It’s a little after 1am ET on Saturday, June 13th, and I’m about to get ottoneu back up after messing up the database about 1.5 hours ago.
I’m working on getting ottoneu Fantasy Football ready for this fall, and in setting up some testing this evening I accidentally ran some operations meant for the football database on the baseball database. The end result is that all lineup changes made on Friday, June 12th have been irrecoverably lost.
I apologize, of course. It is unacceptable for a fantasy game to lose even a tiny bit of integrity in scoring.
The bright side, if you can call it that, is two-fold: 1) whoever you had in your lineup for Thursday will get stats on Friday, so teams will not get 0s across the board, and 2) this affects everyone equally.
Again, I apologize. I am working very hard on making ottoneu a world-class fantasy experience, and tonight was a slight misstep. I will do everything in my power to prevent mistakes like this from occurring in the future. As always, please reach out to me via email if you have any concerns or would like to have a longer conversation.
UPDATE: Just realized that if you started an auction on 6/12, it will probably need to be started again. Trades may also need to be re-accepted too – if this is causing a significant problem, please let me know. I’m hoping that because it was only one day, it shouldn’t have too great an impact.
UPDATE 2: I have made the following measures to prevent these events from occurring in the future: 1) database backups every other hour instead of once a day, 2) a change to how I connect to the ottoneu database
UPDATE 3: I’ve taken more steps to ensure this kind of mistake won’t happen again. I’m looking into building a tool that would allow commissioners to retroactively change lineups, though the jury is still out on if this is a good idea or a reasonable response to losing one day’s worth of lineup changes in 3+ seasons. Comments, Slack, and email remain the best ways to reach out!
Was it just the lineup changes that were affected or the entire day’s stats? Because it seems that there has been no change to the standings despite the fact that I my guys from Thursday still collected points today. I came into Friday tied in slugging and I’m still that way despite a nearly scoring nearly 225 points better than my opponent today. Doesn’t look like today’s lineups affected anything.
Stats are actually being run as we speak. In about 10 minutes I think you’ll see some changes.
Thanks!
Having never touched the back-end of a SQL database before January, I’m now running pre-written queries and SELECTing my own data every day at work, and I’m perpetually terrified I’m going to somehow write something wrong to the table. Sorry that this happened to you. I obviously have no idea what software you’re actually using, but would it be feasible to rename the tables between the two databases so that an operation meant for one would be unable to process on the other?
I had that mostly set up, but I had accidentally overlooked it on a couple of key tables. Human error got the best of me.
I think auctions completed yesterday were also messed up. Can that be rectified or should we figure out a way to re-do?
Your commissioner should be able to help you out on any auctions that changed results.
Does not affect everyone equally… It affects those who had starting pitchers last night much more.
This kind of hits a nerve with me as one of my favorite things about fangraphs/ottoneu is that I don’t have to hear about football.
I agree that it affected people who had starting pitchers more – my point was that it was not selective on a per-team basis or anything. That doesn’t make it feel better, of course. I will do my best to see if there is a way to fix this in the future, and I apologize for the inconvenience and sloppiness.
Something messed up with auctions too…i started this auction and it says someone else did i think it ended prematurely http://ottoneu.fangraphs.com/244/auctionresults?id=121882
That auction was lost when that data was lost, so someone else restarted it in your league.
Can you check to see if it ended prematurely? I can’t imagine I started it while I was busy.
What happened is that you started it on the 12th during the day, and then the database broke and the record indicating you started that auction was wiped. Then, someone else in your league started an auction on the same player. Does that make sense? You should feel free to email me (help at ottoneu dot com) if you need more clarity, easier over email.
I lost 2 saves and a home run because of this and quite a bit in avg as well.
I know mistakes happen and Niv feels terrible. We all make mistakes at work and ultimately it’s just a silly game we play.
All that said however I am pretty bothered by the fact that there is no current attempt to rectify this. Some may have “prizes” on the line and we all paid for the service. If it’s impossible to recover the lineups (and it sounds like it is) I’d like to see some kind of attempt at rectifying this- maybe a FG plus subscription for a year, or a coupon code for next year’s ottoneu.
After all this mistake was made in creating a product to increase revenues. Doesn’t seem right that your current customers are paying for that. Again, is this the end of the world (or even the fantasy season)? No. But this has definitely dampened the experience for the sake of a football game and I really hope nobody (including me) loses their season because of 1 save or something.
I’m working with some folks in the community Slack around some ideas on how to rectify this that aren’t also abusable, so this isn’t the last you’ve heard on the issue. I sympathize with you much in the same way you sympathize with me – we all know mistakes happen, but the response is as important (more important) than never making mistakes.
Once I have more on the overall response, I will write it up here and be as transparent about it as I was with the error.
No. I do not need recompense. So tired of this attitude of every slightest wrong deserves remuneration beyond an honest apology, which I received. Honest mistake, sincere apology. I am out no blood, no one died, there was no intent to cause harm., no one was purposefully and/or willfully misled. An error was made, a lesson was learned, and no one was hurt. Move on.
The request for more is just another open window into our broken society.
There’s a line between addressing the problem head-on in a way that satisfies the majority of users and just giving away free stuff to make up for a mistake. I’m going for the former, and I believe everyone who reads this would be happy with that approach.
I specifically stated multiple times that this isn’t a huge deal in the grand scheme of things so I don’t need your overwrought “nobody died” lecture. Also good to know that only if someone intentionally harms you are they in any way responsible.
Ottoneu is a business. I offered one idea for how they might demonstrate to their customers that they are valued an intend for this to not happen again. I didn’t say I “deserved” anything as you state.
But by all means please turn this suggestion into a broad statement on what’s wrong with the world today.
how did you lose 2 saves? do you have 2 closers who you regularly bench but would have started yesterday? considering your post (you talk about gaining in average and saves) I am guessing this is a 5×5 league? If that is the case, why would you ever have two closers on your bench??
Because their teams weren’t playing on Thursday, so I was using those spots for other relievers to try and help with rate stats and maybe vulture a win.
Football is fucking horrible and now this. What a fucking joke. As if the terrible interface wasn’t enough we now have to put up the sport for brain dead morons ruining the best sport on the planet. Thanks a lot.
Everyone that gave money to this charlatan should get their money back. This is inexcusable and you should be ashamed of yourself.
No excuses here at all, and I feel worse about this than anyone. The integrity of ottoneu Fantasy Baseball is of the utmost importance to me, which is why I wrote this post and continue to update it as I take steps to make sure that something like this never happens again. It may seem like a small thing to some people, but this kind of data loss is completely unacceptable and inexcusable.
Thank you for playing and I hope you’ll consider staying with ottoneu Fantasy Baseball going forward.
I had my worst night this season in my league. This error actually helped me. Would have been worse.
I for one am going nowhere and believe that Niv’s repeated apologies are more than enough to make up for any lost stats. Good luck getting this fixed, and I hope you do not lose too many customers. I would hate to lose my favorite fantasy baseball platform.
League managers should definitely be given the ability to fix this if at all possible. And the morning after is hardly the right time to play the “first time in 3+ seasons” card.
Especially since:
1) this is the first year I have played otto, so, I really don’t care what happened 2 years ago
2) this isn’t the first time I’ve had problems with a lineup change on this site, and I’m not the only person in my league who has had issues with it. Granted, I can’t say that the problem then wasn’t btwn the keyboard and the chair, but that’s not the point. The point is, it’s now perfectly plausible to wonder whether it WASN’T user error. I really am at a loss to understand how this could even accidentally happen.
I came to otto expecting a much better experience. But from the clunky interface to the draft, now this…well, it probably cements that I won’t be back with my league next year. Frankly, I thought nerds and geeks would be better at this sort of thing.
P.S. It pisses me off most that this happened over footbaw. Like there aren’t enough places to play that already. Good god.
Maybe it is the first time in 3 seasons, but it’s also happened one time within the first month that ottoneu football was announced and because of that it’s more difficult to see this not happening again especially as football season starts. That’s troubling for many of us who are here for baseball.
This is basically the one thing that a fantasy site can’t do. Particularly one that charges money to play and is geared to the more in depth and serious player. Difficult to see paying for this in the future in a saturated market with free platforms without some assurance that football won’t continue to affect things.
And that the only notification was a banner at the top of the page for half a day doesn’t speak for you guys either.
So its as if yesterday never happened? So the guy in my league who is in first place doesn’t get the negative impact of King Felix’s start and can stay in first in his pitching categories? What I fail to understand is how you can’t manually enter the stats yourself. A lot of work yes. But this website generates a lot of money and should put in the work to fix the problem. I know you will have zero database issues collecting the website tax for every league.
I get that mistakes happen. But what continues to irk me is how many changes are being implemented to baseball midseason. I don’t care about fantasy football and if I did I could go to espn. And football season isnt even close to starting! These changes can be applied during the allstar week when nothing is really going on fantasy wise. Instead you are toying with databases midseason in which you admitted you didn’t have a backup for…
I didn’t mean to cause a car accident, but a sincere transparent apology doesn’t rectify the situation.
Yesterday DID happen. But lineup changes made yesterday did not. So assuming Felix was already in his SP slot (which for 99.999% of felix owners is probably the case) those points still happened.
Basically, if Felix was moved from bench to SP during the day yesterday, his points won’t count. If he was already in the spot, they will.
I couldn’t disagree more with the thought that “this affects everyone equally.” Whatever ground I gained before the data loss will not count. It’s hard enough to climb in the standings as it is. It would affect everyone equally IF they had the same day that I did, but they didn’t. I put a lot of work into constructing my roster. A lot of time studying match-ups. A lot of money too. And that time and work payed off in the form of a good day with my stats.
I don’t have the luxury of stating that this fiasco is unacceptable, because I have to accept it. I’m in a dynasty league. I don’t have the heart to tune into the Live scoring board to monitor my team because I don’t want to wonder if what my team is doing is going to even count. I hate to think I have to live with the stats of a starting pitcher that I moved to the bench the day of his start(because of the match-up and an innings limit), just because he wasn’t on the bench the day before his scheduled start.
“The bright side, if you can call it that, is two-fold: 1) whoever you had in your lineup for Thursday will get stats on Friday, so teams will not get 0s across the board, and 2) this affects everyone equally.”
My line-up Fri. was completely different from Thur. because of the limited slate on Thursday. On May 14th, I was unable to switch out players who were scratched from their line-ups because Ottoneu was down. I was told then that “everybody is in the same boat,” but again, that is not true. Because everybody in my league does not own the two players that I was trying to insert into my line-up.
I am frustrated and it feels very weird, after all of the work that I’ve put into this, that I now have to hope that I don’t get close enough in the standings for the accumulation of lost points to come into play.
I can see where people are upset here in regards to Felix. No one was sitting him for that game. And he put up -39 pts in 1/3 of an inning, which brought his ppi from 5.41 to 4.92 on the SEASON.
Are people still mad over this? What exactly do you want to happen? It happened, it’s done, Niv has apologized 500 times when he really didn’t have to, so what are you still mad about? Want refund for the equivalent of one day in a year? That 4 cents really going to make a difference to you? Leave it alone, he has put in safeguards to prevent it from happening again.