As a dodgy old magician with more illusion than power…

Image borrowed from http://blogs.elsitech.com/?tag=/encryption

I fear I smell sleight of hand.

However, the resub is as clear a sign as the cancel, so yes, I will resubscribe, but as many, many people have pointed out, there is more to this change that simply a forum ID change.

So the backdown is announced here (thank you to all of you that sent it to me while I slept and dreamed of Internet Dragons):

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=25968987278&sid=1

The sleight of hand I speak of, comes from the fact that over the last few days we have learned that Blizzard didn’t/doesn’t intend to stop with the forums, however there no real admission of this yet.

Image may be NSFW.
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Image borrowed from http://climateprogress.org/2009/07/26/fallows-part-2-boiling-brainless-frogs-and-the-ooda-loop/

Definite:

As a result of those discussions, we’ve decided at this time that real names will not be required for posting on official Blizzard forums.

Not so definite:

I want to make sure it’s clear that our plans for the forums are completely separate from our plans for the optional in-game Real ID system now live with World of Warcraft and launching soon with StarCraft II. We believe that the powerful communications functionality enabled by Real ID, such as cross-game and cross-realm chat, make Battle.net a great place for players to stay connected to real-life friends and family while playing Blizzard games. And of course, you’ll still be able to keep your relationships at the anonymous, character level if you so choose when you communicate with other players in game. Over time, we will continue to evolve Real ID on Battle.net to add new and exciting functionality within our games for players who decide to use the feature.

This is still where my issue lies.

If you want to participate fully in our games in the future, you will have to hand your balls to the wall on a plate

Ohh yeah, that’s my interpretation…

Why can’t they just pull their finger out at let us have a single sign on “Handle”, then all the problems in the world will go away.

As Achtung Panzercow puts it:

But rest assured that I will never take anything they say at simple face value ever again, and nor should you. With their claim that “this is just to de-troll the forums!”, they insulted my intelligence. I don’t like that.

Make the optional part:

I can choose to use my real name, or my handle.

You see one of the things that has pissed me off about this whole debate is, that it will be easier for Blizzard to shut down the trolls… why, because they have our real name? The already know what account the trolls have posted from – CLOSE THE TROLL’S ACCOUNT! They don’t need real names anywhere to shut down a players account, THEY are BLIZZARD, THEY have the account details.

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The Carrot and the Stick

I used the biggest sticks I possess over the last few days, I know many of you did so too.

The thing about sticks, is they lose their effectiveness unless balanced with carrots, so I am resubscribing, and I encourage those of you that joined me in a /ragequit to do the same – because just as the account cancellation was the clearest signal of your displeasure, so will the resubscription be the clearest indication of your approval of the change in policy.

I can assure you I will not be reactivating 6 month subscription – I don’t trust them that much, I don’t trust them any longer. I refuse to be the frog in the pot.

Thanks

Thanks to all of you that said your farewells. I’d love to go back and reply to you all.. but do you really want a series of “Thank you & bye for nows”
Thanks to all of you that sent me invitations to join them in other games (or build new communities to enable ex-WoW players to remain together, without Blizzards assistance).
Thanks to all of that supported me in my rage, whether by comment, blog linkage, or blog post unrelated to mine, that added perspective and kept the fire alive.
Thanks to all of you that disagreed with me, that made me review my stance. I still don’t agree with you, but I did listen and think.
Thanks to Grimmtooth for expressing my /ragequit best…

Gnomageddon /ragequits. We’re almost there ourselves. Someone asked me if I was surprised; after thinking of it, I realized that Gnome’s passionate spirit made this move fall right into his idiom. Our first RealID casualty, and a bitter one it is.

Maintain the rage

As I went to bed last night, I expressed my fear about this weekend to the folk on Twitter. I was concerned that after a weekend of raiding, after Cataclysm annoucements and Beta announcements, the rage would have subsided.

Gnomeaggedon Unlike other bloggers, I am not sick of RealID posts. Actizzard are waiting for 21st century apathy to step up and claim our rage.

SuicidalZebra @Gnomeaggedon Expect to see a new Beta Build push today simply to get the WoW news sites and blogs to change the subject.

Gnomeaggedon http://bit.ly/aiBBXX and http://bit.ly/cGJILH Maybe I should go PvP to calm down

Gnomeaggedon @antikris77 1st I must take my Battleground rage out on Blizzard.. they trained me in it, time to turn it on my master

Copra @Gnomeaggedon btw. you should be calm to make any real PvP. angry… you just mess around and get frustrated.

Gnomeaggedon @Copra I am a Fire Mage… my PvP is chaos… think Berserker, shrunk to 3 foot then add FIRE!