Judge Rules WoW Bot Violates DMCA 498
An anonymous reader writes to tell us that Blizzard has added another victory in their campaign against World of Warcraft bots. A federal judge has ruled that not only did the Glider bot break the EULA, it can be classified as a circumvention device under the DMCA. "As we've noted before, Blizzard's legal arguments, which Judge David G. Campbell largely accepted, could have far-reaching and troubling implications for the software industry. Donnelly is not the most sympathetic defendant, and some users may cheer the demise of a software vendor that helps users break the rules of Blizzard's wildly popular role playing game. But the sweeping language of Judge Campbell's decision, combined with his equally troubling decision last summer, creates a lot of new uncertainty for software vendors seeking to enter software markets dominated by entrenched incumbents and achieve interoperability with legacy platforms."
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Insightful)
Doesn't matter. (Score:5, Insightful)
Blizzard is doing a lot of damage to the industry (Score:3, Insightful)
It seems like each and every time Blizzard has filed a suit over something related to "violating the terms of their EULA", they've been handed a victory.
I've been troubled by ALL of these rulings over the years, and this just adds to the total.
As far as I'm concerned, people who pay for a copy of their game software have *every* right to opt to use said software with other, alternate servers, if they so desire. They also have every right to run any manner of automated script or "bot" in lieu of physically sitting in front of their screen and hand-manipulating the character they've paid for the subscription to use on Blizzard's servers!
It's a really BAD precedent to set, to legally enforce the idea that a software developer can FORCE a customer to use their product only in specific ways they outline. Imagine if Microsoft or Apple came along and dictated that their operating systems could no longer legally be used as a platform running any "p2p sharing software" (since as we ALL know, torrents and other types of p2p sharing are inherently bad, right?).
Or imagine if you bought the latest edition of a "Call of Duty" game, only to find out the EULA stated it was illegal to play except on weekends? Blizzard has effectively won the legal ability for developers to state and enforce anything like this they'd like to put in the agreement!
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Doesn't matter. (Score:5, Insightful)
That was several months ago. This is about a judge not understanding the difference between breaking a contract and breaking access-control mechanisms.
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Insightful)
Because they want to keep the other 70%?
Re:Blizzard is doing a lot of damage to the indust (Score:5, Insightful)
if 10 million people play WoW, do you think a few of them might be judges?
Re:Blizzard is doing a lot of damage to the indust (Score:3, Insightful)
So Blizzard shouldn't be able to set the terms of use for a _service_ they provide?
Just think how viable xbox live would be if MS couldn't stop people from running hacks and mods.
And I'm sure everyone sitting in a queue waiting to get on their primary server will just love you and your afkave bot.
Re:Blizzard is doing a lot of damage to the indust (Score:5, Insightful)
They also have every right to run any manner of automated script or "bot" in lieu of physically sitting in front of their screen and hand-manipulating the character they've paid for the subscription to use on Blizzard's servers!
Not as long as you share a game world. Though it's not physical, whenever people meet there are rules to follow. Even if you paid membership to a sports club, they could deny you access if you came there shirtless. They could throw you out if you're breaking the rules and being an ass. You can't wave your membership card in their face and say "You can't touch me, I've paid to be here!". Client software and bots are exactly the same as dress code and club rules. With single player games you can do whatever the fuck you want, just as you can in the privacy of your own home. WoW is not your home (or if it is, seek professional help).
Re:Doesn't matter. (Score:2, Insightful)
But Warden is an anti-cheat measure, not a copy protection measure. Does this mean that circumventing ANY measure, no matter what it's for, is illegal now? Does that include nonsense like "rightclick blocker" Javascript?
Never about Piracy. (Score:3, Insightful)
For anyone who was wondering whether the DMCA, or DRM, had anything to do with piracy, look here:
Glider violates the provision of the DMCA that prohibits "trafficking" in software that is "primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work" protected by copyright.
Sounds pretty open and shut for Glider...
But unless I'm missing something, that's a valid interpretation of that language -- any technological measure which controls access to a work.
Not "prevents piracy", or "prevents duplication", or even "prevents already-illegal stuff that we didn't need a new law for anyway."
No, it's all about control. It's about preventing you from using stuff you legitimately bought in new and interesting ways, so they can sell it to you again in those new and interesting ways. Or it's about preventing you from doing something that damages them in a completely unrelated way, if they can.
It's about taking control away from the consumer, and putting it back in the hands of the publisher.
If it stops piracy, great. But I don't think that they could've come up with something this devious by accident, especially when it's clear how ineffective the stuff is at its supposed purpose (preventing piracy).
I don't get Siy and Pearlman... (Score:5, Insightful)
FTA:
Siy and Pearlman also expressed skepticism at the notion that these "dynamic, non-literal elements" constitute a distinct copyrighted work.
If I'm reading the trial order [mmoglider.com] correctly (IANAL), it seems to cite the following cases in support of "non-literal elements" being copyrighted:
See Atari Games Corp. v. Oman, 888 F.2d 878, 884-85 (D.C. Cir. 1989); Midway Mfg. Co. v. Arctic Int'l, Inc., 704 F.2d 1009, 1011-12 (7th Cir. 1983); Williams Elec., Inc. v. Arctic Int'l, Inc., 685 F.2d 870, 874 (3d Cir. 1982); Stern Elecs., Inc. v. Kaufman, 669 F.2d 852, 855-56 (2d Cir. 1982)
What I'd like to see from Siy and Pearlman is a description of what these cases are, and why their citation is somehow irrelevant with regards to non-literal elements and copyright enforceability. The judge certainly seemed to think they applied. (Again, if I'm reading the order correctly. I might be wrong. Who knows.)
Re:True, But They've Done Much More Harm Than That (Score:2, Insightful)
How much more hand holding can they do when the genre conventions already include having the amount of time you played the game dictate your strength? How sad is it that people call an MMO "hard" because it takes more time to get stronger? How much sadder is it that people define themselves as "hardcore" for playing games that waste more time than others?
Re:Blizzard is doing a lot of damage to the indust (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Insightful)
Is there even any point to the game if you can't even be buggered to play it yourself?
It's a *dumb* game, that's why this problem exists (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:3, Insightful)
Get up, walk out of the theatre, tell the manager, tell an usher, tell someone who looks important.
At the theatre I work at, we love to kick out the unruly lot that make the movies worse for everyone. Every time we walk in, they hush down, it's hard for us to know where the problems are. It's also a multiplex, with only one usher for many theatres, doing double duty, cleaning and checking the facilities.
So, do something about it. Honestly, having the balls to fix the problem is probably not their problem, more likely, they don't have anything substantive and don't want to interrupt the movie more severely than it already has been. Nothing distracts everyone in the theatre more than an argument in the seats. Make the theatre staff know it's a problem, and it'll probably be taken care of.
Why should I do their job for them? They make money by providing a place that people want to visit badly enough that they are willing to pay for doing so. I'll use one of the many other ways to see the movies of my choice and enjoy it with no such problems before I'll help the them do their jobs while paying for the privilege.
Now if you or any other staff are "doing double duty" or are otherwise overworked and cannot take care of these things, that's really between yourself and management. I am not interested in really effective people who are more than willing to take care of any problems I bring to their attention (at best that's a "close second"). I am interested in not having those problems in the first place, which is not unreasonable considering that these problems are easy to identify (if you missed the guy shouting into his brightly-lit cellphone, I assure you that no one else did). That you mention "arguing in the seats" is part of the problem too, methinks. "Leave this premises right now or we call the police and press trespassing charges" is rather difficult to argue with, it's just not done for PR reasons.
Besides, I recognize that any valid reason why theater staff would eject someone is a symptom. The fact that most chronological adults are actually overgrown children who never matured to the point of caring about how their actions affect other people is the actual underlying problem. Movie theaters just provide a confined space where it's more difficult than usual to avoid the results. My preference, the option that is most pleasing to me, is to decide that it's not worthwhile to me and to recognize that there are many other options. I prefer that to trying to fix what I can very easily live without.
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Insightful)
See the Battlefield series.
If someone wants to cheat on a singleplayer game, more power to them. But doing it in an environment where others are playing reduces the value of others who abide by the terms of service.
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:2, Insightful)
That you mention "arguing in the seats" is part of the problem too, methinks. "Leave this premises right now or we call the police and press trespassing charges" is rather difficult to argue with, it's just not done for PR reasons.
And yet, the same people that will laugh and joke into a cell phone during a movie still find a way to argue with that, the most prevalent being 'I paid for my movie, I'm not leaving'. Sure they eventually give up, but that's beside the point.
Admittedly, I only go to a movie theatre 2 or 3 times a year, but that is more a price point issue than anything else. $22 for my wife and I to go see a new movie once, or wait 3 months and spend the same amount to own it forever... the choice is usually pretty clear.
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:3, Insightful)
Never played WoW or any other MMORPG for that matter, but I thought the point of these kinds of bots was to grind for you, to do the tedious things that have to be done to level up (something I am familiar with as I recently started playing Oblivion) so you can spend your game time doing the more interesting things.
Obviously Blizzard doesn't like this because they want you to pay for your monthly account for several months while you grind and occasionally do interesting things, rather than level up quickly (from a real life time line perspective) and spend less time doing more fun things.
Re:DMCA is essential to an orderly society. (Score:3, Insightful)
DMCA is essential to an orderly society.
That must be why we didn't need it for hundreds of years worth of "orderly society".
Without the ability of a software producer to control how his product is used...
Without that, we might just get some real innovation. You know, people combining existing inventions in new ways. The horror!
People might actually tinker with the things they legitimately own! Think of that! The modding community must be stopped at all costs!
If you have no legal right to use your camera to take pictures of child pornography or use your mega-phone to disrupt a sleeping neighborhood.
And what do either of these have to do with the DMCA? They were illegal before the DMCA, and they'll be illegal if the DMCA is repealed.
Blizzard is stupid beacause... (Score:1, Insightful)
...when an entire industry (legal or not) rises up to counter act an element of your game (farming) perhaps one should take that as a sign that you game shouldn't do that.
The purpose for farming is to make players play longer. It provides no challenge and no real gameplay element.
Blizzard is just too lazy to make actual content that would keep players occupied. They rely on addiction instead of providing a fun, playable game.
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Insightful)
Freedom isn't about doing whatever you want with no repercussions. There are always repercussions which is the way it should be in a lot of instances.
It's all well in good to say that you're free to say nigger and people are free to react in whatever way but the fact is the way they will react makes it more or less impossible to use the word in most cases. Secondly if you are free to do something wrong and people are free to retaliate then even if you have the freedom to use a WoW bot then Blizzard should have the freedom to stop you and protect the majority of their paying customers that dislike it.
If it were a single player game where you only affected yourself then go nuts and do whatever you want but it's a multi-player game where people have to pay a monthly fee and if most people don't want it then the majority win. As I said Blizzard has the right to retain as many customers as possible.
Whether or not the DCMA route was the right way to go about it may be debatable. Part of me does say they're not circumventing copyright protection but another part of me says that bot users in any game are scum so fuck 'em.
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:3, Insightful)
Also they have bought the game but connect to Blizzards servers, play by the rules or leave, have fun with your game outside of their servers ...
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:3, Insightful)
Accept the other 70% aren't exactly running away now, are they?
That 70% seems pretty much willing to deal with the spam.
Have you ditched email because of spam? I haven't. But damned if I don't do everything I can to limit the spam that I ever see. And I'd be right up in line to punch the bastard(s) doing it if such a fantasy was ever made real.
I've also had to deal with spam in-game. Its an annoyance that has thankfully lessened with Blizzard's active involvement in decreasing it. Blizzard taking action increases the likelyhood that I'm going to continue paying my monthly fee(s).
Re:It's a *dumb* game, that's why this problem exi (Score:5, Insightful)
Am I the only one who is pretty disgusted at the trend of games where the primary skill function is just how much time your character spends doing stuff?
Go play a FPS and you'll find autoaim bots, wallhacks, and other assorted cheating tools. Corner a cheater and they'll complain about how they have a "real life" and can't spend all their time playing the game to get the skills to compete with other players. This is simply more of the same.
There are thousands of folks who want instant gratification. Twitch monkeys who can't stand not being at the top of whatever hill they see but don't want to invest the time it takes to get there (nevermind that being at the top of the hill doesn't HAVE to be the point of a lot of these games). So they go for the short-cut.
Yeah, treadmills and grinds aren't for everyone. But that doesn't mean you get to ditch the rules because they're inconvenient for you. Play the game... or don't play at all.
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:3, Insightful)
Never played WoW
Oh good, an expert opinion coming up here ...
Obviously Blizzard doesn't like this because they want you to pay for your monthly account for several months while you grind and occasionally do interesting things, rather than level up quickly (from a real life time line perspective) and spend less time doing more fun things.
Considering that the number of active accounts has passed 12 million, I would say there are a fair amount of people who find the game interesting.
I mouse clicked for every point of my maxed fishing skill, I mouse clicked for every bit of stuff I've looted off corpses. Doing that sort of stuff by 'bot degrades the things I earned by playing. It's not as if it is a difficult game and it's getting easier all the time.
I'm happy that Blizzard is actively going after cheats. Not so happy with the way they went about getting this one. But certainly not unhappy enough to close my accounts.
Re:Doesn't matter. (Score:3, Insightful)
Glider does not bypass protection mechanisms granting you the ability to access copyrighted work without a license.
That depends on if you are considering the World of Warcraft client installed on the user's PC as the copyrighted work in question, then you might be correct.
If you consider WoW, the online game/service as the copyrighted work, however, and the WoW client (or more specifically, Warden) as the protection mechanism, though, things turn around rather quickly.
WoW as a whole is the product that Blizzard is selling. They do NOT sell a standalone client - they license you a client when you sign up for their online service. It is this distinction that makes this case so much different from many others.
To sum up, again. Warden is designed to control access to a protected work. Specifically to limit access to the uses permitted by Blizzard's WoW ToS. Glider intentionally circumvents this. Specifically, every time WoW is patched and Glider is yet again blocked, Glider is patched to get around it. This is clearly criminal under the DMCA, no fancy lawyering needed to make it seem so.
In the old days this would have been a simple civil case, where Blizzard sued MDY for damages, and drove them into bankruptcy, while playing a never ending cat and mouse game with blocking glider. Now, thanks to the DMCA, it's a criminal matter and MDY's CEO is personally responsible.
Much more minor circumventions (i.e. using deCSS to play your lawfully purchased DVD's or stripping DRM out of songs purchased from the internet) also run afoul of this law, and are criminal acts.
This is a totally legitimate application of the law, doing what it was written to do. The only way out of this mess is to repeal or rewrite the DMCA. "Accessing copyrighted work without a licence" is not the only application of the DMCA - it is in fact written quite broadly. Bypassing anything that "controls access" is completely illegal in the USA.
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Insightful)
We should reinstate the draft and send these people to some foreign country to get blown up. Or at the very least, basic training.
Yes because it is much better when the annoying people are trained killers. Military training doesn't necessarily stop you being an inconsiderate twat.
Re:Doesn't matter. (Score:4, Insightful)
Bullshit. If Warden failed to detect ANY bots, despite being intended to do so, does that make ALL bots circumvention programs?
Circumvention is an ACTION, requiring ACTION on the part of the bot. Otherwise Blizzard could have some debug comment: "This code is intended to prevent screenshots from stealing our copyrighted artz", followed by nothing. Then the Print Screen functions would be CIRCUMVENTING the "protection" by "not being detected".
Re:Doesn't matter. (Score:3, Insightful)
A substantial portion of game content in WoW is server-side. The scripts for raid encounters, NPC locations and dialogue, and other elements are arguably creative works, and they are stored on the server. The game client downloads these elements and renders them using local models and textures.
Warden prevents access to such game content by preventing users from authenticating with the WoW servers if detected cheat programs are loaded. Glider circumvents this measure by fooling Warden into allowing access to such content.
This sounds like a violation of the anti-circumvention provisions of the DMCA to me. Mind you, I think that those provisions are bullshit, but I'm not sure we can trash the judge for ruling the way he did.
Re:Blizzard is doing a lot of damage to the indust (Score:1, Insightful)
if 10 million people play WoW, do you think a few of them might be judges?
No.
If 10 million people eat pork, do you think a few of them might be muslim?
Numbers alone do nothing.
This is not chance, this is choice.
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:4, Insightful)
WoW is a painfully boring game.
Think about how boring this game is: It's so boring that an entire economy of real money has sprung up based on paying people or machines to do the horribly boring task of playing the game.
This is why I tried it for a weekend then quit right away: I have a job that pays me about 70k/yr to do incredibly boring things. Why would I come home and pay Blizzard $120/yr plus expansion packs for the privilege of doing incredibly boring things?
If it was because I want to keep up with my friends who are also playing, it makes sense to hire a Chinese kid to play the game for me, so I can have the L70 character so I can play with my friends without having to go through the boring, months long process of levelling up a character.