WoW vs. MDY Industries

[Xavier434]

Originally posted by: Phew
If Blizzard would make their game so that there weren't any mindless tasks worth automating, they wouldn't have botters/gold spammers.

I played WoW for years, then realized that 90% of what you do in that game feels like work. I shouldn't have to pay someone else so that I can do work.

If everyone felt the same way you do then they wouldn't have over 10 million subscribers. That's like saying that FPS game developers wouldn't have people using aimbots in their games if they would just make their game easier to get headshots.

 

[Phew]

Originally posted by: Xavier434
If everyone felt the same way you do then they wouldn't have over 10 million subscribers. That's like saying that FPS game developers wouldn't have people using aimbots in their games if they would just make their game easier to get headshots.

Getting a headshot in a FPS takes skill. Mining ore for 8 hrs so you can buy raid consumables doesn't, it only takes tolerance for boredom.

Over 10 million people huff paint to get high, but that doesn't mean it's a good idea.

 

[Beev]

Huge write up by a Blizzard employee (emphasis mine):

Everyone, We?d like to take a moment to provide a major update on the WoW/MMO Glider case. We know this is a topic that many of you have followed, whether because of being directly affected by Glider users in game or simply because it?s been a controversial World of Warcraft-related issue over the past few years. On January 28, 2009, a U.S. district court judge ruled in Blizzard?s favor on several issues in the civil case between Blizzard and MDY Industries, LLC.

For those who aren?t familiar with the background of this case or the long process that led to this decision, MDY is the creator of Glider, a ?bot? designed to play World of Warcraft automatically with little to no player input. We consider such automated play to be cheating because it goes against the spirit of the game and provides unfair advantages over other players, and we have expressly forbidden the use of bots in the World of Warcraft Terms of Use (ToU) because of this. We take violations of this policy very seriously and have consistently worked to identify the use of bots in game and suspend or close the associated accounts.

When World of Warcraft first launched in 2004, our GM and hacks teams searched for bots manually -- a process that became increasingly ineffective as bot technology evolved. Bots continued to proliferate within the game, and the community let us know loud and clear that this was something they opposed as much as we did. In response, we developed some security measures to protect the game and automatically detect the use of bots and other unauthorized hacks. We also reached out to the makers or operators of these bots in an effort to stop their distribution, and in most cases we were able to come to an agreement. While many bots were discontinued as a result, some bot makers continued their operations, and we needed to take a different route to remove them from the game -- with Glider being the biggest example.

In November 2006, we contacted MDY in an effort to halt the distribution of Glider. In response, MDY filed suit against Blizzard, asking the court to allow MDY to continue operating Glider unhindered. We then filed a countersuit alleging copyright infringement, in that Glider made unlawful use of our intellectual property; unlawful interference with the ToU agreement between us and our players; and Digital Millennium Copyright Act violations, in that MDY had circumvented the protections we?d implemented to protect the game. We asked the court to award money damages and to shut down MDY permanently.

Following these filings and associated court proceedings, a summary judgment was made in July 2008 finding in favor of Blizzard on two counts -- copyright infringement and unlawful interference with our business -- with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act count to be decided in a formal trial. In response to the summary judgment, MDY agreed to a stipulated judgment in the amount of 6 million dollars pending further appeal.

The trial for the remaining issues took place in early January of this year, and the ruling we?re discussing today came as a result of that. In his decision, the U.S. district court judge ruled that Glider violates the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, as the program intentionally circumvents our anti-cheat measures. In addition, the judge ruled that Glider?s creator is personally liable for the damages caused. Lastly, the judge ruled that we?re entitled to a permanent injunction against the distribution of Glider, which will take effect shortly unless MDY obtains a stay of the injunction during the appeal process. For the sake of the game and the players, we hope we?ve seen the last of Glider, but we?ll continue to take measures in game and out of game to protect World of Warcraft if MDY chooses to continue pursuing the matter.

Ultimately, this recent ruling strongly supports our efforts. We remain vigilant in defending our games against cheaters and unauthorized third-party hack programs, and we are as committed as ever to maintaining the overall quality of the player experiences in our games. To that end, we will continue to take any measure necessary to protect our games and our intellectual property rights.

While we generally try to keep the focus on the games themselves here in the forums, and try to avoid bogging everyone down with business-related matters, this was an important ruling for us, and we know keeping bots out of World of Warcraft is an important topic to many of you as well. We want to say thanks to all of you for playing Blizzard games and for either speaking out on the subject over the years or simply showing your support by abiding by World of Warcraft?s ToU and helping us keep the game fair for everyone.

Edit: As an aside, my take on it is this: You play MMO's because they are time killers. If you don't want to kill time then don't fucking play MMO's and bitch about how big of a timesink they are. Idiots.

 

[skace]

Originally posted by: SunnyD
Legitimate use argument: "To allow the end user to do whatever they want with the software."

You realize fair use goes away if the RIAA/MPAA decide to start putting EULAs in with CD's and DVD's right?

You know, it's funny, I doubt you'd play a game that followed your side of the argument, because I guarantee it wouldn't be fun. It would be about as fun as trying to play soccer with a group of people that didn't honor the no-handball rule. Or basketball with a team that refused to honor traveling calls.

 

[Xavier434]

Originally posted by: Phew

Originally posted by: Xavier434
If everyone felt the same way you do then they wouldn't have over 10 million subscribers. That's like saying that FPS game developers wouldn't have people using aimbots in their games if they would just make their game easier to get headshots.

Getting a headshot in a FPS takes skill. Mining ore for 8 hrs so you can buy raid consumables doesn't, it only takes tolerance for boredom.

Over 10 million people huff paint to get high, but that doesn't mean it's a good idea.

No matter how you slice it, it is all the same. Fun.

Some people have more fun playing FPS games. Some have more fun playing MMOs. Other perfer movies. Some prefer books. When I am gathering resources in an MMO I am having a good time. I never choose to mine ore for hours at a time but I do have fun during the time I spend collecting. If I had something else to do that produced a larger sensation of fun then I would do that instead. I know I am not alone on this one.

You can argue that head shots in an FPS take more skill than mining ore in an MMO. You can argue that in your opinion I have bad taste when it comes to entertainment. What you cannot do is argue against the fact that I am having fun at no harm to myself or others. That is all that matters.

 

[EricMartello]

Originally posted by: Phew
If Blizzard would make their game so that there weren't any mindless tasks worth automating, they wouldn't have botters/gold spammers.

I played WoW for years, then realized that 90% of what you do in that game feels like work. I shouldn't have to pay someone else so that I can do work.

I pretty much agree with you here, and I never had a problem with people who use a bot to automate farming. The only time I'd have a problem with someone using a bot is in PvP.

WoW has 10 million subscribers, but only a little more than 20% of those are US-based accounts. I'd say 30% are Euro accounts with the remaining 50% being gold farmer accounts.

Glider itself isn't cheating because it's not giving the player an unfair advantage because it is not altering the way the game works to benefit that player. It's just automating farming - just like many people AFK in battlegrounds for honor using a bot to keep them "active". In my opinion, Blizzard's concern with the Wow Glider is that it represents a stepping stone to more aggressive bots that actually do enable cheating.

If you look at other MMOs, especially the multitude of free ones out there, cheating is rampant and it completely ruins the game. Not because people are auto-farming, but because they use bots to change the mechanics of the game, allowing them to move faster than they should, have more HP or Magic than they should, have more powerful attacks, etc. Blizzard had to attack and beat WoW Glider, because if they did not, they'd be opening the door for more blatant hacks.

I'd say overall Blizzard does a decent job of keeping cheaters out of the game...sadly, on my realm, there is a guild full of cheaters who take advantage of known game exploits, map hacks and such. They also do things like arena win trading to inflate their ratings and get good gear, etc.

 

[Beev]

Originally posted by: EricMartello
Glider itself isn't cheating because it's not giving the player an unfair advantage

Yes it IS. In MMO's your advantage is time. People with more time (generally) have the advantage. Botting gives these players unlimited time, and in essence gives them an unfair advantage.

"Man, I need to make the sword, but I need to farm up the ore. So if I set aside 2 hours for that I could have it in a week or so..."

"Lol bot while I'm at work lolololololol"

Bots are fucking pathetic if nothing else.

 

[Xavier434]

Originally posted by: Beev

Originally posted by: EricMartello
Glider itself isn't cheating because it's not giving the player an unfair advantage

Yes it IS. In MMO's your advantage is time. People with more time (generally) have the advantage. Botting gives these players unlimited time, and in essence gives them an unfair advantage.

"Man, I need to make the sword, but I need to farm up the ore. So if I set aside 2 hours for that I could have it in a week or so..."

"Lol bot while I'm at work lolololololol"

Bots are fucking pathetic if nothing else.

Correct, time and ease of obtaining things in an MMO is the only thing which really sets the value. If time is taken out of the equation, the value is completely lost.

 

[Phew]

Xavier, my point is that mining/dailies/etc are things you do in WoW so that you can more enjoy other aspects of the game (raids/pvp/whatever). If every raid boss/player in BG you killed gave a giant stack of ore, you'd never fly around mining. Think about each sub-task in a MMO as a mini-game. I'd play a game that was just like BGs in WoW, I'd play a game that was just instances/raids. No one would play a game that was flying around between yellow dots on a map then clicking them.

Bots automate tasks that no one actually enjoys. If the only source of gold/resources in WoW was non-repeatable quests, PvP, and instances, there would be no botting, and consequently less gold-selling. But Blizzard made it so the fastest way to make money was to do something boring and repetitive, so they end up with bots everywhere.

 

[Beev]

Originally posted by: Phew
Bots automate tasks that no one actually enjoys. If the only source of gold/resources in WoW was non-repeatable quests, PvP, and instances, there would be no botting, and consequently less gold-selling. But Blizzard made it so the fastest way to make money was to do something boring and repetitive, so they end up with bots everywhere.

Really? I enjoy quite a few of the dailies, and finding ore while I do them is a delight. That pretty much throws your point out the window.

 

[Phew]

I don't think many botters are doing dailies, they are farming ore and motes (or whatever the mote equivalent is now). Dailies may very well have been implemented to combat botted farming.

 

[EricMartello]

Originally posted by: Beev

Originally posted by: EricMartello
Glider itself isn't cheating because it's not giving the player an unfair advantage

Yes it IS. In MMO's your advantage is time. People with more time (generally) have the advantage. Botting gives these players unlimited time, and in essence gives them an unfair advantage.

"Man, I need to make the sword, but I need to farm up the ore. So if I set aside 2 hours for that I could have it in a week or so..."

"Lol bot while I'm at work lolololololol"

Bots are fucking pathetic if nothing else.

From the way you talk, I'd say you're a typical wow player...and you probably play as a rogue. haha

Your argument is weak and tired. If you're going to say that botting is cheating because it allows someone to effectively spend more time playing the game - what about all the casual players that only play a few hours a week vs the nerds who play hours each day? I'd say the nerds are cheating because they play more. Maybe Blizzard needs to go after the parents who support wow-addicted kidults that never log off.

Correct, time and ease of obtaining things in an MMO is the only thing which really sets the value. If time is taken out of the equation, the value is completely lost.

Hardly...In WoW the crafted items are far surpassed by the ones that drop in dungeons. For all intents and purposes, dungeon/raid drops are not farmable.

You can run 25-man vault in less than 30 mins and end up with some of the best gear in the game as a drop - or you can spend hours looking for ore to mine to build armor/weapons that will be inferior.

 

[SunnyD]

Originally posted by: chizow
A few flaws with the arguments here. Owning a gun is protected in the US by the second amendment, so owning or buying a firearm by itself isn't an illegal act. Also, if a company sold the gun directly to a minor and violated any laws in the process, they could be held directly liable, as the act of selling to a minor can be considered negligent even though owning and selling firearms is not.

As for middle-ware and grey market software like this bot and various cloning software, they are not directly protected by law as legal under existing copyright law in the US, which is why providing software that enables others to break EULA or copyright has been interpreted as being directly liable. If this guy wants to make a living selling software that violates US law, he can always move his business to Antigua or the Caymans, wherever Slysoft is incorporated.

Indeed, you're spot on. But it is up to the individual to break a contract, not a 3rd party (in this case MDY). It's a loose interpretation of course.

We of course fall back to the main issue - EULAs. This is where all of my problems lay.

Here's the irony - my job is to ensure that my company's software is protected in order to ensure licensing revenue. Go figure...

 

[Xavier434]

Originally posted by: Phew
Xavier, my point is that mining/dailies/etc are things you do in WoW so that you can more enjoy other aspects of the game (raids/pvp/whatever). If every raid boss/player in BG you killed gave a giant stack of ore, you'd never fly around mining. Think about each sub-task in a MMO as a mini-game. I'd play a game that was just like BGs in WoW, I'd play a game that was just instances/raids. No one would play a game that was flying around between yellow dots on a map then clicking them.

Bots automate tasks that no one actually enjoys. If the only source of gold/resources in WoW was non-repeatable quests, PvP, and instances, there would be no botting, and consequently less gold-selling. But Blizzard made it so the fastest way to make money was to do something boring and repetitive, so they end up with bots everywhere.

You are incorrect about no one actually enjoying such things. Personally, I prefer to farm my own mats rather than buy them. I do that because I like farming. That is part of why I play MMOs.

However, I also like farming because the items I am getting have a certain value associated with them and that value is defeated if bots are allowed to run rampant. I understand that not everyone cares about that sort of thing because, like you, they just don't enjoy any kind of farming. For those people, there is also an answer which doesn't reduce the value of said resources resulting in making the game less fun for people like me. That answer is the AH and it is especially effective these days now that you really don't have to farm much if at all to get gold.

 

[Beev]

Originally posted by: EricMartello

Originally posted by: Beev

Originally posted by: EricMartello
Glider itself isn't cheating because it's not giving the player an unfair advantage

Yes it IS. In MMO's your advantage is time. People with more time (generally) have the advantage. Botting gives these players unlimited time, and in essence gives them an unfair advantage.

"Man, I need to make the sword, but I need to farm up the ore. So if I set aside 2 hours for that I could have it in a week or so..."

"Lol bot while I'm at work lolololololol"

Bots are fucking pathetic if nothing else.

From the way you talk, I'd say you're a typical wow player...and you probably play as a rogue. haha

Your argument is weak and tired. If you're going to say that botting is cheating because it allows someone to effectively spend more time playing the game - what about all the casual players that only play a few hours a week vs the nerds who play hours each day? I'd say the nerds are cheating because they play more. Maybe Blizzard needs to go after the parents who support wow-addicted kidults that never log off.

Close, I play one of the arguably most shafted classes: warlock. Good try though.

It isn't cheating if a person actually spends the time themselves. A casual player that plays for maybe 2 hours a week KNOWS they aren't contending for top dog items, etc. No hardcore player can play 24/7, which Glider effectively let you do. Any other counter arguments you'd like to try and present?

 

[skace]

Originally posted by: EricMartello
Glider itself isn't cheating because it's not giving the player an unfair advantage because it is not altering the way the game works to benefit that player. It's just automating farming - just like many people AFK in battlegrounds for honor using a bot to keep them "active". In my opinion, Blizzard's concern with the Wow Glider is that it represents a stepping stone to more aggressive bots that actually do enable cheating.

Bots single-handedly destroy any semblance of an economy.

And since you are still arguing it, of course botting is cheating. What else would it be? Fair play? Cmon, are you dense? Is an aimbot fair play in an FPS? Then how is a bot that runs your entire char in an MMO not cheating? You are using an external and rule-breaking source to gain an advantage, that's basically the very definition of cheating.

 

[EricMartello]

Originally posted by: Beev
Close, I play one of the arguably most shafted classes: warlock. Good try though.

It isn't cheating if a person actually spends the time themselves. A casual player that plays for maybe 2 hours a week KNOWS they aren't contending for top dog items, etc. No hardcore player can play 24/7, which Glider effectively let you do. Any other counter arguments you'd like to try and present?

Warlock was my next guess...and I'd say that the warrior class has it the worst right now, although the game in general is pretty bad now considering what it used to be.

It's not cheating if a person does it themselves...but what if six people play in 4 hour shifts? Is that cheating? The time spent playing doesn't really matter because guess who controls the spawn rates of mobs/nodes as well as the drop rates of important items - blizzard. None of that is being changed, and it is well known that some items cannot be farmed 24/7 because the game adjusts to compensate.

Bots single-handedly destroy any semblance of an economy.

The in-game economy is controlled by Blizzard, who inturn controls the spawn rates, drop rates and overall "quantity" of items in the game. Furthermore, the economy isn't the issue here...but last I checked, higher supply = lower prices, so if botters are selling the stuff they farm it's making mats cheaper for everyone. Not a bad thing in my opinion.

And since you are still arguing it, of course botting is cheating. What else would it be? Fair play? Cmon, are you dense? Is an aimbot fair play in an FPS? Then how is a bot that runs your entire char in an MMO not cheating? You are using an external and rule-breaking source to gain an advantage, that's basically the very definition of cheating.

My position is that I don't care. Aimbots are not a apples-to-apples comparison, because aimbots are changing the game mechanic to your advantage by tracking players for you. Glider does not do any kind of PvP, but if it did, I would have a problem with it.

Glider never "runs your entire char". All it does is target and attack the nearest mob in the area, then auto-loot when it finishes. If it pulls too many mobs your char will die. if you are attacked by another player, you die. It's not exactly doing anything drastic, and the "rules" that are coded into WoW are not being changed since it is not doing anything the player could not do on their own.

 

[Beev]

Originally posted by: EricMartello
It's not cheating if a person does it themselves...but what if six people play in 4 hour shifts? Is that cheating?

Yes, because the ToS allows you and only you to use your account. Unless you have a children then one of them is allowed to play on your account. Granted, 6 people playing on one account is harder to track than a mindless bot...

 

[ShawnD1]

Originally posted by: skace
Bots single-handedly destroy any semblance of an economy.

I don't know why people say this. I don't bot or cheat but my characters are always rich as hell and I can afford almost any item I want at any given time. I don't even play the game that much.

 

[JSt0rm]

How is this a bad thing? Doesn't it keep people from sitting in front of the computer? Thats good!