Blizzard Suing Creators of StarCraft II Hacks

An anonymous reader writes with this excerpt from Rock, Paper, Shotgun: "Blizzard have taken the extremely peculiar decision to ban players from playing StarCraft II for using cheats in the single-player game. This meant that, despite cheating no one but themselves, they were locked out of playing the single-player game. Which is clearly bonkers. But it's not enough for the developer. Blizzard's lawyers are now setting out to sue those who create cheats. Gamespot reports that the megolithic company is chasing after three developers of hacks for 'destroying' their online game. It definitely will be in violation of the end user agreement, so there's a case. However, it's a certain element of their claim that stands out for attention. They're claiming using the hacks causes people to infringe copyright: 'When users of the Hacks download, install, and use the Hacks, they copy StarCraft II copyrighted content into their computer's RAM in excess of the scope of their limited license, as set forth in the EULA and ToU, and create derivative works of StarCraft II.'" Blizzard used similar reasoning in their successful lawsuit against the creators of a World of Warcraft bot.

Comments

Re:Interesting Logic

[drinkypoo]

I do not think "being able to buy video games on whatever terms I demand" qualifies as a "basic human right". Lets cut the hyperbole.

I think that "being able to use that which I have paid for" is a "basic right". Let's stop making excuses. Or, you know, when the rights that you care about vanish, then don't be surprised that there's nobody to speak up for you. This is the natural consequence of waving hands and making excuses when rights vanish. It's especially a natural consequence of giving money to those who are seeking to deprive you of rights.

Re:Interesting Logic

[drinkypoo]

You'd have had no different an experience if the game you tried to install required a downloaded patch to run because of compatibility issues.

Uh, that's like telling someone who has been shot to death that they'd have had no different experience if they were stabbed to death. First of all, it's not true, and second of all, it's orthogonal to the point.

I agree that the current state of DRM is horrible, way far from perfect, but I can still see why something needs to be done to stem piracy.

But there has never been any proof that anything need be done to stem piracy whatsoever! Further, a CD key which is checked for dups during network play has repeatedly been shown to be as effective as anything else. The only place you can really prevent use of pirated software is on your servers, and even then you can't precisely prevent it, only scale it back. The idea that Steam adds anything to copyright protection is laughable at best. You can get Steam-powered games without steam via Bittorrent, since the GAME is not actually powered by Steam, only its delivery.

they do have as much right to limit your use of a product as you have to tell them to shove their product where the sun doesn't shine.

no, they have no legal right to legally limit MY use of a product, even copyrighted material, as per First Sale law. They also don't have the right to limit my transfer of copyright, but I do have to follow applicable law meaning I must transfer or destroy any copies. I have the right to modify anything I have purchased in any way I like. They have the right to technically limit my use of the product, but I have the legal right to circumvent it except as prohibited by the DMCA. If I need to circumvent their copyright protection for purposes of interoperability, well, I'm not sure how that falls out since the DMCA prohibits one and protects the other. I am not going to go read the text now so I'm not sure which wins. Even if I read it I won't be sure, which is why I'm not going to bother :)

Re:Blizzard Jumped the Shark

[shutdown -p now]

Also, personally I spent a *lot* of time getting a Kerrigan portrait, and I'd prefer that people seeing it know it was earned legitimately and not just hacked somehow.

Get a life.