I don't think this will affect their subscriber pool. Maybe a lot of people will cancel their subs now but they will eventually come back. Because when it comes to themepark MMORPG, nothing comes even remotely close to WoW.
I, personally, don't care about the forums. Never used them, never will.
Well I have said it many other threads, Don't post on the offical forums and nothing has changed, you dont have to tie to your SC2 account to face book and you dont have to enable RealID.
I'll be making a 2nd bnet account to register SC2 in a few weeks, this is not becuase of realID I just want to be sure that If I am careles with say my main Bnet account (WoW) and get hacked my SC2 account is safe while I work to fix my other account.
Not that Bnet is any less secure than other service that use an email address as the login such as steam, it's just that Bnet is so much more popular and is targeted more. Like Windows vs MAC on viruses, MAC are no more resistant to viruses than Windows its just windows is more popular so more viruses are written to effect it.
I will still probably use my real name on my SC2 bnet account as I doubt I'll be posting in the main forums, Teamliquid is where more constructive posters go to to talk about SC2.
So for me REALID.. meh not going to use it... so I don't care.
That is a meager drop in the bucket, they got 3 million account, when you get 1.5 mill posting then i will belive its a little more than just some of the outspoken forum boys complaining. I still think its wrong, but seams most of the folks either don't know or dont care that blizzard is doing this to them.
I don't know about that last statement, especially with all the attention this is getting. I mean, this has been picked up by the mainstream media, it's all over the freakin place. It was on prime-time news TV broadcasts on the BBC (the BBC is shown worldwide, and is one of the most popular news services in the worlds), and all the US networks, most of the major US newspapers have stories about it on their websites, and if there hasn't been a story in print I'm sure there will be tomorrow. And there is one thing common to almost all these stories, they all think it is a terrible idea (notice I said almost, I don't have a % or anything but from a quick look I'd say easily 75% think it's a bad move).
Your post is the reason that I think Blizz may actually still go through with this...that's the main excuse that I am sure has been heard more then anything else, that the outcry on the forums is only a very small, and vocal, minority that doesn't need to be listened to. The thing is this has gone beyond the forums, the mainstream media picked it up and are casting it in a negative light, and personally every, single, person I have told about this, IRL mind you, think it's an awful idea and that, their given reason for doing so and response is like "killing an ant w/ a nuculear weapon". And it really, really is.
I think in this case, and this is definitely the exception to the rule, that most people actually do know what is going on this time. The problem is it can, fairly logically, be dismissed as a "vocal minority", and we know Blizzard won't go so far as to do a log-in poll to actually find out what their paying customers truly feel about this b/c then they might have to really eat crow.
It'll be interesting to see what happens if this does get implemented. I don't think Blizzard will be backing down on this sadly, this seems kind of heavy-handed for them, and I can only imagine that it comes down all the way from that prick, Kotick. If it does though I know that personally, I either wouldn't use my real name on my account, or simply not use the forums. And if there are ways to find out a persons name that doesn't use the forums then I would be forced to not play their games, and that would be a serious shame.
Went to the Bilz forums and wow what a storm. In any case I never really cared for WoW, but this could set a precendent and other game companies might want to follow suit. I hope not......
I don't play WoW, but anyone who thinks the reason they have given about stopping trolling, etc, is being very naive. Given what they and a lot of developers have recently been saying this is obviously the first step to Wowville, it's been on the rumour mill for a long time that wow will be going the item shop route at some point, this is actually a very clever first step to that. They are preemptively maximizing all of their current assets to make that step as profitable as possible.
I personally vehemently dissagree with the decission but that doesn't mean it's a bad one with regard to their bottom line and lets face it that's all that matters. This could turn out to be a very, very important step in mmo history and could be the begining of the end for what we have traditionally known it to be.
----- The person who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs now to the infancy of our species.
I just had to post here because the OP is totally insane with the statement "World of Warcraft is finally going to die" theres a dozen of reasons why it wont.
1. Only a small population of the WoW community use the forums and arnt forced to use them before or after this goes live.
2. Blizzards newest expansion which will be rolling out "Cataclysm" will attract alot of new players to the scene due to all the old content been re-done, and will hold most veteran subscribers due to new raids and content.
3. How many players will have the same RL names, because im quite sure everyone dosent have a totally different name, its not like it will say "My names *BLAH BLAH* i live at *THIS LOCATION* oh and btw my credit card details are *LOTS OF NUMBERS*
Please think about what your writing before you say a multi billion company's main franchise will fall.
I would never use realID. I have zero desire to reveal my real name to fellow gamers. Skipping the forums would be easy for me. I tend to do everything in the game, not in forums. I like to post on forums like this about general MMORPG gaming topics, but when I'm playing an MMORPG, I don't spend time on a particular forum discussing the game, I play it.
If I want a walk through for something, or a character build, I can go somewhere like Ten Ton Hammer, and they have no "realID".
Non issue for me, since I would never even consider using the official Blizzard forums for anything.
I did read somewhere, probably in official thread, that there is a LUA command to display your real name from in game so not using the forums is not a complete solution, it could be added in a mod to send this information to anyone using a whisper. I dont know if thats true, the guy posted a line of code but I'm not a programer. Such a pity, I can't recall where exactñy i found it, maybe it was here in mmorpg.com.
I resubbed when I heard they were doing this. I hope it cleans up the crap on the forums (and perhaps in game) as Bliz intends.
How does this action achieve this? I know this is the 'line' but I can't see how this will make any difference to that whatsoever?
Given this seems to be the only reason, or the only one that's given, please explain how this will make any difference at all. Sorry to seem rude but at the moment I feel like a guy in a room with an elephant, no oneseems to be questioning the most basic level of this.
----- The person who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs now to the infancy of our species.
People nowadays or so pathetic and whine over anything done.
If you don't like the change - don't use the forums; don't play the game - but don't bother posting bout it for everyone else to read.
I don't care bout the name being shown - I've never used the official forums. and if I used them so what if my name shows cause it isn't like I'm gonna be posting threats towards people or trolling.
Like another person posted; I hope this helps to get rid of alot of the anoying "trolls" and such from the game itself and it's forums.
I just had to post here because the OP is totally insane with the statement "World of Warcraft is finally going to die" theres a dozen of reasons why it wont.
1. Only a small population of the WoW community use the forums and arnt forced to use them before or after this goes live.
2. Blizzards newest expansion which will be rolling out "Cataclysm" will attract alot of new players to the scene due to all the old content been re-done, and will hold most veteran subscribers due to new raids and content.
3. How many players will have the same RL names, because im quite sure everyone dosent have a totally different name, its not like it will say "My names *BLAH BLAH* i live at *THIS LOCATION* oh and btw my credit card details are *LOTS OF NUMBERS*
Please think about what your writing before you say a multi billion company's main franchise will fall.
Actually they made this to a developer. He thought writing his real name will make things smoother, few post later they were posting his address, mother's name, and all kinf of information. You can check it if you want.
I just had to post here because the OP is totally insane with the statement "World of Warcraft is finally going to die" theres a dozen of reasons why it wont.
1. Only a small population of the WoW community use the forums and arnt forced to use them before or after this goes live.
2. Blizzards newest expansion which will be rolling out "Cataclysm" will attract alot of new players to the scene due to all the old content been re-done, and will hold most veteran subscribers due to new raids and content.
3. How many players will have the same RL names, because im quite sure everyone dosent have a totally different name, its not like it will say "My names *BLAH BLAH* i live at *THIS LOCATION* oh and btw my credit card details are *LOTS OF NUMBERS*
Please think about what your writing before you say a multi billion company's main franchise will fall.
Actually they made this to a developer. He thought writing his real name will make things smoother, few post later they were posting his address, mother's name, and all kinf of information. You can check it if you want.
Can you imagine the first person to post once this goes live, jesus the guys life will be spammed to death. I'm willing to bet the guys name is James Smith or John Johnson
----- The person who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs now to the infancy of our species.
Blizzard announces RealID, to facilitate B.Net's incorporation into facebook among other things (the flaming trolls all over thier forums)..
The flaming trolls get upset (obviously).. So the flame troll post, and get their accounts banned..
SO.. they come here to flame troll how WoW is now going to die...
ROFL classic..
Just remember, I never laugh WITH you.
I don't even play WoW, but I'm looking forward to them making idiots of themselves. I also wouldn't count myself as a troll, what I am concerned about is privacy of myself and others. So please don't jump to conclusions.
I didn't mention you, so the only person jumping to conclusions here is you.
However, the fact that you took such immediate notice of my post, while apparantly completely forgetting what the OP said (who did have accounts banned) tells me a few things:
1) You haven't read any of the posts, so you are simply here to troll.
2) Chances are, had my post actually been directed to you, I would probably still be correct.
By your comments alone you hinted that people who are concerned about their privacy are trolls. And that's why I pulled you up about it. Be careful what you type, because it can be misunderstood.
What I'm seeing here, is another large corporation dictating to us what they can do with the information they hold on all of us. I don't know about you, but I don't like the way it's going.
Where is it going to end?
Something like this can affect job prospects and you own personal safety. There's a lot of nuts out there. If you think it's so safe, then continue using the WoW forums after they alter them.
I resubbed when I heard they were doing this. I hope it cleans up the crap on the forums (and perhaps in game) as Bliz intends.
How does this action achieve this? I know this is the 'line' but I can't see how this will make any difference to that whatsoever?
Given this seems to be the only reason, or the only one that's given, please explain how this will make any difference at all. Sorry to seem rude but at the moment I feel like a guy in a room with an elephant, no oneseems to be questioning the most basic level of this.
I see it too, and so do a lot of people. While I left WoW some time ago, this concerns me deeply, because a major move like this by ANY corporation has ripple effects elsewhere.
There is absolutely no legitimate reason to do this. Any troll/problem poster on those forums can be banned/blocked/ even prosecuted via the personal info/IP info/etc that Blizz already has on record. But not just the forums are affected by this, from what I've been reading about it, even in game, if you have a friend on your realID, your info will subsequently be exposed to others linked to them on Real ID down the line, to people you do not even know.
WoW is absolutely infamous for the amount of gold farmers and hackers prowling in it...is it really such a stretch to see that identity theft could become a serious problem from this? Not to mention real life stories we already have of gaming insanity reaching out of the internet into real life when someone gets pissed and tracks someone down. Doesn't matter if it is a rare occurrence,,,,it will only take one for a major lawsuit to be headed their way.
On top of that, what about people who opt out but need tech support? They then cannot go to the forums, because they don't want their real names used, yet it would be forced on them if they post. Who, then, is being punished? Certainly not the trolls.
I hope the negative blowback from this is huge, it needs to be. We have enough problems with privacy exploitations as it is, this only adds to it. If the negative blowback is strong enough and loud enough, then at least it may cause any other idiot executives in other companies who might be considering such a thing to think twice.
I just had to post here because the OP is totally insane with the statement "World of Warcraft is finally going to die" theres a dozen of reasons why it wont.
1. Only a small population of the WoW community use the forums and arnt forced to use them before or after this goes live.
2. Blizzards newest expansion which will be rolling out "Cataclysm" will attract alot of new players to the scene due to all the old content been re-done, and will hold most veteran subscribers due to new raids and content.
3. How many players will have the same RL names, because im quite sure everyone dosent have a totally different name, its not like it will say "My names *BLAH BLAH* i live at *THIS LOCATION* oh and btw my credit card details are *LOTS OF NUMBERS*
Please think about what your writing before you say a multi billion company's main franchise will fall.
Actually they made this to a developer. He thought writing his real name will make things smoother, few post later they were posting his address, mother's name, and all kinf of information. You can check it if you want.
His address and phone number was not correct, but put it into perspective we already knew he worked for blizzard and what he looked like. A name is usless on it's own unless you know somthing else such as employer or schools they attended.. your name on a forum post does not give you that.
Originally posted by Rzep Never used their forum and dont plan to. So I am pretty sure I will be back for Cataclysm and wont care a bit about this whole controversy.
Clearly a bug that will be fixed, but why would you add yourself and friend of yourself, plus it only exposes your name... so dont use those mods untill fixed.
Clearly a bug that will be fixed, but why would you add yourself and friend of yourself, plus it only exposes your name... so dont use those mods untill fixed.
Also do you really think those interested in your info need an addon to get it? I am sorry buy you are just unaware how easy it is to obtain such information on the internet. I am curious though what Blizzard will do in light of all this outrage. Ive always thought it was a comapny that listend to their fanbase and so this will be a sort of test. Will it in any way effect my decision whether I will play Blizzard game from now on? I dont know it is way too early to tell. Remember that Blizzcon is coming up and if the nerdrage spills out into real life at their con they will most likely abandon the idea. To those who think that Kotick is the man behind the idea and this means that they will follow through with it. That is not how I see the situation. Even if Kotick is the ideaman in this case and wants to push this through he is still accountable to the shareholders who are not retarded and will notice the outcry. WoW is a cash cow for Acti and I do not think anyone there is stupid enough to mess with something that works and will undoubtedly work for many years to come. Of course their is also the case of Blizz really wanting to curb the trolling and I do believe that this would partially help with the problem. Not all trolls are tech savy 20+ years olds, many of them are simply kids out to annoy people for whatever reason and the thought that they might be held resoponsible for their actions would scare some away from trolling, spamming and so on. Only time will tell. I am for now keeping my nerd rage in check to see how this thing plays out.
Comments
I don't think this will affect their subscriber pool. Maybe a lot of people will cancel their subs now but they will eventually come back. Because when it comes to themepark MMORPG, nothing comes even remotely close to WoW.
I, personally, don't care about the forums. Never used them, never will.
Well I have said it many other threads, Don't post on the offical forums and nothing has changed, you dont have to tie to your SC2 account to face book and you dont have to enable RealID.
I'll be making a 2nd bnet account to register SC2 in a few weeks, this is not becuase of realID I just want to be sure that If I am careles with say my main Bnet account (WoW) and get hacked my SC2 account is safe while I work to fix my other account.
Not that Bnet is any less secure than other service that use an email address as the login such as steam, it's just that Bnet is so much more popular and is targeted more. Like Windows vs MAC on viruses, MAC are no more resistant to viruses than Windows its just windows is more popular so more viruses are written to effect it.
I will still probably use my real name on my SC2 bnet account as I doubt I'll be posting in the main forums, Teamliquid is where more constructive posters go to to talk about SC2.
So for me REALID.. meh not going to use it... so I don't care.
I don't know about that last statement, especially with all the attention this is getting. I mean, this has been picked up by the mainstream media, it's all over the freakin place. It was on prime-time news TV broadcasts on the BBC (the BBC is shown worldwide, and is one of the most popular news services in the worlds), and all the US networks, most of the major US newspapers have stories about it on their websites, and if there hasn't been a story in print I'm sure there will be tomorrow. And there is one thing common to almost all these stories, they all think it is a terrible idea (notice I said almost, I don't have a % or anything but from a quick look I'd say easily 75% think it's a bad move).
Your post is the reason that I think Blizz may actually still go through with this...that's the main excuse that I am sure has been heard more then anything else, that the outcry on the forums is only a very small, and vocal, minority that doesn't need to be listened to. The thing is this has gone beyond the forums, the mainstream media picked it up and are casting it in a negative light, and personally every, single, person I have told about this, IRL mind you, think it's an awful idea and that, their given reason for doing so and response is like "killing an ant w/ a nuculear weapon". And it really, really is.
I think in this case, and this is definitely the exception to the rule, that most people actually do know what is going on this time. The problem is it can, fairly logically, be dismissed as a "vocal minority", and we know Blizzard won't go so far as to do a log-in poll to actually find out what their paying customers truly feel about this b/c then they might have to really eat crow.
It'll be interesting to see what happens if this does get implemented. I don't think Blizzard will be backing down on this sadly, this seems kind of heavy-handed for them, and I can only imagine that it comes down all the way from that prick, Kotick. If it does though I know that personally, I either wouldn't use my real name on my account, or simply not use the forums. And if there are ways to find out a persons name that doesn't use the forums then I would be forced to not play their games, and that would be a serious shame.
Hahahahahahahahahahaha this could kill Blizz off. Deck chair and popcorn time!
Went to the Bilz forums and wow what a storm. In any case I never really cared for WoW, but this could set a precendent and other game companies might want to follow suit. I hope not......
I don't play WoW, but anyone who thinks the reason they have given about stopping trolling, etc, is being very naive. Given what they and a lot of developers have recently been saying this is obviously the first step to Wowville, it's been on the rumour mill for a long time that wow will be going the item shop route at some point, this is actually a very clever first step to that. They are preemptively maximizing all of their current assets to make that step as profitable as possible.
I personally vehemently dissagree with the decission but that doesn't mean it's a bad one with regard to their bottom line and lets face it that's all that matters. This could turn out to be a very, very important step in mmo history and could be the begining of the end for what we have traditionally known it to be.
-----
The person who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs now to the infancy of our species.
Nom nom nom.
I just had to post here because the OP is totally insane with the statement "World of Warcraft is finally going to die" theres a dozen of reasons why it wont.
1. Only a small population of the WoW community use the forums and arnt forced to use them before or after this goes live.
2. Blizzards newest expansion which will be rolling out "Cataclysm" will attract alot of new players to the scene due to all the old content been re-done, and will hold most veteran subscribers due to new raids and content.
3. How many players will have the same RL names, because im quite sure everyone dosent have a totally different name, its not like it will say "My names *BLAH BLAH* i live at *THIS LOCATION* oh and btw my credit card details are *LOTS OF NUMBERS*
Please think about what your writing before you say a multi billion company's main franchise will fall.
I resubbed when I heard they were doing this. I hope it cleans up the crap on the forums (and perhaps in game) as Bliz intends.
Too much drama, not enough truth in it.
I did read somewhere, probably in official thread, that there is a LUA command to display your real name from in game so not using the forums is not a complete solution, it could be added in a mod to send this information to anyone using a whisper. I dont know if thats true, the guy posted a line of code but I'm not a programer. Such a pity, I can't recall where exactñy i found it, maybe it was here in mmorpg.com.
Edit: ah yeah here it is: http://www.wow.com/2010/07/06/security-flaw-allows-addons-to-expose-full-real-life-names-witho/
How does this action achieve this? I know this is the 'line' but I can't see how this will make any difference to that whatsoever?
Given this seems to be the only reason, or the only one that's given, please explain how this will make any difference at all. Sorry to seem rude but at the moment I feel like a guy in a room with an elephant, no oneseems to be questioning the most basic level of this.
-----
The person who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs now to the infancy of our species.
It's not just a forum problem.
"There is as yet insufficient data for a meaningful answer."
People nowadays or so pathetic and whine over anything done.
If you don't like the change - don't use the forums; don't play the game - but don't bother posting bout it for everyone else to read.
I don't care bout the name being shown - I've never used the official forums. and if I used them so what if my name shows cause it isn't like I'm gonna be posting threats towards people or trolling.
Like another person posted; I hope this helps to get rid of alot of the anoying "trolls" and such from the game itself and it's forums.
Actually they made this to a developer. He thought writing his real name will make things smoother, few post later they were posting his address, mother's name, and all kinf of information. You can check it if you want.
Can you imagine the first person to post once this goes live, jesus the guys life will be spammed to death. I'm willing to bet the guys name is James Smith or John Johnson
-----
The person who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs now to the infancy of our species.
By your comments alone you hinted that people who are concerned about their privacy are trolls. And that's why I pulled you up about it. Be careful what you type, because it can be misunderstood.
What I'm seeing here, is another large corporation dictating to us what they can do with the information they hold on all of us. I don't know about you, but I don't like the way it's going.
Where is it going to end?
Something like this can affect job prospects and you own personal safety. There's a lot of nuts out there. If you think it's so safe, then continue using the WoW forums after they alter them.
Never used their forum and dont plan to. So I am pretty sure I will be back for Cataclysm and wont care a bit about this whole controversy.
I see it too, and so do a lot of people. While I left WoW some time ago, this concerns me deeply, because a major move like this by ANY corporation has ripple effects elsewhere.
There is absolutely no legitimate reason to do this. Any troll/problem poster on those forums can be banned/blocked/ even prosecuted via the personal info/IP info/etc that Blizz already has on record. But not just the forums are affected by this, from what I've been reading about it, even in game, if you have a friend on your realID, your info will subsequently be exposed to others linked to them on Real ID down the line, to people you do not even know.
WoW is absolutely infamous for the amount of gold farmers and hackers prowling in it...is it really such a stretch to see that identity theft could become a serious problem from this? Not to mention real life stories we already have of gaming insanity reaching out of the internet into real life when someone gets pissed and tracks someone down. Doesn't matter if it is a rare occurrence,,,,it will only take one for a major lawsuit to be headed their way.
On top of that, what about people who opt out but need tech support? They then cannot go to the forums, because they don't want their real names used, yet it would be forced on them if they post. Who, then, is being punished? Certainly not the trolls.
I hope the negative blowback from this is huge, it needs to be. We have enough problems with privacy exploitations as it is, this only adds to it. If the negative blowback is strong enough and loud enough, then at least it may cause any other idiot executives in other companies who might be considering such a thing to think twice.
Sure? Go read this: http://www.wow.com/2010/07/06/security-flaw-allows-addons-to-expose-full-real-life-names-witho/
His address and phone number was not correct, but put it into perspective we already knew he worked for blizzard and what he looked like. A name is usless on it's own unless you know somthing else such as employer or schools they attended.. your name on a forum post does not give you that.
I´m sure there will be alot of rage quitting and then people will come back in a month or so just as usual.
All statements I make is from my point of view unless stated otherwise.
Die, little WoW, die. Mwahahahahaha. Er, ha.
Clearly a bug that will be fixed, but why would you add yourself and friend of yourself, plus it only exposes your name... so dont use those mods untill fixed.
Also do you really think those interested in your info need an addon to get it? I am sorry buy you are just unaware how easy it is to obtain such information on the internet. I am curious though what Blizzard will do in light of all this outrage. Ive always thought it was a comapny that listend to their fanbase and so this will be a sort of test. Will it in any way effect my decision whether I will play Blizzard game from now on? I dont know it is way too early to tell. Remember that Blizzcon is coming up and if the nerdrage spills out into real life at their con they will most likely abandon the idea. To those who think that Kotick is the man behind the idea and this means that they will follow through with it. That is not how I see the situation. Even if Kotick is the ideaman in this case and wants to push this through he is still accountable to the shareholders who are not retarded and will notice the outcry. WoW is a cash cow for Acti and I do not think anyone there is stupid enough to mess with something that works and will undoubtedly work for many years to come. Of course their is also the case of Blizz really wanting to curb the trolling and I do believe that this would partially help with the problem. Not all trolls are tech savy 20+ years olds, many of them are simply kids out to annoy people for whatever reason and the thought that they might be held resoponsible for their actions would scare some away from trolling, spamming and so on. Only time will tell. I am for now keeping my nerd rage in check to see how this thing plays out.