Experience.

Effectively, here's what's happened. I've bought a game. In order to use all the bits of that game I've paid for, I need to enter details online, so I give them the minimum, because I just want to play the game I've paid for. This first game (Mass Effect 2) won't even let you start playing once booted until it has phoned home to EA and checked to see if there is anything new I might want to buy from them. EA have altered their Terms of Service to ones I do not agree with. I have been directed to cancel my account, but they don't tell you anywhere how to do this beyond the first step. Having now complied with their procedure to the best of my abilities I am being told there is no way I can cancel my account and therefore no way I can be removed from my agreement to these terms of service. That's it. The end. If further EA accounts linked to XBox accounts are hacked and mine's one of them, that's tough shit. I don't have a full friends list, I've about 75 and at least two of these people have had money stolen from them vie their EA and then in turn XBox accounts. Here's one. So, I am left with no choice but to provide y correct date of birth to EA on the off-chance that that's the one I provided at the time. Then it occurred to me... if they are storing incorrect information, they are obliged to store correct information if notified. If they accept the date I pulled out of my arse, they must equally accept the correct one and once they have that one, I' able to tell them what they already know and cancel my account....

Dear Kapil,

As I have already explained twice I cannot say what information I provided two years ago. I cannot see what you recorded as this does not appear in my account. My correct date of birth is ********  however. If this is what you have on file, can you please now after a ridiculous amount of my time wasted cancel this account, the new terms and conditions of which I DO NOT AGREE WITH.

You are required under the Data Protection Act 1988 to hold correct, up-to-date information about me and my correct date of birth, detailed above, can be accepted by EA without evidence given that EA has already proven willing to do so and would again were I to set up another account tomorrow. As such please ensure that you are compliant with the Data Protection Act 1988. I shall be submitting a Subject Access Request as per the terms of the Data Protection Act 1988 in due course if I am unsatisfied that EA is fulfilling its legal obligations in this regard.

I note that you have ignored my request in my previous email of 18/01/2012 for details of how to escalate my problem within your organisation. Why have you failed to provide me with this information?

Governmentyard.

Let's see what comes back, shall we? Regardless of whether it was appropriate for me to fudge my date of birth in the first place, I defy you to find a single human being in the world who doesn't do this, not a single company who doesn't realise that fact. To bind an unwilling customer in perpetuity to an account they don't want on that technicality is bloody disgraceful.

It's what comes out of my ears...

Bloody Steam. 

I was forced to install this in order to play a game I buy every release - Football Manager. Sports Interactive will always find some way of diminishing my enjoyment of their excellent title every year, usually connected to DRM somehow*. This year, their game Football Manager 2012 had to have Steam (a sort of games shop by Half Life creators Valve, which behaves in some very strange ways indeed) even if you bought the boxed version, or you can't play Football Manager this year at all. Unless you download it for nothing off Pirate Bay.

My assumption was that it was only one game for one year and that I could always get rid of steam in 12 months time, or at worst get a pirate copy of the game once a decent one is available and uninstall Steam that way, but to date I've complied and installed one piece of software so that I can install another, which is nonsense. 

The first problems came along very quickly. I play FM with an editor and a scout, have done for years, never with any bother. Scouts are programs that take the save file and show me information about players in it the way I tell it to, as opposed to the way the game shows them to me. It gives me control of my data. Editors come in handy when you play Garath McCleary down the wing and notice they've made him white, however these manipulate your data while it is in memory. Again, compatibility with the game version and save version is paramount. 

Steam auto-updates games, and I would fire up my game once a week to find it had been patched again, unbeknownst to me, which would then involve me having to download new versions of scout and editor each time. Laborious and unhelpful, particularly if I'm only on for a quick go. Eventually, I came to learn that even though I want to be prompted to install any update for any game on Steam, I did not have that choice, it was nowhere in the menus. Instead I have to go through game by game specifying it like Floella Benjamin trying each shaped window on Playschool. Awesome. 

In any case, I long since told Steam to leave my Football Manager game alone. This has reduced the interference of Steam to a simple minute-long delay when I click the FM icon on my desktop before it begins loading. I have no idea what Steam does during this pointless period but in a very great number of years of PC gaming (My first were HHGTTG by Infocom and Starglider) I've never known a game need to sit there doing sod all for sixty seconds before showing me so much as a splash screen. So well done on that. What has caused me to pen this sarcy little post is that today I've tried in vain to fire up FM2012 and have a couple of matches while I wait for the Forest vs. Bristol City match to begin, but apparently I can fuck off, because a big update is downloading for Football Manager. Just like I told it not to. 

Even better, the desktop icon for FM now doesn't lead anywhere. Thanks, SI! Thanks, Steam!

I've been buying Football Manager since it was called Championship Manager on the Atari ST, sixteen or seventeen years ago. I'm looking for a compelling reason not to just help myself to it in future. 

* Everything from throwing a shit-fit when I dare to try to play a CD in my CD drive to throwing a strop at what other software I've got installed (clue: none of your fucking business, whoever you are) to simply not allowing me to play until I connect to a server that isn't there. That was a great day I took off work, sat reading the pirates on the forums go on about how good the game was while the box sat forlornly on my desk like an impotent porn star.


**UPDATE** - The update was enormous and it will be a few days before they update the scout, which means that I can't progress with my game as I'm at a point where scouting is vital to what I'm trying to achieve. Even though after half an hour it has condescended to let me play my game, I still can't. 

*WINK* Yes, of course we're Christian...

Lovely David Cameron, handsome boy that he is, has commemorated the KJB 400th anniversary with a speech at Oxford where he's said the Nation is a Christian nation. Presently, a nation going apeshit about it on social networks. There's really no need. 

What people don't seem to acknowledge is that not only is he factually, statistically and historically correct, but that it's a good thing. We've got a head of church and state whom we don't choose, who is immovable and who represents us as a Nation to the world. We've got Church of England Bishops unelected in the House of Lords, voting down policies our elected representatives have placed before them and I bloody love it.

I love it because I've met fundamentalists, I've met the radical atheist left and I've had a bloody good look around the world at how religion is done elsewhere. I've also met a lot of Church of Englanders, priests and flock, and they're almost entirely harmless. Our situation at the moment is perfect. We've taken the most moderate, inoffensive, callow religion we can find and threaded it through the bedrock of our society in such a way as to prevent any other getting in there instead. Frothing Islamist Prime Minister gets elected? No worries, he's still just working for The (Church of England) Crown. And we know how many of the 72% Christians in this country ever go to church, or ever proselytise at us, compared to the evangelicals, who seem to be growing at a rate which makes me shudder.

There are a hundred wicked, cruel and divisive religions in the UK who do a much better job of harming the world we all share than the C of E. Ideally, I'd want to see a world based upon reason, where superstition holds no power (note, I didn't say has no place). In lieu of this impossible aspiration, I'll take what we've got in the UK - a wishy-washy state faith which serves as a relatively harmless umbrella for the ostensible good moral fibre the average Briton tends to espouse, whatever their mojo. 

The alternative, I'm quite certain, is an empty chair that ultimately people will fight to occupy. And that's where we'd start to really have something to complain about. Tweeters can rant about Cameron's speech all they want, but calling out a Conservative Prime Minister for saying he's moderately C of E and quoting some facts about Christianity and the Bible at an event for said things is stupid when there's evangelicals out there fronting charities to help the vulnerable when their only real goal is to fill their churches and pockets, islamists who deny their own children basic human rights, Jehovah's Witnesses who send young girls out into the world on their own at seventeen with literally no understanding of how sex works... I needn't go on, need I?

If you want an example of intelligent design, I say one could go a long way and not find a better case of something which could have been set up by a very cunning secularist than the British Church, State and Monarchy. 

God save the Queen. Because if he doesn't, I'm not sure who will be there to save the rest of us, nor what from. 

Tweetdeck - Some questions about the 'improvements'

A couple of pre-comment acknowledgements here, before anyone jumps in...

1: I know these things are all provided to me free of charge. 

2: I know I can always 'make my own' if I'm really that arsed. The twitter API is there to be used.

3: I'm still allowed to mouth off about what I think, hence this blog, so feel free to simulate me keeping my whining to myself by reading a different entry, or a different blog. 

4: Your Mum.

Right then, to business...

I loved Tweetdeck. On phone or on Chrome, it was my special beautiful naughty friend who kept me on top of everything in the most graceful and easy manner possible. This evening, I was feeling frustrated by my wife's lack of animated interest in things like galactic clouds and cosmic rays and wanted to tweet about it. I went into my studio, sat at the mainbox and went looking for my tweetdeck app icon in chrome. My eyes couldn't find it. Instead, amidst all the other, equally and uniformly light blue icons there was one of the twitter bird, with Tweetdeck written below it. 

Oh no. 

Back in May, Twitter bought Tweetdeck which is the sort of move you can feel in your balls probably isn't going to end well. I didn't fear, as many did, the integration of ads into the app but I did fear a uniformity of design being 'rolled out' across all the Twitter-owned stuff in future. The icon says it all really - Tweetdeck's little yellow bird always stood out for me, a beacon promising gibberish from my friends and others, shining out from a cluttered array of icons to welcome me into a five-minute skive over a fag or coffee when I need it most. Now, it's just the Twitter icon. Same as Twitter, which isn't the app I was using. No, I was using Tweetdeck. A different app. Not the same. Do you see? 

Different people use different things because they are different. That's the point. Here's my eight questions for the Tweetdeck crew...

1: Tweetdeck has always been a unique, individual front-end for Twitter. It had that rare commodity in modern software - a bit of what can only be described as charisma. The Yellow in this, to me, is as important to the feel of the software as the Swoosh to Nike. How far is the sprint towards homogenity going to carry you?

2: I used to love my text entry box that bestrode the screen, now I've to click an icon and do it in a popup, like some dirty boy who spends his time cruising badly designed shopping websites. Why was this change made?

3:  It is admirable that one of the features that seems to have been added  as opposed to brutally gutted from the Chrome app is the ability to have usernames or real names. Why though have you made it so that userbnames now have the @ next to them? I understand they are above the rest of the message text, but given your other bizarre formatting decisions there's a part of my brain that sees each tweet as being a reply to the person who in fact posted it, and I cant shake this off after a couple of hour's use. Was the assumption made that the 'power users' of which Tweetdeck has always been so proud are too stupid to remember they have names set to 'user' and not 'real'? - also, so many @s are a waste of space, whiuch leads me nicely into...

4:  Column wise, I have three I always want to see all of, and a fourth which didn't quite all fit on my screen. No matter, so long as I can see who the latest posts in it are from, that's space well used. Why have you prevented me from doing this now, replacing the 99.9% visible column with a completely blank space save for an arrow which, when clicked, shows me that column I could see almost all of anyway, but at the expense of the other three?

There is no rational explanation for a design choice like this. I could try and suppose it's part of a deliberate drive to dumb down the experience but I'll never attribute to shenanigans anything I can just as easily put down to stupidity. I don't want to be rude to the developers of something I've admired and enjoyed for so long but WHAT THE SHUDDERING FUCK IS THAT ALL ABOUT? Did you even realise that'd piss away nearly a quarter of the screen space for some users?

5: I've always liked the space in Tweetdeck. I could have sworn this was due to an adjustable text size function in the old version. Now I can't tell whether the default font is larger or the avatars too big or what it is, that's causing each tweet to appear cluttered, cramped and unappealing to view. Which is it?

6: Direct Messages now only show the first line of themselves, they fail to wrap onto the next line in that message's slice of the DM column. Is this a design choice or is it broken? Why do all the changes seem to involve either leaving acres of empty useless space or cramming as much as possible into too small a space?

7: The @me column seems frightfully choosy about whether it tells me I've been retweeted or not. Can I go ahead and assume this is just a bug?

8: I used to dance from column to column like a bewilderingly handsome geek Nijinsky using the tilt function of my mouse scroll wheel. It's a posh mouse I spent loads of money on, for just this sort of thing. Now I forlornly tilt it in a futile muscle-memory spasm of pain, regret and wistful longing for a fondly remembered better day. Is that what you wanted?

My response to this has been swift and measured. I'm not quitting yet but I'm sizing up my exits and putting contingencies in place. I need to track down an .apk of the Android version I'm currently using, because I must assume the next update will turn my driody Tweetdeck as pointlessly function-bereft and similar to Twitter as the Chrome one. I'm also running a couple of other clients alongside Tweetdeck just to see if they'll cut the mustard in future. 

I'm seeking a plugin for G+ that will put my Twitter streams into there somehow, and I'm looking for another web app that will do the same job as Tweetdeck. This will give the Tweetdeck boys and girls time to read angry blogs like this and consider refinements to their 'update'. I'm a patient man with anything that has proven its quality and Tweetdeck can maintain its once - untouchable status. They've got a couple of months to reintroduce the killer features.

Credit where it is due, the one place old (or proper!) Tweetdeck fell down was when I tried to bring up info on another user. This is now much improved with a popup of rare quality and useability from the little I've poked at it. Also, unlike the rest of my experience of nu-Tweetdeck, this bit runs faster than before. 

Bluffer's guide to Nottingham Forest, Part 2

Current and recent players of note

Earnie - Robert Earnshaw. Tiny Welsh striker who scored goals for fun at every club he played for except Derby County because he hates them, Earnie is a legend in his native Cardiff and very nearly one on Trentside as well. Celebrates his goals with a forward somersault and really really likes basketball. Left in the summer to finish his career at Cardiff City where he started it, a move not begrudged by Forest supporters, some of whom think we'd seen the best of him already in any case.

Chambo - Luke Chambers, current captain and partner of Wes Morgan in central defence, Chambo was brought to the club by Calderwood from both men's former employers, inconsequential Northampton Town. On form he is a steady player, good at the thing she can do and smart enough to avoid the things he can't. Off form, a crushing liability and possesses a strange allergy to the presence of Steve McClaren, the man who made him captain. Scores a lot of good headers from set pieces. You might want to make a decision about whether he is any good at right back, as that old conversational chestnut is currently en vogue once more.

Tys - Nathan Tyson, the fastest footballer on two legs recently moved to local rivals Derby with the best wishes of half the fans and cries of 'traitor' from the other half, though they're just being silly. Tys 'added pace' to a fairly immobile squad of players however this was negated by his having no peripheral vision with which to see fellow players in better goalscoring position. Was hypnotised at a young age into thinking the goal is actually in 'row z' of the stands at any given football ground. Became a legend for a while when he waved a Forest-emblemed corner flag near some Derby fans after we beat them, sparking a riot.

Lily - Robbie Savage, buck-toothed, gay-haired, self-regarding shagwit and former Derby player, current BBC pundit and celebrity ballroom dancing arse. A very able midfielder who undermined his own career by being dirtier than that redhead I went out with at college many years ago, Savage's employment by the BBC typifies their ongoing commitment to employing controversial people with nothing to say in order to generate lots of audience participation in phone-ins and web debates. No-one is impressed. It should be pointed out that he has never been a Forest player and joins this list purely by dint of his frequent mention online by Forest fans.

Non-league Nigel - Nigel Clough, son of Brain, played under his father as a striker and excelled for a number of years, becoming one of our top goalscorers of all time. Managed tiny local club Burton for ages and became Derby manager when Billy Davies took over at Forest. Has fallen out of favour with Forest fans not so much because of his job at Derby but more around his dour persona and disingenuous comments regarding a club that once adored him and would still like to, given half a chance. Doing OK at Derby these days.

Campy - Lee Camp, talismanic goalkeeper and saviour of the club many times under Billy Davies, now returning to form, he also keeps goal for Northern Ireland. If he has a bad day, the whole club has a bad day. If he has a good one, we get three points and BBC commentator Colin Fray ruptures another vocal cord.

Raddy - Radoslav Majewski - skilful Polish midfield player, scorer of occasional wondergoals. In and out of the side due to competition for a place in attacking midfield with Lewis McGugan, a skillful midfield player who scores occasional wondergoals. Feel free to join the debate over which should play... there's no right answer.

Gugs/Google/Lewis - Lewis McGugan - Radoslav Majevski with an occasional weight/workrate problem. When he scores, it is usually an 'unstoppable' shot, frequently from free kicks. Every few matches, one hears the commentator say his name after seventy minutes and you suddenly realise he's been on the pitch since kick-off.

Reidy - Andy Reid - with the build and potential of John Robertson, Reid left the club a young man and achieved little, returning this summer with a paycheck almost as big as his arse. We know he can 'do it' for us with his fancy left foot but the jury is as out as Elton John over whether he ever will.

Cohen - Chris Cohen, hardworking, talented midfielder who gets played all over the pitch, much to his detriment but needs must, sometimes. Currently out for the season with a knackered leg, he is greatly missed.

Robbie Findley - You tell us!

McGoaldrought - David McGoldrick. Striker bought at some expense by Billy Davies. Either he's got a footballing brain too quick for his team-mates to keep up with (there is some evidence for this) or he's a bit less good that Billy thought he was. Jury out. Fingers crossed.

Freeman, Bamford, Lascelles - Defender, striker, defender from the reserve/youth teams, widely considered to be utterly brilliant and the source of much debate regarding their non-inclusion in the main team even when all the senior players are being awful.

Dex - Dexter Blackstock - Striker who 'likes to attack the goal' - a popular figure with fans if not a prolific scorer, we lack another player with his repertoire of moves, which is to our detriment as he's been out for a season. Back soon though.

Moose - French midfield rhinoceros on rollerblades and/or brick wall with hammers for feet. When you hear a long 'booo' on the radio, that's the fans shouting 'Mooooooooose'. Unless it's full time, in which case we've lost and didn't try hard enough/didn't sign a left back/didn't make the right substitutions/whatever. Regarded as the only semi-fit player in the squad capable of breaking up opposition attacks before they reach the defence, he will be imperious one game and a confusing, bandy-legged mess the next. Often injured but never disliked.