Would you steer away from this post if you had to use your real name to leave a comment here?
Santa Monica, Calif.-based Activision Blizzard just put that question to many of its customers. In a post earlier this week on its Battle.net forums, the game developer informed players of its popular Starcraft and World of Warcraft games, among others, that they would soon have to use their legal monikers when chatting about their in-game exploits on its forums.
Blizzard defended the change as a necessary move to stop spamming and trash-talking:
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.
As of this morning, 74 pages of comments follow that post. The ones I’ve read don’t seem too positive about Blizzard’s move. Typical reply, from “Marine71”: “What an awful idea. Who comes up with this trash? Seriously. What happened to you, Blizzard?”
Hmmmm… would you comment on Dvorak Uncensored if you had to use your real name?
So what if registration scares off lameboys? Fewer assholes. Their “contribution” to the discourse is minimal.
I have a username, but it is linked to me and anyone can contact me if desired. I support allowing people to have an anonymous identity in the game, but it should be registered to a real person so action can be taken to rein in the idiots.
And with this move, Pedobear is definitely smiling….
Couple points : Blizz DOES ( ok, so they did. they backed off “for now’) require RealID to post on the forums.
WoW Forums are an active place, and one of the best compeilations of info on a single topic ever made, anywhere. people DO use them a lot. Most just read – because the info there that is deemed worthy is Stickied, and that’s a MUCH faster way of figuring an answer to whatever dilemme you have then waiting on in-game support. that literally can take 3-4 days.
Posting a simple question usually gets 4-6 answers in a matter of minutes. Sure 3 of those answers will tell you to read the stickies, u Bleeping Noob, but the others will be helpful. And you should have read the stickies 😛
The real ID is plan has been talked about in bits and pieces for a while now. I don’t have alll the supporting links, so reasearch it yourself, mmk?
It starts with Kottle’s expressed vision that internet anonymity is and should be a thing of the past ( I stronngly disagree with this idea).
So, what he is driving at is that ALL battle.net games use this realD.. Also, the Facebook database is somehow tied in there as well.
IF he gets his way he now has a unique ID for tens of millions of people across several social websites, with various interests. That database will be easily searchable. And indexable, too.
How will that help him? Easy! He now has taken the concept of target marketing to new heights ( or lows, depending on how you feel about being the target).
And because he controls the database, he gets PAID to allow access to it by other marketers.
Not to mention that he can more easily tailor his “purchasing opportunities” to the Users.
All of this is great for Activision.
It’s really crappy for the uniquely American notion that we have a right to be left the hell alone.
I fully expect Activision to implement this anyway. Kottle has already indicated that he firmly beleives he has a vision and a mandate, and that makes him very dangerous indeed. While the concepts may appear benign, and the implementation may be acceptable in the small parcels being doled out now, the over-all program is scary as all Hell.
Doesn’t Activision have an independant Ethicist on staff anywhere? Or even a Court Jester to poke fun at the project while relaying the real concerns?
They damned welll should.
“[Award for longest name ever used on DU. – ed.]”
Jesus! Don’t encourage him!
Besides, it should be:
bobbo, to promote Hell on earth we must misrepresent libertarianism, blathered on,
Somebody–no appreciation for the difference between libertarianism and LIEberTARDism? Well, thats your problem right there!
Oh, so you are going to pretend that it was not your intention to call all libertarians liars?