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Checks out.

https://worldofwarcraft.com/en...

MMO prices haven't gone up in two decades

1999: $9,89 (Source: http://everquest.allakhazam.com/history/patches-1999.html)
2010: $14,99 (Source: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/faq/general.html)

Both of those numbers pretty much represent standard mmorpg pricing at their respective times. The Urban Consumer Price Index (CPI-U which was the first one I found figures for) gives inflation between 1999 and 2010 as 32%, so the price increase is not too different from average inflation.

You really should not post about something you're so ignorant about. Any player can get the full combat log output to a text file by typing /combatlog in-game. Combat log messages are sent to the client (and readable by any mod, and then later output to WoWCombatLog.txt if you enabled logging) in a highly machine-readable format like this:
  10/27 14:19:06.220 SPELL_CAST_START,0x0200000000203F7D,"Beria",0x511,0x0000000000000000,nil,0x80000000,686,"Shadow Bolt",0x20

It's been like this since around patch 2.2 or so. And this is pretty much entirely for mod authors' benefit, because Blizzard can just get all the combat data they need from the server side.

Also, there's a thread on the Blizzard UI forums entirely dedicated to keeping mod authors updated on API/UI changes, often posting them several months before they are even on the test realms.

The fact is, Blizzard doesn't think mods should be necessary to play the game, and up until now, the only one generally considered necessary by most players has been the healing raid frames, something remedied in 4.0. By not having any official channels for users to obtain UI mods, Blizzard tacitly does not have to approve/disapprove any UI mods, which I think actually gives them MORE freedom and gives people MORE options than if there was some official channel for third party UI mods.

Yeah, you can tell the game is fucked: it has literally no fanbois.

Seriously, go through this story and the previous story, and you'll find that literally no one defends the game.

OK, so maybe that's just Slashdot, but even on Kotaku, no one is willing to stand up for the game. No one likes the game. There are no good reviews of it, anywhere. The best people are willing to say is that it might be a playable game in a year.

It's all over. Square Enix should just admit that they blew it and just close the doors on it. They have until December 7th to fix the game, and they've already announced that they'll miss that deadline. So forget it - it's all over.

If I think back before WoW to my first MMO which was Star Wars Galaxies, I can recall the complete lack of a tutorial, the completely unpolished game play and the glitches right off the bat. But I stuck with it for a long time right up until the combat upgrade because I didn't know that there was a World of Warcraft.

I can't fault the ideas behind Star Wars Galaxies, but its execution was just terrible. It turned out to be a lot of pretty graphics (for its time) and very little substance.

So, of course, SOE patched out the old gameplay mechanics rather than adding substance...

I don't go back to WoW until an expansion comes out and then I just level max my characters and drop it after a month.

At least with the next expansion, the old world is changing, too. I'm thinking about returning to WoW for a month just to level up a new character from scratch (likely a Troll or Gnome just to see their new starting area). Preferably by having a friend that still plays WoW use a Scroll of Resurrection on me.

Speaking of WoW, patch 4.0.1 goes live today. It's a 4.8GB patch that appears to have updated a lot of the games sounds and graphics, as well as changed some class and game mechanics.

Such as:
There now being 3 types of Glyphs rather than 2.
Talent points are awarded every other level, so that at level 70, you only have 31 talent points at level 70 and 41 at level 85.
You must choose a class specialization at level 10, then spend 31 talent points in that talent tree before you can spend any of the remaining 10 in either of the other trees. This means you are restricted to one talent tree until level 70.
Hunters now have 5 pets with them at a time, with storage for 20 in the Stable.
Hunters no longer need to find/buy/craft ammo. Instead, they have an unlimited supply that they get from... well, somewhere. HammerSpace maybe?
Warlocks no longer need to carry around Soul Shards, as they're no longer used in most spells... instead, you have 3 that work like DK Runes.
Soul Shards are used for the spell Soul Burn, which modifies the spell cast immediately afterwards.
DKs Blood talent tree is now their tanking talent tree.

and a bunch of other changes I can't recall right now. I was reading over all these yesterday, but of course, the WoW site is blocked where I work.

Actually, now that I mention it, the new WoW expansion sounds like it's seriously going to limit customization, particularly on the talents front.

P.S. If you want to experience the new version of the old world, it'll be released in another huge patch: patch 4.0.3.

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/underdev/3p9/gnomeregan2.xml

Please read the patch notes, directly from blizzard:
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/patch-4-13-04.shtml

I wish I was checking /. on Tuesday instead of posting on the WoW forums. As far as I can tell, Slashdot has completely missed the point here.

The forums have virtually nothing to do with it. Blizzard could delete the forums tomorrow and it wouldn't affect the community much, aside from having no way of talking with developers / tech support / customer support. We'd all happily migrate over to mmo-champion overnight--it's not that big a deal. Forcing real names on the forums to "prevent trolling" is a total red herring. What this is really about is Activision's recent deal with Facebook. Face-Lizzard-Vision is not something that people want to see.

Of note: In the past when Blizzard has announced major changes to this game that they felt would make this game better, official posters have been very active on the forums posting to clarify concerns, and outline why they see this change as being beneficial. Aside from a couple posts clarifying major misunderstandings, there have been *NO* posts from official Blizzard posters in the last 40,000 posts in the official threat (plus probably at least 10,000 posts in threads that have been locked and/or deleted).

What does this tell you? Blizzard is not behind this change. This change has been forced down the pipe by Activision to attempt to monetize the player base with ad revenue from the facebook deal.

If you're interested, here's a rough timeline of the changes:
September 2009 interview with Activision's CEO where he says that he will attempt to exploit all Activison's franchises for maximum revenue
May 5th, Blizzard announces a deal with Facebook for Facebook integration with WoW
Two weeks ago, RealID is introduced as an optional feature to chat cross server with close friends and family only
On Sunday, an exploit is discovered which makes anyone with an AddOn installed (virtually everyone) vulnerable to have their name identified in game by anyone.
On Tuesday, Blizzard announces that RealID is no longer an optional service, and will now be required for forum use.
A few hours later, a Blizzard poster on the EU forums clarifies this has been in the works for over a year, and that outrage was expected and planned for.

Can you connect the dots? Here's a hint: the purported purpose (slapping down trolls) could be just as easily be handled by requiring forum goers to select a unique handle, or only one WoW character, with which to do all their posting... you know, like, every single other major forum on the planet? The only reason that first name and last name specifically are required are if you make the connection to Facebook!

Additionally, in the patch two weeks ago, changes were made to the Terms of Use (unannounced) to include a subsection on gathering user data for use with a third party advertising partner.

This Real ID changeover has also been planned for over a year, and Blizzard posters have made no attempts to clarify how this proposed system will improve the forums (after all of two minutes it took forum posters to suggest the alternative solution of merely requiring a unique forum moniker.) Blizzard is clearly not behind this change. This is a done deal, by Activision, to sell out WoW players to advertisers, sharing their personal information with the world, through Facebook.

One WoW fan has co

I wish I was checking /. on Tuesday instead of posting on the WoW forums. As far as I can tell, Slashdot has completely missed the point here.

The forums have virtually nothing to do with it. Blizzard could delete the forums tomorrow and it wouldn't affect the community much, aside from having no way of talking with developers / tech support / customer support. We'd all happily migrate over to mmo-champion overnight--it's not that big a deal. Forcing real names on the forums to "prevent trolling" is a total red herring. What this is really about is Activision's recent deal with Facebook. Face-Lizzard-Vision is not something that people want to see.

Of note: In the past when Blizzard has announced major changes to this game that they felt would make this game better, official posters have been very active on the forums posting to clarify concerns, and outline why they see this change as being beneficial. Aside from a couple posts clarifying major misunderstandings, there have been *NO* posts from official Blizzard posters in the last 40,000 posts in the official threat (plus probably at least 10,000 posts in threads that have been locked and/or deleted).

What does this tell you? Blizzard is not behind this change. This change has been forced down the pipe by Activision to attempt to monetize the player base with ad revenue from the facebook deal.

If you're interested, here's a rough timeline of the changes:
September 2009 interview with Activision's CEO where he says that he will attempt to exploit all Activison's franchises for maximum revenue
May 5th, Blizzard announces a deal with Facebook for Facebook integration with WoW
Two weeks ago, RealID is introduced as an optional feature to chat cross server with close friends and family only
On Sunday, an exploit is discovered which makes anyone with an AddOn installed (virtually everyone) vulnerable to have their name identified in game by anyone.
On Tuesday, Blizzard announces that RealID is no longer an optional service, and will now be required for forum use.
A few hours later, a Blizzard poster on the EU forums clarifies this has been in the works for over a year, and that outrage was expected and planned for.

Can you connect the dots? Here's a hint: the purported purpose (slapping down trolls) could be just as easily be handled by requiring forum goers to select a unique handle, or only one WoW character, with which to do all their posting... you know, like, every single other major forum on the planet? The only reason that first name and last name specifically are required are if you make the connection to Facebook!

Additionally, in the patch two weeks ago, changes were made to the Terms of Use (unannounced) to include a subsection on gathering user data for use with a third party advertising partner.

This Real ID changeover has also been planned for over a year, and Blizzard posters have made no attempts to clarify how this proposed system will improve the forums (after all of two minutes it took forum posters to suggest the alternative solution of merely requiring a unique forum moniker.) Blizzard is clearly not behind this change. This is a done deal, by Activision, to sell out WoW players to advertisers, sharing their personal information with the world, through Facebook.

One WoW fan has co

When RealID was rolled out, they said it's for friends and family and people you trust.

But you have to trust all of your friends' friends. You know, people who may or may not be friends, family, and anyone else you know.

You could ignore that and never be able to chat across games, servers, or factions.

With the forums, there is no opt-in. You post, you're name is revealed. From the sound of it, you don't need to be logged in to the website to see people's real names. They're doing this to... what'd they say again? Bring responsibility and accountability to posters? To prevent trolling? Chilling effect is what I believe it's called.

A community manager offered his name to placate the masses. This has led to a new word: Whippled. Definition: Trying to ease the worries expressed by your captive audience only to show that those worries are well founded.

http://wowriot.gameriot.com/blogs/Americans-are-bad-at-games/Real-Names-on-the-Official-Forums-New-REAL-ID-function?gr_i_ni

Other people have said it's not a bad idea. This was one of them (note the tense): http://seewhatyoudidthere.com/2010/07/07/realid-changes-the-very-real-ease-of-stalking-in-the-internet-age/

Others still are saying they will opt-out and never post on the forums. That's nice but it's not ending here. Oh, far from it. They've got a deal with Facebook and, by the looks of it, they're going ahead full steam.

Official topic is well on its way to 40k replies now. http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=25712374700&sid=1&pageNo=1

Yeah... and Facebook recently inked a big money deal with Activision-Blizzard, and now the latter has pushed out RealID into WoW, and they just announced that for SC2, and in a few months also for WoW, all forum posts in the official forums are going to have players' real names (first and last name) attached to them. That thread has over 35,000 posts in it already in it from irate WoW players, many of them (including myself) have already cancelled their accounts.

Oh, but Blizzard's own forum moderators won't have THEIR names revealed, because they "cannot risk having their personal lives compromised by in-game issues". But they have no problem selling out their own customers.

Its been a long time since I saw such a dickwad move by an MMO company. This rivals Star Wars Galaxies NGE in terms of betrayal of the player-base by Blizzard.

How? You a Blizzard shill?

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?sid=1&topicId=25626349382

There is one of the better posts on Blizzards own forums as to why publishing someones 1st and last name, in association with other details, is a (TM) very bad thing.

Yes they can already sell off what data they have but not without their users going wtf!? But when RealID becomes the norm well then it's no wonder Joe Bob Jones is getting targeted ads for snickerdoodles. His forum posts, linked with Facebook and all the rest that I talked about, said that he might like them!

For expressing your opinion:

US SC2 Thread:
http://forums.battle.net/thread.html?topicId=25626109041 (337 posts atm)

US Forums Thread:
http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=25712374700&sid=1 (4517 posts atm)

EU Forums Thread:
http://forums.wow-europe.com/thread.html?topicId=13816838128 (858 posts atm)

I name my constructs like certain aboriginal cultures name people: based on the first thing I see around my work desk when I decide to assign something to the variable

Ahh, so just like this comic?

According to the EULA blizzard owned when you had control. Blizzard owns it after you had control. You didn't buy it you paid for access to it.

From http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/legal/eula.html

Ownership.

        A. All title, ownership rights and intellectual property rights in and to the Game and all copies thereof (including without limitation any titles, computer code, themes, objects, characters, character names, stories, dialog, catch phrases, locations, concepts, artwork, character inventories, structural or landscape designs, animations, sounds, musical compositions and recordings, audio-visual effects, storylines, character likenesses, methods of operation, moral rights, and any related documentation) are owned or licensed by Blizzard.

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=13275700466&sid=1

Funniest Blizzard April fools joke

This one was a little funnier I thought. Although it pokes fun at WoW culture rather than generic game culture.

I can think of a few reasons that matter to me. I'm sure some people can think of a few other reasons.

What are the 11 million WoW players using, for instance.

Something old probably old.

What are EQ and UO players using? What are players of original non-Steam iD games using? How about those EA games? Maxis games? The runaway ridiculously best-selling The Sims runs on gaming PCs, not cell phones.

My guess would be that the vast majority of games are played on seriously under powered desktops, gaming systems are almost certainly a tiny fraction of the market

Here is the terms of service agreement, that you must click "I agree" before you are even allowed to play:

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/legal/termsofuse.html

C. Blizzard may, with or without notice to you, disclose your Internet Protocol (IP) address(es), personal information, Chat logs, and other information about you and your activities: (a) in response to a request by law enforcement, a court order or other legal process; or (b) if Blizzard believes that doing so may protect your safety or the safety of others.

Note: "in response to a request by law enforcement". Pretty clear.

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/legal/termsofuse.html

17. C. Blizzard may, with or without notice to you, disclose your Internet Protocol (IP) address(es), personal information, Chat logs, and other information about you and your activities: (a) in response to a request by law enforcement, a court order or other legal process; or (b) if Blizzard believes that doing so may protect your safety or the safety of others.

blizzrd have never said they will protect your privacy, you've just assumed it.

Gee, here we are in a thread discussing Blizzard's privacy policy, the one where they give a list of special cases where they are allowed to disclose your information and giving it up on a general request by law enforcement was not on the list. Seems like a pretty straightforward promise to me.

in their terms and condidtions they have a clause stating they will co operate with law enforcement.

Ah, so now we have a case where the privacy policy contradicts the terms of use. That's interesting.

Even more interesting is that the "Last Updated" date on the Privacy Policy is newer than the Terms of Service (January 14, 2009 versus July 29, 2008).
Seems to me that the most current document is the controlling one since Blizzard says they can change the terms of the ToS at anytime.

So I guess that means you are "BAM" out of the game, doesn't it?

section 17c. "C. Blizzard may, with or without notice to you, disclose your Internet Protocol (IP) address(es), personal information, Chat logs, and other information about you and your activities: (a) in response to a request by law enforcement, a court order or other legal process; or (b) if Blizzard believes that doing so may protect your safety or the safety of others. "

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/legal/termsofuse.html

BAM, thanks for playing.

Anyone who has a problem with this should simply not use their services.

... and make as loud a noise as they can about it so that anyone else who shares their sensibilities about privacy will know about it too.

Especially when they disclose this in their terms of service.

Not the case.

They absolutly do clearly disclose this in ther Terms of Service. You mindlessly clicking on agree without reading it is not their fault.

from WOW's TOS:

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/legal/termsofuse.html

17. C. Blizzard may, with or without notice to you, disclose your Internet Protocol (IP) address(es), personal information, Chat logs, and other information about you and your activities: (a) in response to a request by law enforcement, a court order or other legal process; or (b) if Blizzard believes that doing so may protect your safety or the safety of others.

WOW's TOS is incredibly clear and up front about this; if law enforcement 'requests', they give.

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/legal/termsofuse.html

17. C. Blizzard may, with or without notice to you, disclose your Internet Protocol (IP) address(es), personal information, Chat logs, and other information about you and your activities: (a) in response to a request by law enforcement, a court order or other legal process; or (b) if Blizzard believes that doing so may protect your safety or the safety of others.

They followed their privacy policy. The guy should have read it. This seems to be a surprise to you, so maybe you should have read it to, and if it bothers you, stop playing.

Gee, maybe YOU should read the privacy policy.
I just did.
It doesn't say anything like what you are implying it does.
The closest it gets is that they will disclose as required by law - not the convenience of law enforcement.

One has to wonder, if Blizzard goes that far above and beyond requests of law enforcement and gives mountains of data in response to polite requests-- not even subpoenas-- how seriously do they take the privacy of *your* personal information?

Well, though people do tend to gloss over the fine details in things like EULAs and Terms of Service, it's not as if Blizzard is hiding anything from its users. From the WoW Terms of Use:

C. Blizzard may, with or without notice to you, disclose your Internet Protocol (IP) address(es), personal information, Chat logs, and other information about you and your activities: (a) in response to a request by law enforcement, a court order or other legal process; or (b) if Blizzard believes that doing so may protect your safety or the safety of others.

Blizzard gets a request from law enforcement, Blizzard hands over the info, simple as that. (And actually, if it were my company I'd probably have a similar policy. A "polite request" is just about the only contact I'd ever want to have with law enforcement, and the sooner they disappear from my life the better.)

Then 60-70 was nerfed shortly before Lich King hit.

I have heard this several times, but never seen it in any of the patch notes -- do you know which patch?

You might also want to disable core parking as instructed in this other thread:

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=20677771277&sid=1

I haven't done this myself, but i did notice a large performance jump when i set the processAffinityMask to 255 on my i7 860 setup

Here you go:
http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=1778017311&sid=1

i'd recommend setting it to value of 255, which means that the OS will handle the load balancing on all your cores

3. Eligibility.
You represent that you are an adult in your country of residence. You agree to these Terms of Use on behalf of yourself and, at your discretion, for one (1) minor child for whom you are a parent or guardian and whom you have authorized to use the account you create on the Service.

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/legal/termsofuse.html

So, you are wrong. You can talk to children on WoW.

Where is the innovation? Where is the Wow stuff?

WoW won't run on Windows 95, you insensitive clod!

The way Battle.net accounts are currently set up, if you receive a suspension on a World of Warcraft account attached to that Battle.net account, it has no affect on any other World of Warcraft accounts that may also be attached.

Source: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=20464488049&pageNo=2&sid=1#39

You want to expand on that? The only thing I can think of with broader appeal than that, is Pizza. Actual bread, cheese, tomato, to your door in 30 minutes or less.

Everquest II did that. WoW countered with Chinese, but that turned out to be an April Fool's prank. The EQII /pizza command, however, was real, but I believe it's been discontinued.

>>So, since she doesn't walk in perfect lock-step with the "core" of the Republican party, she's not really a Republican? Apparently the GOP disagrees, since she's y'know, a member of the party.

There are members of each political party that are more or less conservative on a variety of issues, and she is one of the most liberal members of the GOP. So yeah, it doesn't surprise me, really that she'd want to curtain freedom of speech online.

Personally, I'd vote for the measure as long as Obama got a shiny gold sledgehammer he got to keep on his desk. Our messiah would ensure the Banhammer was only used for the purposes of good not evil, such as deleting users who can't use proper punctuation or spelling, or, well, nearly anyone who posts on the World of Warcraft forums. Oh, let's just pick one at random: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=47143292&postId=483932803&sid=1#176

Truly, the world would be a better place with forum trolls slain.

What is your specific question in this? Are you asking what they plan to do about this? If that's the case, a little research would have helped.

Have you read the blue post from the 14th, which explains the progress of the instance server upgrade?

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=19109959718&pageNo=1&sid=1#0

Some context would be helpful. Are you playing on one of the servers that has been upgraded, and you're still encountering instance creation issues? Or, are you playing on a server that has yet to be upgraded?

The gold spam question is relevant, though you should already know one part of their answer: Right click the spam text, click "Report Spam". (Spam isn't just their problem, it's our problem, too. As responsible players, we *should* be reporting that. Honestly, does it take that much effort?)

I think that a more relevant question is what they're doing about proactively preventing the corpse spam.

It's not yet clear whether the old version of the damaged zones will still be around in some form, but look for an explanation in the next few days.

Really? The FAQ over on the Cataclysm page is quite clear about this:

Will I need the expansion to be able to experience the Cataclysm changes?

When the Cataclysm occurs, it will occur for all players, whether they have purchased the expansion or not--you will no longer be to play in the original version of Kalimdor or the Eastern Kingdoms. However, certain features such as the new zones, new races, and new level cap will only be accessible to players who purchase the expansion.

From the FAQ:

Will I need the expansion to be able to experience the Cataclysm changes?

When the Cataclysm occurs, it will occur for all players, whether they have purchased the expansion or not--you will no longer be to play in the original version of Kalimdor or the Eastern Kingdoms. However, certain features such as the new zones, new races, and new level cap will only be accessible to players who purchase the expansion.

So... Yeah, the "old way" will likely only live-on in our memory.

I'm personally very curious to see how this will work out. If nothing else, this will basically make it a whole new game-- for a while at least, starting a new character will mean not being familiar with the lay of the land, regions will have to be re-learned, etc...

I'm excited to see this.

"Will I need the expansion to be able to experience the Cataclysm changes? When the Cataclysm occurs, it will occur for all players, whether they have purchased the expansion or not--you will no longer be to play in the original version of Kalimdor or the Eastern Kingdoms. However, certain features such as the new zones, new races, and new level cap will only be accessible to players who purchase the expansion."

From the faq: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/cataclysm/faq/

... here!

I remember reading in a post on the Wow forums, that infact most of the staff actually use a linux client, but the cost/benefit ratio of support and patch testing for a linux client makes it impossible to release. At any rate, there is blue support on the forums for using WoW with wine.

There is blue support in so far as they won't support it. ;) But they do recognize the use of Cedega and Wine and generally allow for it.

I remember reading in a post on the Wow forums, that infact most of the staff actually use a linux client, but the cost/benefit ratio of support and patch testing for a linux client makes it impossible to release. At any rate, there is blue support on the forums for using WoW with wine.

There is blue support in so far as they won't support it. ;) But they do recognize the use of Cedega and Wine and generally allow for it.

Imagine owning Fenway Park. You sell tickets to Red Sox games. These tickets allocate seats in Fenway to individual spectators. Some of these tickets are sold by the entire season â" guaranteeing the same seat to the buyer for each game of the season.
Season ticket holders are able to renew their purchase each year. Some have done so for years and years and years. Others have had their tickets passed down amongst family members. The tickets once owned by a grandfather are now owned by the grandson.
These season ticket holders have put tremendous time and money into being able to sit in these same seats each year for each game. Should these fans be granted a property right in their seats?

If the people who sold them to you signed a contract saying you were building some sort of equity by buying those seats year after year, then you have that. That's not the case and they could probably drop your right to them for next year when they decide to resell everything in a lottery or auction. Tough luck for you if they get greedy. If you don't like it, stop buying Fenway Park tickets. Americans love to have a sense of undeserved entitlement and this is no different. Next analogy:

Now imagine living near a city park. You and a number of residents have taken it upon yourselves to help beautify the park. You plant grass, replenish flower gardens, and repair jungle gyms. The park is now a jewel in your city because of your effort.
The city, however, has decided to sell the land to a property developer. Despite your wishes, and the wishes of your friends who helped beautify the park, there is nothing you can do to stop the sale. Should you have a property right in the park you spent so much time restoring?

Again, you don't have anything in writing so you're out of luck. If you didn't realize what you were doing to begin with, you're a moron. You didn't own the park in the first place and sprucing it up doesn't give you any ownership of it. Cleaning my neighbor's yard doesn't entitle me to it; cleaning public property doesn't entitle you to it. Get a petition or run for election to change things. You don't own it because you cleaned it. Unfortunate how things played out but there it is.

In World of Warcraft, I feel I 'own' Ampere on Thunderlord server but Blizzard's Terms of Use sets me straight:

Ownership. All rights and title in and to the Service (including without limitation any user accounts, titles, computer code, themes, objects, characters, character names, stories, dialogue, catch phrases, locations, concepts, artwork, animations, sounds, musical compositions, audio-visual effects, methods of operation, moral rights, any related documentation, "applets" incorporated into the Game Client, transcripts of the chat rooms, character profile information, recordings of games played using the Game Client, and the Game Client and server software) are owned by Blizzard or its licensors. The Game and the Service are protected by United States and international laws, and may contain certain licensed materials in which Blizzard's licensors may enforce their rights in the event of any violation of this Agreement.

(emphasis mine) I know I feel the right to him but Blizzard owns it. This has always been laid out for me and this paper is pointless in arguing for virtual property rights or against them. If you own them, they will say (like Slashdot). If you don't own them and you want to, find another game or site. I don't understand how the paper men

I think you may be interested in an item Blizzard created in WoW just for you!

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/items/tinfoilhat.xml

You might like to come live in the current world. Like everything else in entertainment (movies, games, comics whatever), music is entertainment and professionally made. It requires time, effort and money

Your argument fails. While feature-length movies are generally the domain of professionals (requires a ton more time), there are entertaining other shorter movies such as Homestar Runner which doesn't even have ads on their site yet has hundreds of videos. Games? There are loads of games that the game itself is free while they use other ways of making a profit. Heck, I can download the WoW client for free ( http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/downloads/wowclient-download.html ) yet I wouldn't say it was unprofitable in the least. Comics? Lets see here, off of the top of my head there are, Megatokyo ( http://www.megatokyo.com/ ), User Friendly ( http://www.userfriendly.org/ ) and XKCD ( http://xkcd.com/ ) And XKCD lets you use their comic so long as you attribute to them.

Maybe it's not the game makers that are the problem, but the jerkoffs who refuse to engineer half-cow half-man, half-goat half-bluemangroup, reanimated corpses, manbearpigs, and cross-breeds between humans, monkeys, and patches of sod!

FFS! this kind of whining is what gives liberals like me a bad name!
My guild on wow is run by a husband and wife team, and there are other women, black people, germans, and indians in the guild (i KNOW, I speak to them over voice chat!!). NONE of them complain.

Maybe it's not the game makers that are the problem, but the jerkoffs who refuse to engineer half-cow half-man, half-goat half-bluemangroup, reanimated corpses, manbearpigs, and cross-breeds between humans, monkeys, and patches of sod!

FFS! this kind of whining is what gives liberals like me a bad name!
My guild on wow is run by a husband and wife team, and there are other women, black people, germans, and indians in the guild (i KNOW, I speak to them over voice chat!!). NONE of them complain.

Maybe it's not the game makers that are the problem, but the jerkoffs who refuse to engineer half-cow half-man, half-goat half-bluemangroup, reanimated corpses, manbearpigs, and cross-breeds between humans, monkeys, and patches of sod!

FFS! this kind of whining is what gives liberals like me a bad name!
My guild on wow is run by a husband and wife team, and there are other women, black people, germans, and indians in the guild (i KNOW, I speak to them over voice chat!!). NONE of them complain.

Maybe it's not the game makers that are the problem, but the jerkoffs who refuse to engineer half-cow half-man, half-goat half-bluemangroup, reanimated corpses, manbearpigs, and cross-breeds between humans, monkeys, and patches of sod!

FFS! this kind of whining is what gives liberals like me a bad name!
My guild on wow is run by a husband and wife team, and there are other women, black people, germans, and indians in the guild (i KNOW, I speak to them over voice chat!!). NONE of them complain.