Blizzard to take away any anonymity you had left

[Kryte]

I've canceled my own account.

[Dvorkin]

This is pretty funny.

"Do You Like WoW, but HATE Real ID? "If so, cancel your subscription, but keep playing anyways.

It may be funny indeed, but that's what I just did.

I never posted on official forums (at least, don't remember doing so), and have no intention to do that in the future. I'm heterosexual male, have nothing to hide, and all my co-workers and managers who care (and those who don't care too) know that I play WoW. But, still, I don't want my real name to be associated with my in-game identity. Forcing me to reveal my real name when posting, say, on Technical Support forum is just a bit too much.

Of course, me canceling subscription does not mean much. I don't loose anything and it's too easy to re-new it (and I will do it come Cataclysm anyway, Real ID or not). Most likely, Blizzard understands that as well. But, I hope, if enough people send them a message in such a way - may be they reconsider their decision. This is very bad decision.

[Golden]

You can type your own name in at a website like http://pipl.com/ and get a frightening amount of results and information. :/

O.O according to that site........I don't exist :lol:

I was surprised to see that the thing found only a couple of things about me. o.O I remember my address being available online for a while due to a web hotel service screwing stuff up, but apparently it's gone now. Facebook and a certain website I made for a friend of my mom are the only things that come up. *phew*

[mpd_84]

googleing myself doesnt bring up anything for me.its fairly common and i never use it online.im gonna have to talk with my mom tomorrow about all this.if i cancel my account well need to cancel my reserve copy of cata to and i dont know if we can get a refund now or not...

[Mockingbird]

You can type your own name in at a website like http://pipl.com/ and get a frightening amount of results and information. :/

O.O according to that site........I don't exist

I was surprised to see that the thing found only a couple of things about me. o.O I remember my address being available online for a while due to a web hotel service screwing stuff up, but apparently it's gone now. Facebook and a certain website I made for a friend of my mom are the only things that come up. *phew*

It found my Facebook, an old Bebo account I didn't remember I had, two of my email addresses, my job history and a scientific paper I co-authored (in four locations).

Took about 6 seconds.

Scary, but also kind of cool.

[Ghanur]

One of their employees posted his real name, the customers found his facebook and other information.

Blog about the shitstorm that happend http://wowriot.gameriot.com/blogs/Ameri ... 29&gr_i_ni

Activision now deleted the thread in the official forums, but the internet never forgets

Point beeing, I'm working in a field, where it's still not good to be known as a gamer, realID is a killer.
I will never reactivate any account maintained by Activision (there is no more Blizzard!).

And don't hold your breath Activision will stop realID: there are too many idiots out there, who publish everything on facebook and other information collecting sites, those just don't care about their own life.

Activision? "Nuke them from orbit!"

[Acherontia]

http://forums.wow-europe.com/thread.htm ... 8128&sid=1 <--EU forum link.

I don't think they're listening, though. Or they're working against their will and being forced to enforce Big Daddy Activision's will.

[Sharilar]

Huh, that PIPL site didn't find me at all, thankfully, and I share a name with some semi-famous musician so google is pretty useless on locating my info as well. I've always been very careful about what I do online with my real name, especially since people have gotten fired for stuff on Facebook. Guess it's just as well I've never been able to log into Blizz's forums. (It always errors out.)

[Teigan]

Wow, I just checked what my other guild was saying on their forum. Several good members are going to quit WoW completely because of this.

[Saturo]

Wow, I just checked what my other guild was saying on their forum. Several good members are going to quit WoW completely because of this. :(

Aye. I've been considering it for a while. WoW started going down in TBC, but WOTLK turned it... Too simple, TBH. THe money I'm currently spending on WoW is likely to turn to EVE, unless Cata brings changes like a serious need for CC.

Also, they'd damn better remove Rogue AoE. Rogues are singletarget, not insane multitarget-knife-tossing freaks.

[Teigan]

Also, as far as adding friends...I won't be comfortable anymore asking to add someone to friends. Used to be, if I enjoyed working with someone, or offered to help them with something and didn't want to forget, I added them to friends. I asked first, of course.
After this, adding friends just ain't so friendly. It's tantamount to walking up to a stranger and asking to see their tax returns!

[Ryai]

Also, as far as adding friends...I won't be comfortable anymore asking to add someone to friends. Used to be, if I enjoyed working with someone, or offered to help them with something and didn't want to forget, I added them to friends. I asked first, of course.
After this, adding friends just ain't so friendly. It's tantamount to walking up to a stranger and asking to see their tax returns!

For Real ID probably but there's still the wow specific for adding friends, as I doubt they can take that away.

Tbh tho I want an ignore list like Real ID- ignore one toon, whole account of that player is ignored.

Forever.

[Bulletdance]

I learned just how much Blizz cares about their customers during the whole worgen pet incident. Many of their employees were extremely rude even when I tried to be professional about it. (though after a while I basically told them off to be honest) I doubt they will change this. I feel bad for the employee who put his name out there. Its not like it was his decision to make this change to the forums. It does prove just how vicious the people on the official forums are. I don't understand why anyone would want to use them period. I do worry about the younger people who play though I don't know if its even legal for Blizz to show their names like that without parental consent. I don't think teens under a certain age can even enter into contracts.

[Noor]

I am still reeling after having read those news. I have a unique name. I am most likely the ONLY person on the planet with my name (rare surname combined with an uncommon first name). I have also lived in Norway, where privacy isn't as common as here in the US. So, if someone gets my name, they can find out what I earned in years gone by. And with that information, they can also find out my parents and brothers information, address and phone numbers. With 4 people (now 3) in a country with my surname, it is pretty hard to hide from harassment. I do not post often on the WoW forums, and none of those posts have been trolls or spam of any kind. But, I guess Blizzard will save on bandwidth, because I will now never post.

And it was stated that this will make finding useful information on the WoW forums easier. Yes, because there will be little to none. Imagine that some of those people who write class and gear guides do not want their information spread on the web and thus will not post there anymore.

It's just insanity. I know I've cancelled my account, with the thought of returning closer to Cata... but I may not return at all now.

[Karathyriel]

I just posted this:

Excuse me if I might sound a little disappointed but:

We have been planning this change for a very long time. During this time, we have thought ahead about the scope and impact of this change and predicted that many people would no longer wish to post in the forums after this change goes live. We are fine with that, because we want to change these forums dramatically in a positive and more constructive direction.

This sounds awfully like someone saying: "We are aware that you won't like it. We have thought about it. We just don't care and do it like we planned it. You don't agree with us? Great, there's the door, get out and don't come back."

You guys know, no matter if I post with my RealID, my characters name or an unalterable Nickname, that it is me who posted, right? So if I do or say something that is against forum rules you shouldn't have any problem in identifying me and taking measures that you think are appropriate, right?

So why, and please, I ask this in full earnest, am I forced to have my real name shown to every freak and madman out there, giving them the posibility to track me down in real life when it is just not necesaary. Think of all the women playing WoW who will now be not posting to avoid stalking or something along those lines. And this post:

This point would have some legitimacy if the forums were the only means of contacting our technical support staff, however, there are multiple other options to receive support. One option would be using the technical support phone contacts as listed on this page: http://www.wow-europe.com/en/support/technical.html

Another option would be to contact the technical support team via email, which can be done via this support contact webform: https://eu.blizzard.com/support/webform ... cale=en_gb

Lastly, there is also the option of reading the forums to see if other players have posted similar issues, or if there is information provided in sticky threads that may help solve the issue at hand.

None of these options require posting on the forums and thus giving out your real name to the public :

states clearly that no account and no login will be needed to read the new forum system.

All in all, my characters are better protected than I am, because I have to show my name but no one will be able to connect me to my characters. Everyone in the whole wide world, equally if playing WoW or not, can find me posting here with my real name but will not be able to tell what class(es) or on which realm I'm playing. Now that is some relief, isn't it? Great stuff, honestly.

What did you say?

These threads, however, can often be lost amongst a great deal of other threads that are basically filled with trolling, name calling, flaming, off-topic conversations and that's just a small amount of some of the content that has been found in these forums over the years. We don't want that anymore, and we believe the Real ID change will bring about a lot of the improvement that we are hoping for.

They only could be filled with those forbidden things because noone ever did anything to make it stop. Now guess who could have done that? A hint: It's not the players or forum users!

All the quotes I used were blueposts.

Reckon, this earns me a ban, don't you?

[Vephriel]

I can't help but feel this is their lazy way of getting around hiring more moderators. -_-

"Ugh, these forums are such a mess and we only have a few people watching them. It'll be costly to hire enough mod staff to keep them in check."

"I know! Let's just implement something so that no one will ever want to post again! Then there won't be any users that need moderating!"

[Adam-Savage]

Reckon, this earns me a ban, don't you?

I would not be shocked to find out you where banned. I know I wont be posting in the forums. I'm not sure how I will respond if adding friend via Real Id becomes the only way to add friends. Is your thread still there by chance ?

[Adam-Savage]

Got this from the forum as well..It's ok for us to have our names shown but blizzard wont have there ppl names shown.

This post WILL get deleted, Im just trying to get this information out so other people will realize how much Blizzard is screwing us over.

After a long talk with a few Blizzard phone reps, it turns out BLUES will NOT have their real names posted in the forums due to "Security Concerns." Blues are free to hide from the nightmare RealID will turn these forums into, and yet we, the paying customers, will be forced into it?

Thats right everyone, YOU will have to reveal your real name in order to post on these forums. Blues, on the other hand "Cannot risk having their personal lives compromised by in-game issues" (Thanks, Josh with no last name - thats a gem).

I have already canceled my account and filed a complaint with the ESRB about all of this, I suggest you do the same.

[Rhyela]

Got this from the forum as well..It's ok for us to have our names shown but blizzard wont have there ppl names shown.

This post WILL get deleted, Im just trying to get this information out so other people will realize how much Blizzard is screwing us over.

After a long talk with a few Blizzard phone reps, it turns out BLUES will NOT have their real names posted in the forums due to "Security Concerns." Blues are free to hide from the nightmare RealID will turn these forums into, and yet we, the paying customers, will be forced into it?

Thats right everyone, YOU will have to reveal your real name in order to post on these forums. Blues, on the other hand "Cannot risk having their personal lives compromised by in-game issues" (Thanks, Josh with no last name - thats a gem).

I have already canceled my account and filed a complaint with the ESRB about all of this, I suggest you do the same.

Would filing a complaint with the Better Business Bureau do anything, you think? I admit I don't know much about all this legal stuff, I just know it's wrong.

[Adam-Savage]

Got this from the forum as well..It's ok for us to have our names shown but blizzard wont have there ppl names shown.

This post WILL get deleted, Im just trying to get this information out so other people will realize how much Blizzard is screwing us over.

After a long talk with a few Blizzard phone reps, it turns out BLUES will NOT have their real names posted in the forums due to "Security Concerns." Blues are free to hide from the nightmare RealID will turn these forums into, and yet we, the paying customers, will be forced into it?

Thats right everyone, YOU will have to reveal your real name in order to post on these forums. Blues, on the other hand "Cannot risk having their personal lives compromised by in-game issues" (Thanks, Josh with no last name - thats a gem).

I have already canceled my account and filed a complaint with the ESRB about all of this, I suggest you do the same.

Would filing a complaint with the Better Business Bureau do anything, you think? I admit I don't know much about all this legal stuff, I just know it's wrong.

Probably not because it's purely optional at this point really.