Iranian Players Blocked From World of Warcraft Due To Trade Sanctions 475
cold fjord writes "Is this the end of the world . . . of Warcraft? Maybe for Iranian gamers who are undergoing a forced morale check due to tightening sanctions cutting access to their game of choice. From the article: 'Iranian players of "World of Warcraft" ... have found themselves frozen out by Blizzard Activision Inc., the American company behind the game. Iranian role playing enthusiasts have spent much of the past week peppering Blizzard's message board with complaints about how they weren't able to log on to the service — only to be told recently that U.S. law was to blame. "United States trade restrictions and economic sanction laws prohibit Blizzard from doing business with residents of certain nations, including Iran," the company said in an email sent to players last week...'"
Thanks to the sanctions, they can't get refunds either.
When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:5, Insightful)
I remember growing up during the Cold War, and being taught all the pro-U.S. propaganda: The Russian space program sucks. You don't need papers to travel in the U.S. unlike the USSR. U.S,. citizens were free to travel anywhere, unlike those poor Soviets. Only Poland cracked down on labor unions and dissedents. And so on.
It was only after I grew up and learned to see through the bullshit that I realized that was all lies. We had been lied to just as much as the Soviets. The Russian space program is filled with firsts that American students never learned about (we only got the NASA stuff and a brief mention of Sputnik). You DAMN SURE DO need papers to travel in the U.S. (try getting pull over by a cop sometime and tell him you have no identification, driver's license, proof of insurance, and registration and just see what happens, or try coming here sometime to see if the cops accept "We don't need no papers, this is America!" in lieu of your passport/green card/visa). Polish labor unions weren't the only ones that got cracked down on in the 80's. And American are ABSOLUTELY NOT allowed to travel anywhere they wish (try joining your European friend on his vacation in Cuba sometime if you think so).
And if you're American you are also prohibited from doing business with any country the American government doesn't like (which are usually the ones who dared overthrow one of the U.S.'s corrupt puppet regimes).
Land of the free...not so much.
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:5, Informative)
There are a lot of factual problems with your statements. I'm not going to list all the Soviet space accomplishments I learned about in school, because that's likely a function of specific school one went to and how much detail on the space program one had. But let's look at your other claims.
First of all, the US has not (until very recently in some states like Arizona) been a papers-please state, that is a state where the police can just stop you on the street and ask for your ID and other paperwork. The difference with cars is that you need a license to drive a car. Comparing that to what the USSR did is just not accurate.
Second, it is possible to travel to Cuba and has been for over a decade, and in fact it just got easier about a year ago. http://travel.nytimes.com/2011/07/10/travel/at-long-last-legal-trips-to-cuba.html [nytimes.com]. Even in years where it has been difficult, a minimum of around 50,000 Americans traveled there has been around 50,000. Moreover, there's a very large difference between it being difficult to travel to a specific country and making it nearly impossible to travel to most of the planet. Remember the Berlin Wall at all? People were shot trying to flee as a regular occurrence. The US may do nasty things sometimes to keep people out, but they aren't threatening their own citizens to keep them in.
None of this is to say that the US is perfect. There are serious problems with civil liberties. And in many ways they've gotten much worse in the last decade. But that doesn't mean it is at all like how things were in the Soviet Union.
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:4, Insightful)
The difference with cars is that you need a license to drive a car. Comparing that to what the USSR did is just not accurate.
The problem is that the authorities can always come up with some bullshit legalistic explanation like that. Excuse, after excuse, after excuse, carving out holes in our rights until the constiution looks like swiss cheese.
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:5, Informative)
So what was it that the USSR did exactly? I don't mean in Berlin near the wall, I mean in Moscow or Stalingrad or a Russian city with russian citizens, not conquered and occupied territory.
In the papers context, anyone authorized (police, KGB, GRU, etc.) could stop citizens at any time and ask for their papers, that included identification information, where they worked, etc. and could ask them why they were they were, what they were doing etc. Failure to cooperate was a crime. And this was frequently used and moreover was used to intimidate groups they didn't like. For a personal example, I know someone who grew up near Moscow in the 1970s who had become interested in Judaism. She joined a group of people who were reading and studying old texts. After a few months, it reached the attention of the government, and one time they went to their regular meeting, she was stopped by KGB people and asked where she was going, and told that it was an unwise thing to do. At the next meeting, they were raided and all arrested. She served a few months in jail and upon being released couldn't get any jobs. In the US, nor in most of the Western world do things like that happen. The USSR wasn't just bad compared to the US, it was bad compared to most civilized countries.
I'm perfectly fine with flying pretty much anywhere in the world, but I won't currently fly to the U.S..
Sure, the current restrictions on flying are stupid, petty and deeply inconvenient. If I were not a US citizen I'd probably not be that inclined to fly here either. But that goes to the "things aren't perfect and have gotten worse" matter, not to any sort of comparison with the USSR.
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:4, Interesting)
For a personal example, I know someone who grew up near Moscow in the 1970s who had become interested in Judaism. She joined a group of people who were reading and studying old texts. After a few months, it reached the attention of the government, and one time they went to their regular meeting, she was stopped by KGB people and asked where she was going, and told that it was an unwise thing to do. At the next meeting, they were raided and all arrested.
On an unrelated note, I recall reading on one of Russian Jewish websites covering religious obligations and such that they had problems studying Torah in the USSR partly because they knew that the KGB would likely be recording them, and this (the use of a recording device) is prohibited on Saturdays - and their rabbis disagreed on whether they were affected by this or not, given that they knew that they were recorded, and that the recording was enabled explicitly because of them being there (i.e. they were the "trigger", so to speak). Go figure.
The Russian Program was So Great (Score:2)
If a cop pulls over someone with no Drivers Licence and no Insurance they have proven that they shouldn't be driving. You need
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On the other hand, NASA failed to realise that building the contents of a capsule that was going to be filled with high-pressure oxygen from materials that spontaneously combusted when in a high-pressure environment of pure oxygen might be a bad idea [wikipedia.org] until it killed an entire crew of astronauts in early testing.
Re:The Russian Program was So Great (Score:4, Interesting)
Not due to superior American-ism, but due to: 1) learning from Russian mistakes (they went first almost every time), 2) better luck.
NASA killed plenty of people, in space and on the ground. Space exploration is dangerous-- in the 50s and 60s space exploration was insanely dangerous-- for every country attempting it. That's just a fact.
You also have to remember that during pretty much the shuttle era, Russian space travel was on average far more safe than US space travel.
I will say that the Russians seemed to lose a lot more automated probes due to stupid mistakes (giving bad instructions, bad change control, etc.) But those were just robots. And the US has lost probes due to stupid mistakes, too.
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I remember growing up during the Cold War, and being taught all the pro-U.S. propaganda: The Russian space program sucks.
It does, or it did anyway. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_space_program#Incidents.2C_Failures.2C_and_Setbacks [wikipedia.org]
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:5, Interesting)
yeah, i remember hearing all that bullshit about russians having to wait in line for food, paying outlandish prices for western goods like jeans and vcr's b/c they weren't available there, being afraid to speak out b/c the police would throw them in jail and afraid their neighbors would turn them in as dissidents if they weren't seen vocally espousing their true loyalty.. I always assumed it was completely biased propaganda in a cold war US vs THEM style.
Fast forward 20 years. I married a Russian woman and learned that what was happening was generally much _worse_ than what I had been taught. Just recently read Archipelago Gulag which again confirmed this for me. What I was hearing about russia wasn't nearly as bad as Russia really was.
Now, I don;t like the direction American laws and politics are heading one bit, and I will continue to fight against the tide. But false equivalences like the parent post show nothing so much as a lack of perspective...
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:5, Interesting)
When I was a kid, I lived in a country called USSR. It being the last years of its existence, we also thought that America was free, and we shall soon be like them in that respect, as soon as we get rid of those pesky commies.
And, yes, a lot of that turned out to be BS. But, having lived in USA for a few years now, I can assure you that it's definitely much more free than the USSR or Russia ever was. I'm not going to claim that USA is the "most free" country in the world or some such. But it's definitely reasonable to broadly call it "free", alongside a few others.
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That is not true actually. If the police ask for your identification and you do not provide it, they can hold you until your identity is verified to make sure you don't have any warrants issued against you.
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There are also state laws in many states requiring people to carry identification.
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Name one.
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:4, Informative)
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:4, Informative)
And the limits are generally that actual physical ID is not required. It is only required that you answer the question "what is your name". Police can also ask other questions related to their investigations, but that is outside the topic of "are you required to carry ID in the U.S."
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Mississippi.
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:4, Informative)
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Police can detain you for any reason for 24 hours.
... and strip search anyone and everyone they 'detain.'
Nope, no police state to see here, move along Citizen...
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Uh... The veteran who got arrested/committed after posting on facebook was publicly making actual threats of violence.
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If you're walking in a US neighborhood that a patrolling police officer thinks you look out of place in, he will stop and talk to you and he will likely demand identification. If you really want to you can try to explain to the officer why you don't need to, but you're most likely going to get into a drawn out argument with a police officer. this is how 'Merica works.
"You don't need papers," my ass.
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Evidence for this? Or are you just talking out of your ass. I suspect "ass".
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:5, Informative)
Evidence for this?
All you want [wikipedia.org]
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Don't you mean "disturbing the peace" and "resisting arrest"? (sarcasm)
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Freedom doesn't mean no one who works for the government will ever ask you to do something you don't want to do. Freedom just means you have the right to say "no" if they ask you to do it.
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You left-out "fear".
I admit that I was afraid of how this cop might act, but decided I'd rather exert my right to be free, than submit to illegal demands for an ID.
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...until the police decide to hassle you and throw you in jail for not giving them ID. It happens. Particularly in the south to people with brown skin, but hell just the other day in Pennsylvania I had an office demand _multiple_ pieces of ID while I was walking into a restaurant.
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:5, Informative)
If you did public transit you don't even need that.
TSA now "inspects" railroad passengers to prevent terrorists from hijacking a train and crashing it into a skyscraper. Most news reports about it were the usual frothing at the mouth stockholm syndrome request for them to start body cavity searches of bus passengers. Several states require if you're an adult on public land you must carry ID or you'll be charged. In practice across the entire country if you interact with any cop and have no ID it is assumed there's a warrant out for you and you'll sit in a cell until they figure out who you are via prints or... something.
In the USSR you could be detained for moving between zones without a good reason
In the USA we only do that to black people. As a white dude I'm free to travel, not so for my black ex-coworkers who have all kinds of stories. They're only allowed to drive on certain roads and shop in certain stores without suspicion. Admittedly I live in one of the most segregated metro areas in the country (and no, its not in the south). My cousin who went to Soweto (spelling?) township in South Africa during the apartheid years didn't feel race relations were all that different from home, but some of his fellow peace corps volunteers were pretty freaked out, so I guess it depends where you live in the USA.
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"Several states require if you're an adult on public land you must carry ID or you'll be charged."
I think you need to back up this statement. Because it simply is not true.
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http://epic.org/privacy/hiibel/ [epic.org]
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Ah, the everlovin' anecdote! Ok I'll play. I was stopped more than once while walking down the street. I wasn't even crossing the city limits. Shall we keep going back and forth?
As long as we comply we have nothing to fear. Ain't life grand? Now I will admit, nothing beats American TV, and some of the roads are billiard table smooth. Most buildings are straight and square. And the territory is some of the most beautiful on the planet. And the government appears to be more pragmatic, but please, don't try to
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The plural of anecdote is not evidence. I have never once been asked for identification other than when pulled over for speeding to verify I am licensed to drive and have insurance. If it's true that you have undergone the treatment you claim, but that is a huge outlier and not the norm.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_while_black
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It is also illegal to pull someone over for "driving while black". You can not point to this as official policy of US or its states, though possibly it is unofficial policy in some areas. Police can be and are sued over this. You can't really compare this to Soviet style systems where national laws were created to require papers.
In many places in the US you don't even need to carry a form of ID to vote (which personally I think is a good thing). There are no standardized forms of identification in the U
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You've never been stopped and made to produce ID for no good reason while walking down the street?
LE can ask, but you are not legally required to produce ID just walking down the street and without probable cause and/or suspicion of that individual having just committed a crime or you are suspected of being about to commit a crime by the "reasonable person" test. If asked, you are required to tell them your name & home address, but that's all. You are not legally required to produce ID or tell them anything else, period.
In states that allow the open-carry of a firearm, it's been ruled that even then
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:5, Insightful)
Anecdote? I just drove through 4 states this weekend and back again without being asked for papers. I do it every few months. I've never, ever, been stopped. Hell, I didn't see a single cop in the entire state of Pennsylvania, and I drove for hours through it. Are you seriously suggesting that having a driver's license and maybe being pulled over for speeding is like Soviet travel restrictions?
In the USSR, you simply could not travel between zones without an internal passport and and permission. It wasn't a matter of maybe being stopped, you would be arrested if you tried, and it you were really unlucky, you'd be talking to the KGB about what you were trying to do. There would be no "maybe" or having to be "caught" or "stopped". The police would be informed of your attempt as soon as you tried to buy a ticket or leave the local area and you'd be taken immediately into custody simply for trying to travel. No excuses about terrorism or contraband or anything. There was no "corruption" involved. It was simply illegal to travel without papers, full stop.
That is not, and has never been the United States. Attempts to even suggest the cases are similar are hyperbole at best.
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Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:5, Interesting)
>>>I recently crossed several state borders without being stopped by police for papers. So no, we are not the USSR.
It all depends WHICH states and of course timing. A few years ago I was sightseeing the perimeter of this country. I had no problems in the north, no problems along the west coast, and no problems along the southern border until I decided to go see the Gulf of Mexico. On my way back the DHS pulled me over and demanded to search my car. No warrant. Just a demand. I refused. So they detained me for an hour in the hot summer sun, giving me a nice sunburn, and then finally said, "The judge refused to give us a warrant. You can go." And I'm not the only one..... there are lots of similar incidents documented, with video, on youtube. Including cases where people were drug from their car and beaten. There's no reason for the police to detain a tourist for an hour w/o cause. The Supreme Court has already ruled, again and again, that such detainments are a violation of the 4th amendment but the DHS and Executive Branch doesn't give a shit. ("The justices made their ruling. Now let's see them try to enforce it.")
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:4, Informative)
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:4, Insightful)
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Actually, you can be detained by police, if you are anywhere near (their definition) a crime. They can hold you for up to 48 hours with no explanation given, except that they want to hold you in case you committed a crime. It's sick what this country has come to.
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NO! You cannot be detained in the U.S. just for not having ID. You are simply wrong.
You are so cute and naive. You can be detained for looking at a cop in a wrong way, or using camera in public.
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:5, Informative)
NO! You cannot be detained in the U.S. just for not having ID. You are simply wrong.
The U.S. also does not have any requirements for exit. Airlines will check that you have a passport so that you can get intothe country you arrive at. But the U.S. has no exit restrictions at our borders. You are free to leave.
Actually, there are currently 24 states (that's roughly half of the US) that have "Stop and Identify" laws.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop_and_identify_statutes
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American fascists wear the velvet glove only because everybody complies. Resisters are jailed, just like over there in Russia, or any where else. Don't think those gloves won't come off, if they really feel threatened.
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"just because we require people to be licensed to drive motor vehicles that we're not the land of the free."
If you don't drive and have no license,you won't vote for the next president in lots of states.
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:5, Informative)
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:4)
The Iranian Government is receiving sanctions for threatening parts of the world with destruction. We don't allow that this day and age.
Oh, I see. You don't allow such threats, but then you go and destroy other countries.
Flawless.
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:5, Funny)
America may not have all the freedoms I'd like, but it sure as hell beats any other place on this planet!
Often quite literally!
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America may not have all the freedoms I'd like, but it sure as hell beats any other place on this planet!
That must be why it is ranked #7 *
Not that I think the precise rankings of any given country are indisputably correct; the important take away is that:
a) The USA is undeniably a very good place to live on this planet.
b) The USA does NOT "sure as hell beats any other place on this planet!" There are a number of other very good places to live on this planet; several of them arguably better than the USA.
(*
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:5, Funny)
Usain Bolt won the 100m dash in the Olympics, can you tell me the name of the person who finished #7? No, because he ended up not mattering.
Give me a break, anyone with half a brain knows that 27-year-old Richard Thompson of Trinidad and Tobago came in 7th place in lane 2 with a time of 9.98s, following a 160ms reaction time.
What next, "What's the 9th most populous city in Turkmenistan?" Come on man, everybody knows this.
Re:When I was a kid we thought America was free (Score:5, Insightful)
The America of 2012 doesn't beat the America of 2100 if we wake-up and start demanding our rights be given back.
There's really no excuse for a college student to be fined almost a million dollars for downloading 30 songs. There's no excuse for a facebook customer to be arrested by the FBI and indefinitely detained w/o charges just because he exercised his right of free speech online (the SCOTUS has ruled even "I'm going to kill you" is protected speech in a ruling of a black man who was arrested during a civil rights protest). There's no excuse for an American citizen and his teenage child to be executed by the president w/o their guaranteed right to a trial before a jury of their peers. There's no excuse for why elderly women are being strip-searched by SA agents at airports. There's no excuse why other SA agents are putting mothers in glass jails because they are carrying bottled milk for their children. There's no excuse for SA agents to make large-breasted women walk through a nude body scanner 3 times and then joke about it: "Don't topple over!"
There's no excuse for why a pastor driving through California was pulled-over by DHS, ordered to get out of his car, had his windows smashed-in, and then beaten in the street. (The judge later acquited the pastor of all charges because he had done nothing wrong; did not have drugs; the dog had been kicked by the officer to make it bark.) (The judge also tried to prosecute the DHS agents too, but the president's administration has granted them immunity. Wonder why?) There's no excuse for why a man sitting in his home minding his own business suddenly has police ram down his door, and then shoot him dead. (Turns out they got the wrong house.) There's no excuse for why a granddaughter was shot and killed in a similar raid. There's no excuse for why a homeless man who was wittling wood & selling it on the street was told, "Drop your knife" and then shot a mere 1 second later.
There's no excuse for why a black mother had her child taken from her, because she refused to give the kid Ritalin medicine (the judge found her innocent as well & is pressing charges against the CPS). There's no excuse for why an environmentalist living in the Arizona and "off the grid" had his brand-new house condemnded & demolished and replaced with a shopping mall. There's no excuse for why a WW2 vet living alone and miding his own business had police break into his house & demand to see the basement. They found a garden there with grow lights, declared the grow lights illegal (they aren't), and then kicked the guy out of his home. Followed by demolishing it. Followed by another new mall.
I could go on and on for the next HOUR of your time. There's no excuse for Any of these things to occur in the U.S.A. and if they do occur, then the mistake should be reversed and the police prosecuted. In some cases it is, but in 99% of the cases the police have immunity from their crimes. So much for the Bill of Rights, the Constitution, or the protection of law from abuses of power by agents of the government.
Re:Iran's nuke program seems illogical (Score:4, Informative)
Iran is committed to the extinction of the Jews.
Not they're not. That's a bunch of horseshit propaganda that the U.S. and Israel have created to justify their shadow war against Iran, one that's been going on since their puppet totalitarian Shah got tossed out by the modern DEMOCRATIC government of Iran.
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>>>Iran is committed to the extinction of the Jews. This is a publicly stated policy
No there isn't. The comment you are referring to has been accurately translated as, "Someday the government in Jerusalem will fall and be wiped from the pages of history." It isn't the Jews that government hates, but the government. In fact there are many Jews living in Iran even as we speak, and they are not being round-up and exterminated. So stop spreading anti-Arab/Iranian hate speech and racism.
As for the n
Re:Iran's nuke program seems illogical (Score:4, Informative)
Ahmadinejad has made too many anti-Semitic remarks to mention here so here is a handy list by year: http://www.adl.org/main_International_Affairs/ahmadinejad_words.htm [adl.org]
So no it is not just one "mistranslated" statement. And no, mentioning it has nothing to do with "spreading anti-Arab/Iranian hate speech and racism". Where the hell did you get that from?
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Which starts with the well known sophistry of "wipe Israel off the map", a debunked lie. Between that and their support of the 'Ground Zero Mosque' ban, the ADL has zero credibility.
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"Unless all the other Islam countries are going to do nothing which is very unlikely"
The arab countries' governments would be quite ecstatic to see Iran taken down. 'Persia' and Arabia have had this power competition for centuries. Notice how the arab countries are trying to change the name of the Persian Gulf to just the Gulf in order to piss Iran off. There might be other countries to jump on Iran's side, but not their closest neighbors.
Meh theres always private servers... (Score:2, Informative)
So they move to private servers.
Now this, this will surely inspire a Revolution (Score:4, Funny)
Because obviously there's nothing more likely to inspire outrage and violence than nerds denied their gaming habits.
This will be the straw that breaks the camel's back, and returns Democracy and Freedom to Iran, decades after the CIA took it away.
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I think this will actually break the back of the islamist militants.
If the guys who spend all day playing WoW actually go outside and live life, they might lose their virginity. And then there won't be enough virgins to supply the suicide bombers with their 72.
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Re:Now this, this will surely inspire a Revolution (Score:5, Funny)
The koran never said they were female virgins.
I dunno about that (Score:3)
I think that last part is just Blizzard actually, lol. I would think that receiving $50 or whatever from services provided to an Iranian then getting told that's not allowed would mean you have to undo the trade by giving that $50 back.
Re:I dunno about that (Score:5, Insightful)
When you register with Blizzard, part of the information that's required is the country you reside in. The question in my mind is whether "Iran" was ever on the list and - if it was - whether you were able to register an account and purchase games if you set that as your answer.
If - as is quite possible - the only way to register an account in Iran was to pretend to be from somewhere else, then even in the absence of sanctions, Blizzard could probably just shrug, say "TOS violation" and refuse a refund.
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I distinctly remember that when I started my current job over a decade ago, part of our introductory training dealt with prohibited countries where we were not allowed to do business. There were 8-10 countries on that list, and I remember three of them being Iraq, Iran, and North Korea. I don't remember the rest of the list. These restrictions are nothing new; my guess is that Blizzard recently stepped up enforcement from "Where did you say you were from? India? Sure, we trust you." to "Let's automatically
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:It was even available to begin with? (Score:5, Insightful)
Perhaps it's not quite as bad there as you've been led to believe?
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Re:It was even available to begin with? (Score:5, Interesting)
Of course it is possible.
But then again it is pretty easy to believe the worst of a country that punishes female infidelity by stoning.
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Iran is not run by the taliban. They have their own issues, but they are not the worst of the worst.
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Iran is not run by the taliban. They have their own issues, but they are not the worst of the worst.
World has been safe since "the worst of the worst" are locked up in guantanamo, thankyou GWB.
(sarcasm)
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Given the hardline stance in Iran, I would think all western games would be banned for being un islamic in the first place.
Probably not all of them, but some of them, yeah. There's a wiki page for everything:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Christian_video_games_by_genre [wikipedia.org]
Computerized chess game, yeah I think that'll be OK.
Stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm always shocked at just how much American culture has spread world wide. And the thing is - it often works in our favor. Iranian kids playing WoW can't in any way benefit Iran that I can think of, but has multiple benefits for the U.S. Someone from the gov should be on the horn right now getting those accounts reactiviated.
Re:Stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
Undermining a theocracy (Score:5, Interesting)
Iran had a secular democracy in 1953. The CIA helped overthrow it and installed a dictatorship. Then the US puppet's security arm, Savak, worked with the CIA to kill off, imprison and exile the left. By the late 1970s, the only independent bodies in Iran were the mullahs, and the informal relationships bazaar merchants formed. Thus when the economy collapsed, and repression intensified, the mullahs and bazaar merchants were at the forefront of the revolution, they were the only independent bodies the CIA had not wrecked.
Then Americans have the gall to stick up their nose and whine about theocracies. Of course, Iran is a secular paradise compared to somewhere like US puppet regime Saudi Arabia. In Saudi Arabia, women are not even allowed to drive cars. So why do we hear this theocracy stuff for Iran but not Saudi Arabia? Would it have something to do with the government (which has popular support, and some democratic forms - much, much more than Saudi Arabia) not asking "how high" whenever the powers that be in the US say "jump"? The gall and hypocrisy and rose-colored glasses of imperial-happy Americans seems unlimited, only planes flying into their war-planning pentagon buildings seem to wake them up from their stupor for a short bit.
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Fist of all, the government was not elected. Mossadegh was appointed to become PM by the Shah of Iran according to the Iranian constitution from 1906.
Mossadegh was elected to parliament in 1944. The parliament voted him prime minister in 1951, and yes, the Shah appointed him such, just as the queen of England appoints the prime minister in the UK.
Since when does CIA count as a reliable source? Do you believe everything CIA says?...There are many books, articles, documents, audio that proves otherwise. Iranian and foreign historians say otherwise.
No I don't believe everything the CIA says. People can read all sides and all accounts and come to their own conclusions.
Richard Helms, long time CIA director, told a BBC television program that '' the agency did not counter rumours of in Iran because the Iranian episode looked like a success. At the time, of course, agency needed some success, especially to counter fiascos as the Bay of Pigs.'''
Donald Wilber, the CIA operative whose ''secret report'' has been given top billing by the New York Times makes it clear that whatever he and his CIA colleagues were up to in Tehran at the time simply failed.
I think they neither had 100% failure nor 100% success. You're right, everything didn't go 100% as they wanted. But they did want Mossadegh out and the Shah in, and were successful in that
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Have a read. Good stuff.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cultural_imperialism [wikipedia.org]
Re:Stupid (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, I doubt that Blizzard's actions are related to any recent change of policy by the US Government. Rather, it's about companies looking differently at how current policies might be applied in the wake of the HSBC case that's running at the moment (which may or may not be a piece of Wall Street protectionism).
I can't prove it, because obviously they'll have updated their registration systems now, but I'd be prepared to bet that Blizzard have never allowed the registration of accounts (or at least the purchase of games or subscriptions on accounts) where the customer identified themselves as being from Iran. They - and quite a lot of other companies - would have been operating on the principle that this was enough to get them legally in the clear against charges of dealing with regimes subject to sanctions.
The HSBC case has shown (among other things) that getting customers to tick a box certifying that they aren't from such a country is not, in fact, enough to prevent you from having to answer some fairly scary questions. I suspect Blizzard have just looked at their legal risk register and decided that they need to move to an IP-blocking system. So it's not actually a change of policy by either the US Government or Blizzard - but rather a change in approach and methodology.
Re:Stupid (Score:4, Funny)
Maybe Barrack's level 60 wizard got killed by Ahmadinejad's level 60 warrior or whatever the fuck you get in these games nowadays?
Oh great (Score:5, Insightful)
The US has just pissed off a few hundred more Iranians. Ahmadinejad couldn't be more happy.
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They were never legally allowed to buy or play WOW in the first place. Blizzard's just changing the enforcement to be more proactive.
Wait a sec... (Score:2)
Re:Wait a sec... (Score:5, Informative)
WOW-player and computer-savvy are two different things.
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Usually, WoW is a good way to be someone who uses a computer every day, but who still manages to know almost nothing about how it works. Sort of like Fantasy Football players.
Lists to check (Score:4, Interesting)
The Bureau of Industry and Security [doc.gov], US Department of Commerce, is the place to go to see the appropriate regulations. See, especially, the Export Administration Regulations [doc.gov], the Commerce Control List (especially), and the Lists to Check [doc.gov] list. (Yes, there are so many lists that the lists themselves have a list.)
WoW still hasn't gone F2P? (Score:2)
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Yeah, lets solve all Blizzard business troubles by making their entire business model to give their game and services away for free with no business transactions at all!
F2P, we loose money on every gamer but make it up in bulk.
What a moron. And if you comment on how F2P leads to cash sales... exactly how would those not be blocked by sanctions as business transactions? I had hoped I would not need to point this out on a tech forum but apparently I do.
Please BMOC, nominate yourself for a Darwin award soon.
Ah, WoW, afaik, still has the largest userbase of any MMO, or very near the largest. There's lots of smaller games that survive and even thrive on the freemium model. I don't think Blizzard has anything to fear from going F2P if they haven't already. As you said, they would be better suited to make it up in bulk.
Oh, and, why you so angry?
Finally, a sanction this will work... (Score:2)
...that's all Iran wants - a million pissed off teen/twenty-somethings will a whole lot o' anger and a newfound whole lot o' free time on their hands...
Oh please (Score:3)
Upon First Read of the Headline (Score:3)
How convenient for Blizzard (Score:4, Interesting)
I would require Blizzard set aside the funds so that if/when the sanctions get lifted they can either process the refunds or reinstate the accounts. Otherwise how much money has Blizzard "gained" by doing this??
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But clearly they need those nuclear power plants to power all of those computers.
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There have been no recent changes that would require them to no longer provide WOW in Iran.
Its a widely held, but completely wrong, belief that US companies can't do business with/in Iran. Totally false. We mostly export "bad stuff" to them like tobacco products, corn, soy... the kind of stuff we use to sicken and poison our own walmart-ian underclass. So thats kind of weird. We also export stereotypical medical stuff to Iran. No one wants TV stories about how the state dept slowly killed a cute little Iranian kid by denying export of some obscure medical pill. Well, maybe it would play at
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