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Blizzard Issues DMCA Notice to a Fan-Run 'WoW' Legacy Server (torrentfreak.com)
An anonymous reader calls it "the never-ending stupidity of copyright wars." TorrentFreak reports:
Blizzard Entertainment is taking a stand against a popular World of Warcraft legacy server. The fan-operated project allows gamers to experience how the game was played over a decade ago and to revive old battles... In recent years the project has captured the hearts of tens of thousands of die-hard WoW fans. At the time of writing, the most popular realm has more than 6,000 people playing from all over the world... Blizzard, however, sees this as copyright infringement and has asked GitHub to pull the site's code offline.
The article notes the DMCA notice came "just weeks after several organizations and gaming fans asked the US Copyright Office to make a DMCA circumvention exemption for 'abandoned' games."
The article notes the DMCA notice came "just weeks after several organizations and gaming fans asked the US Copyright Office to make a DMCA circumvention exemption for 'abandoned' games."
WoW in its "classic", level 50 (or was it 60?) cap form, IS abandoned. Blizzard does not offer the option to play on a server where the old dungeons are the endgame and expansion creep isn't forcing people to play the game in a way they never wanted to.
If Blizzard offered no-expansion servers, we can talk.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Either way just move the server/code to Canada.
We already have "interoperability" exemptions to copyright. This is an ideal example of why they were put in. User demand for a specific version of the product which the original maker refuses to support.
No. 2.4.3 vs, 3.3.5...etc.
Private servers run different EXPANSIONS. Because Bliz took that feeling away from TBC and WOTLK. CATA garbage, MOP garbage.... and everything else pretty much after.
Even if Bliz starts to do classic mode (which they are) that still can't change the facts.
Bliz is wrong; they changed MAJOR aspects of the game to the extent that each expansion is like a GAME in and of itself, and not a VERSION of a GAME.
That is the final crux; Warcraft is many different games each time there is an expansion and the company DENIES PLAYERS the right of playing previous GAMES.
ie: TBC is warcraft but it is the game TBC. WOTLK is warcraft but it is the GAME WOTLK. When they bring out this next patch, LEGION will be ABANDONWARE.
I just hate how nobody UNDERSTANDS THIS. Dammit.
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
Companies only started releasing those games in response to the public constantly pirating them. It seems like we need pirates to help the copyright holders find valid business models.