Comments on: Poll: What do you think of the Blizzard Real ID Forum Changes?

By: Erk

Erk — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 16:10:13 +0000

Update: The players have been heard, and the realid change for the forums has been scrapped. Everyone breathe a sigh of relief! http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=25968987278&sid=1&pageNo=1#0

By: Aristos

Aristos — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 09:01:42 +0000

That’s tame – it’s when you do the weekly raid / daily HC after 3am to get the next day’s/week’s badges that it’s bad

By: Nont

Nont — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 08:22:41 +0000

Posting with my real name, the idea doesn’t exactly appeal to me. Only people i know in the real world know my name, i don’t need some loon to track me down because of some in game issue. Sure you could “opt-out” by not posting in the forums but what about tech support? blizz has horrible wait times for there phone support. And what about when i go searching for a job or the like and my prospective employer googles me? All in all, in my opinion its a horrible idea and the privacy ramifications… well it leaves A LOT to be desired.

By: EpicHippo

EpicHippo — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 04:30:30 +0000

I’m going to be honest. This was the final straw for me with Blizzard. I have been an avid supporter of their games ever since I first picked up Diablo for the first time, and have played all their games since. I started WoW as soon as it was out and had a great load of fun with it. I cringed at all the changes made as it chugged its way to WotLK, but I dealt with it and kept going. However, with recent changes, Blizzard has shown that it is no longer the company that I loved and supported. Online store, mobile auction house, the Real ID on the forums, and then the announcement on the new talent trees. While the Real ID change might not be going through, even the fact that they were willing to make this change in the first place allowed me with no regrets, to click that cancel account button. Although I will miss the great times I had in WoW, I’m just no longer willing to support a company thats willing to bastardize its player base that much. I hope all you guys enjoy your times, myself, I’ll be playing Aion and League of Legends.

By: Hoser

Hoser — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 16:23:04 +0000

I’m going with this was an Activision move and Blizzard went ahead and put it out there so it could be completely blown out of the water by subscribers. Blizzard knows its consumers and knew that this would create such an uproar that Activision would have no choice but to pull it.

By: Eirik

Eirik — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 16:37:52 +0000

> I resent the implication they’re making that if you don’t want people to know your real name, you must have some malicious reason for it.

The fallacy is pretty common; you see it by proponents of the National ID card system, TSA, etc.

There are, as of yesterday, more than 29,000 posts in the RealID thread on the blizzard forums about this issue. Any argument I could make here has been made there probably hundreds of times.

I read on the /GU forums that this is coming from the Activision side of things, and that the Blizzard creative side people are as up in arms about it as we players are… and don’t have the reins to stop it.

If you really want to complain, write a paper letter to

Robert Kotick
c/o Activision
3100 Ocean Park Boulevard
Santa Monica, CA 90405
United States

Please express you issues clearly and in a business-like fashion. Don’t devolve to ad hominem attacks, etc.

By: JR

JR — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 15:16:40 +0000

Too far. Way too far. I’ll be brief as the same valid points have been brought up over and over and I have no need to restate them.

What people are failing to grasp in all of this is that this will not stop at the forums. It is JUST the forums right now, and fine, I’ll just not post there. If I have an issue I’ll just sit on hold forever after calling them. Yay. HOWEVER, this will go further. Where does it stop? When we all have our real names over our heads running around Dal?

There are a LOT of us out there with our fingers hovering over the “cancel account” button. Once the next step is taken, I can guarantee I’m out.

Also – I’d be curious to see the breakdown of males vs. females (possibly with some minority vs. non-minority, those with corporate jobs vs. non-corporate) that think this is ok/not ok.

Sadly, we live in a messed up world where people have to be constantly on their guard. In doing this and taking any (assumed) steps further, they aren’t even giving us the chance to mount a guard.

I’m in the “if you want to do something, make an alias that you have to use for everything” camp. Accomplishes the same thing while still protecting your customers’ identity.

By: unknownloner

unknownloner — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 14:45:20 +0000

alright boys and girls, conspiracy theory time.
alright so you will be required to post with your name that you signed up with, not neccasarily your real name although it probably was. now what if you made a second account, an alt account, to post on the forums? more money in blizzards pocket and you get to keep your anonymity sort of like a premium feature.

probably not the case but its fun to think about stuff. anyway this could actually hurt blizzard in some ways. hackers only need your email adress to get your username and password, so if they find your name linked to your email adress they can,
A. send you emails personallized to your name to make you think even more its from blizzard to get keyloggers
B. hack your email account and use blizzards own site to get your username and password
c. hack your email account but do something like steal bank info.

By: KellyK

KellyK — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 12:56:54 +0000

I think it’s a ridiculous violation of privacy, and like Hanoumatoi says, it’s women and minorities who it’s going to affect the most. Why should you agree to have a “Stalk Me” sign posted on your back because you have a question to post in the customer service forums or want to talk about lore on the board? And for a woman who doesn’t want to admit her gender on forums, now she’s got no choice if she has a feminine name.

Or what about someone who’s gay or trans and needs to keep that info somewhat private for their own safety? Huge red flags and privacy concerns there.

Accountability with a unique username is one thing, but your full name is personal information that should be private. To the folks who are saying it’s not–um…Blizz’s whole reason for doing this is to make people accountable for everything they say on the forums by tying it to their real name. If you aren’t identifiable by it, then there’s no point. They’re *working* from the assumption that if you want to hide your identity, you’re trolling or doing something malicious, which is really not the case.

By: Grimloche

Grimloche — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 12:42:29 +0000

I voted other. I do like the Real ID system. However, instead of showing the real names of people on the forums they should, instead, show a single name that is perma linked to that specific person. For instance, before when you were making forum posts you could choose any of your toons on any post, so it could look like 50 people posting. Make them pick 1 of their toons, or, not even a toon but a forum screen name that is linked to that account. I use the same screen name on any forum I’m on, it doesn’t bother me. I don’t use my full real name on the interwebs for I am not stupid. Even my facebook page isn’t my full real name. I’m happy in the fact I google my name and nothing comes up.

Now I only use the forums when there are tech issues and I’m looking for a fix or if it’s out of the ordinary and to see if others are having the same issue or if it’s just me. Regardless of the issue Blizzard’s responce is always the same. “try rebooting your modem”

Any ways. They should let you create a screen name just for the forums that links to your Real ID account and the only way you can change this screen name is by either contacting blizzard directly to have it changed or by buying a new account. Just my thought though.