Cloud variables are now only limited to 128 characters.

I just finished my cloud engine for my AI https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/204633341/
I find out it was all for naut. My AI can no longer learn anything outside of my own inputs in editor.
Another project, an RPG https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/188824419/
This will not register any new or existing players now. People's saved data is now gone or stuck.

I'm not just talking about myself; I'm talking about everyone else who used cloud variables other than some high scores. Griffpatch's multiplayer games are probably not working, other people's cloud chat bots are stuck (lucky if you have tons of saved responses prior to this update), etc… The variety of different kinds of projects are narrowed down to basically non-cloud, single-player works. The cloud projects now have to be redone in a different way, i.e: the creator has to put in all suggested response phrases; has to put in everyone's save data or create a copy/paste.
You put a wrench into the works, and halted progress.

I understand the chat room restriction. I understand the foul language concern.
But you are putting so many people who are doing good (no bad/immoral things) under confinement, lock and key.
Also, where is the trust? Scratch is mostly a friendly site. The level of toxicity here is so low, it's like the Internet is not allowed in (bc the internet is super toxic). Us cloud-users have implemented either a whitelist of what you can say or a blacklist of what you cannot say.

I was excited to come back to Scratch when I realized the potential of cloud data. Now that this happened, I'm either going to make projects I don't really care to make, or become low-activity.

Support for the reasons mentioned in your post.

Unlike some other updates that people were outraged at, and started bring it back studios for and Scratch listened to little or no feedback about the updates, Scratch actually has a valid reason this time, they can not afford the server space for large cloud variables. I would support if Scratch could afford the server space for this.

muellly wrote:

Unlike some other updates that people were outraged at, and started bring it back studios for and Scratch listened to little or no feedback about the updates, Scratch actually has a valid reason this time, they can not afford the server space for large cloud variables. I would support if Scratch could afford the server space for this.

I'm pretty sure Scratch has the server space.

dude341 wrote:

Support for the reasons mentioned in your post.

Agreed.

dude341 wrote:

muellly wrote:

Unlike some other updates that people were outraged at, and started bring it back studios for and Scratch listened to little or no feedback about the updates, Scratch actually has a valid reason this time, they can not afford the server space for large cloud variables. I would support if Scratch could afford the server space for this.

I'm pretty sure Scratch has the server space.

It's not about server space, it's about network traffic and server updates or at least that's what I've heard.

I don't support changing it back (well I do, but I understand that it isn't possible right now), but I do support fixing the error message you get. Right now if you try to set a cloudvar to a number that's too long it looks like it worked but doesn't actually send it to the server. They should make it show the same message as if you try to set it to a non-number, and not change the variable.

I think there's other, more technical reasons related to the servers, but if they can find a way around that, then you have my full support.

██       ██  ██            ██  ██       ██
██       ██  ██            ██  ██       ██
██       ██  ██     ██     ██  ██       ██
██       ██  ██     ██     ██  ██       ██
███     ███   ██   ████   ██   ███     ███
 █████████     █████  █████     █████████

Oh,kinda looks like a dupe.

Botcho_Otkho wrote:

Oh,kinda looks like a dupe.

Not a dupe. He or she is requesting special access for trusted Scratchers to use the unlimited cloud data. I'm requesting that they give it to everyone. But that may not be such a bad idea if various Scratchers are abusing it. Either way, I want it back so I can continue my projects that use it.

Jun-Dragon wrote:

Botcho_Otkho wrote:

Oh,kinda looks like a dupe.

Not a dupe. He or she is requesting special access for trusted Scratchers to use the unlimited cloud data. I'm requesting that they give it to everyone. But that may not be such a bad idea if various Scratchers are abusing it. Either way, I want it back so I can continue my projects that use it.

Sorry.

If there are no technical reasons then support

There's also a non-technical reason for this cloud update: moderation.

thisandagain wrote:

These new limits were put into place to prevent abuse of the cloud variables system that was causing it to be unreasonable to maintain, scale, moderate, and support financially. In addition, these new limits help reduce the possibility of projects like “Chat Rooms” (which are incredibly difficult for the ST to keep safe).

(emphasis added by me - source)

I love how, besides a few posts on existing user topics, this has been a completely silent update. Nice team.

Also, to heck with that “it's too difficult to maintain” excuse. Cloud variables have been working fine as is for the over four years I've been here, and haven't really had much of an issue.

And not the financial excuse either. On top of being located in a very well-known college (and still having it's subdomain, by the way!) The ST has received thousands upon thousands of dollars in donations (according to their donations page) from well-known foundations. Multiple cloud projects have been broken, and it's basically useless for more advanced projects now.

Yeah, okay, chat rooms are a thing, but I've been here over four years, and the only big ones that could be regarded as known are ones by popular and very user-friendly users like griffpatch.

What is this, some misguided effort to drastically reduce Scratch's features (which is what 3.0 is more or less doing?) Or is little Jimmy's catching game with a high score too much for the servers to handle?

I'll support for reverting it in the future if they can gain more funding and moderation support, but I think making sure both of those and any of Scratch's other prerequisites are secured is a much bigger priority.

Sheep_maker wrote:

There's also a non-technical reason for this cloud update: moderation.

thisandagain wrote:

These new limits were put into place to prevent abuse of the cloud variables system that was causing it to be unreasonable to maintain, scale, moderate, and support financially. In addition, these new limits help reduce the possibility of projects like “Chat Rooms” (which are incredibly difficult for the ST to keep safe).

(emphasis added by me - source)

I agree with their decision to do this partially for moderation purposes, honestly. The scale of Scratch is pretty big, and as it gets bigger, the ST simply can't manage the entire thing as easily. Preventing people from abusing cloud variables for unsafe chat rooms is at least one less thing to worry about, although it is quite a shocking and large move.

CosmicBunBun wrote:

Also, to heck with that “it's too difficult to maintain” excuse. Cloud variables have been working fine as is for the over four years I've been here, and haven't really had much of an issue.

And not the financial excuse either. On top of being located in a very well-known college (and still having it's subdomain, by the way!) The ST has received thousands upon thousands of dollars in donations (according to their donations page) from well-known foundations. Multiple cloud projects have been broken, and it's basically useless for more advanced projects now.

What about when Scratch grows? Because if we have 10 multiplayer games (as an example), and then we get 10 more, now we're going to need to handle double the amount of data. And while Scratch can support way more than 20 projects, it gets a lot more than that, too. Plus, they also need to consider the future. It might be working fine now, but when you factor in the rate at which cloud projects pop up, how much bandwidth and server memory is needed to store all of it, and anything else Scratch wants to do with extra funding, things can start being unsustainable.

CosmicBunBun wrote:

Yeah, okay, chat rooms are a thing, but I've been here over four years, and the only big ones that could be regarded as known are ones by popular and very user-friendly users like griffpatch.

So what about the unknown ones then? Because if a few users to come across and abuse them, that's a problem. Chat rooms open up a huge realm of moderation problems, and if you're already trying to handle thousands and thousands of comments, projects, ban appeals, and forum posts daily, in addition to trying to work on the future of Scratch, it gets hard to add even more stuff to deal with on top of that. I think it's quite heavy-handed and that it definitely does break too many projects, but if the other option is to have Scratch spend even more and more funding (which, keep in mind, Scratch is a non-profit organization and users don't pay anything to use the Cloud Data bandwidth) and moderation time on this instead of other, serious issues, then at a certain point it's necessary, and it's better that they do it now before it begins causing really big problems.

Support due to the reasons specified above.

Yeah. I was gonna make a cloud multiplayer, but the fact of this has pretty much just pushed me to working on another game. Whitelists are VERY secure, but I see the issues in blacklists. Support

Keep it numbers only, we can decode and encode characters if we really need it (01 = a, 02 = b, etc) but atleast max the limit to 512 or 1024. Sending numbers over the internet shouldn't take that much bandwidth

Bump

We are getting closer to the time where Scratch will have ads because it will have no money.

MeIoetta wrote:

We are getting closer to the time where Scratch will have ads because it will have no money.

They already had ads which I think they might have possible made money from (remember all the CN ads?)