They have left Blizzard no options other than legal prosecution here.
If Blizz let them go unpunished, it will open up the floodgates. Everyone will know Blizzard is all bark and no bite. Pirate servers will proliferate, and it won't stay with "vanilla" versions of WoW...
I was just about to go there. I can't see them not prosecuting. Unfortunately, Intellectual Property law is super complicated, yet super important. If they allow this to continue without prosecution then I'm sure there would be serious repercussions. For some reason I thought you could lose your rights to a property if you are aware of infringements but do nothing to protect your property. Someone will probably be more informed on this than me, though.
It'll be interesting to see how quickly that olive branch turns into a switch and someone starts getting beaten.
It's clear neither of you are all that aware of just how proliferate "pirate" servers already are, including servers already running up to date versions of WoW. While your all busy demonizing the people playing Vanilla there's thousands of people playing the current retail game for free. Many of these servers are for profit ventures as well. It can hardly get more proliferate than it is.
You've all got your torches and pitchforks out ready to watch the bloodbath, but it could all be for naught. We have no idea what sort of agreements may or may not have been made between Blizzard and Nostalrius. Documents guaranteeing freedom from further legal action could have been signed before they ever agreed to meet Blizzard. I'm not saying this occurred, but it certainly could have.
There are far more dangerous server groups out there doing actual harm to Blizzard's IP and pockets that they could go after if they wanted to. To act like they absolutely HAVE to make some sort of example out of Nost is just plain ridiculous. Did everyone forget about the giant example they set with Alyson Reeves and Scapegaming? Yet here we still are.
Really think about this, do you believe Nost would have done this if they didn't at least believe they were safe to do so? I ask this to everyone wanting to see these guys go down. I know you have zero respect for these people, but what they accomplished must at least earn them enough respect to not be considered complete fools.
We'll just have to wait and see I guess. A lot of people seem to be calling for blood, whether Blizzard is among them is yet to be seen. Even if any civil proceedings do go forward it won't have any effect on the private server scene.
First of all, I think I was quite aware of my own ignorance with regards to IP law apart from what I thought I had heard sometime before.
Secondly, I don't believe that we should be glorifying what they are doing. Glorifying these types of things is what has led us to groups like Lizard Squad. All these groups are based on this same prevailing idea of entitlement that we see mentioned on here so often. Regardless of how wide-spread a problem it is, that doesn't take away from the fact that these guys ran a server that was, obviously, very good. It had hundreds of thousands of users. It was good enough that Blizzard sat down with them. However, the minute that Blizzard didn't comply with their demands they began kicking and screaming like 2 year-olds. I'm sorry, it doesn't get much more entitled than that.
I'm sure that private servers will continue to run. I'm sure that game piracy will continue to happen. However, if someone blatantly pirates something from you, then tells you that you better do something, "Or else..." and THEY follow through, and YOU do nothing? Who's the bitch?
You, and a lot of other people, are assuming that Blizzard even cares. As @Sovrath pointed out earlier, Blizzard has the right to either protect their IP, or not. They don't have to go after these guys, and I don't think there would be any benefit in doing so.
Blizzard does not own the code they released, it doesn't matter what the code is for, it's open source and Blizzard can't touch it, otherwise they would have a long time ago and cut off these servers at the root. Beyond that they could go after them for having ran the server in the first place, but since they complied with the C&D letter I'm not sure if that's likely, especially if any agreements were signed when they agreed to meet with Blizzard.
Will Blizzard go after Elysium, the 'new' Nostalrius? Definitely, just as they go after every group with a C&D order. Will Elysium comply? Nope, they've already stated so, just like they never complied when faced with such orders over their Valkyrie server.
In short, it's not about looking like a "bitch". It's about whether there's any actual benefit to suing the original Nost devs and whether or not that's even possible at this point. It most likely is still is, but there's a chance that it may not be.
Yeah, and this is the part where I wasn't completely clear on about IP law. I was under the impression that there were consequences to NOT protecting your IP. Maybe there isn't as @Sovrath pointed out.
I find it interesting that the Nost server code ISN'T illegal, yet bot code is?
Either way, I think Blizzard most definitely does look like the "bitch" if they could do something and choose to do nothing. Maybe they have great reasons not to, but either way the optics of the decision look bad.
First of all, I think I was quite aware of my own ignorance with regards to IP law apart from what I thought I had heard sometime before.
Secondly, I don't believe that we should be glorifying what they are doing. Glorifying these types of things is what has led us to groups like Lizard Squad. All these groups are based on this same prevailing idea of entitlement that we see mentioned on here so often. Regardless of how wide-spread a problem it is, that doesn't take away from the fact that these guys ran a server that was, obviously, very good. It had hundreds of thousands of users. It was good enough that Blizzard sat down with them. However, the minute that Blizzard didn't comply with their demands they began kicking and screaming like 2 year-olds. I'm sorry, it doesn't get much more entitled than that.
I'm sure that private servers will continue to run. I'm sure that game piracy will continue to happen. However, if someone blatantly pirates something from you, then tells you that you better do something, "Or else..." and THEY follow through, and YOU do nothing? Who's the bitch?
I would be sympathetic to the entitlement argument you make if I didn't know that, at least here in America, approximately half of the population pirates entertainment products still sold in the identical form.
Pot, meet American Kettle.
Lol, too true! Actually I suppose that would go even further back (looking at you VHS recorder). I still think it's a matter of entitlement, though. Piracy is no different.
You can't stop the signal. There will always be people running illegal private servers offering old WoW content. Blizzard has had the chance for years to get ahead of the curve and offer official Legacy realms but have chosen not to. They have literally told their fans that they don't want what they think they want.
I understand loving a game, but this is psycho. It's a f#%king game, the developer/publishers are sellout dweebs who suck... we get it. Leave the title and the company alone. If you're going to mobilize, do it in a fashion that makes sense.
All that effort they spent fussing with Blizzard they could have spent with Mark Kern and his misguided petition writing baby teeth having self on his game Ember.
TL;DR Stop obsessing over stuff that doesn't belong to you.
"As far as the forum code of conduct, I would think it's a bit outdated and in need of a refre *CLOSED*"
Politically it doesn't look very good for the Nost Team to do this right now. I won't speculate on the legal repercussions except to say that lawsuits may get filed and then the fight over the legitimacy of those lawsuits will begin after they are filed. The use of the name "World of Warcraft" alone is enough to open up the possibility of a lawsuit by Blizzard, so right now anything is possible on the legal front.
What is more concerning is that this was the one card the Nost Team had to play and at the moment it seems they might have played it in a less than artful manner. Only time will tell if they actually should have played it, and/or played it at a different time. I would guess this won't endear them to the folks at Blizzard, but whether or not the Blizzard folks will now deep six any plans of Legacy Servers out of spite is speculative at best.
That said I'm not sure what the Nost Team was thinking would result from this release. What is their endgame? What do they expect Blizzard to do now that they've done it? Do they expect Blizzard to apologize profusely and put out Vanilla servers tomorrow? Do they expect thousands of Vanilla WoW servers to pop up overnight and that Blizzard will go bankrupt trying to squash them all? I'll even give them the benefit of the doubt with the metaphor and say they've pitched the tea into the harbor. What was the result they wanted? If it was just a "F*ck You" to Blizzard then I find that infantile, futile and ultimately unsupportable. If the idea was to come off like heroes who are struggling against the evil World of Warcraft Overloads at Blizzard it doesn't seem to have worked.
As a side note here I am once again struck by the petulant entitlement we gamers seem to possess. We seem to feel that because we have played a game we have some right to demand changes and even special versions of the game to the point where we will even ennoble and condone any action so long as it furthers our desires to have exactly what we want. It is curious how the Nost Team (I might have to rethink that designation based on my next statement) has been transformed from a group enterprising computer programmers that gave some people a place to take a nostalgia trip to keepers of the Vanilla Warcraft flame that are speaking for untold millions and struggling mightily against the Evil Empire of Blizzard to return us to all that was once good and great in the Warcraft Universe. It might have something to do with our "outsider/geek" status that makes us all feel that "The Man" is messing with our good time and we have to strike back in a way that only us geeks can. I wonder if any significant study has been done on the psychology of us gamers that would answer that small rhetorical question?
(Please forgive me for wondering this out loud and remember before you get angry with me that I include myself in the group of "gamers" referred to in this paragraph. I have noticed this tendency in myself as I from time to time on this very board have been known to assert that I know better than the developers of certain games what is good for their games).
Well the milk is spilled. I guess we'll just have to wait and see what becomes of it.
Many a small thing has been made large by the right kind of advertising.
Politically it doesn't look very good for the Nost Team to do this right now. I won't speculate on the legal repercussions except to say that lawsuits may get filed and then the fight over the legitimacy of those lawsuits will begin after they are filed. The use of the name "World of Warcraft" alone is enough to open up the possibility of a lawsuit by Blizzard, so right now anything is possible on the legal front.
What is more concerning is that this was the one card the Nost Team had to play and at the moment it seems they might have played it in a less than artful manner. Only time will tell if they actually should have played it, and/or played it at a different time. I would guess this won't endear them to the folks at Blizzard, but whether or not the Blizzard folks will now deep six any plans of Legacy Servers out of spite is speculative at best.
That said I'm not sure what the Nost Team was thinking would result from this release. What is their endgame? What do they expect Blizzard to do now that they've done it? Do they expect Blizzard to apologize profusely and put out Vanilla servers tomorrow? Do they expect thousands of Vanilla WoW servers to pop up overnight and that Blizzard will go bankrupt trying to squash them all? I'll even give them the benefit of the doubt with the metaphor and say they've pitched the tea into the harbor. What was the result they wanted? If it was just a "F*ck You" to Blizzard then I find that infantile, futile and ultimately unsupportable. If the idea was to come off like heroes who are struggling against the evil World of Warcraft Overloads at Blizzard it doesn't seem to have worked.
As a side note here I am once again struck by the petulant entitlement we gamers seem to possess. We seem to feel that because we have played a game we have some right to demand changes and even special versions of the game to the point where we will even ennoble and condone any action so long as it furthers our desires to have exactly what we want. It is curious how the Nost Team (I might have to rethink that designation based on my next statement) has been transformed from a group enterprising computer programmers that gave some people a place to take a nostalgia trip to keepers of the Vanilla Warcraft flame that are speaking for untold millions and struggling mightily against the Evil Empire of Blizzard to return us to all that was once good and great in the Warcraft Universe. It might have something to do with our "outsider/geek" status that makes us all feel that "The Man" is messing with our good time and we have to strike back in a way that only us geeks can. I wonder if any significant study has been done on the psychology of us gamers that would answer that small rhetorical question?
(Please forgive me for wondering this out loud and remember before you get angry with me that I include myself in the group of "gamers" referred to in this paragraph. I have noticed this tendency in myself as I from time to time on this very board have been known to assert that I know better than the developers of certain games what is good for their games).
Well the milk is spilled. I guess we'll just have to wait and see what becomes of it.
I think their reasoning is pretty clear, it was posted in their announcement and is also included in the article here at MMORPG.com.
"So, it's time for us to release our source code and additional tools to the community in the hope that it will maintain the Legacy community as much as possible until Blizzard announces an official Legacy plan - should they decide to do that."
I don't think they had any reasoning beyond that. 'If Blizzard won't right now, then we will.' With this they also took themselves out of the equation, they no longer have a horse in the race. It's all in the hands of Blizzard and the Vanilla community.
Thank you for that. It answers what they were thinking but I'm not sure it answers what they thought would actually happen. I can only speculate that they believe someone else will take their work and put up another Nostralus type server. However, Blizzard will now be on the watch for just such a thing and will move to shut it down, just as they did with Nostralus. In fact the most likely practical outcome of this move is that this might bring extra heat down on the World of Warcraft freeshard community from Blizzard that the Freeshard Community didn't sign up for and might not want. As people have pointed out there are no shortage of WoW Freeshards and they might not be as sanguine about taking on Blizzard as the Nost group was and is. In other words the Nost group might have called attention to some people who didn't want it and really didn't want to be in this fight. Doing this might have been a bit reckless when taken in that light. It will cause light to shine in places that might not appreciate that light. The Nost group is playing a bit of Legal Russian Roulette here and might have forced some people to sit in on the game who might not have wanted to sit in.
However, we'll have to wait and see.
Many a small thing has been made large by the right kind of advertising.
You can't stop the signal. There will always be people running illegal private servers offering old WoW content. Blizzard has had the chance for years to get ahead of the curve and offer official Legacy realms but have chosen not to. They have literally told their fans that they don't want what they think they want.
That's assuming getting ahead of the curve would actually help anything in this regard, I doubt it would. The popular private servers would still be the popular private servers, just as they have been in EQ's case (just look at project 99 as an example). They've already established their communities as well as characters.
Blizzard in a business sense is doing it right IMO. Go after the servers that get too big for their britches, don't waste your time on the rest.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
They should have a different server for the base vanilla game, and every expansion. They won't because they want to force feed you whatever turd they dressed up as the new version of the game. Why buy the new expansion when your happy playing in WOTLK or w/e you like? It is a decision based out of sales greed.
You hope Blizz goes after them in every legal way!!??? REALLY, well let's take a look. It will be a tough fight since it was not a perfect world of warcraft port an they charged no money for it. So it can be argued that it's Fan Art which is protected from big companies. Then there is the little thing of Blizzard wanting nothing to do with vanilla servers and saying so publicly, so can blizzard prove damages? Probably not since people playing an imperfect buggy vanilla server are NOT EVER going to play official blizz servers so no customers were taken. Can blizzard prove theft of intellectual property? Again probably not cause blizzard has given Warcraft coding away free in many forms many times. Some might say well EULA, well there is the little thing of Blizz allowing those under 18 to agree to the EULA a couple million times. Does that destroy the credibility of the legal nature of such an agreement? Is that allowed, for a company to let minors to sign a binding agreement? More then likely blizz will just end up making themselves look bad QQin about it. CHEERS Nost team respect!!!!!!!!!
Maybe it's wrong for Blizzard to not provide a product only they are allowed to make? If they decline to create a product that only they have the legal right to do, then perhaps laws should be put in place that would allow a product to be made regardless.
Yeah, defend Blizzard you corporate capitalist bastards, lol.
That's been done many times... Starting with LOTRO... no law needed to be made ...
In all seriousness, no law would ever be made that gave someone the right to run off with someone else's copyrighted material (IP) and make new products with it.. That said, make a new IP, copy the game systems, create new models etc.. and make as many vanilla WOW's as you want.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
It's not that cut and dry but it's no surprise to me that people keep insisting otherwise.
Maybe it's wrong for Blizzard to not provide a product only they are allowed to make? If they decline to create a product that only they have the legal right to do, then perhaps laws should be put in place that would allow a product to be made regardless.
Oh, by the way, I have a patent on the cure for cancer. However, it's better for me to just give you expensive treatments for the rest of your life, because it makes me more money. Yeah, defend Blizzard you corporate capitalist bastards, lol.
yes, how dare Blizzard have a say on how their copyrighted content is used, indeed *sarcasm*
To make something clear: neither you or anyone else have a word on how a company can manage their own content. If you dont like how capitalism works, feel free to move to North-Korea.
In my opinion blizz is using this shit for free publicity. I guarantee that a majority of the staff here will be all over this shit spouting nonsense like " wow is the best its ever been". Subjectivity is a wonderful thing. Vanilla wow is a completely different game than present day wow. I dont think that they are direct competition.
I know its hard for some of you to understand this but there are a decent number of people that would have liked blizzard to have taken wow in a more alliance vs horde direction. Blizzard chose a more pve route which is fine, its their ip, but that doesnt mean that everyone enjoys that route. Some, like me, prefered the pvp at southshore than pretty much everything else the game offers...
Politically it doesn't look very good for the Nost Team to do this right now. I won't speculate on the legal repercussions except to say that lawsuits may get filed and then the fight over the legitimacy of those lawsuits will begin after they are filed. The use of the name "World of Warcraft" alone is enough to open up the possibility of a lawsuit by Blizzard, so right now anything is possible on the legal front.
What is more concerning is that this was the one card the Nost Team had to play and at the moment it seems they might have played it in a less than artful manner. Only time will tell if they actually should have played it, and/or played it at a different time. I would guess this won't endear them to the folks at Blizzard, but whether or not the Blizzard folks will now deep six any plans of Legacy Servers out of spite is speculative at best.
That said I'm not sure what the Nost Team was thinking would result from this release. What is their endgame? What do they expect Blizzard to do now that they've done it? Do they expect Blizzard to apologize profusely and put out Vanilla servers tomorrow? Do they expect thousands of Vanilla WoW servers to pop up overnight and that Blizzard will go bankrupt trying to squash them all? I'll even give them the benefit of the doubt with the metaphor and say they've pitched the tea into the harbor. What was the result they wanted? If it was just a "F*ck You" to Blizzard then I find that infantile, futile and ultimately unsupportable. If the idea was to come off like heroes who are struggling against the evil World of Warcraft Overloads at Blizzard it doesn't seem to have worked.
As a side note here I am once again struck by the petulant entitlement we gamers seem to possess. We seem to feel that because we have played a game we have some right to demand changes and even special versions of the game to the point where we will even ennoble and condone any action so long as it furthers our desires to have exactly what we want. It is curious how the Nost Team (I might have to rethink that designation based on my next statement) has been transformed from a group enterprising computer programmers that gave some people a place to take a nostalgia trip to keepers of the Vanilla Warcraft flame that are speaking for untold millions and struggling mightily against the Evil Empire of Blizzard to return us to all that was once good and great in the Warcraft Universe. It might have something to do with our "outsider/geek" status that makes us all feel that "The Man" is messing with our good time and we have to strike back in a way that only us geeks can. I wonder if any significant study has been done on the psychology of us gamers that would answer that small rhetorical question?
(Please forgive me for wondering this out loud and remember before you get angry with me that I include myself in the group of "gamers" referred to in this paragraph. I have noticed this tendency in myself as I from time to time on this very board have been known to assert that I know better than the developers of certain games what is good for their games).
Well the milk is spilled. I guess we'll just have to wait and see what becomes of it.
I think their reasoning is pretty clear, it was posted in their announcement and is also included in the article here at MMORPG.com.
"So, it's time for us to release our source code and additional tools to the community in the hope that it will maintain the Legacy community as much as possible until Blizzard announces an official Legacy plan - should they decide to do that."
I don't think they had any reasoning beyond that. 'If Blizzard won't right now, then we will.' With this they also took themselves out of the equation, they no longer have a horse in the race. It's all in the hands of Blizzard and the Vanilla community.
Thank you for that. It answers what they were thinking but I'm not sure it answers what they thought would actually happen. I can only speculate that they believe someone else will take their work and put up another Nostralus type server. However, Blizzard will now be on the watch for just such a thing and will move to shut it down, just as they did with Nostralus. In fact the most likely practical outcome of this move is that this might bring extra heat down on the World of Warcraft freeshard community from Blizzard that the Freeshard Community didn't sign up for and might not want. As people have pointed out there are no shortage of WoW Freeshards and they might not be as sanguine about taking on Blizzard as the Nost group was and is. In other words the Nost group might have called attention to some people who didn't want it and really didn't want to be in this fight. Doing this might have been a bit reckless when taken in that light. It will cause light to shine in places that might not appreciate that light. The Nost group is playing a bit of Legal Russian Roulette here and might have forced some people to sit in on the game who might not have wanted to sit in.
However, we'll have to wait and see.
I can answer that as well. What they expect to happen is that the group they're first giving the code to, currently going by the name Elysium, will reopen the original Nost servers and continue service as if they were never shut down, old characters and all.
The Elysium team have been at this for over 8 years with another wow server called Valkyrie. In that time they've received, and ignored, numerous orders by Blizzard's lawyers to cease operations. So, the feel confident enough that they can withstand whatever Blizzard decides to throw at them now, whether they can remains to be seen.
In short, Nostalrius's plan was/is to endorse Elysium as the "official" (lol), continuation of Nostalrius, and will release their code only to them. Once Elysium have the new Nostalrius up and running, time frame currently unknown, they are supposed to release the code to the general public. If they ever do, who knows.
So, in reality, it's not clear that Nost's code will ever actually go public. Elysium, assuming they survive Blizzard (if/when Blizzard comes knocking), could very well decide to keep it to themselves.
From what i've heard - The Elysium team has agreed to help improve the code and finish the documentations required to make it a good, user friendly, open source project. In return they get the code first and can use it as needed. I haven't seen anything about re-opening the original Nostalrius tho, but sounds like a neat move if they can pull it off.
Again, Nost have done nothing to be prosecuted for. The code they are using is their code, reversed engineered. It's not Blizzard's. If Blizzard wants to take legal action, they'd have to move against all the players that use the vanilla WoW client.
Again, Nost have done nothing to be prosecuted for. The code they are using is their code, reversed engineered. It's not Blizzard's. If Blizzard wants to take legal action, they'd have to move against all the players that use the vanilla WoW client.
Perhaps, but every character, every location, every quest, every item, every story is not their "own" and is considered theft of intellectual property.
Again, Nost have done nothing to be prosecuted for. The code they are using is their code, reversed engineered. It's not Blizzard's. If Blizzard wants to take legal action, they'd have to move against all the players that use the vanilla WoW client.
Perhaps, but every character, every location, every quest, every item, every story is not their "own" and is considered theft of intellectual property.
I thought that was client side? and controlled/checked by the server code.
Again, Nost have done nothing to be prosecuted for. The code they are using is their code, reversed engineered. It's not Blizzard's. If Blizzard wants to take legal action, they'd have to move against all the players that use the vanilla WoW client.
Perhaps, but every character, every location, every quest, every item, every story is not their "own" and is considered theft of intellectual property.
I thought that was client side? and controlled/checked by the server code.
Again, Nost have done nothing to be prosecuted for. The code they are using is their code, reversed engineered. It's not Blizzard's. If Blizzard wants to take legal action, they'd have to move against all the players that use the vanilla WoW client.
Perhaps, but every character, every location, every quest, every item, every story is not their "own" and is considered theft of intellectual property.
I thought that was client side? and controlled/checked by the server code.
Possible lines of defence if it had gone to trial:
the software is simply a "bot", albeit a very sophisticated one - so go after the players;
we are only facilitators not enablers - think pirate websites that host links - so players to blame;
Blizzard are no longer offering the WoW that people bought in 2004, that game is no longer supported.
Legal cases (and its hard when multiple countries have to be considered) suggest that - maybe:
they would probably "win" on the software side which works like e.g. the Brave search engine that blocks some (invasive) ads and replaces them with either nothing or with (good) ads and - like the Nost code - doesn't alter the original (web page) code.
lose the "vanilla WoW" is no longer supported argument - although untested companies modify products all the time and retain copyrights etc. to the original;
and - probably - be found guilty of hosting - they were hosting after all - a pirate website. (Things haven't been clear cut over this either of course.)
The hosting though would be the Achilles' heel I think - even if the Pirate Party did well in Iceland's recent elections! (They are a serious party btw.)
yes, how dare Blizzard have a say on how their copyrighted content is used, indeed *sarcasm*
To make something clear: neither you or anyone else have a word on how a company can manage their own content. If you dont like how capitalism works, feel free to move to North-Korea.
Do you use an ad-blocker? If so how dare you have a say on what you see. After all the hard work that has gone into the copyrighted web page. Its OK though because that is - indeed - how capitalism works.
Welcome to the big picture. Which comes into play in the legal system.
Again, Nost have done nothing to be prosecuted for. The code they are using is their code, reversed engineered. It's not Blizzard's. If Blizzard wants to take legal action, they'd have to move against all the players that use the vanilla WoW client.
Perhaps, but every character, every location, every quest, every item, every story is not their "own" and is considered theft of intellectual property.
We clearly talk about 2 things noone knows here: Coding and Law in that matter.
Comments
Yeah, and this is the part where I wasn't completely clear on about IP law. I was under the impression that there were consequences to NOT protecting your IP. Maybe there isn't as @Sovrath pointed out.
I find it interesting that the Nost server code ISN'T illegal, yet bot code is?
Either way, I think Blizzard most definitely does look like the "bitch" if they could do something and choose to do nothing. Maybe they have great reasons not to, but either way the optics of the decision look bad.
I guess we'll have to wait and see what happens.
Crazkanuk
----------------
Azarelos - 90 Hunter - Emerald
Durnzig - 90 Paladin - Emerald
Demonicron - 90 Death Knight - Emerald Dream - US
Tankinpain - 90 Monk - Azjol-Nerub - US
Brindell - 90 Warrior - Emerald Dream - US
----------------
Lol, too true! Actually I suppose that would go even further back (looking at you VHS recorder). I still think it's a matter of entitlement, though. Piracy is no different.
Crazkanuk
----------------
Azarelos - 90 Hunter - Emerald
Durnzig - 90 Paladin - Emerald
Demonicron - 90 Death Knight - Emerald Dream - US
Tankinpain - 90 Monk - Azjol-Nerub - US
Brindell - 90 Warrior - Emerald Dream - US
----------------
All that effort they spent fussing with Blizzard they could have spent with Mark Kern and his misguided petition writing baby teeth having self on his game Ember.
TL;DR
Stop obsessing over stuff that doesn't belong to you.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
What is more concerning is that this was the one card the Nost Team had to play and at the moment it seems they might have played it in a less than artful manner. Only time will tell if they actually should have played it, and/or played it at a different time. I would guess this won't endear them to the folks at Blizzard, but whether or not the Blizzard folks will now deep six any plans of Legacy Servers out of spite is speculative at best.
That said I'm not sure what the Nost Team was thinking would result from this release. What is their endgame? What do they expect Blizzard to do now that they've done it? Do they expect Blizzard to apologize profusely and put out Vanilla servers tomorrow? Do they expect thousands of Vanilla WoW servers to pop up overnight and that Blizzard will go bankrupt trying to squash them all? I'll even give them the benefit of the doubt with the metaphor and say they've pitched the tea into the harbor. What was the result they wanted? If it was just a "F*ck You" to Blizzard then I find that infantile, futile and ultimately unsupportable. If the idea was to come off like heroes who are struggling against the evil World of Warcraft Overloads at Blizzard it doesn't seem to have worked.
As a side note here I am once again struck by the petulant entitlement we gamers seem to possess. We seem to feel that because we have played a game we have some right to demand changes and even special versions of the game to the point where we will even ennoble and condone any action so long as it furthers our desires to have exactly what we want. It is curious how the Nost Team (I might have to rethink that designation based on my next statement) has been transformed from a group enterprising computer programmers that gave some people a place to take a nostalgia trip to keepers of the Vanilla Warcraft flame that are speaking for untold millions and struggling mightily against the Evil Empire of Blizzard to return us to all that was once good and great in the Warcraft Universe. It might have something to do with our "outsider/geek" status that makes us all feel that "The Man" is messing with our good time and we have to strike back in a way that only us geeks can. I wonder if any significant study has been done on the psychology of us gamers that would answer that small rhetorical question?
(Please forgive me for wondering this out loud and remember before you get angry with me that I include myself in the group of "gamers" referred to in this paragraph. I have noticed this tendency in myself as I from time to time on this very board have been known to assert that I know better than the developers of certain games what is good for their games).
Well the milk is spilled. I guess we'll just have to wait and see what becomes of it.
Many a small thing has been made large by the right kind of advertising.
Nost is wrong. Period.
However, we'll have to wait and see.
Many a small thing has been made large by the right kind of advertising.
Blizzard in a business sense is doing it right IMO. Go after the servers that get too big for their britches, don't waste your time on the rest.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Wait ... wrong board.
Many a small thing has been made large by the right kind of advertising.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
In all seriousness, no law would ever be made that gave someone the right to run off with someone else's copyrighted material (IP) and make new products with it.. That said, make a new IP, copy the game systems, create new models etc.. and make as many vanilla WOW's as you want.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
yes, how dare Blizzard have a say on how their copyrighted content is used, indeed *sarcasm*
To make something clear: neither you or anyone else have a word on how a company can manage their own content. If you dont like how capitalism works, feel free to move to North-Korea.
I know its hard for some of you to understand this but there are a decent number of people that would have liked blizzard to have taken wow in a more alliance vs horde direction. Blizzard chose a more pve route which is fine, its their ip, but that doesnt mean that everyone enjoys that route. Some, like me, prefered the pvp at southshore than pretty much everything else the game offers...
If Blizzard wants to take legal action, they'd have to move against all the players that use the vanilla WoW client.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
What?....
- the software is simply a "bot", albeit a very sophisticated one - so go after the players;
- we are only facilitators not enablers - think pirate websites that host links - so players to blame;
- Blizzard are no longer offering the WoW that people bought in 2004, that game is no longer supported.
Legal cases (and its hard when multiple countries have to be considered) suggest that - maybe:- they would probably "win" on the software side which works like e.g. the Brave search engine that blocks some (invasive) ads and replaces them with either nothing or with (good) ads and - like the Nost code - doesn't alter the original (web page) code.
- lose the "vanilla WoW" is no longer supported argument - although untested companies modify products all the time and retain copyrights etc. to the original;
- and - probably - be found guilty of hosting - they were hosting after all - a pirate website. (Things haven't been clear cut over this either of course.)
The hosting though would be the Achilles' heel I think - even if the Pirate Party did well in Iceland's recent elections! (They are a serious party btw.)Welcome to the big picture. Which comes into play in the legal system.