"We have been planning this change for a very long time. During this time, we have thought ahead about the scope and impact of this change and predicted that many people would no longer wish to post in the forums after this change goes live. We are fine with that, because we want to change these forums dramatically in a positive and more constructive direction."
This is flat out fail. If you don't want people posting in your forums then shut them down or make them Blizzard only access, pay to access, or whatever. Another case of overhauling an entire system because of a few bad apples.
Sad thing is if people blindly go along with it every other company will eventually do it too.
So many people have such a warped, scared view of the world.
People steal ID's by swiping Credit Cards, sending out virus. Nobody is going to go through the effort to target you from a videogame forum where they ONLY get your first and last name. If somebody wanted to steal somebodies information they could open up ANY page of the phone book and get a better start.
Even if they can somehow manage to find information about you by just googling your name, what good does that do them? Are they going to stalk you, no. Are they going to do anything with that information? no.
Theives have FAR better ways to get the information they need about targets far more valuable than any of you would ever be. You use your real name every day, you show your credit card to minimum wage employee's at walmart every week, you hand your credit card to watiresses. You show your drivers license to bouncers.
People wear name tags to conventions; do they all lose thier identities, get stalked raped and die? No they dont.
People are blowing this into a rediculous situation. I personally am VERY glad that Blizzard is doing this, if not just so we can have precident on the internet of people using their real names.
You can actually find more about my personally by searching my character in WoW's name than my real name, but do I care if people can find out one picture of me from facebook and my music choices on last.fm? No I don't, because that means nothing. If anybody asked me for a picture I'd show them, if anybody asked me what music I listen to I'd say Red Hot Chili Peppers are my favourite band. People are far to paranoid, hopefully this becomes a reality check.
What I see on these RealID threads is far too many people who have fortunately not been on the receiving end of harassment in real life passing judgment on other people who may have grounds for their fears.
I think the internet is just sucking sympathy out of humanity instead of injecting it like we initially thought we would.
I know it's going to be shocking, but everybody playing MMOs is not like you. Some people have problems that would constitute a minority, or even unique problems. That does not mean they should be ignored. And speaking for them is asinine.
So you're an ordinary person with no worries and no need for a high level of privacy, good for you! Not everybody has to be ordinary, or part of the majority.
Salman Rushdie should be able to play a game and post on their boards in peace as well.
Come to think of it, I'm having a fun time right now imagining Salman Rushdie trolling WOW forums.
The issue here is that if you have some sort of bizzare security situation... Don't post on the forums.
If you are going to make an ass of yourself and make the forums a worse place for other people, then you should have to deal with the consiquences.
What makes Salman Rushdie so special? Sure hes the only one with his name or one of 5 people. But who is going to target him. Who is going to read through the WoW forums and find a guy with a name that "seems rare" search the name, then from that information target him.
This same guy would have a MUCH easier time just going into the phonebook, finding a name, grabbing the full name address and phone number and getting off to a much better start.
Well, I guess you don't know enough about Rushdie then. He is special, believe me. And I'm pretty sure he'd not have an easy time in the game or on the forums if his realID was known.
As for "Who's going to do that?" : See my quoted post above. I understand it may seem pretty unlikely from where you're standing, but that really does not make it so, it just means you're not familiar with that kind of danger. And no, it has nothing to do with trolling forums (I hope you got that that was a joke), it's purely about making your identity public.
My point is primarily about opening the door to in-game hate and real-life hate feeding off of each other. This change brings about a security issue; and saying "well, don't post on the forums then!" is just as wrong in principle as saying "well, we made carrying firearms free in this town and some nutcases assault your kind here, so maybe you don't want to go out. Hey, you have a choice there: Go out, or don't!"
Of course people have security issues outside of the games they play, too... This does not justify having yet another one on top of those - in fact, it's all the more reason to not give them an additional cause for worry!
The problem with your analogy is that leaving your house is much less voluntary than posting on an ingame forum. This is a totally voluntary act, to make your opinion known on a board on the internet; You could go your whole life without doing it and be no worse off.
Not to mention that you don't even have to tie your character to your name on the forum. That is entirely optional.
To adress the more rediculous responses: Rapists aren't going to target and stalk people on wow, thats rediculous. If they want to get a little kid, they just hop in their van and goto a school, its 1000x easier. These scenarios you are giving are rediculous, NOBODY is going to try to hunt you down for a comment you made then kill you by finding your address via your full name.
To target a minor ingame, you'd have to first know his character name, his parents would have to let him use the forums, and he'd have to link that specific ingame character to his player name. Then he'd have to have a rare enough name such that you could actually track him down in the real world. Already this is getting convoluted. Then you'd have to actually get to the address, which may or may not be current. Then you have to find some way to get to the kid without parents/police/people getting suspicious.
Which may never happen.
OR, they could do what every other sexual deviant does and pick a target of convenience, which constitutes almost every rape in the world.
You people are so scared of any change and privacy that you don't even bother to think before you freak out.
after 6 or so years, I had to change it a little...
The people who keep yapping on about "consequences" make me laugh, really they do. This scenario is almost exactly like the surveillence and control legislation that was enacted in the US and UK after 9/11 "to fight terrorism". Despite the fact that, on even a quick analysis, it's pretty useless for fighting terrorism.
Have you stopped to consider just how this move by Blizzard will inflict these so-called "consequences"?
Either Blizzard will do the inflicting, or someone else will. That means spending time and effort doing that. If Blizzard are to be spending this time and effort... why aren't they just doing it now? The only "consequence" they can bring to bear is a ban. But they can do this already, whether or not someone posts on their real name. So how, exactly, will showing people's names enable them to do this more effectively? Blizzard can already SEE your name if they want to. They own your god damb account. They can see your alts. They can see your other accounts on the same credit card. They already have this information about you. They've got your fucking credit card number, for god's sake.
So how does this help? Explain it to me. What are they able to do with this change that they couldn't do right now?
(Or.... are we talking about vigilante justice here? Mob action. Crowd-sourced retribution? Are those the consequences that we're oh-so-very politely alluding to? Because that's a very sharp two-edged sword, mi amigos. Are you absolutely sure you want to get in to an internet pissing contest - which has now suddenly escalated in to real life - with the kind of people who drink bile and vinegar all day, just in case they get a chance to piss on your wheaties?)
No, this is blatantly, obviously and solely about Blizzard selling their customers information to Facebook. All this talk about "cleaning up the forums" is just a smokescreen.
Let's say that only 99.9% of men have never sexually assaulted a woman, That means that ~6,000 rapists play WoW and have access to the forums.
You don't know how many men that play WoW. Your math attempt is moot.
Blizzard say that they have 11 million subscribers. I'm assuming that at least 55% of those are male. you know that the "~" character means "approximately", right? I make no pretence at precision, but I'd be prepared to bet that my calculation is correct within a factor of 2.
Using approximately values is disliked a lot by the physics community, and it ain't particually smart to use it when you try to prove a point either. Making up statistics gets you nowhere, hence why I said your attempt was and still is moot.
If you say that 99.9% of men have never sexually assaulted a woman, then that means there are 3.415.900 men that have, which sounds quite unreasonably to me.
It's good that you make no pretence at precision because I question your result, not that it can't be true (it definitely can).
I don't play WOW, but I would not post on any gaming forum that displayed my real name. I also wouldn't play a game that used my personal info as leverage to keep me from posting on their forums.
I think this only gives the trolls and nerd-ragers ammo. Imagine you get in an argument with some unstable ass-hat on the forums. Now he will be a few mouse clicks away from your business contact info, home address and phone number, facebook page.... no thanks. How about players under 18, will they be divulging their first and last name too? I'm not a paranoid guy, but don't we generally tell children not to post their info online? This sounds like a dream come true for pedophiles and griefers.
Personally, I hope this drives a few people away from WoW. The sooner that game dies, the better.
I forget where, but it was either in Oklahoma, Kansas, or Texas. The courts ruled, that since AT&T did not have a signature / digital signature confirming the person signed the TOS / EULA. Then the TOS / EULA was null and void and did not apply to the person, even though the person was an AT&T customer. Like I said, it was a precedent set 1 - 2 years ago. However, somehow people seem to forget that it ever happened.
You are misapplying this. A 'weak' digital signature might not be sufficient proof that someone actually agreed to a TOS if there is a dispute if someone actually signed the contract. However, if it can be proven that the person did press the Accept button then that is not an issue.
This would only matter if Blizzard posted someone's name and the person argued that he never pressed Accept. However, in this case to post on the Blizzard forums you have to click Accept first so the issue is moot.
I don't play WOW, but I would not post on any gaming forum that displayed my real name. I also wouldn't play a game that used my personal info as leverage to keep me from posting on their forums.
I think this only gives the trolls and nerd-ragers ammo. Imagine you get in an argument with some unstable ass-hat on the forums. Now he will be a few mouse clicks away from your business contact info, home address and phone number, facebook page.... no thanks. How about players under 18, will they be divulging their first and last name too? I'm not a paranoid guy, but don't we generally tell children not to post their info online? This sounds like a dream come true for pedophiles and griefers.
Personally, I hope this drives a few people away from WoW. The sooner that game dies, the better.
People have already been killed over video games long before this change.
Crazy people will still be crazy with or without this change.
Would like to make a shout out to all the crazy people out there!
Let's say that only 99.9% of men have never sexually assaulted a woman, That means that ~6,000 rapists play WoW and have access to the forums.
You don't know how many men that play WoW. Your math attempt is moot.
Blizzard say that they have 11 million subscribers. I'm assuming that at least 55% of those are male. you know that the "~" character means "approximately", right? I make no pretence at precision, but I'd be prepared to bet that my calculation is correct within a factor of 2.
Using approximately values is disliked a lot by the physics community, and it ain't particually smart to use it when you try to prove a point either. Making up statistics gets you nowhere, hence why I said your attempt was and still is moot.
If you say that 99.9% of men have never sexually assaulted a woman, then that means there are 3.415.900 men that have, which sounds quite unreasonably to me.
It's good that you make no pretence at precision because I question your result, not that it can't be true (it definitely can).
BSc in Applied Physics crew checking in here. Physicists use approximations all the time. This is aside, of course, from the much more important fact that This Aint Physics™ It's Statistics. Perhaps you're going to tell me that the Statistics community doesn't like approximations either...? *snicker* *snort* *snarf*
Defining the paramaters of the problem and making some clearly declared assumptions (you see where I clearly declared my assumptions?) to get an order-of-magnitude grasp of the solution range is a perfectly valid technique for physicists and statisticians. After all, if you're looking to do something, and a quick, rough calculation shows that you're 1000-10000x short of the required quantity, then what does it matter if the precise answer is 1158.332x ?
What number of rapists playing WoW would you deem an acceptable number before you were OK with your daughter posting on their forums with her real name? If you'd be OK with, say, 2000, then yes it's worth refining the calculation, because there might be more or less than your tolerance number. If you're not OK with any rapists seeing your daughters name, then it's not worth the trouble, because it's basically certain that at least one of the 11 million people is a rapist.
My question would actually be (after some thinking about the issue). What is Blizz's hidden agenda? Because , unless i missed something concerning Real ID, in no way is it going to earn them money , i think all the uproar on the WoW forums prove that already. And as we all know big companies act accordingly to profit , and there are NO exceptions there amongst the big guys. (there are differences in approach tho, while EA tries to rip off their consumers as much as they possibly could other developers might prefer to satisfy the consumers to create a better brand image and increase consumer loyalty).
Fere libenter homines id quod volunt credunt. Among those who dislike oppression are many who like to oppress.
My question would actually be (after some thinking about the issue). What is Blizz's hidden agenda? Because , unless i missed something concerning Real ID, in no way is it going to earn them money , i think all the uproar on the WoW forums prove that already. And as we all know big companies act accordingly to profit , and there are NO exceptions there amongst the big guys. (there are differences in approach tho, while EA tries to rip off their consumers as much as they possibly could other developers might prefer to satisfy the consumers to create a better brand image and increase consumer loyalty).
Their agenda isn't hidden. They're actually pretty open about it. This is about selling their customer's information via facebook.
BSc in Applied Physics crew checking in here. Physicists use approximations all the time. This is aside, of course, from the much more important fact that This Aint Physics™ It's Statistics. Perhaps you're going to tell me that the Statistics community doesn't like approximations either...? *snicker* *snort* *snarf*
Defining the paramaters of the problem and making some clearly declared assumptions (you see where I clearly declared my assumptions?) to get an order-of-magnitude grasp of the solution range is a perfectly valid technique for physicists and statisticians. After all, if you're looking to do something, and a quick, rough calculation shows that you're 1000-10000x short of the required quantity, then what does it matter if the precise answer is 1158.332x ?
What number of rapists playing WoW would you deem an acceptable number before you were OK with your daughter posting on their forums with her real name? If you'd be OK with, say, 2000, then yes it's worth refining the calculation, because there might be more or less than your tolerance number. If you're not OK with any rapists seeing your daughters name, then it's not worth the trouble, because it's basically certain that at least one of the 11 million people is a rapist.
Let's say that only 99.9% of men have never sexually assaulted a woman, That means that ~6,000 rapists play WoW and have access to the forums.
You don't know how many men that play WoW. Your math attempt is moot.
Blizzard say that they have 11 million subscribers. I'm assuming that at least 55% of those are male. you know that the "~" character means "approximately", right? I make no pretence at precision, but I'd be prepared to bet that my calculation is correct within a factor of 2.
Using approximately values is disliked a lot by the physics community, and it ain't particually smart to use it when you try to prove a point either. Making up statistics gets you nowhere, hence why I said your attempt was and still is moot.
If you say that 99.9% of men have never sexually assaulted a woman, then that means there are 3.415.900 men that have, which sounds quite unreasonably to me.
It's good that you make no pretence at precision because I question your result, not that it can't be true (it definitely can).
BSc in Applied Physics crew checking in here. Physicists use approximations all the time. This is aside, of course, from the much more important fact that This Aint Physics™ It's Statistics. Perhaps you're going to tell me that the Statistics community doesn't like approximations either...? *snicker* *snort* *snarf*
Defining the paramaters of the problem and making some clearly declared assumptions (you see where I clearly declared my assumptions?) to get an order-of-magnitude grasp of the solution range is a perfectly valid technique for physicists and statisticians. After all, if you're looking to do something, and a quick, rough calculation shows that you're 1000-10000x short of the required quantity, then what does it matter if the precise answer is 1158.332x ?
What number of rapists playing WoW would you deem an acceptable number before you were OK with your daughter posting on their forums with her real name? If you'd be OK with, say, 2000, then yes it's worth refining the calculation, because there might be more or less than your tolerance number. If you're not OK with any rapists seeing your daughters name, then it's not worth the trouble, because it's basically certain that at least one of the 11 million people is a rapist.
See how that works?
Here endeth the lesson.
What you're not explaining is why this guy would target a girl who may or may not a child, on a forum. Then you're not explaining why he would travel across the country to an adress he found on the internet that may or may not be the real address.
Pedophiles tend to hit easy targets, like friends kids, or nieces. Or kids walking alone in the park.
You using situations that just WOULDN'T happen in the real world. You're trying to pick terrifiying situations to scare people rather than argue with real logic. You're a bachelor of science, you should know better than that.
after 6 or so years, I had to change it a little...
A social network. They started to link Blizzard accounts to Facebook a while ago. Check out the thread on Battlenet.
Social networking is big $, everyone wants to get in on it. Word of mouth > commercials.
Really? Somebody should tell the makers of Facebook, because last I checked they've been having huge issues getting funding because there is no way to make money.
Every time they try, people cry foul about privacy.
after 6 or so years, I had to change it a little...
A social network. They started to link Blizzard accounts to Facebook a while ago. Check out the thread on Battlenet.
Social networking is big $, everyone wants to get in on it. Word of mouth > commercials.
I knew i missed something
We can only hope WoW dies because of this. Would open the MMO market for more/new developers and increase the odds of something original coming out (tho on the other hand some might see this as an opportunity to take over the ex-wow players by making an other clone...)
Fere libenter homines id quod volunt credunt. Among those who dislike oppression are many who like to oppress.
BSc in Applied Physics crew checking in here. Physicists use approximations all the time. This is aside, of course, from the much more important fact that This Aint Physics™ It's Statistics. Perhaps you're going to tell me that the Statistics community doesn't like approximations either...? *snicker* *snort* *snarf*
Defining the paramaters of the problem and making some clearly declared assumptions (you see where I clearly declared my assumptions?) to get an order-of-magnitude grasp of the solution range is a perfectly valid technique for physicists and statisticians. After all, if you're looking to do something, and a quick, rough calculation shows that you're 1000-10000x short of the required quantity, then what does it matter if the precise answer is 1158.332x ?
What number of rapists playing WoW would you deem an acceptable number before you were OK with your daughter posting on their forums with her real name? If you'd be OK with, say, 2000, then yes it's worth refining the calculation, because there might be more or less than your tolerance number. If you're not OK with any rapists seeing your daughters name, then it's not worth the trouble, because it's basically certain that at least one of the 11 million people is a rapist.
See how that works?
Here endeth the lesson.
Thank you for the lesson master, your teachings have been important.
Acceptable number before I'd let any child near the forum: 0
I just don't believe that there are rapists playing WoW, but I guess that's because I'm a Dane and we're some of the happiest people on the planet because we don't have trust issues, either that or I'm just naive.
Also, I underlined the best part.
Also², when approximations are made there will always be errors. Good luck getting a fusion reactor working using approximations (yes, children are as important as fusion reactors).
I have no problem with Blizzard showing real names on the forums. If people are so paranoid about someone on the internets learning their real name then they are not required to post. There are probably hundreds if not thousands of websites that they can post anonymously from if they feel the need.
I have no problem with Blizzard showing real names on the forums. If people are so paranoid about someone on the internets learning their real name then they are not required to post. There are probably hundreds if not thousands of websites that they can post anonymously from if they feel the need.
Uhm, people who pay for WoW pay for the forum access too. It's part of the "deal".
If the forum didn't cost anything, anyone could post there, but only people with an account can, so taht means it's part of the "subscription". So Blizzard or you who say "don't post then", don't make much sense, because you pay for the service.
BSc in Applied Physics crew checking in here. Physicists use approximations all the time. This is aside, of course, from the much more important fact that This Aint Physics™ It's Statistics. Perhaps you're going to tell me that the Statistics community doesn't like approximations either...? *snicker* *snort* *snarf*
Defining the paramaters of the problem and making some clearly declared assumptions (you see where I clearly declared my assumptions?) to get an order-of-magnitude grasp of the solution range is a perfectly valid technique for physicists and statisticians. After all, if you're looking to do something, and a quick, rough calculation shows that you're 1000-10000x short of the required quantity, then what does it matter if the precise answer is 1158.332x ?
What number of rapists playing WoW would you deem an acceptable number before you were OK with your daughter posting on their forums with her real name? If you'd be OK with, say, 2000, then yes it's worth refining the calculation, because there might be more or less than your tolerance number. If you're not OK with any rapists seeing your daughters name, then it's not worth the trouble, because it's basically certain that at least one of the 11 million people is a rapist.
See how that works?
Here endeth the lesson.
Thank you for the lesson master, your teachings have been important.
Acceptable number before I'd let any child near the forum: 0
I just don't believe that there are rapists playing WoW, but I guess that's because I'm a Dane and we're some of the happiest people on the planet because we don't have trust issues, either that or I'm just naive.
Also, I underlined the best part.
Also², when approximations are made there will always be errors. Good luck getting a fusion reactor working using approximations (yes, children are as important as fusion reactors).
Are you seriously going to assert that not one single WoW subscriber is a rapist? Do you realise what the probability of this is?
(Hint: it's roughly on a par with the chances of getting that fusion reactor to run on unicorn piss)
Let's say that only 99.9% of men have never sexually assaulted a woman, That means that ~6,000 rapists play WoW and have access to the forums.
You don't know how many men that play WoW. Your math attempt is moot.
Blizzard say that they have 11 million subscribers. I'm assuming that at least 55% of those are male. you know that the "~" character means "approximately", right? I make no pretence at precision, but I'd be prepared to bet that my calculation is correct within a factor of 2.
Using approximately values is disliked a lot by the physics community, and it ain't particually smart to use it when you try to prove a point either. Making up statistics gets you nowhere, hence why I said your attempt was and still is moot.
If you say that 99.9% of men have never sexually assaulted a woman, then that means there are 3.415.900 men that have, which sounds quite unreasonably to me.
It's good that you make no pretence at precision because I question your result, not that it can't be true (it definitely can).
BSc in Applied Physics crew checking in here. Physicists use approximations all the time. This is aside, of course, from the much more important fact that This Aint Physics™ It's Statistics. Perhaps you're going to tell me that the Statistics community doesn't like approximations either...? *snicker* *snort* *snarf*
Defining the paramaters of the problem and making some clearly declared assumptions (you see where I clearly declared my assumptions?) to get an order-of-magnitude grasp of the solution range is a perfectly valid technique for physicists and statisticians. After all, if you're looking to do something, and a quick, rough calculation shows that you're 1000-10000x short of the required quantity, then what does it matter if the precise answer is 1158.332x ?
What number of rapists playing WoW would you deem an acceptable number before you were OK with your daughter posting on their forums with her real name? If you'd be OK with, say, 2000, then yes it's worth refining the calculation, because there might be more or less than your tolerance number. If you're not OK with any rapists seeing your daughters name, then it's not worth the trouble, because it's basically certain that at least one of the 11 million people is a rapist.
See how that works?
Here endeth the lesson.
What you're not explaining is why this guy would target a girl who may or may not a child, on a forum. Then you're not explaining why he would travel across the country to an adress he found on the internet that may or may not be the real address.
Pedophiles tend to hit easy targets, like friends kids, or nieces. Or kids walking alone in the park.
You using situations that just WOULDN'T happen in the real world. You're trying to pick terrifiying situations to scare people rather than argue with real logic. You're a bachelor of science, you should know better than that.
Er, except that recent history abounds with examples of people doing exactly that.
Are you seriously going to assert that not one single WoW subscriber is a rapist? Do you realise what the probability of this is?
(Hint: it's roughly on a par with the chances of getting that fusion reactor to run on unicorn piss)
Unlike other people I assume the best, so yes I believe there aren't one single rapist playing WoW, just as I believe there aren't one single Taliban follower or alien playing this game. You can call me naive and ignorant, but to be truthful it's because I don't care if there are rapists playing WoW, and why should I? It's highly unlikely that they will find my sister that plays WoW and if they do, the chance of them living even 500 km near us is slim to nil.
The problem with your analogy is that leaving your house is much less voluntary than posting on an ingame forum. This is a totally voluntary act, to make your opinion known on a board on the internet; You could go your whole life without doing it and be no worse off.
Not to mention that you don't even have to tie your character to your name on the forum. That is entirely optional.
....
Of course it's an extreme analogy but that's alright: analogies don't work in degrees, they work on principles. I am talking about the principle here. The problem is that the company itself brings about a security issue and then expects the customer to bear the burden or opt out.
For a lot of people this will not be akin to "choice" but to just the "illusion of choice", as they will practically be robbed of one of the choices through being highly inconvenienced by "posting on forums").
Sure, it may not be a big deal - hell, I don't post games' official forums myself, so what do I care, right? - but this does not change that there's an issue with the practice.
Even if it inconveniences two people, an issue with this sort of serious consequences should be avoided.
I have no problem with Blizzard showing real names on the forums. If people are so paranoid about someone on the internets learning their real name then they are not required to post. There are probably hundreds if not thousands of websites that they can post anonymously from if they feel the need.
Uhm, people who pay for WoW pay for the forum access too. It's part of the "deal".
If the forum didn't cost anything, anyone could post there, but only people with an account can, so taht means it's part of the "subscription". So Blizzard or you who say "don't post then", don't make much sense, because you pay for the service.
Its a service they pay for, the condition is that it shows your name.
You have a choice, you aren't entitled to animity on their forum.
after 6 or so years, I had to change it a little...
Let's say that only 99.9% of men have never sexually assaulted a woman, That means that ~6,000 rapists play WoW and have access to the forums.
You don't know how many men that play WoW. Your math attempt is moot.
Blizzard say that they have 11 million subscribers. I'm assuming that at least 55% of those are male. you know that the "~" character means "approximately", right? I make no pretence at precision, but I'd be prepared to bet that my calculation is correct within a factor of 2.
Using approximately values is disliked a lot by the physics community, and it ain't particually smart to use it when you try to prove a point either. Making up statistics gets you nowhere, hence why I said your attempt was and still is moot.
If you say that 99.9% of men have never sexually assaulted a woman, then that means there are 3.415.900 men that have, which sounds quite unreasonably to me.
It's good that you make no pretence at precision because I question your result, not that it can't be true (it definitely can).
BSc in Applied Physics crew checking in here. Physicists use approximations all the time. This is aside, of course, from the much more important fact that This Aint Physics™ It's Statistics. Perhaps you're going to tell me that the Statistics community doesn't like approximations either...? *snicker* *snort* *snarf*
Defining the paramaters of the problem and making some clearly declared assumptions (you see where I clearly declared my assumptions?) to get an order-of-magnitude grasp of the solution range is a perfectly valid technique for physicists and statisticians. After all, if you're looking to do something, and a quick, rough calculation shows that you're 1000-10000x short of the required quantity, then what does it matter if the precise answer is 1158.332x ?
What number of rapists playing WoW would you deem an acceptable number before you were OK with your daughter posting on their forums with her real name? If you'd be OK with, say, 2000, then yes it's worth refining the calculation, because there might be more or less than your tolerance number. If you're not OK with any rapists seeing your daughters name, then it's not worth the trouble, because it's basically certain that at least one of the 11 million people is a rapist.
See how that works?
Here endeth the lesson.
What you're not explaining is why this guy would target a girl who may or may not a child, on a forum. Then you're not explaining why he would travel across the country to an adress he found on the internet that may or may not be the real address.
Pedophiles tend to hit easy targets, like friends kids, or nieces. Or kids walking alone in the park.
You using situations that just WOULDN'T happen in the real world. You're trying to pick terrifiying situations to scare people rather than argue with real logic. You're a bachelor of science, you should know better than that.
Er, except that recent history abounds with examples of people doing exactly that.
Comments
This is flat out fail. If you don't want people posting in your forums then shut them down or make them Blizzard only access, pay to access, or whatever. Another case of overhauling an entire system because of a few bad apples.
Sad thing is if people blindly go along with it every other company will eventually do it too.
The problem with your analogy is that leaving your house is much less voluntary than posting on an ingame forum. This is a totally voluntary act, to make your opinion known on a board on the internet; You could go your whole life without doing it and be no worse off.
Not to mention that you don't even have to tie your character to your name on the forum. That is entirely optional.
To adress the more rediculous responses: Rapists aren't going to target and stalk people on wow, thats rediculous. If they want to get a little kid, they just hop in their van and goto a school, its 1000x easier. These scenarios you are giving are rediculous, NOBODY is going to try to hunt you down for a comment you made then kill you by finding your address via your full name.
To target a minor ingame, you'd have to first know his character name, his parents would have to let him use the forums, and he'd have to link that specific ingame character to his player name. Then he'd have to have a rare enough name such that you could actually track him down in the real world. Already this is getting convoluted. Then you'd have to actually get to the address, which may or may not be current. Then you have to find some way to get to the kid without parents/police/people getting suspicious.
Which may never happen.
OR, they could do what every other sexual deviant does and pick a target of convenience, which constitutes almost every rape in the world.
You people are so scared of any change and privacy that you don't even bother to think before you freak out.
after 6 or so years, I had to change it a little...
The people who keep yapping on about "consequences" make me laugh, really they do. This scenario is almost exactly like the surveillence and control legislation that was enacted in the US and UK after 9/11 "to fight terrorism". Despite the fact that, on even a quick analysis, it's pretty useless for fighting terrorism.
Have you stopped to consider just how this move by Blizzard will inflict these so-called "consequences"?
Either Blizzard will do the inflicting, or someone else will. That means spending time and effort doing that. If Blizzard are to be spending this time and effort... why aren't they just doing it now? The only "consequence" they can bring to bear is a ban. But they can do this already, whether or not someone posts on their real name. So how, exactly, will showing people's names enable them to do this more effectively? Blizzard can already SEE your name if they want to. They own your god damb account. They can see your alts. They can see your other accounts on the same credit card. They already have this information about you. They've got your fucking credit card number, for god's sake.
So how does this help? Explain it to me. What are they able to do with this change that they couldn't do right now?
(Or.... are we talking about vigilante justice here? Mob action. Crowd-sourced retribution? Are those the consequences that we're oh-so-very politely alluding to? Because that's a very sharp two-edged sword, mi amigos. Are you absolutely sure you want to get in to an internet pissing contest - which has now suddenly escalated in to real life - with the kind of people who drink bile and vinegar all day, just in case they get a chance to piss on your wheaties?)
No, this is blatantly, obviously and solely about Blizzard selling their customers information to Facebook. All this talk about "cleaning up the forums" is just a smokescreen.
Give me liberty or give me lasers
Using approximately values is disliked a lot by the physics community, and it ain't particually smart to use it when you try to prove a point either. Making up statistics gets you nowhere, hence why I said your attempt was and still is moot.
If you say that 99.9% of men have never sexually assaulted a woman, then that means there are 3.415.900 men that have, which sounds quite unreasonably to me.
It's good that you make no pretence at precision because I question your result, not that it can't be true (it definitely can).
Eleanor Rigby.
I don't play WOW, but I would not post on any gaming forum that displayed my real name. I also wouldn't play a game that used my personal info as leverage to keep me from posting on their forums.
I think this only gives the trolls and nerd-ragers ammo. Imagine you get in an argument with some unstable ass-hat on the forums. Now he will be a few mouse clicks away from your business contact info, home address and phone number, facebook page.... no thanks. How about players under 18, will they be divulging their first and last name too? I'm not a paranoid guy, but don't we generally tell children not to post their info online? This sounds like a dream come true for pedophiles and griefers.
Personally, I hope this drives a few people away from WoW. The sooner that game dies, the better.
-----Zero Punctuation Eve Online Review-----
You are misapplying this. A 'weak' digital signature might not be sufficient proof that someone actually agreed to a TOS if there is a dispute if someone actually signed the contract. However, if it can be proven that the person did press the Accept button then that is not an issue.
This would only matter if Blizzard posted someone's name and the person argued that he never pressed Accept. However, in this case to post on the Blizzard forums you have to click Accept first so the issue is moot.
People have already been killed over video games long before this change.
Crazy people will still be crazy with or without this change.
Would like to make a shout out to all the crazy people out there!
I love you! Please don't kill me! /hug
BSc in Applied Physics crew checking in here. Physicists use approximations all the time. This is aside, of course, from the much more important fact that This Aint Physics™ It's Statistics. Perhaps you're going to tell me that the Statistics community doesn't like approximations either...? *snicker* *snort* *snarf*
Defining the paramaters of the problem and making some clearly declared assumptions (you see where I clearly declared my assumptions?) to get an order-of-magnitude grasp of the solution range is a perfectly valid technique for physicists and statisticians. After all, if you're looking to do something, and a quick, rough calculation shows that you're 1000-10000x short of the required quantity, then what does it matter if the precise answer is 1158.332x ?
What number of rapists playing WoW would you deem an acceptable number before you were OK with your daughter posting on their forums with her real name? If you'd be OK with, say, 2000, then yes it's worth refining the calculation, because there might be more or less than your tolerance number. If you're not OK with any rapists seeing your daughters name, then it's not worth the trouble, because it's basically certain that at least one of the 11 million people is a rapist.
See how that works?
Here endeth the lesson.
Give me liberty or give me lasers
My question would actually be (after some thinking about the issue). What is Blizz's hidden agenda? Because , unless i missed something concerning Real ID, in no way is it going to earn them money , i think all the uproar on the WoW forums prove that already. And as we all know big companies act accordingly to profit , and there are NO exceptions there amongst the big guys. (there are differences in approach tho, while EA tries to rip off their consumers as much as they possibly could other developers might prefer to satisfy the consumers to create a better brand image and increase consumer loyalty).
Fere libenter homines id quod volunt credunt.
Among those who dislike oppression are many who like to oppress.
Their agenda isn't hidden. They're actually pretty open about it. This is about selling their customer's information via facebook.
Give me liberty or give me lasers
^ Perfect.
Thank you Malcanis!
What you're not explaining is why this guy would target a girl who may or may not a child, on a forum. Then you're not explaining why he would travel across the country to an adress he found on the internet that may or may not be the real address.
Pedophiles tend to hit easy targets, like friends kids, or nieces. Or kids walking alone in the park.
You using situations that just WOULDN'T happen in the real world. You're trying to pick terrifiying situations to scare people rather than argue with real logic. You're a bachelor of science, you should know better than that.
after 6 or so years, I had to change it a little...
A social network. They started to link Blizzard accounts to Facebook a while ago. Check out the thread on Battlenet.
Social networking is big $, everyone wants to get in on it. Word of mouth > commercials.
Really? Somebody should tell the makers of Facebook, because last I checked they've been having huge issues getting funding because there is no way to make money.
Every time they try, people cry foul about privacy.
after 6 or so years, I had to change it a little...
I knew i missed something
We can only hope WoW dies because of this. Would open the MMO market for more/new developers and increase the odds of something original coming out (tho on the other hand some might see this as an opportunity to take over the ex-wow players by making an other clone...)
Fere libenter homines id quod volunt credunt.
Among those who dislike oppression are many who like to oppress.
Thank you for the lesson master, your teachings have been important.
Acceptable number before I'd let any child near the forum: 0
I just don't believe that there are rapists playing WoW, but I guess that's because I'm a Dane and we're some of the happiest people on the planet because we don't have trust issues, either that or I'm just naive.
Also, I underlined the best part.
Also², when approximations are made there will always be errors. Good luck getting a fusion reactor working using approximations (yes, children are as important as fusion reactors).
Eleanor Rigby.
I have no problem with Blizzard showing real names on the forums. If people are so paranoid about someone on the internets learning their real name then they are not required to post. There are probably hundreds if not thousands of websites that they can post anonymously from if they feel the need.
Uhm, people who pay for WoW pay for the forum access too. It's part of the "deal".
If the forum didn't cost anything, anyone could post there, but only people with an account can, so taht means it's part of the "subscription". So Blizzard or you who say "don't post then", don't make much sense, because you pay for the service.
Are you seriously going to assert that not one single WoW subscriber is a rapist? Do you realise what the probability of this is?
(Hint: it's roughly on a par with the chances of getting that fusion reactor to run on unicorn piss)
Give me liberty or give me lasers
Er, except that recent history abounds with examples of people doing exactly that.
Give me liberty or give me lasers
Unlike other people I assume the best, so yes I believe there aren't one single rapist playing WoW, just as I believe there aren't one single Taliban follower or alien playing this game. You can call me naive and ignorant, but to be truthful it's because I don't care if there are rapists playing WoW, and why should I? It's highly unlikely that they will find my sister that plays WoW and if they do, the chance of them living even 500 km near us is slim to nil.
Eleanor Rigby.
I love RealID and will continue to support it, i have written blizzard many times showing my approval!
ReadID is here to stay!
Its a service they pay for, the condition is that it shows your name.
You have a choice, you aren't entitled to animity on their forum.
after 6 or so years, I had to change it a little...
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7092340.html#