Ask someone who strays away from MMOs what their biggest fear about the genre is, and chances are one of those answers will be along the lines of “looking like a nerd.” Despite World of Warcraft, among other games, bringing MMOs into the mainstream audience, many MMOers (alongside video games as a whole) still fear the age old stereotype that we are all basement dwelling nerds with pale skin who live with our parents at the age of 30, dress up as female characters, and participate in LARPing. Now, I may not have a basement, and my Irish/Croatian/German mixture does leave me with mayonnaise-esque skin, and I am under all consideration a nerd, however I am at least ten years off of 30, and still in college.
But I’m getting off track here. Blizzard’s recent update (as with all updates) is causing quite an outrage among privacy advocates. The update to the Armory now broadcasts all of the player’s feats in real time, with the option to subscribe via RSS. Players are also unable to opt out of this feed, or keep it protected to friends and family, making it the bane of players who either shouldn’t be playing World of Warcraft, or those who happen to boot the game up at work.
Now, these players may just be wearing their +10 armor tinfoil hat, but there is something to be said about not wanting your activities broadcast for all to see. Chances are, most of you have had marathons that you wouldn’t want broadcast, staying up that extra half hour that turned into a 3am raid, and by the time you got to sleep the sun was coming back up. But I digress.
One of the MMO Fallout Scouters in WoW reported that this is in fact a useful tool to guilds. Using the RSS feed for raids, Guild Leaders could consolidate the members of the raid to a feed, where they could monitor what the players are looting to ensure that no one is breaking the guild’s rules secretly.
I’m not going to bother going into the legality that people are bringing up, because the move is legal. Blizzard does still have full ownership over everyone’s account, and this is in the terms of service and EULA. Whether or not Blizzard adds an opt-out for this feature comes down to how many players are willing to vote with their wallets and leave over this. Other than that, this all comes down to player’s prerogative.
MMO Fallout 