Blizzard Backs Down On Real Names For Forums

Ashe Tyrael writes "Earlier this week, Blizzard announced that they were going to be implementing changes in their official forums (for StarCraft II when it launched, and for WoW prior to Cataclysm) that would require users to post under their real names, as part of the Real ID system. After perusing nearly 14,000 European and 50,000 US forum posts, the majority of which decried this move with various levels of vehemence, it looks like Blizzard has given in to the pressure. From the official statement: 'We've been constantly monitoring the feedback you've given us, as well as internally discussing your concerns about the use of real names on our forums. As a result of those discussions, we've decided at this time that real names will not be required for posting on official Blizzard forums.' Not that this doesn't leave room for them to re-implement this at a later date, but that's a pretty definite 'no.' It was clear they were going to take criticism, but the size of the backlash was impressive. It seems likely Blizzard simply wasn't expecting that level of antipathy toward their new policy.

Comments

Windows Phone 7 Has Been Canceled

[Anonymous Coward]

Where's the fat lady?

Re:Pretty Obvious Reasoning

[geekoid]

Clearly you aren't an insider.

A) there are many reasons for people not wanting their real name to appear. None fo them have anythign to do with trolling.

B) Blizzards gas crap for moderators.

C) If they had enough moderators, then there wouldn't be a problem on the forums.

Blizzard doesn't want to pay to have enough moderators to actually moderate. This idea was to gt around having to do that.
Too bad it's based on a false premise.

I don'tr think there are a lot of people that go to the forums before buying the game.

What blizzard will probably do is have a feature where real_ID people can get updates to there facebook account.
That won't help, because I could have two identities.

Sparkle Mammoths

[BobMcD]

Everyone knows that Sparkle Ponies are made from the collected tears from forum QQ. What we didn't know is that Blizzard will soon be selling a new mount - a multi-passenger mammoth, also sparkley and also made of pure QQ. It seems that not only was their QQ stock low, but the new mount required a lot more of it. So they announced this change. The resultant QQ from every continent on the globe means the Sparkle Mammoth will be in great supply.

Gratz on your new mount!

mo3 down

[Anonymous Coward]

non-fucking-existant. is the group tha7 reciprocating bad

Slashdot Reports Blizzard Trivia

[Anonymous Coward]

while U.S.A. in final stretch of collapse.

Hilarious.

Yours In Astrakhan,
Kilgore T.

Re:Pretty Obvious Reasoning

[Low Ranked Craig]

35 = 15.

Re:They learned why it's a bard idea the hard way.

[Visaris]

There are levels of investigation appropriate for various types of posts. For example, if I were submitting a story to Slashdot, I would spend more time looking into things. However, I don't have the time to fully research and vet every little thing I ever link to on the web. Be realistic.

Re:Pretty Obvious Reasoning

[geekoid]

so, what happens when you are invaded by religious idiots?