The other day I noticed that the hundreds of messages you guys had sent to me in the past few months through the Nabaztag bunny widget on my blog had disappeared. At first I thought that it was a problem with the Nabaztag web site, a visual glitch, surely they could not have deleted them? For a web application, deleting user's data without copious amounts of notice is tantamount to shooting yourself in the foot repeatedly while yelling, "Hey, look at how unbelievably stupid I am, I don't deserve to be in business!"
Unfortunately, deleting the messages is exactly what Nabaztag did.
Here's the first response they sent to my support email:
When they are not played again, archived messages are stored for a two months period. We will now extend this period to 6 months (and also explain this rule on the website).
We really do apologize for the inconvenience.
Firstly, this is not an inconvenience. An inconvenience is your site being down for a couple of hours. Deleting people's data without informing them is a very serious matter.
Furthermore, a great number of the messages that were deleted were less than two months old. So I emailed them again and received this response:
Ok, you were refering to messages sent through the API. These only have a lifetime of one day. I'm sorry, but we cannot provide more time for these messages as they can reach (as in your case) a huge volume.
I don't know which is worse, that they delete messages after one day without telling people or that they are so dumb as to save the MP3s of the messages instead of just the text. If they did the latter, they wouldn't have a storage issue. Instead, they choose to give fuck all respect to their user's data and delete their messages.
And, contrary to what their support department maintains, it has not always been this way. My archive had hundreds of messages and none of them were deleted until the whole lot was deleted in one go the other day. They just decided to implement this policy one day and delete people's messages without even the common courtesy of giving us any warning so we could back things up.
This sucks, Nabaztag. And yes, I'm angry.
Some of you put a lot of effort into sending my some amazing messages and I was looking forward to featuring the best ones on this blog. Now they're all lost.
Nabaztag, I strongly urge you to reverse this ridiculous policy and start respecting your user's data.
Until Nabaztag wakes up, if you're using the Nabaztag API or receiving messages on your Nabaztag that you care about preserving, either have the online interface email you (so you have a backup) or save the messages in your own database before making the API call.
I personally apologize from any of you who sent me bunny messages through my widget for not backing them up and safeguarding them better. Like a fool, I trusted Nabaztag. Unlike Nabaztag, I place a great deal of importance on your creativity, time, and effort, whether in leaving me a comment on my blog or sending me witty bunny messages to brighten up my day. (And I really loved some of the clever messages you guys sent to me over the past few months.)
Nabaztag may not be sorry, but I am.
Update: I got another email this morning and it looks like things are changing. Here's what it reads:
I think I have some good news for you.
**None of your messages have been deleted.**
They are all stored, not in your received messages, not in the archived one, but in your sent messages (when using the API, you're the one sending the messages). Go to the website in the 'Sent' tab and you should see them all.
In the future I would also recommend you to turn on the e-mail notification of messages, so that you have also a copy of your messages in your e-mail (oh wait, you already did this).
Well this is a relief. I'm not entirely certain but I don't believe they were there yesterday. I am definitely sure that that's not where they used to be so this is the result of some change at some point (they used to go in the Received messages and I could archive them, in which case they would appear under the archived messages.) In any case, I'm just happy to have my messages back and now I'm going to manually go through 476 pages of messages to copy them for safekeeping. Don't you want my job?
It would be great if Nabaztag could confirm what their latest policy is with regards to messages so that we know and can plan accordingly, especially when building applications that use the API. It is in their interests to keep the messages (as text, not MP3s) indefinitely as it will also mean that people use their web site instead of using other people's sites to manage their messages in the long term.
Update: Well, I just made it to page 30 of 476 and my arms are tired from all the copy and pasting from their web site into Numbers. Can we please have a feature to back up/export these messages? Even if it's just a single page that dumps them all at once so we can copy and paste. This is going to take hours otherwise.
Update: Looks like Nabaztag's support has come through in the end. Franck from the Nabaztag Infirmary just sent me an Excel file with all the messages from the API. Thanks -- that's saved me a few hours of copy and paste! 
The Nabaztag just deleted all your bunny messages. article by Aral Balkan, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0 UK: England License.
this is just electronics toys^^…..
Hmm, maybe it is time to start again with my NabAIR application, with a feature: “save received messages”. You’re right about the policy, it just sucks, can’t understand they delete the messages because of storage problems. It is just text!
That must be the most stupid reason i’ve EVER heard.
We’re in a modern time of ‘large hard discs’. You can get giant hard disk for no price.
A corporation like Nabaztag surely can put down some money on investing into harddrive-space.
Needless to repeat that it is just ‘text’…
But Ok: Maybe business is going bad and they can’t invest in stuff like this(would’nt be weird if sticking to a policy like this )…
But deleting data from users
a) without backing up
b) without notifying people in advance
c) without telling them at all
That must be the most redicoulas policy i’ve ever seen.
Anyway, Aral: I think people reading your blog will understand, and you’ll get plenty of new messages.
Thinking: Is it mentioned anywhere in their policy they might do that?
Storing MP3s instead of text? Deleting content without warning? Limiting API-driven content to a single day?!
Can you imagine if Google Maps saved each individual user’s map queries in a full-bitmap format? Can you imagine if your GMail only lasted 2 months and then was gone? Can you imagine if Flickr deleted uploaded photos (which I ONLY do via API) after 24 hours?!
This company has no business operating in the Web 2.0 world.
The part that strikes me is that they appear to be pointing out that “in your case” you’ll end up using all their disk space. Besides the fact that it’s not that much data, it’s a customer like you that they should be happy to have. Not complaining when you actually use the service.
I think it’s the right tact to offer them the sincere advice that they change their misguided ways. We’ll see how they react.
Deleting messages like that definitely sucks. I hope they wise up and follow a more sane policy.
Although i was a bit surprised that you didn’t make a copy of the messages when sending them through the API in the first place.
Can you download messages in MP3 format then store it to a remote server and then schedule-stream them to your Nabaztag? It is good as a backup solution.
Definitely more than an inconvenience. I think it qualifies as ‘Denial of service’, since they did this without warning and we, the consumers, were not given the opportunity to arrange for the safe archiving of our valued data.
Luckily, I had clicked the email option and thus been archiving the messages sent to my wabbit, so I’m not affected by this ridiculous policy. In fact, I looked up the law. So I looked in the Data Protection Act 1998, Section 14: Rectification, blocking, erasure and destruction; Subsection (5) says:
(5) Where the court makes an order under subsection (4) it may, where it considers it reasonably practicable, order the data controller to notify third parties to whom the data have been disclosed of the rectification, blocking, erasure or destruction.
Nabaztag, being the “Data Controller” have failed in the provision to notify the third parties of data erasure. So lets say that a friend sends me a message on my Nabaztag and then dies prior to the message being deleted without notification from the data controller. Now I consider it to be a matter to take to court, since I feel that the message I was sent was the last time my dear friend had been in contact with me and thus the court orders the data controller to notify third parties of the ‘erasure’. They have already done this, and if they cannot recover the data, then I believe I could sue for damages.
I haven’t looked in the Nabaztag smallprint, nor do I claim to be a lawyer (I just build eLearning material for them!) … but surely any data controller is obliged to notify the third parties before the erasure of data.
@James: Part of the reason I didn’t was because the Nabaztag API is part of SWX PHP and I didn’t want to tie it into a database and force people to go through the trouble of setting one up just to use it.
Boo sucks! Aren’t you using the paid version of the service as well, Aral? That double sucks. If they can’t factor the cost of data storage into their pricing structure then that’s hardly your problem. Grr.
What a huge hassle for you! I’m sorry your messages got deleted I sent you one the other day.
Is there a widgetized public version of that sweet Bunny Talk widget you have on this page in the right hand column?
I would love to embed it under my lifecasting bunny.
Pouvez-vous imaginer si Google Maps enregistrées chaque utilisateur de la carte requêtes dans un plein format bitmap? Pouvez-vous imaginer si votre GMail n’a duré que 2 mois, puis avait disparu? Pouvez-vous imaginer si supprimé Flickr photos téléchargées