Stupid Ideas
My New Project Goes Live!
6October 4, 2010
Some of you may remember an entry I made a little while back talking about the future of Lume the Mad. Well, wait no more! The first step towards this future has been taken, and a friend and I have launched Eat Sleep Breathe WoW! To make this announcement easier for me, I’ll simply copy and paste the introductory news entry from the site.
Welcome to the launch of Eat Sleep Breathe WoW! We hope to use this site to bring you interesting and exciting video content covering World of Warcraft and its community. For more information on the site and how it will initially operate, please watch the first episode of Site Insight and read about us below!
We’re greatly looking forward to producing some interesting videos for you guys!
What Will the Site Cover?
As a strong believer in starting small, the site will initially offer a variety of content, with each area receiving a small amount of my scattered focus. These areas will include: commentary and criticism, previews, guides, and coverage of the game’s community and how the game affects things outside its confines.
We will not initially cover news about the game. That being said, I don’t want to rule it out as a possibility.
When it comes to guides, I won’t be making too many. Guides are not something I want to do as an individual, but they are definitely something I want to include as the site grows.
How Will the Content be Delivered?
The content will be delivered through shows done in an episodic format. Initially, each show will have a specific focus. But I may also add shows with a broader focus that can somehow distinguish their content from the other shows, by way of talent, method, style or a combination of these.
The videos produced by the site will not be as they are typically done by others in the WoW community. While there is certainly a place in the community for PvP montages with randomly chosen rock songs playing in the background, and boss kills with trance soundtracks, these can easily done by anyone with Fraps and minimal editing skills.
Furthermore, we would like to include a quality of production most other vodcasts fail to meet. This means we will actually include game sounds when their inclusion is warranted, and we will avoid the pitfall of having that boring guy (me) talking directly into the camera with minimal game footage to supplement what’s being said.
What Are Your Goals and Expectations for the Site?
Someone recently told me you have to be ambitious if you want to be an entrepeneur. However, I also have a strong investment in honesty. And to be honest, I’m going into this project without any expectations of success. Success only comes on the heels of failure, so this can either be that failure or a success. But I am not without ambition. Should I manage to find an audience, I do plan to grow and treat the site as a business. Eventually, I’d like to add more people to the team and find ways to increase our content and its quality.
This will be an experiment and an adventure. We’ll see where it goes from here!
Please feel free to join the forums over at the new site and ask any questions you might have for the site. I welcome any comments or suggestions you might have.
What does this mean for Lume the Mad?
I will likely be transitioning from Lume the Mad to a new blog that would be more of a personal soapbox. I won’t be reproducing content from the new site on this blog. I will, however, keep an archive of this blog either here or at the new site.
Thank You
I just want to thank all of my readers and the bloggers I’ve interacted with over these past couple years. Thank you for your support and for whatever interest you’ve had in my blog, be it negative or positive. While I wasn’t as active as I’d like to have been during my crazy days of raid leading, I’m looking forward to this new beginning and appreciate the experiences that have led me in this direction.
Thank you! And make sure you check back here for further developments!
Let’s Send Them a Message About Real ID
1July 7, 2010
I’ve had a lot of people tell me Blizzard stands to make tons of money off its progressing Real ID policy. You know what I think? I think they actually stand to lose money off this proposition.
As it stands, there are millions of casual players who don’t have the same attachment to WoW as those of us who have played the game seriously for months or years. They may have guilds, but they only play maybe a few hours each week: casually leveling, running five-mans, doing a few BG’s, etc. Some of these players already split their time between WoW and other MMOs, which is why they’re casual in the first place. These players can easily move on to other MMOs or put more emphasis on the other games they already play.
As far as hardcore players go, we may be more reluctant to move on. We’re “entrenched,” so-to-speak. We have developed a lot of friendships. We have put a lot of time into the game. So it’s more difficult for us to just cancel our accounts and move on, as that demands leaving behind the communities we’ve joined or helped develop. We’re also aware of communities like Elitist Jerks, which will be a safe haven for those of us who still wish to speak about WoW on a forum without revealing our identities.
But that doesn’t mean we can’t make an impact. How many of you pre-ordered Starcraft 2 or Diablo 3? How many of you were planning on at least trying Blizzard’s next generation MMO? How many of you have second accounts?
I say: consider canceling your pre-orders and state your intention to boycott the next-gen MMO if this policy does not change.
What Do I Plan to Do?
I’m personally well-entrenched in WoW. I’ve been a part of the guild I’m in for over three years (longer, if you consider its first iteration). I made promises to people in the guild that we’d be doing hardcore battleground in Cataclysm. I’m developing a web site that will have WoW-based video content (I’m in the middle of filming the second episode that consists of 128 scenes). So I’m not going to outright quit or drop any projects I’ve already put a lot of time into.
But I will cancel my Starcraft 2 pre-order if the policy remains unchanged a week before its scheduled release. And I’m personally planning to boycott the next-gen MMO if the policy remains in place.
I’m also considering protesting at Blizzcon. I’m not willing to outright sell my ticket to someone else, because I’m still planning to meet with guildies and some other people I raid with. But the video site will be up-and-running before Blizzcon, and it’s a nice place for a soapbox. I’d like to cover the convention objectively, but how can you? I’m developing this site because I want to have an impact on MMO design and decisions. It would be criminal not to speak my mind about a policy that is so reviled by a large part of the Battle.net community.
And I should note moving on from WoW is not out of the question. Once the hardcore battleground portion of the guild is up and running, there’s no reason I can’t toss leadership to one of the experienced BGers that I’ve already invited. There’s no reason I and the person I’ve been working with on designing the new site can’t transfer our framework to other games. I’m greatly looking forward to The Old Republic and The Secret World, as it is. If they meet my expectations, I wouldn’t mind shifting my focus to one or both of them if the Real ID forum policy is still in place. Or even a traditional video game with a hardcore multiplayer experience that warrants extensive hardcore coverage.
Does Blizzard Know This?
Whether or not Blizzard knows they stand to lose money is not of issue. It’s a bad business decision either way.
If Blizzard knows, that means the company is willing to sacrifice profits for a personal belief that people in a video game community should not be afraid to reveal their real identities. Which, in turn, shows they don’t understand just how important forum communities are to the video game experience. It goes to show whoever is behind this policy doesn’t understand some of the stigmas when it comes to playing video games (especially MMOs) still exist and are actually true. As a result, this is not something a player should have to opt-out of if they simply want to protect their identities.
And, let’s face it, there are persons of questionable stature in every community. There are even some in my neighborhood, which is quite well-to-do. But gaming communities are of particular concern. It can get very passionate. It’s a competitive environment, afterall. While people have to reveal their names if they post on the forums, if they don’t post on the forums, you still never know if you’re playing with someone with a history of violence. But they can easily find your names, if you’ve decided you want to ask a question on the technical support forums. Or if you’ve decided you need to recruit using the Blizzard forums. These people can then discover your name. And, if they’re persistent, or you have an extremely unique name, they can find you.
So what do people do to protect themselves? They stop posting on the forums, even if they are upstanding citizens of the gaming community. This, in turn, removes valuable contributions to the community. So all you’re doing is trading one problem (anonymous trolls), for others (the reluctance of contribution from upstanding members of the community, and the dangers that come with revealing your identity).
And if we consider the other possibility, meaning Blizzard doesn’t know, it goes to show their lack of foresight when it comes to running a business. Which does not bode well for their profitability and the future decisions they make. Which would make people like me feel as though we could potentially be on a sinking ship, where the company’s executives and decision-makers don’t have a clue.
Either way, my confidence has been shaken. The hiring of Greg Canessa, who was CEO of PopCap Games before becoming the guy in charge of developing Battle.net, really made me wonder what they were thinking. What the hell would someone involved in a mini-games company know about developing a networking and community system for traditional games? Games that have vastly different stigmas and players than those who play something like Peggle? Very little. And given how Battle.net 2.0 is actually more like Battle.net 1.2 with additional flaws in design and policies, my suspicion is only reinforced. Either these ideas were his, or he didn’t push back against pressure from people higher up. And let’s not forget the merger with Activision. Two words: Bobby Kotick.
Going forward, my faith is a lot less solid. No matter the outcome of this whole Real ID debacle.
Are you serious?
10July 6, 2010
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. Certain classic forums, including the classic Battle.net forums, will remain unchanged.
Are you serious?
This is just asking for people to steal any B.net user’s identities. This is just asking people to resort to real-life harassment, especially for anyone with an extremely uncommon name. I don’t know if you know this, Blizzard, but it’s pretty easy to find someone using a background-check service like beenverified.com. If there’s only a few people with a specific name and their address just happens to be known by such a service, good game for them! They better be smart enough not to post on your forums.
I don’t think you guys understand just how serious this is. This is not some community store we’re shopping in to buy groceries, where pretty much everyone knows you already live in the neighborhood. This is a game with an entirely different social dynamic. People on the Internet are not easy to deal with, real name or not. Already, people have decried the friends of friends issue with RealID in the game itself. And you told us if you don’t want your name displayed, then just don’t add people. Oh, but then you can’t use a potentially great service, simply because you fear for your privacy.
But now we can’t even post on the forums? What if I have a technical problem, but I don’t want reveal my real name? I guess I’m shit out of luck, huh? I’ll have to sit in the hour-long phone queue for customer service. Or I’ll have to wait a few days for an email response to my issue. Because I can’t post where other players in the community can help me more efficiently.
I’m sorry. But this is not happening. I highly doubt even more than 10% of the playerbase is going to support this. Just like the friends of friends name issue was decried almost universally, this will be decried even moreso. And I fully expect you will even lose customers over this.
I understand trolling and flaming is a serious issue. So what. That’s the price we pay for privacy. And we’re willing to pay it. And for some people, if that means cancelling their accounts, I bet they’ll go that far.
So back off already! And pay attention to what people are saying about RealID! This isn’t like making a game decision where we can just grit our teeth and see if it works out or not. This is serious. This is nothing to experiment with. And I don’t know who is calling the shots on this, but please tell them to pay attention to what’s going on over at Facebook. Yeah, you can see people’s real name on Facebook. But there’s an option to hide it from people other than your friends (even from friends of friends). People were already irked with the subtleties of RealID. And now it’s about to get even worse.
Prepare for massive backlash, until you change your policies. Prepare for people to migrate to privately-run forums. Prepare for some people to cancel their accounts. Prepare for protests at Blizzcon, even.
And just so I can be constructive, let me offer my own idea to combat trolling: allow people to access a list of every single character tied to the character or profile from which someone has posted. It’s simple, without compromising a piece of someone’s real-life privacy. And you’ll even make money off the hardcore trolls, since they’ll be forced to buy another account or game copy.
Edit #1
Most forum systems retroactively update (name changed characters apply retroactively, for example). Unless Bliz decides otherwise, its a safe bet that old posts will have RL names associated.
You can lookup each of your characters and delete their posts. Time consuming, but its what I did… (rag@WoW.com)
Awesome.
This makes me realize just how difficult it will be to recruit for a guild, as well. If you want to recruit for a guild, but you don’t want to have your real name plastered all over Google searches that return Blizzard forum posts, you’ll have to buy another account. But how many people want to give money to a company adopting stupid policies like this? I sure as hell don’t.
The more people point things out, the more annoyed I become. I dare not threaten to cancel my account, because most people who threaten don’t actually do it. And there’s a chance Blizzard could change their policy. But it sure as hell is pushing me towards it, because I really don’t want to support a company making terrible decisions like this.
Hell, when I think about it, I don’t even have to use my real name with my local newspaper. So I can say what I have to say without enabling job recruiters from seeing my name attached to any political viewpoints plastered in the reader letters of the op/ed section.
Edit #2
Larisa makes a damn good entry about the issue over at The Pink Pigtail Inn. It’s more constructive than my emotion-laden argument. And she’s also pointed out something I didn’t realize immediately: people who cried about it potentially turning into a slippery slope were right. I didn’t think Blizzard would take it this far. Boy, was I wrong.
Edit #3
We put a lot of thought into this change and have a long-term vision for the Real ID service and wanted to make sure that we communicated ahead of time and very clearly as to what will be changing and how. Keep in mind that posting is optional, and we recognize that some players will choose not to utilize the Real ID feature in game or post on the forums and support everyone’s individual choice on using or not using it.
So if you’re looking for help in the form of technical support or information about the game (be it from Blizzard employees or other customers), but you don’t want to reveal your private information, don’t post. It’s optional, afterall.
Bad. Business. Decision. Full stop. Stop trying to dance around it. The whole Real ID thing is nothing so special that should warrant a sacrifice of privacy.
Or have you not seen God Mode’s blog entry where he takes the name of one of your employees (freely given by the employee) and proceeds to find where (he thinks) he lives, who he lives with, his Facebook page, his Twitter, etc.? I’d link to it, but I’m afraid of breaking something in the EULA. But the point is it’s possible and it’s fucking dangerous. Even if the address is wrong (and I suspect it is), it’s still dangerous. Dangerous to the person living there, regardless of whether or not it’s actually him.
Get your heads on straight, Blizzard. If you don’t, say goodbye to my Starcraft 2 pre-order. And don’t expect me to try your next gen MMO if this policy continues.
Edit #4
So it’s clear, your forums names won’t change retroactively. So I guess that’s one less concern. Doesn’t change mine or others’ overall opinions.
Edit #5
“what kind of society do we live in that we need fear our neighbors learn our names?”
Well. For starters, what right do you have to know my name? What if I don’t want you to know it (and I still want to use the forums to organize raids or recruit for my guild)? Why do you want to know my name? What possible use is it to you?
About that last one… Sure, real names allow Good People to recognize previously encountered douchebags on sight and avoid them, but they allow Bad People to locate and torment the Good People. The upside for Good People is approximately jack squat, because it’s already not that hard to avoid previously encountered jerks in-game without real names. The upside for Bad People is far greater (e.g. zero social engineering effort to determine someone’s name). It streamlines the harassment workflow and offers little in return. (Informis @ brokentoys.org)
Edit #6
Teamliquid.net, a popular Starcraft community, has posted a poll asking people “Will you post on forums under full name?” As of writing this section, 1973 people have voted “No,” 375 people have voted “Yes,” and 211 have said they “Will create battle.net account with false name.” That means only 15% of the playerbase will post when real names are enforced on the forums. This also means that 85% do not want to post under their real names.
Let me say that one more time with formatted emphasis.
That means 85% of people in the hardcore Starcraft community do not want to post under their real names.
Nevermind that some people on Team Liquid are professional Starcraft players and people already know their full names.
Edit #7
Over at Bashiok’s Twitter, discovered because he voluntarily revealed his real name:
@micahwhipple is there any hope if i dont want to share my real life information for me to keep playing any blizzard game?
@agcemo Choosing to post and show your Real ID on a forum, that is your real first and last name, doesn’t involve playing a Blizzard game.
You’re telling me the community experience is not a part of the game? You’re making a rebuttal with a literal interpretation that doesn’t reflect the reality of the gaming experience. Especially the massively multiplayer onling gaming experience. Communicating with other players is very much a part of it. Communicating with the staff is very much a part of it. And the company you’re working for is making it very difficult to do that.
Edit #8
InsideFacebook.com, a site dedicated to the social network, said meanwhile that Facebook’s growth slowed in the United States in June as it picked up only 320,800 new monthly active users last month compared with 7.8 million in May.
Inside Facebook said the slowdown in growth could “simply be a blip.”
“But in the years we’ve been tracking the demographic data, we’ve rarely seen a dip like this, so we would tend to favor the idea of a root cause,” it said.
“One possibility is that we’re finally seeing the backlash from heavy media attention to Facebook privacy issues — some of which were real, some the result of confusion and sensationalism,” it added. (Source)
Wake up, Blizzard! This could be a potentially serious issue for you. You’re already in the mainstream media over at BBC News.
