Geek News: Forum Real ID Cancelled

Posted by on Jul 9, 2010 in Geek News | 3 comments

In a controversial move earlier in the week, Blizzard announced that their Real ID system would soon be rolled-out onto their official game forums where any posts made after the implemented change, would display your full name for all and sundry.

The news raised a furor among the community, igniting debate and many an opinion piece such as Shade’s open letter and our very own thoughts on the subject.

About an hour ago, Mike Morhaime, the CEO and Co-founder of Blizzard Entertainment, released a statement via a Blue Post on the forums, revealing that the planned Real ID for the forums has been cancelled.

The full statement below:

Hello everyone,

I’d like to take some time to speak with all of you regarding our desire to make the Blizzard forums a better place for players to discuss our games. We’ve been constantly monitoring the feedback you’ve given us, as well as internally discussing your concerns about the use of real names on our forums. 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.

It’s important to note that we still remain committed to improving our forums. Our efforts are driven 100% by the desire to find ways to make our community areas more welcoming for players and encourage more constructive conversations about our games. We will still move forward with new forum features such as conversation threading, the ability to rate posts up or down, improved search functionality, and more. However, when we launch the new StarCraft II forums that include these new features, you will be posting by your StarCraft II Battle.net character name + character code, not your real name. The upgraded World of Warcraft forums with these new features will launch close to the release of Cataclysm, and also will not require your real name.

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.

In closing, I want to point out that our connection with our community has always been and will always be extremely important to us. We strongly believe that Every Voice Matters, (http://us.blizzard.com/en-us/company/about/mission.html) and we feel fortunate to have a community that cares so passionately about our games. We will always appreciate the feedback and support of our players, which has been a key to Blizzard’s success from the beginning.

Mike Morhaime
CEO & Cofounder
Blizzard Entertainment

This news comes after a Blue – a forum moderator – revealed his name, and WoW Riot managed to track down and divulge personal details of his to their readers. After today’s announcement, they have since removed his information from their site.

While the cancellation is good news for the vocal gamers, the Real ID debate, in-game, continues; especially after an add-on exploit came to light which pulls your Real ID info and is displayed as, technically, you’re automatically a Real ID friend of, well, yourself.

Regardless, this news is bound to show Blizzard in a favourable light for listening to their community and responding to feedback; which is something that they are to be praised for despite this debacle.

About Rob


Rob Kidman is an aspiring writer, have-a-go designer, avid tea drinker and geek from birth. Oh, and he’s British. What he doesn’t know about Doctor Who, isn’t worth knowing. Sends text messages in full, perfect grammar, no matter if it costs an extra 10p, as he believes txtspk to be an affront to the Queens’ English. Partial to cheese and pickle, random gherkins, and a fan of the miniature sombrero.

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  • http://www.orangeloungeradio.com Rob Roberts

    Thanks for your reports keeping folks informed, other Rob :) I’m glad you noted that the Real-ID debate continues. I think it is so important to note that while yes, Blizzard outlined a ridiculous proposal this week to the community regarding the real names, this is all that has been reversed by Morhaime’s statement– a feature that was never actually implemented.

    What remains however, is a flawed system that WAS implemented. Contrary to Blizzards claims, you do NOT opt-in to the program. The exploit that you link to in the article regarding the add-ons sadly was overshadowed by the forum news. While yes, one has to be very careful about the add-ons you do and do not add, the mere fact that your real name is even displayable in the game at all thru a “back door” is a severe problem to me. The only way to truly remove this flaw is to “opt-out” of the RealID “feature” by using the parental controls process on your own account, even if you are an add-on. I’m sorry blizzard but if I had to “opt-out”, then your program is clearly not “opt-in”. It is a flawed design reminiscent of the Facebook privacy policy that took much heat when you were opted-in by default to most privacy disclosures.

    Of course, on Facebook, at least I can change my name to a preferred pseudonym to make my internet trail less trackable. And yes… I’m aware you’re not supposed to use a fake name on Facebook but lets see, one of the top pages belongs to “Lady Gaga”… I think it’s generally accepted that as long as you don’t pick a name like “Mike Hunt” or “Dicks McGee”, you aren’t going to get shut down by the Facebook police. Then again, I knew a Michael Hunt once… poor guy.

    Anyway, if Blizzard is so gung-ho about partnering with Facebook in the future, it should take a good hard look at what Facebook has had to learn about privacy.

  • http://www.orangeloungeradio.com Rob Roberts

    Oops -> “even if you are an adult” in the second paragraph, not add-on LOL

  • Rob

    You’re very welcome, OLR Rob :) And I completely agree with you about Blizzard learning a thing or “three” from Facebook in terms of privacy. I mean, they moved us to Battle.Net to keep our accounts secure. They implemented the authenticators to further add to that layer of protection, and then, on a whim, they announce that they’re going to publicly “out” their customers? Might as well post your log-in details too. It’s a double standard, and one I had to pinch myself at, thinking it was all an April Fool’s joke.

    The fact that the only way to properly opt-out, in-game, is to pretend that you’re a minor playing on a parents’ account is very wrong, and honestly, in light of all this, I can see them perhaps “revising” Real ID on live realms.

    As for the add-on exploit, it’s unbelievable that it didn’t get the attention that it so very clearly deserves. If anything, it should have immediately become “the” story of the day. I’m not sure which add-on they’re talking about, but I know for a fact and have photographic proof of, that DBM – probably the most used, reputable add-on – now also pulls your Real ID info. I was fishing in Dalaran when a bug in an old version of it displayed my full name in my chat-window. Thankfully, it didn’t publish it in general of /s, it was for my eyes only, but still.

    That said, I’m very much looking forward to Sunday’s show; even more than I do each week already!

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