Every one of you is a serial stalker, rapist, identity thief, and overall annoyance. No one likes you and no, you are not special; you are not a beautiful or unique snowflake. You are purified, virtual reality evil.
But only if you play Blizzard games.
So, yes, prety much all of you.
Blizzard’s recent announcement to use real names in the new StarCraft II community site and World of Warcraft Cataclysm expansion forum has sparked a heated backlash from Battle.net users, with commenters fearing for their lives, jobs, money, privacy and emotional security when the shift takes place before July 27.
But with the comments it’s receiving on the Battle.net forums, perhaps Blizzard should be fearing for its own life instead. With over 1,399 combined pages of angry rants and threats to leave the forums and games entirely, Blizzard has sparked an online riot that could quickly turn to revolution.
Based on its new RealID service, Blizzard says its plans are a completely innocent attempt to stop flame wars and trolling on its immensely popular forums:
The first and most significant change is that in the near future, anyone posting or replying to a post on official Blizzard forums will be doing so using their Real ID – that is, their real-life first and last name – with the option to also display the name of their primary in-game character alongside it. These changes will go into effect on all StarCraft II forums with the launch of the new community site prior to the July 27 release of the game, with the World of Warcraft site and forums following suit near the launch of Cataclysm. The classic Battle.net forums, including those for Diablo II and Warcraft III, will be moving to a new legacy forum section with the release of the StarCraft II community site and at that time will also transition to using Real ID for posting.
The official forums have always been a great place to discuss the latest info on our games, offer ideas and suggestions, and share experiences with other players – however, the forums have also earned a reputation as a place where flame wars, trolling, and other unpleasantness run wild. Removing the veil of anonymity typical to online dialogue will contribute to a more positive forum environment, promote constructive conversations, and connect the Blizzard community in ways they haven’t been connected before. With this change, you’ll see blue posters (i.e. Blizzard employees) posting by their real first and last names on our forums as well.
However pure its intentions, it would appear Battle.net users disagree with Blizzard’s new, hippie transparency philosophy, and a few for valid reasons. Blizzard’s decision is the most severe move against the common perceptions of internet privacy yet seen in the gaming community and a degree of backlash is duly expected.
Online anonymity is one reason so many people are drawn to computer games and forums. For some it is the ability to create a completely separate personality online, for others it is to live out a fantasy life, and for others still it is a simple matter of escape. The response to Blizzard’s announcement seems extreme, and for obvious reasons. People are fighting for their lives – virtual lives, but a life to which they are emotionally attached all the same. Perhaps we should be more concerned about the emotional attachment in the first place – how healthy is it to harbor a virtual persona on this level? – but for now the concern lies in Blizzard’s presumptuous removal of our anonymity.
But that’s just my opinion.
What do you think? Is a real name really this big of a deal, or are we overreacting as our anonymous personalities so often allow us to do? Post your thoughts below (and feel free to include your real name, if you dare).
This is a breach of every privacy regulation known to man. (well allmost) Look I CHOOSE to give my real name here, because I stand for my opinion and I dont mind if people disagree with me. Im not a flamer or anything. But this is just illegal what Blizzard is about to do. Here in the Netherlands we have a special authority that checks if companies and the government upholds the privacy regulations as are written down.
It’s normal that the Real ID would generate rage inside the forums because people simply don’t want to show their real name inside them.
In my opinion the Real ID its a good addition because right now we(battle.net users) can communicate with people that play both Starcraft 2 (when it gets out) and WOW and I think its specially easy and simple to chat with friends because some people have alts or are in different realms and you want to talk with them in game and this system allows. But I think that the part of the name could be optional like for example on steam you can put a nickname and the same thing should be implemented on this system specially on the forums.
Like this I think that everyone would be happy, Blizzard would have its battle.net Real ID system implemented and the users would be happy to use it with freaking out and being afraid of loosing their privacy.
Keep up the good work and continue to cut through the crap of the Video Game Industry
Bet you anything 90% of those people have a facebook account. What’s the difference between some weirdo browsing facebook for names and using that to look up info on a person? Just gives said weirdo a focus instead of picking someone at random.
“Big Brother” is doing alot worse than Blizzard imo as far as invasion of privacy.
The main issue here is not invasion of privacy. It is being used to hide the fact that now they can’t get on these forums and act like assholes anonymously and that really pisses them off. boo freaking hoo.
I’m sure we’ll see a class action lawsuit soon
I think it is a very good idea, it will lower all the bad things on the forums like trolls and bad coments, and in theory it should only be good and constructive posts being posted then.
One thing though I want to mention is how people are saying it is a break on personal security and all that, well nobody is telling you to post anything on the forum. It’s a part of their new EULA you sign under when you crate a B-net account. They can change anything they want in their EULA, and if you don’t agree on it, well then you might aswell stop playing Blizzard games, simple is that.
After all people are already sharing all their personal info on Facebook, Twitter ect. with everybody on the internet, I don’t think a real life name will make any damage at all.
If this creates some kind of lawsuit, I call American-lol on that.
I think it’s not a good idea to reveal real names for obvious reasons. There are a few people who may take things to seriously and then the flame wars will get too personal. I suspect that around half of the fans will just migrate to another site and possibly all of them if the official forum falls into a “Cataclysm.”
I posted this on Kotaku forums and would like to post it here also, as I feel as much people as possible shouldn’t know why this RealID system is just plain wrong
I’ve been a long time reader of Kotaku, but never a poster. I lurk, and I enjoy it. Until now. The mind boggling ignorance that the people are showing in these posts is really concerning and I feel the need to somehow try and educate people why this is wrong on so many levels.
There is so many articles about this, so many heated discussions about why this is wrong, and rebutals on the subjects. What I’d like to say is although some of you don’t think your privacy can be endangered though sharing your personal information, there are people out there who think it can. It is ignorant to think just because you are ok with something, everyone should also be.
All this can be summed up very well with just 2 articles. First one is an excellent RPS article written by Alec Meer (http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2010/07/07/broken-armour-blizzards-forum-folly), and the other one is a blog article showing how someone can get in contact with you in real life just from your name and surname (http://seewhatyoudidthere.com/2010/07/07/realid-changes-the-very-real-ease-of-stalking-in-the-internet-age/ Please read it and understand that there is a fundamental difference between social networks and gaming. Blizzard is trying to turn their games into social networks, and the gamers need to put a stop to that before it roots itself in.
Today I tried deleting my Battle.net account. I couldn’t find an option to do so, and when clicking on Help I was directed to a Technical section of their forum. Now for those saying you don’t have to post anything there, no one is forcing you…how will I get that information without making a post with my name and surname for all to see?
Please take some time to see how dreadfully wrong you are, I’ve posted this here also, but wasn’t logged in and now the comment is waiting authorization
http://kotaku.com/comment/25632672/
The people defending this RealID system need to wake up and realise what impact this could have to future gaming. Social networks and games are fundamentally different.
i agree with odoakar that well imo i dont want my games to turn into facebook or any thing but it will reduce some trolling maybe who knows but the privacy part is a big issue
I think it is a great idea! Most people today have facebooks, myspaces or whatever so at some point their real name is out on the internet. I think the reason why this is such a heated topic is because of peoples unhealthy obsession with their virtual identity and it’s distance from their real one. If it really is such a problem then don’t play the game, it’s not like they are displaying your name, your address, your date of birth and SS#. If anything it means if your going to talk s*** people will know exactly who is talking it.
I don’t care, I won’t be posting on their stupid forums anyway.
I’m sure that the people who are “cyber rioting” are all the trolls, jerks, assholes, dicks, twats, and little pukes that won’t be able to continue acting like there’s no law or respect in forums.
I think it’s a great idea, finally, Internet anonymity won’t be an excuse for people to act like the cyberspace was some kind of lawless old west.
Cheers axeheads!
Actually, that’s exactly what your doing. Once your name and Internet persona are linked, it’s simple to find out anything about pretty much anyone. You’ll 99% have a unique connection. With that you can pinpoint the exact person – of which there may be several with the same name – and from that you can find out a lot. Depending on how good you are, you will have the SS# as well.
If you think displaying your real name is a good idea, you’re not a good idea. Why are you throwing your anonymity away? That layer of protection between you and the psychopaths. Anyone can still lurk the forums and figure out that player X with name Y humiliated them in a match and thus they have this hatred. Hit up the forums, find the name, look up the address, murder. Sure this is extreme, but even lighter scare and stalk tactics will make people curl up in a corner.
If it wasn’t for my security awareness, I’d be easy to find. I have a unique name, according to the Internet, at least when used in full. There are too many people that take the Internet far too serious for me to risk some idiot rolling up to my door or just generally harassing me.
Sure, it’ll probably reduce trolls, but only because anyone will be able to find said troll.
Oh and the real reason Blizzard is doing this is because of some sort of Facebook partnership.
I personally don’t care but there are ppl that will or might be affected by this. Nicknames are a fundamental asset of gaming and exist because they have a very important role to play regarding privacy they are NOT MANDATORY!
They also add to the cool factor!
Sent from my HTC Desire
I think there are two separate issues in discussion here:
The trolling of the forums is one, and the persona that you create in order to escape into the “virtual” world is another.
First of all, I do not play Starcraft nor do I use the Battle.net platform.
That said, my empiric opinion is that as far as using the “RealID” in the forums, I don’t really see why not.
Now to carry that “RealID” throughout your every relation with the game environment THAT is a different issue:
If people want their “darkKnightOFDOOM” ID (or something 8P) to be associated with their Starcraft game skills, they’re fantasy bad ass army commander, that’s their gaming given right I say, and Blizzard should thread lightly in this area.
While that is a nice article it still does not really prove a point. There are countless other ways that person’s name could have been found. Yeah it’ll be easier now for anyone to have at it but with determination and resources it would have still been done.
MMO’s are a Social Game so its not that far from removed from a social network. Starcraft has a huge multiplayer following and that sounds like a social network to me as well. Company’s use facebook, myspace, twitter, etc already on their current and potential employee’s. My company just recently fired some people over their facebook content. It’s not going to be any different if they get rid of you because your a gamer. Hell if your lucky maybe they’ll screw up when they do and you can turn it back on them with a lawsuit cause that’s the American way.
Blizzard has been pretty gestapo lately in their rules and whatnot that this does not really suprise me. Just don’t post anymore on their site. Stop playing their games. I really don’t see them changing this unless they are taken to court over it.
reading the o-boards were a headache anyway and support on the forums for the most part are cut&paste answers. go hassle their phone support.
Jess, have you ever noticed that your first and last name are appended to every article and post you make on this site? Is that a breach of privacy? Of course not. You are merely confident in what you write and believe in its integrity enough to associate it with your good name.
The people who are decrying this as a “breach of security” must be totally oblivious to the fact that their personal information is on countless databases.
Ever been called by a telemarketer? Guess what? They had your full name, phone number, and address. They didn’t have to go on Blizzard’s forums to find that out.
Another example: My mother has been getting phone calls from scammers, who claim she owes money on recent doctor’s bills. They knew her name, number, address, and even the fact that she’d recently had a doctor’s appointment earlier that month. They knew all of this, and my mother doesn’t even own a computer.
Having your first and last name appended to a forum post isn’t a breach of security; it’s called having integrity. Most of the gutless weasels who post immature, hateful garbage do so because there is absolutely zero accountability thanks to the shield of anonymity the Internets provides.
I say good for Blizzard. The irrational, self-important manbabies who made all those ranting posts will do either one of two things: 1) leave Battle.net, removing their toxic presence and improving the health of the community or 2) swallow their pride, grow a pair, and start acting their age. Either way, win.
Best idea eva! Should definitely be the norm.
It’s funny because every single one of those angry ranters plays World of Warcraft, and they will continue to play it even if this shit goes down.
actually i really don ‘t care about this because anonymity in internet is just the case of matter when someone really wants to find your real identity with a little effort everyone can find a lot of info on you. People think they made anonymous comment but actually there is a lot of ways how to find who you are.
If not, well then i can see a lot of lawsuits Blizzard will get if something will go wrong with their attempt to use real ID.
Yes, there is one problem with real ID usage. As the first commenter said, also in Latvia there is laws and regulations to institutions who want to use real ID and there is also The Council of Europe The Convention on the protection of with regard to automatic processing of personal data that was signed 28.01.1981 in Strasbourg that Blizzard will need to follow to protect our privacy if they want to use our real ID and process those data. Most likely Blizzard’s lawyers already going through all those laws. At least i hope
Its because Jess CHOOSE TO!! not because it is forced down her throat, and that is what Blizzard is doing.
I don’t know how anyone can be OK with this. I never trolled any forum in my life, probably visited blizzard forum once so far, but that is not the point.
No one says it’s impossible to get your ID now, but hanging your real name makes it much easier. No one says that the door is hard to unlock, but leaving a key in the keyhole makes it that much easier (and inviting).
read this: http://wowriot.gameriot.com/blogs/Americans-are-bad-at-games/Real-Names-on-the-Official-Forums-New-REAL-ID-function?gr_i_ni
best case scenario, he is getting 100 pizzas to his adress right now. Worst case, out of 11 million wow players, there is one idiot who will think it is cool to wait for the guy infront of his house.
Do you really want to make it easier for let’s say, an angry nerd-enraged teenager that you beat in pvp 5 times in a row, starts posting negative feedback on your own business site? Or sending mails to your sister or mother?
Do you want your kid to hang out his name in the cesspool of official wow forums? … yes yes, parental controls and all that crap – remember when you were kid, you got arround everything your parents tried to prevent you from doing. Neighbour’s kid has a computer also you know.
Imagine you’re a girl playing wow, suddenly everyone and their mother knows you are girl. I can imagine if nothing else, your everyday gaming life being filled with having to deal with a bunch of /tells that you don’t really want.
Just makes such an easy doorway to make your life unpleasant at best.
Blizzard is releasing 2 games this year. Nothing better then creating a fake controversy to get some free media exposure.
They will ultimatly retract the plan IMO cause of the privacy laws in the EU and US.
fail. posting on forums is optional. and seeing as how the change isn’t retro active. you would essentially be choosing to give your information away. it breaks no laws and i really wish ignorant people would stop saying otherwise
da da da double fail.
didn’t anyone ever tell you not to put your personal info online?
1. blizzard isn’t releasing a list of every customers name/address/ss#. if you don’t want your name on the forum (for whatever ridiculous reason), don’t post. DERP.
2. so you post anyway, and now someone has your name. okay, and? they found your facebook. okay, and? if you have a public profile on facebook, or really any other site for that matter, AND you have personal info posted, then it’s your own fault. did blizzard force you to post your phone number and address on your blog? nope, didn’t think so.
god damn some people are stupid
p.s. not sure why i can’t edit. so sorry for the double post :/
Ehhh, yes it breaks the law. It is a fundamental right to preserve a condition spread in all internet and gaming world. That is not to reveal information about myself to every soul playing Starcraft. True, you may have to state your real name to Blizzard when you create your account ( I really don’t remember if that’s the case), but why do I have to share with the world that I’m playing if I don’t want to? That is a breach of a right for privacy i have, and it is irrelevant if it is retroactive. In fact, its even more damaging if it is, because there has been a fundamental change in contract without you knowing.
For the record, Tim, you are the ignorant fool. Blizzard will be sued for this and they will not win.
And I would like for ignorant people to stop calling other people ignorant. If you experience any bugs and need to report them, or you have a technical question regarding the game you play – do you know what you will have to do to get the info you want? Yes, you will need to post on the Blizzard forums. For example, if you want to know how to delete your Battle.Net account, you are directed to their Technical section of the forum, where you are supposed to create a thread about that. Still optional?
sure is – open a ticket in game.
or gee, i dunno..use google? hurrrrrrr
lol k, whatever you say buddy <3
Ignorant about this subject? Im studying law and then this part always comes up, not only in criminal but also in civil and governmentall law. I have read essays and books about this. To call someone ignorant while not knowing if someone has a background in it, thats ignorance. Just like the government doenst have to know everything about you, other forummembers dont need to know about you if you dont want to. And it DOES break laws, the Dutch privacy authority would not like this kind of actions. And no, knowledge doesnt come from books, but how you underline your argument. What you just did was giving no real argument or assesment why your position is better.
rofl, deleted his post. nice
Let’s just assume you want to get a new job. You apply and the company that you wanted to get a job at starts searching for information regarding you and what you do. They will find a post of yours in a battle.net forum and therefore decide not to give you the job since …. (fill in any reason you like).
It is none of other peoples business what you do in your free time and i dont think you want everybody to know…
just my thoughts
This seem like a ridicules way to stop trolling on a forum.Is the forum account some how link to the account.So that if your get band from the forum your band from the game?No right?So why not just band people on he forums.As far as legality go’s if your chose not to give your name you don’t have to.Forcing people to is a violation of privacy laws(at least where I live).Where they jealous of all the lawsuits face book getting for lesser then that?
I wonder about the paradox of our virtual worlds. On Facebook (never ever will I subscribe to it) people even give away their religion and political attitude with their names but on a games site, they rage about it.
I mean, I would not like to see my real name on any of this platforms, but I wonder how fast people get used to displeasing situations in our modern times. It’s like with Modern Warfare. Everyone complained about it, but no one took action in really boycotting it. People who wrote petitions were the first ones to buy it.
Now they rage, but if the new battle.net forums come, no one will speak about it in a few months because the people are too addicted to their sweets.
“Panem et circenses” like the ancient poet Juvenal wrote it.
I dont think, this would change the trolling and flaming at all. So you got someone flaming your thread and ripping it in two. Now you got his or her real Name, what do you wanne do? Buy a Flyticket for several hundred bucks and punch him at his or her frontdoor in the face? Or go to the police and try to explain how enraged you are about someones posting.
I cannot see a how this should raise the quality bar in blizzforums, sure there will be a few people be deterred, but the flamer with passion will not stop. In my Opinion its more a try to collect treasures treasures Data from the Customer.
I get it, they can ban you from the forums. Then you would need a new ID at all. I guess their will be more Moms around Blizzforums in near future.
It’s one of those theories that “look good on paper” but when you bring it to the real world, it’s going to fall down and ruin everything. Especially the community. If anything, it’ll be a new way of trolls to thrive.
This situation is just going to prompt people to “think before they write” the first stupid thought that passes through their mind.
One more thing, I think people are giving way too much relevance to “real names” in the internet. Most have to realize that it is easier to link personal information to a “nickname/persona” in the internet than by using a real name.
Why? Easy, how many John Smith’s, or Andrew Johnson’s do you think are out there? But your nickname/persona tends to be unique, and very personal…
…Think about that.
Cheers axeheads.
They should just do what Facebook does: Default their site to do whatever they want, but have the option buried deep within profile settings to set it back to normal.
Well, I have my own opinion on this – but ultimately, I think what you have to understand by their public statement is they are trying to protect their community. Unfortunately, we can all say that at some point or other, things are said that you wouldn’t otherwise have done if you were looking at someone face to face. Now, granted, anonymity gives us that option, but the whole point of it is accountability. To say it, regardless of whether you are publicly recognized, gives you more responsibility. I completely agree with this. It’s still your right to post or not. Now, not participating into the forums and still having my name out there on battle.net sucks, but I can live with it if I want to play the game(s). It’s all good in the hood.
I was going to tap out some long manifesto, in response to all of the comments since I last posted, but Raisins pretty much nailed it in far less words.
Cheers, mate.
you clearly haven’t seen any of the discussion about this.
apparently, every single person that plays wow has a “unique – nobody else in the world has this name. i’ve checked” name. and is also in witness protection.
/rollseyes
Ok. So on one hand having people reveal their names in a form would cut down on asshatery, on the other it’s a risk in some ways. This makes for a very volatile discussion because there is a negative to each side and opposing sides will make an example of their opponent’s faults in order to prove their point. In other words, everyone ends up looking like an ass. The negative to having your name displayed in a forum, is that some lovely person who decides that a game is important enough to hunt you down if you beat them, only has to join the forum to discover your name and track you down. This goes for any kind of lovely person out there. If for whatever reason they want to find you, or harass you they can do it. Also, employer’s don’t like to hire gamers, so it makes it easy for them to find out. The negative to not having your name displayed is that there will be nothing to deter trolls and flamers and people like this ruin intelligent discussions, granted, all you have to do is ignore them, but not everyone has that ability. If the only choice of sides is the lesser of two negatives, than there is no side worth taking and I’m not going to support one over the other just because there’s a little less of chance of me getting tracked down and stabbed, when there is still a negative to it. This means Blizzard gets a cookie. Ya get a cookie for realizing that trolls and flamers suck and for trying to do something about it. But it also means you’re gonna hafta try (something other than the name reveal) harder to make your “Utopian Forum” a reality.
I don’t think Blizzard’s been bullied before; giving others your real name is hardly the right action needed to stop flame wars. For that matter, how did the idea come to take place in the first place?
how is your real name gonna tell who you are to a stranger. there are several other people who go by your name. Noone will know your addres ect ect. Alsom this is not illegal, you will have to accept a new privacy policy and if you do so you allow them to show your real name.
you CHOOSE to display your real name when you CHOOSE to post on the forums. Just don’t post, there are plenty of other forums dedicated to this insanely popular game(a lot with much better info as well). I don’t see why so many people are freaking out about this. Instead of posting on the technical support forums, CALL technical support. Hell you’ll get a faster response.
The amount of information you need to know to run a back ground check on some one is surprisingly small.Name,city,age and 30 bucks is all you need to do a full back ground check on some one.This include phone number,addresses,relatives,ect.Having a user name was probably the only safe guard they had on a casual game where people might share half this info openly.If your in America yes this is illegal.I think it tie in to one of the amendments so no matter what they wright up it might as well be on toilet paper.
I’m still wondering like… are they for real or what? They can’t possibly be serious about this can they? Not that I’m affected or anything, but I can see how people are not (going to be) liking this. And if one as dumb as myself can see it, the geniuses at Blizzard must be able to see that coming from miles away, right?
@Odoakar:
“http://seewhatyoudidthere.com/2010/07/07/realid-changes-the-very-real-ease-of-stalking-in-the-internet-age/”
That is good stuff. Somebody at A/B should read that. Also, the follow-up is a nice take on the ever-popular talk with you wallet. If I’d have a WoW-account in the first place, I’d follow his example.
I find it really amusing the number of people here who posted that having the real name identified in a post wasn’t enough of a thing to be worried about, yet they posted under a nick name instead of their real name. Hypocritical at all?
I take it you didn’t read the article about how a Counterstrike player tracked someone down over being killed in a game via knife fight and so spent the next bit of their time tracking the person down and then knifing them in the chest when they answered the door? (they barely missed their heart and the guy survived thankfully).
There are many unstable people in the world, you don’t know who you are giving out information too.
With Facebook at least you can set who sees what and you give that information freely to friends when you lock down your profile, you can choose for friends of friends to see it or just people you have directly accepted as friends.
Performing a background check, whether it be solicited by a business or an individual, is perfectly legal in the United States. I know this because I am a human resources manager, by day, and it’s my job to know what is legal or illegal in such affairs.
I think you may want to go and reread the Constitution because there isn’t a single Amendment which would render background checks, or what Blizzard is doing, unconstitutional.
Don’t go accusing others of taking away your rights, if you have no idea what they actually are.
You should join the actual forums, we even have real life pictures.
Our forums are the perfect example of a very civil community, one that doesn’t need to come up with insults and belittling others to make a point towards our common hobby, videogames.
People have to be more responsible with what their “online persona” shows of themselves, anonymity is no excuse to behave like a total douche.
At the person who said that “who knows how many psychos are out there that may stab you in the heart” for meleeing them in Counter Strike, all I gotta say is this:
Getting killed by some dick wad from an MMO or online game, has a way smaller probability to happen in comparison to some drunk jerk running you over with his/her pick up truck on a Friday night out in downtown.
Cheers axeheads
It may be smaller now, because currently it takes knowledge to find someone’s name based on just an online persona (typically). Once the name is out there, it’ll take nothing but Google and Facebook, seeing as most people have their security settings exceptionally low. Hell, with OpenGraph (which is the opposite of open) I don’t even understand why people still have facebook accounts, especially after its history of handing out personal information like it was nothing.
My point being, once it is simple to get at names, these things will occur more often… on top of that, why be foolish enough to run that risk? That’s like saying, deaths for jay-walking are really low, may as well do it!
Hey all, just wanted to chime in and ask everyone to keep the discussion civil. Please leave the personal attacks and name calling at the door…or I’ll get out my ban-stick and start thrashing faces.
Cheers,
Brent
What you do is fundamentally different from what they are doing.The people who give theyer name up to you is doing by theyer own free will but if they choice not to they don’t have to.Of courses this might prevent them from being hired but it still with in theyer right not to.The argument about the amendment revolve around the 4th amendment act that involve search and seizure, whether or not that can be extended to businesses,where you can tell a cop to piss off if he ask for your id when you did nothing wrong.Not the most perfect allegory but i don’t see why you should let a business have more power then the police.Beside this isn’t some thing I’m using, other people are comparing it to that.I find it a little bit flimsy but Face book,Google,Apple, and many more company’s going through lawsuit’s cause of stuff less relevant then user names and losing so why cant i draw from what was judged to be wrong in those cases wont be wrong in this?This isn’t me accusing any one of any thing.This just me laying out facts that where in other cases that deal with the same kind of issues.I don’t play or care about WOW just voicing the legality of the issues and how both group can get screwed from this.It still just a dumb way to stop trolling when you can just ban a person on a forum instead.
You people who seem to be supporting this move from Activision-Blizzard are forgetting one thing. Identity theft. There is a very small chance that a freak will track you down and do you harm (unless your a girl gamer unfortunately, there are a lot of lonely loosers out there). There is a very real chance however that you could be a victim of fraud or identity theft. THis sort of crime is on the rise and i know of at least two of my relatives have been a victim of it. In both cases they lost hundreds of pounds from accounts, with no recourse on getting the money back. The perpetrators even had the audacity to call up their houses, pretending to be the bank to glean more information. Battle.net will become a new target for frauds. Be very wary with whome you choose to share any of your personal details with online. Or anywhere esle!
@FmF!:
The fourth Amendment can extend to illegal surveillance, i.e. invasion of privacy. However, what Blizzard is doing can’t be qualified as such. Requiring its users to provide and post their real names is different than, say, collecting their social security numbers in order to track their movements.
If this was an illegal act, the FCC would already be knocking on Blizzard’s door and asking for an explanation.
Anyone who is deathly concerned with this should take the time to read Blizzard’s actual privacy policy. It’ll tell you straight up what they can and can’t do with any information you give them.
Ultimately, this issue comes down to morality, not legality. The legal stuff is pretty black and white. The ethics side… as you can see, it’s pretty messy ; )
I figure with the Real ID most people for example are in a wow guild(not me yet have not ever had time to play wow,…kids jeeeze!!!!) and usually names are exchanged anyway and most people do not care if there name gets out, however there are those people that are very uptight about keeping there information online safe and also the parents that do not want themselfs or children to end up being a rape victim!!! so for me its a 50/50
@Wakeingeverygod
That why i refer to it as flimsy but can still be used in this case and if not siting cases involving face book,Google,and apple who bin getting lawsuit for similar thing’s like this as a base for legal ramification to back up my argument.Thing’s like this is very common practice in businesses.How ever it fall in to that ethical gray a lot and have bin sued cause of it.Just cause some thing is ethical doesn’t mean it opted out of legal process.My point is they can be taken to court on this and more then likely will lose,all over a half baked plan.May be we can have this conversation some were else this is a game site and we are getting kind of off topic on the legal aspect of they’re action.^^
I myself don’t have a real problem with this, seeing as I don’t post on the form, and only my friends will know my “real ID”.
But really Blizzard? If your going to make it so people can only post with one user name, at least let them choose what it is, and not force it to be they’re Real Life name. I mean yea, Don’t let them change it once they do, but this is the internet, no one wants to be themselves
but on the plus side, YEA ANTI-FLAME WARS! WHOOOOOO! Now no one will be able to jump to a different name, and start flaming on that one.
Just wish blizzard would have let people who use the forum choose they’re one, single name, instead of using the Real-ID name.
I mean look at Steam, its a good example, sure it still has the flame war problem, but I can at least friend people, and talk to them in any game I want, without having to tell the whole world what my name is.
I personally am not so much concerned with realid since Im not a poster at the wow forums(but I do see it as a big problem for alot of people), but Im more concerned at where this is heading to, Im pretty sure activision(greedy fuckwad bobby kotick in particular) had something to do with this, this whole integration of social networking bothers me, today real names linked on a forum just exposed on the internet for all to see, tomorrow ingame items you can purchase and ingame advertisements, please just keep games and social networking apart(or at least make it optional for the people that dont want to participate, which blizzard shouldve done in the first place imo). And for the whole reducing trolls on forums, come on, who seriously believes that, sure trolls are sadly a part of the internet, but there are other ways to combat that. I think the casual market(facebook, farmville etc) is partly to blame, when blizzard decided to let WoW become more casual friendly, it kinda ruined the experience for me as a hardcore gamer. btw my first post on this site
In regards to those of you talking about female gamers being stalked…Not saying it doesn’t happen, but it’s never happened to me nor any other female gamers I know and we all use facebook, and give out some personal information about the state we live in, etc.
I think the point is, if you are so paranoid that your personal information will be used against you in some way, why are you leaving your footprints all over the internet? It doesn’t matter if someone know’s your real name or not. If they want to steal your identity they can and will.
People still dig in trash for personal information, just as online scammers use key-loggers and phishing. People that have never even used the internet get their identity stolen every day. Seems to me that some of you are living with a false sense of internet security.
If you fear that your identity will get stolen, STOP posting on a forum, downloading programs, or giving out personal information! Might as well go live in the streets so no one has any CHANCE of stealing your identity! Your probability of getting your identity stolen by posting with your real name is slim to none. God, some of you guys are so overly paranoid.
Yes, as long as you do pretty much anything on the internet, it CAN be traced back to the real you. However, it takes a lot more work with just a screen name than with somebody’s REAL name.
And to the people who are using the Facebook argument, a gaming forum is vastly different than a Facebook page. I keep my facebook information set to private anyway, but even if it was public, I doubt my recent trip to the zoo is going to piss anybody off. However, people’s views on games can and have set people off before.
@FmF!:
Certainly, the community can attempt to take legal action against Blizzard via a lawsuit. I’m just not as opptimistic as you are about their chances of winning.
Blizzard isn’t breaking any federal laws, which is the jurisdiction the Internets falls under. That being the case, the community would have to sue based on the grounds that they believe Blizzard’s actions are comprimising their privacy. That’s going to be pretty tough to prove without any clear cut evidence that user’s profiles are indeed being exploited and that Blizzard’s action are the direct cause.
To me, the law is obviously on Blizzard’s side, but that doesn’t mean everyone has to like it. That’s why I said this is more of an ethical conundrum than a legal one. I can leave it at that, if you wish.
As for the comments directed toward the futility of troll deterrence, no one ever said this system would lead to a virtual utopia. That’s impossible. There are just too many jerks in this world, and even the best of us lose our cool, from time to time.
As Raisins stated in a previous post, this action may lead to people being more thoughtful about what they post, instead of just writing down the first, random thought that comes to mind.
Afterall, if a user gains a reputation as a jerk on a forum which displays real names, it’s no longer a fake persona gaining the unflattering title. It’s the user himself. This may seem silly, but it does have a profound, psychological effect.
@Wakingeverygod
I can say the same to you about your optimism that blizzard can win.Not to be rude but I have stated several similar cases brought up against company’s that have the same issues.You have not show me any reason why I should separate those cases from this other then your opinion.I’m going to need some thing with relevance to make me think they are untouchable by this and even if they are they can still be held accountable for some one who abuse the information.Trust me there will be some one who will abuse it.
I think saying this will physiological deter will only work if any one who value the opinion of a strangers.If this some how a significant portion of theyer fourm to make a difference i would rather see it closed down and have every member try to achieve the Darwin award.
Side note blizzard decided to scrap this plan for any of the many things that was said.So we cant see who could have won if they where taken to court.
Idea of real ID idea is great itself. Blizz probably hasn’t ever planned to bring it to life, they just throw this idea to later be like “Hey, we’re not doing this, cause we’re listeting to the gaming community! We’re so cool!” xP
I for one, like this new scheme Blizzard are bringing to their forums. It weeds out all the troll and inappropriate – not to mention rude – comments that are frequently posted there. As for the “Stalkers” on the forums, hopefully this won’t happen too much.
I see it a step into making the Internet a more sensible, idiot-free and grown up place for everyone. If you don’t like this idea, don’t post on the forums, to put it simply. Its not like this idea will over flow into all of Blizzard’s games…
Seriously, If my name was Adam Smith and from New York City, I wouldn’t give a flying fuck about having my name being displayed on the forums. But my name is unique, and I’m from a small town. If my name and location were displayed and someone wanted to do harm to me, i would be pretty fucking easy to find. And we aren’t saying that you can’t have your name displayed. If you want to, for whatever reason, go right on ahead. It is just wrong that everyone MUST have their name displayed. This is just like making a law stating that everyone in the United States must wear assless chaps. Just because some people want to wear them, doesn’t mean everyone should be FORCED to wear them.
Oh, and people can still find out your name even if you dont post. You can search forum users from their database. So if you know what you are doing, and you have some free time, you can find out someone’s name even without them posting.
As long as children keep being born, this will never fucking happen, so stop pretending like it will.
VIVA LA REVOLUTION
I think this would just move the trolling and harassing off of the forums and into people’s private email inboxes.
It’s an interesting concept, but to me it seems like it creates too many privacy issues to justify doing it for the sake of “cleaning up the forums”.
Also, if having your real name being displayed doesn’t matter like some are arguing, then how would it stop trolling?
i’m split on this issue, personally.
1) I think it is a good idea to keep people civil – I try to conduct myself in forums as i would in real life, but sadly few people agree, or at least the worst of us are loudest.
2) However, my misgivings have more to do with the “real world” connecting to my online life, not the other way around. I have a creative professional, and for better or for worse I need to market myself to the world. Of course the internet is one of the ways I do so. So if a potential customer/client were to google search me, do I really want some forum post about the latest patch of SCII popping up? Unfortunately, there’s still a bit of a stigma around gaming and unfortunately I’m not sure its a good idea to broadcast it to everybody.
I agree completely with this move. I think that everyone has the right to privacy, but at the same time no one is forcing you to be in the forum. If you have nothing to hide then you have no problem to support this, after all giving your name won’t do you any harm. If you want to be a troll then fine, but at least have some pride and say who you are instead of hiding behind your screen
Taking in acount that governments, especialy the one in the US, can pretty much track your every move, tap your phone or do worse things whenever they feel like they have some sort of reason. So i dont worry about my name in the gaming industry too much.
Im a grown up gamer (finally) in a grown up industry and stand by what i say, no doubt. However i dont feel the need to share my exact adres, email or other personal information with each and every gamer.
Id really like full disclosure on the ‘why’ of all this.
If it actually makes the service and gaming experience better, sure why not.
But Blizzard and especialy the users on battlenet is not just some other company. In pure numbers it smashes games like modern warfare to bits.
And my most important worry is: whos next? Is this gonna be forced down our throats in the near future in the entire gaming industry? Because at that time i will start to dislike the idea.
Besides that nicknames are a cool way to shape and express your digital identity
The reason whey Blizzard was forcest to stop the Real ID, on forum… Was mostly because of European Fans. Yes, all the complaints did help… But that was only the 2′nd good reason ^^
Because… Most country’s in Europe, have laws for Real ID. Facebook know how those law’s work ^^ Because they broke them, when they lunched in Europe
Law’s & angry fans agents you = You don’t really have a choice
Personally think its an awesome idea, I mean this MIGHT cause some problems but hay nothing is ever 100% safe. If we stop people from hiding behind a screen name then we might even be able to stop things like pirates, RRRR!
Names are like avatars, you can’t do absolutely nothing with them.
So a guy is called Patrick stevens, good luck finding any information on him, Oh, start with facebook and the thousands of search results you’ll get.
Not to mention that you can change your name in account settings, so its not anyone actually has their real name in the Real name section.
Blizzard members just overacted. Facebook and other social websites are much more dangerous than Real names on forums can possibly be, you display your location, your friends, your pictures and heck, sometimes even your house.
However, just like Real names doesn’t hurt you, it doesn’t hurt the troll either.
Why did Blizzard even contemplate this idea, it’s ridiculous. I tend to agree with the lads on Epic Batle Axe, it must have something to do with facebook in order for blizzard to even think this was a good idea.
Forcing things upon people is always a bad idea, but forcing such a major thing onto people like this is crazy.
I think this is a good idea for people who want to use it, so it’s easier for people to recognise them, or to make them more famous in the community for example, in terms of people recognising them more.
But this should only be an optional thing for people who wish to use the system.
@Mihael-Keehl
The thing with facebook is that you have an option to keep your profile private for only friends or public, i think the major thing about this, is that it was forced upon you, yes it’s great for people who wish to use it, but it should be optional only.
Stupid,and this is why with just one question:What’s the point?No,seriously,why do they have to do this?What do they gain from all of this that’s so important?Nobody has ever done something like this before and there was no problem.I don’t play MMORPGs and strategy games,like,at all,I never did and I probably never will,so in order for something like this that has nothing to do with me,to piss me off so much,it must be something really retarded…
It’s blizzard’s ego starting to kick in, thinking they can do whatever they want, thinking they have all the fans in the world can do stuff without their permission, so well done to the community for making their voice heard.
One thing i haven’t read everybody’s post so if i repeat i apologies; i for one think this is a step towards the right direction and here is why, first it is a great to clean up the (lets say) filth on the internet lets face it there are a lot of dick-heads on the internet that because you don’t know who the fuck they are they feel they have the power to crush people just because they see the world differently than you (example you like a game lets say [you know what lets pick a big name] God of War 3 and you innocently post on the internet, the first response you get is “fuck God of War, God of War is for pussy ass bitches who play on a PS3 instead of a 360″ next post “yeah people who by a PS3 are little bitches who love to get Eiffel towered buy two black guys, 360 rules” you then are crushed and sell your ps3 and god of war for a 360 just so that you feel loved. . . is that not heart breaking), second it will help stop the stereotypes like “girls don’t play video games”, “MMO players have know life”, “people who play video games can’t play a run families” etc. etc. listen to some examples, one there are millions of girls who play video games (360/PS3) they are not so rare that you should Horace them coulse they are a girl or think you are the luckiest man coulse you found a gamer girl i bet you out of 6 million people playing Gears of War, about 2 million of them are girls, two people can support a family and play video games DK for instance has enough children for a baseball team and still take care of them and play video games (if people wonder i heard in an episode that DK’s wife is going to have another child so i assume he has more than one. . . how is she by the way); i end this rant by saying that i support this and hope that one day there will be less “filth” on the internet, and as gamers we find out just how diverse we really are
I guest it’s just the same with real identification cards.
The blizzard ID is stupid.
In order to use their forum you have to have an account with them so blizzard knows our names already..
What blizzard needs to do is ban the people who abuse it or punish them from the game with a week off of not playing the game.
This is all about control…First one person does it then every site will follow down the same path…They are just testing the waters…
Honestly, I’m not going to believe this. Give me statistics based on internet stalkers from a legitimate source or I’ll , I don’t care that Dateline NBC catches a predator every week, I feel that it is grossly exaggerated. If you go outside, you are at risk of a predator. If you go to school, you are at risk of a predator. If you go to work, you are at risk of a predator, but did you ever get stalked by one? If we don’t implement something like the Real ID in some form or another, then we may never find a viable solution to clean up internet forums.
My suggestion, a slow and optional integration. Make Real ID exclusive forums with extra mod surveillence, and let the other non ID threads die out as they begin to be spammed by said trolls.
If it was mandatory it would of sucked for all those guys pretending to be girls in WoW.
I don’t believe this BS of how people are afraid of internet stalkers.
No sir, I don’t believe he is dreadfully wrong, but I do believe that your sources are dreadfully wrong. You only gave us one example of a person getting their personal information looked at, and that information came off of a public blog, a sketchy source at best. Unless you provide actual statistics from a credible source, this evidence is simply refutable.
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Can you please provide us the article? In the mean time, I will provide my own stats AND credible sources about the probable chances that you could encounter one of these such players.
Alright, so we have Counter-strike selling about 4.2 million units and Counter-strike source selling about 2.1 million units as of December 2008. (1) Assuming that only 10% of the units sold is still active, we have 620000 people playing Counter-strike collectively. Now let’s add a very reasonable number, about 62 cases of murders because of Counter-strike, which would probably be on the news, you still end up with a 0.001 percent of meeting a homicidal maniac in a server. If my numbers are wrong, please find me 62+ articles and I will be quiet.
So, based on my assumptions, you have to meet at least 10000 people until you meet someone with a bad temper. You have to do a lot of server hopping in order to meet that many people.
Sources:
http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=21319
http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2008/12/valve-unveils-h/
http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/56193
It’s really not a big deal. Like people have said time and time again… people have ways of finding out who you are no matter what. With the Real ID friends list, who cares if someone else can see your name. It doesn’t tell you what characters they have or anything. I am crazy conservative on the privacy rights but if you just take the time to think this through it’s not that big a deal. No more concerning than your friend telling another friend they know you. Who cares.