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."
Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Insightful)
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I think he meant the in-game spamming more than the gold sellers themselves.
It's getting as bad as the spam folder in my gmail, with one small difference: there's no spam folder in WoW, only an easily bypassed filter.
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:4, Informative)
Glider was a bot that would farm for you. It would move to areas, kill things, collect things off the body for you, even fish.
It's not just a spam bot, it's a full script that would play the game for you. Whether it's farming something, fishing to get your levels up, or mining, it was able to do it without your interaction.
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?
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Informative)
Some items are only dropped in one or two areas, which are easily covered by a couple of accounts running glider.
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Not being a WoW player I just have to ask.. If a guild did the same thing without using a bot program would the game mods punish them?
Is the only thing defending the integrity of the WoW game-play model the fact that Blizzard don't think anyone will take the time or effort to break it in person?
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Informative)
However, there are regularly "Chinese gold farmers" out there doing this manually, where someone hires legions of very, very low-paid people to sit and do this all day, wherein the "pit boss" usually turns around and sells the gold via spammers. This isn't allowed as again, it upsets the economy and selling gold for real money is against the ToS. It's also led to a huge amount of account hacking and compromises, which prompted Blizzard to make mails to every in-game character and a logon notice regarding keeping your account safe and not buying gold. I'm not sure what measures Blizzard has taken against gold farmers such as this though. I have noticed, however, the amount of level 1 characters with the name "sjduerlks" (etc) running into the capital cities to shout about gold selling and power-leveling services.
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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
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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
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Does anyone else on a raid with you know whether you botted or whether you manually clicked your way to high rating for fishing or killing large numbers of low level mobs?
I used those specific examples because they were being used to justify botting.
Then why are *you* so affected by what others do that you cannot know or detect?
Because I've obtained the skills to fish (and cook the fish) under the rules and I have to compete in the AH with those who have not.
The achievement system actually works quite well for some of this. Those who have achieved their levels by powerleveling through instances are easily identified. Ebayers betray themselves.
The first time I *knew* I was confronting bots was when I was trying to obtain some Felcloth to make Mooncloth
cut to the chase (Score:3, Funny)
Is there even any point to the game if you can't even be buggered to play it yourself?
Is porn worth it if you fast-forward through the story and dialogues?
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Well, in WoW, you need a lot of gold to buy things like very fast mounts, land and air mounts. It takes months of farming and doing quests, or you can have a bot play for you 8 hours a day while you sleep.
For the people who can only play 2 or 3 hours a day at most, having your computer play for an additional 8 hours would be a huge help. Instead of farming, I spent most of my time in auction halls trying to buy low and sell high, but that really cut into the couple hours of play time I could put in every
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.
It's a *dumb* game, that's why this problem exists (Score:5, Insightful)
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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:It's a *dumb* game, that's why this problem exi (Score:4, Interesting)
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.
You seem to have mistaken my complaint to be one about cheaters. It isn't.
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.
I think that's precisely what I find so wrong with games that reward sacrificed time rather than enhancing aptitudes. Because those "twitch monkeys" aren't at the top of any hill, are they? The gratification they get doesn't come from being the best, so what is it? Do they just like putting virtual bullets into virtual heads controlled by other players?
IMO this isn't healthy, and parallels games that reward time sacrifice: what exactly do these players enjoy doing? It isn't getting better at something, or being the best, because they aren't getting better or becoming the best, their characters are. I think if you set aside the morals and/or social contracts that affect how people feel about cheating, the role of cheat software to a cheater is identical to the role of the items/spells/powers your characters can accumulate: advancing your in-game advantage without advancing your own aptitudes.
It seems to me that games like World of Warcraft and Pokemon have stumbled onto something that Final Fantasy was only beginning to uncover in the 1990s. People crave foraging for items, hunting, exhausting supplies of hiding places for things to collect and hunt, and upgrading their tools. Seems to me like this taps into some very deep-seated primal instincts that are very useful if you do not live in the first world (although I'd bet plenty of the monkeys on wall street eye their investment portfolios with a similar fascination that MMORPG players consider their characters.)
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.
As it seems ambiguous, I'll make it clear: I was advocating the latter option: Don't play at all. Games that make wasting your time part of the experience are ridiculous. Real life contains enough of that.
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.
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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 ...
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The terms of service are not laws and should not have the equivalent weight in the real world of laws.
Contract law isn't the problem here (Score:3, Informative)
The problem with your argument is that contract law isn't what is the problem here. By breaking the terms of the ToS, under their contract with him Blizzard can only cut off his service and keep his money. They can't fine him $150,000 "per act of infringement", as is the case with the DMCA. If you read the article, they're moving beyond contract law and saying violating the terms of service makes you a copyright infringer, subject to copyright law:
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
as cited in the court decision multiple times
[citation needed]
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:4, Interesting)
Blame that on Blizzard. A single employee could monitor, detect, and ban thousands of gold spammers in a single day. Making a million subscribers' days less spammy is not worth $15k/yr to Blizzard.
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Informative)
Prt 2 Org 1g?
Prt = Portal (A Mage-class player can create portals [thottbot.com] for other players to use)
2 = to
Org = Orgrimmar (a major city)
1g = 1 gold (currency)
In this case a player is requesting a mage to teleport them to another city, and is willing to pay 1 gold. (Since the latest patch, most portals usually go for 2-5g... sometimes I even get 10g on the Eonar server.)
Tbl plz.
tbl = Table (A Mage-class player can create refreshment tables [thottbot.com] for other players)
plz = Please
A party member is asking a mage to create a table that they can use for food that replenishes health and mana.
Ned 1g.
Ned = Need
1g = 1 gold (currency)
Someone needs money. Usually you'll see this from the lower players asking higher players for money.
Can u rn me thru RFC? 10s
rn = run (a process where a higher-level character parties with a lower level character and then proceeds to do a low-level quest or dungeon so that the low-level character can complete a quest or get an item without doing any work)
RFC = Ragefire Chasm (a dungeon for a group of low level characters)
10s = 10 silver (currency... 1g = 100s)
A low level character is asking a presumably higher level character to do the dungeon for them, and is willing to pay 10s. (10s is nowhere near the price anyone would pay for a run. Hell, you'll pick up a few gold in the dungeon...)
Now you know, and can be nerdy like us. Just like us... Just like us... Just like us...
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Funny)
You are absolutely free to harass others in the theater.
Good thing there's no law against harassment. If there were, I wonder what they'd call it.
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.
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I pay for my movie tickets but that doesn't give me the right to harass others.
You are not allowed to discuss your personal opinion of the movie to anyone inside or outside the theatre for a period of one (1) year after its theatrical release date in your locality without the prior written consent of the copyright owner. If you fail to comply, you may be fined not less than $1,000, and/or jailed for a period of up to three (3) years. Enjoy the show, and buy our overpriced popcorn.
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Interesting)
I pay for my movie tickets but that doesn't give me the right to harass others.
I wish more people felt that way.
I have multiple reasons why I have rarely or never been inside of a movie theater for the last five years or so, but the inconsiderate actions of the other customers is one of the biggest. I should preface this by saying that I am talking about R-rated movies that do not permit children, so the people I am describing are supposedly adults. From the "restless leg syndrome" individual who won't stop tapping the back of your seat, to the cellphone users who refuse to go outside if they absolutely must take a call, to the fact that I've never seen an establishment that had the balls to eject the small minority who have no respect for everyone else, I feel like they should pay me for the experience, not the other way around. Considering how many other methods there are to enjoy whatever movies I want in an environment that I can control, movie theaters have completely lost their appeal for me.
It's not really the movie theater and I realize that. It's just that theaters are enclosed environments which demand that you pay attention, and the immature, inconsiderate, ADD, "I'm the only person who exists" chronological adults who are really just overgrown children aren't terribly compatible with that atmosphere. I think these are the same folks who would only care about the immediate convenience of having more gold in WoW and would not care about the principle of never buying anything from a spammer for any reason.
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:4, Informative)
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.
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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 in
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Funny)
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.
When I get torqued off by said "unruly lot", I'll ask them myself to shut the fuck up. Heck, I had a couple of Arab characters talking in loud tones in their own language while I was trying to enjoy a good movie. I was irritated but not enough to say anything. Then, one of them sent a goddamn beer can spinning over my head. He wasn't aiming at me, true, I think he was just in high spirits ... but I stood up and told them both that "I DIDN'T APPRECIATE THE SHOWER." They got all wide-eyed and actually apologized, and wonder of wonders were quiet for the rest of the film.
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.
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Why would Blizzard want to cut out 30% of the paid accounts?
Re:Hopefully there's a silver lining (Score:5, Insightful)
Because they want to keep the other 70%?
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It just tells me they might have a market to allow bot creators an interface for making mob AI! Then the players can fight against the botters according to the game rules and those that want to make game bots can improve the game by offering a challenge to players.
In order to keep unmanned botting popular, reward the bots for every player killed. If a bot manages to spawn, kill someone, collect a random item on the corpse and make it back to a "home base" then the bot can put the item on the global auctio
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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).
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That 70% seems pretty much willing to deal with the spam.
I've probably seen as much gold spam *total* since they added the insta-report button than I used to see in a day.
I recall being disappointed that that was all they could come up with when it was first introduced, but it has done an amazingly good job.
Doesn't matter. (Score:5, Insightful)
THAT Doesn't matter. (Score:2)
The specific gripe the bot company appeals on doesn't matter much to me, they would appeal any decision that told them they couldn't sell their product, that's what companies do.
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.
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I haven't read this new ruling, but I read the last one - and he clearly understood everything perfectly well.
Re:Doesn't matter. (Score:5, Informative)
In other words, a tool that a) accesses elements of a copyrighted work b) evades protection mechanisms to do so violates the DMCA. Maybe the issue isn't with the judge, but with the law he's interpreting.
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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?
Re:Doesn't matter. (Score:5, Informative)
DMCA, Wikipedia: "It criminalizes production and dissemination of technology, devices, or services intended to circumvent measures (commonly known as Digital Rights Management or DRM) that control access to copyrighted works and it also criminalizes the act of circumventing an access control, whether or not there is actual infringement of copyright itself."
Re:Doesn't matter. (Score:5, Interesting)
To this judge, that line isn't so clear. The judge's radical invention (for which he deserves a patent ;-) is this: "dynamic nonliteral elements" (fancy talk for the whole experience of the game, consisting of not just Blizzard's code and Blizzard's game data, but also Blizzard's server responses, and the users' actions) has copyright protection. And since Warden limits access to Blizzard's server's responses, then Warden limits access to the "dynamic nonliteral elements" and bypassing Warden is a DMCA violation.
The WoW code is copyrighted: reasonable.
The game data (e.g. graphics and sound) is copyrighted: reasonable.
The user-generated events are copyrighted (and by Blizzard?): wacked out.
The server responses are copyrighted: iffy, as they are not creative works (and you don't even want to think about whether those responses are also shaped by the users' collective inputs -- which noncreative but copyrightable work is a derived work of which?).
The sum of all the previous things run through a function (the Wow code) to become an overall experience, is copyrighted (and by Blizzard): wow!
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The user-generated events are copyrighted (and by Blizzard?): wacked out.
I read through the legal briefing. While the line isn't clear on the "user experience" portion being copyrightable, I think that it mainly was alluding to the things that the server generates to interact with the players: Things such as gold amount given/collected, items dropped by monsters, etc. This was one of Blizzard's points in the claim (specifically); whether that will hold up in court as a "copyrightable" element remains to be seen by the 9th circuit court, apparently.
It might be along the lin
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The server responses are copyrighted: iffy, as they are not creative works (and you don't even want to think about whether those responses are also shaped by the users' collective inputs -- which noncreative but copyrightable work is a derived work of which?).
Actually you could say that as a result of the copyrighted code that the resultant output is copyrighted as well as the output is the primary function of the code. The initial creation of the code is a creative (debatable, but we'll go with what the courts have been ruling for lately) work.
Re:Doesn't matter. (Score:5, Informative)
I'm sorry, but you have this incorrect (at least, in my opinion)
Glider does not bypass warden. Glider is stealthy and is not detected by Warden. Warden still runs. Blizzard updates Warden to detect Glider and hauls out the banstick.
But either way, Glider is not a tool that "accesses elements of a copyrighted work". It is a tool which accesses elements of a copyrighted work that you, as the user/developer, have a legal license to access until such time that Blizzard revokes said license for violation of their terms of use.
In other words, Glider does not bypass protection mechanisms granting you the ability to access copyrighted work without a license. Glider breaks a civil contract, which upon discovery will cause the licensor (Blizzard) to revoke the license of the licensee (you). After that, you can no longer access elements of the copyrighted work.
Re:Doesn't matter. (Score:5, Informative)
17 USC 1201
(2) No person shall manufacture, import, offer to the public, provide, or otherwise traffic in any technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof, that--
(A) is primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title;
(B) has only limited commercially significant purpose or use other than to circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title; or
(C) is marketed by that person or another acting in concert with that person with that person's knowledge for use in circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title.
Warden controls access to the online portion of WoW (a copyrighted work) by checking to see if cheat programs are running and refusing access to WoW if it detects any. Glider is such a program that has, in the past, been blocked by Warden. Glider was updated to circumvent this access control.
The ruling, if you bother to take the time to read it, explains all of this stuff. Maybe you don't like the law, but it was at least properly applied here.
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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
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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 onlin
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Hard to argue that it just "remained undetected" when they actively had to change the software so that Warden could no longer detect it.
In addition, the court found that MDY had repeatedly advertised that their software circumvented protections.
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".
Update from Glider forums (Score:4, Informative)
The judge just ruled and, unfortunately, it did not go much our way. He pretty much awarded everything to Blizzard again.
Here's a link to the order: http://www.mmoglider.com/Legal/trialorder_jan28.pdf [mmoglider.com]
What this means for Glider customers The judge asked us to file a memo by February 13th on why we should be allowed to continue to sell Glider through the appeal process.
I'm not sure why he asked for that, since I don't think he's going to start listening to us now. So we'll file it and see, but it seems very likely that he will rule against us. Then we'll go up to the 9th circuit and try to get a stay, similar to how the Napster case went.
If all goes badly, Glider could be shut down as early as mid-February. So keep your fingers crossed.
That's from 01/28/2009
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Non-Literals (Score:5, Funny)
Judge Campbell has distinguished between the actual bits stored on the World of Warcraft disk (which he called the "literal elements" of the game) and the interface elements the user encounters as he's actually playing the game (which he dubbed "non-literal elements").
It's fun how after playing that game for a while I get called a "non-literal", good thing I stopped playing last year!
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:Blizzard is doing a lot of damage to the indust (Score:5, Funny)
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?).
If both of them did it, then I'm imagining The Year of Linux on the Desktop finally coming to pass! =D
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That's why MS sells Retail licenses...
Part of the price break of the OEM license cost comes from the fact that it is non-transferable.
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?
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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.
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1) They sell software as well as the service. Their terms say you can only use their software with their service. The legal enforcement of this could have far reaching consequences.
2) Their enforcement of those terms is through the courts, where the arguments of their lawyers stretch laws like the DMCA or the validity of EULA's to cover more and more ground. Once there's precedent it affects everyone, not just WOW players or gold farmers.
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Once there's precedent it affects everyone, not just WOW players or gold farmers.
This really depends on what court made the decision. Usually appelate decisions have more weight. If this guy appeals it up to a US district court or (shudder) the US Supreme court, it could have a wide ranging impact. Otherwise, it's just going to put Glider out of buisiness.
Re:Blizzard is doing a lot of damage to the indust (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Blizzard is doing a lot of damage to the indust (Score:5, Interesting)
> So Blizzard shouldn't be able to set the terms of use for a _service_ they provide?
They have every right to. The problem with these cases is just how obscenely far the laws are being stretched. It's setting precedents that could potentially have devastating consequences.
If Blizzard says "thou shall now use a bot", then fine. If a person uses a bot then they have violated Blizzard's terms of service, allowing Blizzard to do what the terms allow. This usually means disconnecting them, but could, in principal, include a fine of $1 million. (Of course, if that were the case they'd almost certainly require a notarized signature, not just a "I Agree" checkbox.)
In this case, Blizzard was unable to detect Glider, and was therefore unable to take recourse against it's users. That's where the road should end. They should either update their cheat detection or give up.
HOWEVER, they went to the courts. They said that because Glider breaks their ToS, the _company_ should be held liable. And because the ToS/EULA is broken, the copying of the program into RAM to operate is a violation of copyright. AND that the people behind Glider should be held responsible for this infringement. They won. As a result, we have the precedents:
1) Copying a program into RAM is not fair use.
2) A company can be held liable if someone breaches a contract with your product.
And now, we get the following:
3) A program which reads/interoperates a with another outside the ToS/EULA is considered a DMCA circumvention device, and the author is _CRIMINALLY_ liable.
All three of these rulings are beyond ridiculous. This one, however, takes the cake as now it's a criminal offense. It's essentially saying that writing an unauthorized plugin, addon, or even operating system can get you thrown in jail.
To highlight:
Windows Vista Home (or any that aren't Ultimate) state in their EULA that they may not be run under a VM. If I were to install it under VMWare server, by these points above, VMWare could be sued out of business and the CEO should go to jail.
Thanks, Blizzard.
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Isn't that kinda like suing Smith & Wesson because people get shot?
You may take my Nesingwary 4000 only from my cold dead hands.
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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.
Yeah, about that. There are these things called license agreements, they're kind of like contracts, which are a sort of legal instrument, that is maybe, like, thousands of years old.
If you don't like the license, don't buy the software.
Re:Blizzard is doing a lot of damage to the indust (Score:4, Interesting)
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.
Yeah, about that. There are these things called license agreements, they're kind of like contracts, which are a sort of legal instrument, that is maybe, like, thousands of years old.
If you don't like the license, don't buy the software.
That makes a lot of sense. However, Blizzard can change the license agreement required to play, and you can't keep playing unless you upgrade to the latest patch and accept the new terms. Since the game is based on accumulative success, do we get reimbursed for what we paid for if the license changes to something we no longer agree with?
Or, in this hypothetical scenario, perhaps we could use the product we bought months ago on an alternate server to continue to enjoy our purchase.
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).
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"Blizzard has effectively won the legal ability for developers to state and enforce anything like this they'd like to put in the agreement!"
And this is a new development? EULAs are full of insane stuff. Blizzard isn't even the worst of the bunch, they just get villified by those who want the rules to be what *THEY* want them to be.
And how does my little (49oy) brother feel when he plays WoW 'by hand', building and accumulating by the rules? He's beyond offended by those that use resources merely to profi
Re:Blizzard is doing a lot of damage to the indust (Score:5, Funny)
You, know, this could just be a coincidence, but a couple of weeks ago I was in Northrend and I ran into an orc named "JudgeCampbell". He had some pretty sweet weapons and armor he was showing off, including a Judicial Robe of Invicibility and a Judge's Battle Gavel of The Dragon, which did an unreal amount of damage. Also, he had all these really powerful spells I'd never even heard of before, such as "Contempt of Court" and "Summon Bailiff". To top it all off, he had like 200,000 gold. I asked where he'd gotten all this stuff and he said he'd just "found it all in some dungeon". It sounded kind of fishy to me, but I didn't think anything much of it at the time.
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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!
Or if you bought Gear of War for Windows and discovered that you could only play it before a certain date, after which it would no longer function, and that date has already passed.
Re:True, But They've Done Much More Harm Than That (Score:5, Funny)
They've so dumbed down the MMORPG market that it is impossible for any other company to come out with any sort of game that isn't hand holding and brain dead at its core.
And adding insult to injury, Hand Holding Online and Brain Death Online did it first! But everyone thinks Blizzard is the innovator...
Wow, if DMCA applies here... (Score:5, Funny)
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More like the other way around, it's illegal to poke holes in a condom since that circumvents the copyprotection.
Just goes to show you (Score:4, Interesting)
don't install the game you're writing the bot for.
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But Donnelly is on the stand for, among other things, willfully allowing others to break their contractual agreement with Blizzard, Vivendi Games, Inc.
The courts could care less about whether or not Donnelly himself violated his contractual obligation with Blizzard/Vivendi, Nor whether Donnelly had actually installed Blizzards software at all.
Interesting tidbit (Score:5, Interesting)
Strangely, though, those who perpetrated the recent Mortgage fiasco which resulted in the current recession are not personally responsible for the actions of their firms. I find it strange that CEOs incur personal liability for their firm's actions only when the victim is another corporation.
Liability for the mortgage fiasco rests solely (Score:2)
with Congress and those two quasi-private but really federally run groups called Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Better yet, all those Congressmen who got sweetheart mortgage deals suddenly no longer need to come clean because they bought off the companies adversely affected by their actions with our tax dollars.
On topic:
I really dislike the summary which wants to relate what this guy did with interoperability. Since when is promoting cheating, breaking the EULA, and profiting off of it, interoperability?
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None of the mortgages Freddie and Fannie cut were subprime. Freddie and Fannie are suffering because of what the big banks did in destabilizing the housing market. Freddie and Fannie would in all likely hood have been OK had it not been for the Subprime lending.
Subprime was all through the major banks cutting their own mortgages and avoiding the government system and it's rules. Subprime is what destroyed the economy, the idea that you can lend that much money to someone that under no circumstance can they
Bot if You Want (Score:2, Interesting)
In my opinion, You can Bot if you want, but do it on a private server.
This case isn't about how someone changed the game on a personal server, but how a person's actions unfairly impacted the game play experience for thousands (or millions) others.
To that extent, enforcing a EULA in a reasonable manner is a different story than enforcing an unreasonable EULA. So those of you worrying about judgments that hinder society and technology should look instead at the recent copyright awarded to apple.
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Actually it's fairly easy for them to find the users that're using WoWGlider. But it's unattractive from a PR and subscriptions standpoint to kick their own paying users off. They'd rather kill Glider without having to target their own users, hence the convoluted arguments and tortured logic to try and find some way of doing that.
IMO they should have gone after him on other grounds. Every WoW subscriber has to agree to the EULA to access the servers. The only purpose of WoWGlider is to break that EULA, and
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Actually, they ARE kicking off the botting users. There are occasional massive bans that scoop up large amounts of botters. Google around a bit and you'll find out about it.
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).
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next case: Microsoft v Andrew Tridgell.
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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.
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.)
The hilarious part (Score:3, Interesting)