Not backing down, at all. And still going with the mediocre argument of killing off trolling.

My biggest beef with real ID is that with some very basic information and $30 you can get a full background check on a person.

I found a website that does just that I found myself from where I live my age and my full name, whats the most common question stated in a chat? a/s/l? If someone knows a rough esimtate of how old someone is or where they are from and has $30 and a point to prove, whats stopping them from pulling up a backround check finding where you live, who your family is, you're criminal record, social security number probobly, everything.

How dangerous is telling you that Itsamystery is 25 and lives in Green Bay? Not very, but put my actual name in the picture and you got yourself an issue.
(Edit: I'm not really 25 nor do I live in Green Bay I was using that as an example)

I've just found something of a logical contradiction in blizzard's "anti-troll" stance: how on earth can giving people's real names be considered safe in an environment Blizzard themselves consider to be full of trolls? They shouldn't act surprised that the first blue to give out his name was severely harrassed....

Blizzard wants it's own social network coupled with a game-distribution platform like Steam.

I don't see how this is going to work. Most of the people there ask questions directly linked to their character, so not giving out your character name isn't an option. Trolling won't stop either. Some people just are jerks and others may be angry at that point (I kinda troll by saying the truth to bad players). They could just be more strict, it works for EJ.

Anonymity is good for a MMO community, it makes everyone equal. No one cares if you have a funny name, what color your skin is, how old you are, what you look like or your social status.
I can't use my real name, since I'm the only result for it on Google.


The first blue gave out his name and 5mins later all details of him were found.

I can't help but be reminded of the Gleemax fiasco.

I'm wondering how long before the first libel suit:
Player has a distinct enough name (i.e Rumple S. Tiltskin). Non-player with same name happens to live in same city, works in same field of expertise, or some other confluence.

Player posts something. Non-player gets (mis-)attributed and has negative effects - hiring/firing decision, legal action, stalking, whatever. Non-player sues Blizzard for defamation, libel, whatever is appropriate. Oh, like, maybe the non-Bashiok involved?


Another problem - real names are non-unique:
When this goes live, I want the John Smith thread. Every player with the given name John Smith goes to the forums and discusses something reasonable in a single thread... where every post is effectively tagged as the same user, since we the masses will have no way to differentiate the John Smiths. That name is not unique, like a character+server combo is. What are they going to do, link home city, SSN, or credit card number, too?

I can even now see Jane Doe posting a reasonable question. Getting some replies. Another Jane Doe posts something sarcastic and insulting to the replies - naturally everyone thinks the second is the first.


Anti-troll:
So trolls don't post... but can still read every single player's full name with complete privacy, then use that information for higher level, less detectable trolling (again reference the poor Bashiok situation). The trolls ordering pizza, or similar, are not giving out their full name in the process, and thereby are not harmed. Only the innocent suffer?


My biggest worry:
95% of the playerbase stops using the forums to protect themselves. 5% remains active. Blizzard points to this 5% and their hundreds of thousands of posts over coming months/years and states public success. Business model of forcibly revealing personal information as "voluntary opt-in" becomes widely adopted. The wise 95% is now restricted and unable to perform some activities (play certain games, use the newest web innovation, whatever) unless we suddenly become part of the publicly-available-'private'-information crowd.

In short, if it even vaguely appears to work, PR will claim it works wildly well, and other companies will adopt it as "good business practice."


P.S. Large raids are elitist and people hate being forced to run them for loot, let's make raids smaller. Smaller raids mean smaller guilds. Smaller guilds mean less socialization. So let's make battlenet/forums social networking, because that's obviously the core of our business! Does no one else find the disconnect between Cata raiding and the widely stated views regarding guilds and now their "socialization" projects?

So what? Maybe I don't get something, because I'm public person (like 20 top searches with my name is me). But if your name appears on Google you are already exposed, and something like RealID won't really change this. Why would I want to pay $30 for "background check" (really, knowing a Name is now background check?) if I can do it without?

This thread is so full of scared people who lost their ability to think critical, it's amusing.

I'm pretty sure Blizzard will be protected by Anti-SLAPP law so this kind of lawsuit will be quickly dismissed.

As for numbers - you got it wrong. First of all, I highly doubt that even 50% of playerbase are using forums somewhat regularly. And it's 5% of them(and it's very generous number) who will stop, and 95% who will continue. Also you can't really say with straight face, that "forcibly revealing personal information" is a business model.

And last thing. What actually stops you from changing your name in account preference? You can still pay for game if your credit card's name different, you just need same billing address. Hell, you can even buy prepaid cards (if you are paranoid about privacy you aren't using credit cards for internet payments anyway).

So what? Sure, our names are easily google-able, but why on earth would anyone ever google them? People can't google what they don't know. With this new option, you're just begging to get googled and harassed.

You're an officer in charge of recruiting, and turned someone down? No problem if he only has your IG identity. If he has your real name, if you're unlucky, you may get annoyed.

You're a girl and you turned some random stranger down IG? Same thing.

You're ML and denied someone loot and he takes it ill? Same thing.


The problem people have here isn't the fact their names were on the Internet, it's the fact that Blizzard is forcing us to expose them if we wish to participate in an aspect of the game (not mentionning what the next steps could be). Hell, Banks consider names to be confidential and non-sharable information, how in the world could a game consider the contrary safely?

People play with an alias for a good reason: because it's a game and because we do NOT want our ID to be shared with everyone without our consent. You say your name is easy to google. Fine; but we don't know it, so we can't google it. When this new forum change comes to be, we will. There's the problem.

Sure YOU wouldnt pay $30 for a background check but last I checked most of the world isnt exactly what I would consider a "Good Person". That person I called out for being bad or that person who got denied getting into a guild might be crazy enough and willing to shell out that $30. For every good person like you who wouldnt try to attack a person in real life cause "its wrong" theres at least 5 people that would.

I'm also rather uncomfortable with the direction the whole RealID business is being taken. While currently all the services it offers are things I can easily opt out off by simply not using them (Can't say I particularly care for either the 'improved friends' or the official Blizzard forums), the part where they're willing to shut off a part of their service to you if you wish to remain anonymous is worrying to me, since it implies that they won't be afraid of shutting you out of any other services where they decide to start forcing you into using your real name.

For example, what if they simply require you to play your character under your real name, no better way of stopping those pesky ninja looters and such right? That's something I definitely wouldn't feel comfortable with. And it's not like I can take steps to remain anonymous anyway, when I originally signed up for WoW, as well as when I signed up for my Battle.Net account I figured they just needed the personal information for billing, so I filled it all in honestly, and it's not possible to change this information after registering your account.

As for why I'm worried, as a former guild master I've had a lot of threats made against me for decisions I made, usually in regards to getting rid of someone for disruptive behavior. I've also had some threatening messages sent to me here on EJ after giving someone an infraction. Most of that is pointless bravado, and for now it's definitely nothing to worry about as no one can link either the nickname I use here nor the nickname of my characters to my real identity. But if someone crazy enough to want to go out and take 'revenge' against me comes along and they can find out my real name, I'm much more vulnerable than I am now, especially due to having the (mis)fortune of having a fairly unique real name. As I said though most of that is pointless bravado, but it just needs one person crazy enough to actually go through with their threats for my life to turn much more unpleasant.

And as unreasonable as that fear might be, it's enough for me to stop playing the game if things went that far. And it's rather sad that I'd have to stop playing a game simply because the company running it decides that everyone should be okay with broadcasting their real names to the online world.