I don't know if people know this, but by opening a phone book you can get many thousands of real names of complete strangers. Crazy world.
My name is Kyle Chester Rybski. I went to Southwick High School and I currently reside in Holyoke, Massachusetts.
Have fun!
Lot of you are forgetting the aspect of "motive" in all of this. Some of your info is out there of course but you are just another drop in the sea of information until you come across the one internet crazy with a motive that will hunt you down come to your home and stab you while you sleep in your bed. The players I meet in wow are nice to game with and chat with but I don't want them coming to pay me a visit after they go psycho over something I said on the wow forum that makes them go postal.
They did this at a perfect time. No matter how many people leave angry at this, by the time Cataclysm comes out a lot of the jaded people will want to come back to the game for the new content. I'm not saying I agree or disagree with what they are doing, but at this point in WoW there is pretty much nothing they could do besides shut down the servers to kill this game.
Wanna bet? See thats the problem Blizzard/Activision thinks this as well./I remember a mightly mmog company once named SOE that had a huge hit with Everquest they continued to pull stuns on the community over and over and over and guess what? People said enough is enough.If this goes through you can bet your a** I won't be back and alot others won't either I have about had it with Bliizzard thinking they can do w/e they please and ppl will put up with it and stay anyway and alot of ppl are.TOo many new mmogs coming out and some other good ones already out to have to put up with Blizzards BS.FInal Fantasty is coming in Sept as well.
It's amazing how naive some people are. "Oh you cant find out anything by just a real name". **shakes head** there have been sites around for years that provide plenty of information with a simple name search. Hell, just go to the White Pages site or something, type in a name and theyll give you a list of addresses and phone numbers (and in some cases even the names of people you are related to / live with). You dont need to be a hacker, ANYONE can access this information. From there it's a simple matter of narrowing it down to the correct city/state, and if you happen to share a name with someone in the same city/state as you it will stil be a very short list with just a few people left to pick from in order to track you down.
Not only can that information be tracked down, but there is also the matter of things like public records which nearly anyone can request/access. Have a crime on your record? Own property? Ever been married/divorced? etc, etc... all of this information is readily available to people who barely know how to use a computer and have just a name to go on... do you people really believe a hacker cant find out much much more if they had a reason (or just felt like it) and took a few hours dedicated to finding out everything they can about you.
If any of you truly believe something like this isnt a risk, ESPECIALLY considering the clusterfuck of psychosis that makes up the population of WoW combined with the nerd / hacking talent that exists there, you're about as gullible as a toddler who believes in the easter bunny.
OMG - do you know what you are saying. I just googled my name and got 5,020,000 results. Then I did a White pages search and there are literally thousands of Kristi and Kristina Martin's. Good luck finding me.
Well, luckily you dont have a very unique name, especially your last name. However, just to narrow it down, you mentione dhow you used to live in MN. Well let's just say i happened to be in your guild or something and you off handedly mentioned you live in MN. Try searching for Kristina Martin in MN.... 22 results for the entire state on whitepages.
Anyway, as i said youre lucky with the name, not everyone else is. Myself... i did the same, first and last name only, the entire country.... guess how many results came up...... 1, thats it, just 1 person with my name in the entire country and it shows my current address.
My last name is barely unique... it's not common but i actually went to school with and played sports with several other people who shared my last name, and it was fairly common in the state i came from, but apparently im the only person with my first name (which is very very common strangely enough).
So basically, by me simply playing WoW, any random fucktard who decided they wanted to harass or hurt me in some way for whatever reason (valid or not), could track me down with no effort at all because nobody else shares my name.
Can I ask you why you think you warrant someone coming and finding you to do you bodily harm? With so many peoples names in the white pages across America - how come this doesn't happen more often?
Because if someone is a jerk in public, they tend not to leave their name behind, so it's hard to track them down.
If someone is a jerk in WoW with this change, the victim or victims have the potential to find out said person's real name, address, phone number, etc.
But yeah, WoW is just WoW. Being corpse camped doesn't cause lasting penalties.
What would truly be disasterous would be if CCP added this for Eve.
Remember those stories about corporations being infiltrated and looted, the Isk bank scam, etc?
Imagine all of that, where the purpetrator's real names are revealed to the victims, who have lost thousands, if not tens of thousands of real life dollars in game assets.
I'm sure if you could look up the name of someone who mugged you, things would be quite a bit different, and there would be a lot of 'vigilante' related killings.
Just as a test I did a search on my name. In less then 5 minutes I could find EVERYTHING about me and any member of my family. This includes note only my phone number and address but other things like marital records, house value records and so much more. Why would I wish for ME to advertise my name on the internet so that it can be made just that much easier to find. While I have nothing to hide, I also have every reason to protect my privacy. And by the way, you might be surprised exactly WHAT information others can look at with just a few clicks.
It's amazing how naive some people are. "Oh you cant find out anything by just a real name". **shakes head** there have been sites around for years that provide plenty of information with a simple name search. Hell, just go to the White Pages site or something, type in a name and theyll give you a list of addresses and phone numbers (and in some cases even the names of people you are related to / live with). You dont need to be a hacker, ANYONE can access this information. From there it's a simple matter of narrowing it down to the correct city/state, and if you happen to share a name with someone in the same city/state as you it will stil be a very short list with just a few people left to pick from in order to track you down.
Not only can that information be tracked down, but there is also the matter of things like public records which nearly anyone can request/access. Have a crime on your record? Own property? Ever been married/divorced? etc, etc... all of this information is readily available to people who barely know how to use a computer and have just a name to go on... do you people really believe a hacker cant find out much much more if they had a reason (or just felt like it) and took a few hours dedicated to finding out everything they can about you.
If any of you truly believe something like this isnt a risk, ESPECIALLY considering the clusterfuck of psychosis that makes up the population of WoW combined with the nerd / hacking talent that exists there, you're about as gullible as a toddler who believes in the easter bunny.
OMG - do you know what you are saying. I just googled my name and got 5,020,000 results. Then I did a White pages search and there are literally thousands of Kristi and Kristina Martin's. Good luck finding me.
Well, luckily you dont have a very unique name, especially your last name. However, just to narrow it down, you mentione dhow you used to live in MN. Well let's just say i happened to be in your guild or something and you off handedly mentioned you live in MN. Try searching for Kristina Martin in MN.... 22 results for the entire state on whitepages.
Anyway, as i said youre lucky with the name, not everyone else is. Myself... i did the same, first and last name only, the entire country.... guess how many results came up...... 1, thats it, just 1 person with my name in the entire country and it shows my current address.
My last name is barely unique... it's not common but i actually went to school with and played sports with several other people who shared my last name, and it was fairly common in the state i came from, but apparently im the only person with my first name (which is very very common strangely enough).
So basically, by me simply playing WoW, any random fucktard who decided they wanted to harass or hurt me in some way for whatever reason (valid or not), could track me down with no effort at all because nobody else shares my name.
Can I ask you why you think you warrant someone coming and finding you to do you bodily harm? With so many peoples names in the white pages across America - how come this doesn't happen more often?
Teala, welcome to the internet... People don't need a good reason to do anything, and many times do it simply because they can, or because they are obsessed with the game they are playing (especially WoW) and any sort of minor insult / slight to their ego, or somehow inadvertently wronging them in their own simple mind, or the simple fact that they cant handle losing is enough reason for them to do it. and it's been attempted a couple times against me, but theyve all backed out due to either cowardice or some sudden grip on reality that they didnt have until that moment. And not only physical harm, there are many ways you can harass people without needing to physical come to them, all it takes is a phone.
As i said in my earlier post there are lots of ways to get ahold of info with a simple name. All Blizzard is doing is ensuring that their customers will not only be at risk of things like theft, but also ensuring theyre going to have lots of people leaving the game due to repeated harassment from the hordes of childish / mentally deficient asshats infesting the game.
It's amazing how naive some people are. "Oh you cant find out anything by just a real name". **shakes head** there have been sites around for years that provide plenty of information with a simple name search. Hell, just go to the White Pages site or something, type in a name and theyll give you a list of addresses and phone numbers (and in some cases even the names of people you are related to / live with). You dont need to be a hacker, ANYONE can access this information. From there it's a simple matter of narrowing it down to the correct city/state, and if you happen to share a name with someone in the same city/state as you it will stil be a very short list with just a few people left to pick from in order to track you down.
Not only can that information be tracked down, but there is also the matter of things like public records which nearly anyone can request/access. Have a crime on your record? Own property? Ever been married/divorced? etc, etc... all of this information is readily available to people who barely know how to use a computer and have just a name to go on... do you people really believe a hacker cant find out much much more if they had a reason (or just felt like it) and took a few hours dedicated to finding out everything they can about you.
If any of you truly believe something like this isnt a risk, ESPECIALLY considering the clusterfuck of psychosis that makes up the population of WoW combined with the nerd / hacking talent that exists there, you're about as gullible as a toddler who believes in the easter bunny.
OMG - do you know what you are saying. I just googled my name and got 5,020,000 results. Then I did a White pages search and there are literally thousands of Kristi and Kristina Martin's. Good luck finding me.
Well, luckily you dont have a very unique name, especially your last name. However, just to narrow it down, you mentione dhow you used to live in MN. Well let's just say i happened to be in your guild or something and you off handedly mentioned you live in MN. Try searching for Kristina Martin in MN.... 22 results for the entire state on whitepages.
Anyway, as i said youre lucky with the name, not everyone else is. Myself... i did the same, first and last name only, the entire country.... guess how many results came up...... 1, thats it, just 1 person with my name in the entire country and it shows my current address.
My last name is barely unique... it's not common but i actually went to school with and played sports with several other people who shared my last name, and it was fairly common in the state i came from, but apparently im the only person with my first name (which is very very common strangely enough).
So basically, by me simply playing WoW, any random fucktard who decided they wanted to harass or hurt me in some way for whatever reason (valid or not), could track me down with no effort at all because nobody else shares my name.
Can I ask you why you think you warrant someone coming and finding you to do you bodily harm? With so many peoples names in the white pages across America - how come this doesn't happen more often?
Because if someone is a jerk in public, they tend not to leave their name behind, so it's hard to track them down.
If someone is a jerk in WoW with this change, the victim or victims have the potential to find out said person's real name, address, phone number, etc.
But yeah, WoW is just WoW. Being corpse camped doesn't cause lasting penalties.
What would truly be disasterous would be if CCP added this for Eve.
Remember those stories about corporations being infiltrated and looted, the Isk bank scam, etc?
Imagine all of that, where the purpetrator's real names are revealed to the victims, who have lost thousands, if not tens of thousands of real life dollars in game assets.
I'm sure if you could look up the name of someone who mugged you, things would be quite a bit different, and there would be a lot of 'vigilante' related killings.
"PK'er" would have a whole new meaning if that happened.
i had an idiot clown from some fringe forum stalk me to the point where he posted on these forums the names and location of my family. And i never divulged my name anywhere on here.
who cares? I love this move of blizz, I would pay anything to see all the forums freaks faces, their life turned upside down, throwing punches to walls and fridges haha
"blizard cant do this to me, noooo , nooo arrrggg I must do something, Ill go to mmrpg.com to cry and get some support"
TO ALL BLIZZ FORUMS PHREAKS:
Your name on all posts are coming live and your days of lame posting, bashing, hating, qqing etc are OVER!. All ur meaninfull life is coming to a end because of this. HANG YOURSELF ON A TREE theres no other option
HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAAHA
On the plus side of all this chaos with Real ID, at least we'd know who this person is lol
Most people go through life pretending to be a boss. I go through life pretending I'm not.
It's amazing how naive some people are. "Oh you cant find out anything by just a real name". **shakes head** there have been sites around for years that provide plenty of information with a simple name search. Hell, just go to the White Pages site or something, type in a name and theyll give you a list of addresses and phone numbers (and in some cases even the names of people you are related to / live with). You dont need to be a hacker, ANYONE can access this information. From there it's a simple matter of narrowing it down to the correct city/state, and if you happen to share a name with someone in the same city/state as you it will stil be a very short list with just a few people left to pick from in order to track you down.
Not only can that information be tracked down, but there is also the matter of things like public records which nearly anyone can request/access. Have a crime on your record? Own property? Ever been married/divorced? etc, etc... all of this information is readily available to people who barely know how to use a computer and have just a name to go on... do you people really believe a hacker cant find out much much more if they had a reason (or just felt like it) and took a few hours dedicated to finding out everything they can about you.
If any of you truly believe something like this isnt a risk, ESPECIALLY considering the clusterfuck of psychosis that makes up the population of WoW combined with the nerd / hacking talent that exists there, you're about as gullible as a toddler who believes in the easter bunny.
OMG - do you know what you are saying. I just googled my name and got 5,020,000 results. Then I did a White pages search and there are literally thousands of Kristi and Kristina Martin's. Good luck finding me.
Well, luckily you dont have a very unique name, especially your last name. However, just to narrow it down, you mentione dhow you used to live in MN. Well let's just say i happened to be in your guild or something and you off handedly mentioned you live in MN. Try searching for Kristina Martin in MN.... 22 results for the entire state on whitepages.
Anyway, as i said youre lucky with the name, not everyone else is. Myself... i did the same, first and last name only, the entire country.... guess how many results came up...... 1, thats it, just 1 person with my name in the entire country and it shows my current address.
My last name is barely unique... it's not common but i actually went to school with and played sports with several other people who shared my last name, and it was fairly common in the state i came from, but apparently im the only person with my first name (which is very very common strangely enough).
So basically, by me simply playing WoW, any random fucktard who decided they wanted to harass or hurt me in some way for whatever reason (valid or not), could track me down with no effort at all because nobody else shares my name.
Can I ask you why you think you warrant someone coming and finding you to do you bodily harm? With so many peoples names in the white pages across America - how come this doesn't happen more often?
All it takes is one person getting upset enough to do so. Why haven't you been targeted? Or Me? Or the person you just said. One, we don't know each others names (well, except yours now). None of us caused another to nerdrage to the point of doing something about it. None of us hate each other with a passion. Also, there is a very tiny amount of people using this forum. Going to the Warcraft forums opens up a LOT more people. People who never will have to post to find out your name. Being females, we do take more people targeting us then a white male with a normal name. People WILL target people with different names. Arabic names. It might be something as simple as verbal names on their facebook or something. It might be something much worse
I saw you posted your name and even gave out a few details. I see your point about the white pages and it not happening. As mentioned in my paragraph above, many people have no reason to. MANY crimes are a fit of emotion. If you upset someone enough, or hurt someone enough, they often go to great lengths to have those feelings changed, or..."evened".
You may have indeed given YOUR real name. But I'd like to point you to this link
This guy found all this information about one person, and he wasn't in a fit of emotion. He wasn't planning on hurting anyone. He was proving how easy it is to do so. And he could pay money to find out even more.
The biggest problem I see, is their blantent disregard for a persons choice of privacy over making more money with facebook. Who cares that someone might get hurt as long as they get more publicity and money coming in. They aren't doing this to "clear up the forums". They are doing this JUST for money. Plain and Simple.
With this change, Some total douchebag can sit on the WoW forums, reading peoples names, getting their info, and nothing can be done about that. They can hurt with no retaliation. I think that's MUCH worse then bliz...I mean activision taking players of the game to Mod the forums FOR FREE to as they say "clean up the forums". Such BS.
So this proves that some guy on the Internet can write a blog entry and make up any kind of story he wants to say his opinion is right. It proved nothing legit.
who cares? I love this move of blizz, I would pay anything to see all the forums freaks faces, their life turned upside down, throwing punches to walls and fridges haha
"blizard cant do this to me, noooo , nooo arrrggg I must do something, Ill go to mmrpg.com to cry and get some support"
TO ALL BLIZZ FORUMS PHREAKS:
Your name on all posts are coming live and your days of lame posting, bashing, hating, qqing etc are OVER!. All ur meaninfull life is coming to a end because of this. HANG YOURSELF ON A TREE theres no other option
HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAAHA
Yeah except ... Real ID isn't going to stop trolling
Before Real ID: Troll gets banned from the WoW forums. Troll creates new account and continues trolling.
With Real ID: Troll gets banned from the WoW forums. Troll creates new account, with a false name, and continues trolling.
I'm going to expect to see a lot of "celebrity" names come the Real ID changes. You know that's what the trolls are going to do. Sad part is, people actually pay just to troll on a forum. A bad one at that.
So this proves that some guy on the Internet can write a blog entry and make up any kind of story he wants to say his opinion is right. It proved nothing legit.
the problem is that if you have a unique name, you are at greater risk. I typed my name out on google and there was like 1 person with my name in the us.....so i guess i cant post on the blizzard forum.
So this proves that some guy on the Internet can write a blog entry and make up any kind of story he wants to say his opinion is right. It proved nothing legit.
the problem is that if you have a unique name, you are at greater risk. I typed my name out on google and there was like 1 person with my name in the us.....so i guess i cant post on the blizzard forum.
I guess not. ::sigh:: It's not like you'll be missing much anyway. It'll still be a cesspool.
this is true.....i dont play luckily. Now if the mmos i played currently started doing that too (eve/lotro/TOR) i would quit them in a heart beat. I enjoy forums, i run my own guild one....but at the same time i dont want my name plastered everywhere. I try not to be a douche most of the time, and i just enjoy the social aspect of it all.
Do like many of us do...make use of forums like the ones here on MMORPG.com. They are better than official forums. They are not so heavily censored and it is easier to deal with trolls. Just put them on ignore.
Originally posted by miagisan this is true.....i dont play luckily. Now if the mmos i played currently started doing that too (eve/lotro/TOR) i would quit them in a heart beat. I enjoy forums, i run my own guild one....but at the same time i dont want my name plastered everywhere. I try not to be a douche most of the time, and i just enjoy the social aspect of it all.
Agreed man. I don't see TOR going this route, thankfully. When I did play WoW, I only made post to bump guild recruitment, but I feel that you shouldn't have to give up personal information to make legit post, like recruitment, bugs, etc. I do applaud Blizzard's intent in this, by trying to get some control over their forums, but they should have went about it another way.
Perhaps a merged accounts forum account. Like the battle.net, so that you only ever have 1 account and it can be rated up or down. So, really low rated players could be monitored better and perhaps have their post faded, like they will with the forum change Blizzard intends to implement.
Really, how many people see your name on a daily basis. You need more then a name to do anything. There are at least 4 people in my county with the same name as me. Why even bother targeting people on an internet forum when it is so much easier to open a phone book. The only people who will get targeted are people who try and troll.
Really, how many people see your name on a daily basis. You need more then a name to do anything. There are at least 4 people in my county with the same name as me. Why even bother targeting people on an internet forum when it is so much easier to open a phone book. The only people who will get targeted are people who try and troll.
lets put it this way.
I kill player x in pvp....say i destroy a really expensive faction fitted t2 ship in eve.
Player X gets pissed (and is a bit of a sociopath in real life) enough to check out my guild recruitment page which has my real name on it since (hypothetically) eve forums use realID.
Types my name into google knowing i am that character.
California to Virginia area is pretty large move. Am I getting warmer?
Reston, VA <=> Woodbridge, VA.
If you think you did find my address, and phone number just PM it and I'll let you know if you are correct.
Is it really only Kristina Martin without anything in between like "Kristina L Martin" or "Kristina R Martin"?
Sorry...all you get is first and last. That is all Blizzard will be showing. Let me give you some help though. I use to live in Nevada, and Minnesota and California. In fact my main cell phone still has a Minnesota area code. Never bothered to change it yet. LOL!
Well since you do not seem to care about sharing info on this forum, would you mind if I hired a private investigator to use the info you have shared to find you. I am willing to spend my life savings and the money I need too, till he finds out where you live, where you work, and so on and so forth. Then I can be your own personal stalker (which ever girl needs), and I will admire you and cherish you from a far. Then one day I will snap and we can make front news with a good old fashioned murder suicide. Sound like a deal? Of course I am joking. Although I am willing to bet that with enough money and time a PI could find you based on just the info you have told us on this site. I do not share my name on forums, so I can see why some would be upset about what Blizz is doing. Although I really do not care either, I try to look at the good side of people and put trust that they are not a raving manic when I talk to them.
Originally posted by pb1285n Really, how many people see your name on a daily basis. You need more then a name to do anything. There are at least 4 people in my county with the same name as me. Why even bother targeting people on an internet forum when it is so much easier to open a phone book. The only people who will get targeted are people who try and troll.
Its not just players, if they do go through with having Blizzard employee's names listed (which I highly doubt, seeing all the feedback about employee security risk) then those employees are at high risk of being targeted. One has been already if you read into this issue any. How hard would it be to target someone when you have their first and last name, narrowed down living location, the name of their place of work, etc. Granted a lot of names where already given out, like Tom Chilton, etc, but the fact remains. If people want to prove a point, or get motivated by all of this to harass a Blizzard employee, (god forbid even more malicious and violent) then it will be even easier than ever before.
I hope nothing happens to anyone out of this. I have had disagreements with Activision-Blizzard many of times, but they're just people like ourselves and don't deserve anything past verbal.
Comments
Lot of you are forgetting the aspect of "motive" in all of this. Some of your info is out there of course but you are just another drop in the sea of information until you come across the one internet crazy with a motive that will hunt you down come to your home and stab you while you sleep in your bed. The players I meet in wow are nice to game with and chat with but I don't want them coming to pay me a visit after they go psycho over something I said on the wow forum that makes them go postal.
Wanna bet? See thats the problem Blizzard/Activision thinks this as well./I remember a mightly mmog company once named SOE that had a huge hit with Everquest they continued to pull stuns on the community over and over and over and guess what? People said enough is enough.If this goes through you can bet your a** I won't be back and alot others won't either I have about had it with Bliizzard thinking they can do w/e they please and ppl will put up with it and stay anyway and alot of ppl are.TOo many new mmogs coming out and some other good ones already out to have to put up with Blizzards BS.FInal Fantasty is coming in Sept as well.
Because if someone is a jerk in public, they tend not to leave their name behind, so it's hard to track them down.
If someone is a jerk in WoW with this change, the victim or victims have the potential to find out said person's real name, address, phone number, etc.
But yeah, WoW is just WoW. Being corpse camped doesn't cause lasting penalties.
What would truly be disasterous would be if CCP added this for Eve.
Remember those stories about corporations being infiltrated and looted, the Isk bank scam, etc?
Imagine all of that, where the purpetrator's real names are revealed to the victims, who have lost thousands, if not tens of thousands of real life dollars in game assets.
I'm sure if you could look up the name of someone who mugged you, things would be quite a bit different, and there would be a lot of 'vigilante' related killings.
Just as a test I did a search on my name. In less then 5 minutes I could find EVERYTHING about me and any member of my family. This includes note only my phone number and address but other things like marital records, house value records and so much more. Why would I wish for ME to advertise my name on the internet so that it can be made just that much easier to find. While I have nothing to hide, I also have every reason to protect my privacy. And by the way, you might be surprised exactly WHAT information others can look at with just a few clicks.
Let's party like it is 1863!
Teala, welcome to the internet... People don't need a good reason to do anything, and many times do it simply because they can, or because they are obsessed with the game they are playing (especially WoW) and any sort of minor insult / slight to their ego, or somehow inadvertently wronging them in their own simple mind, or the simple fact that they cant handle losing is enough reason for them to do it. and it's been attempted a couple times against me, but theyve all backed out due to either cowardice or some sudden grip on reality that they didnt have until that moment. And not only physical harm, there are many ways you can harass people without needing to physical come to them, all it takes is a phone.
As i said in my earlier post there are lots of ways to get ahold of info with a simple name. All Blizzard is doing is ensuring that their customers will not only be at risk of things like theft, but also ensuring theyre going to have lots of people leaving the game due to repeated harassment from the hordes of childish / mentally deficient asshats infesting the game.
"PK'er" would have a whole new meaning if that happened.
i had an idiot clown from some fringe forum stalk me to the point where he posted on these forums the names and location of my family. And i never divulged my name anywhere on here.
On the plus side of all this chaos with Real ID, at least we'd know who this person is lol
Most people go through life pretending to be a boss. I go through life pretending I'm not.
All it takes is one person getting upset enough to do so. Why haven't you been targeted? Or Me? Or the person you just said. One, we don't know each others names (well, except yours now). None of us caused another to nerdrage to the point of doing something about it. None of us hate each other with a passion. Also, there is a very tiny amount of people using this forum. Going to the Warcraft forums opens up a LOT more people. People who never will have to post to find out your name. Being females, we do take more people targeting us then a white male with a normal name. People WILL target people with different names. Arabic names. It might be something as simple as verbal names on their facebook or something. It might be something much worse
I saw you posted your name and even gave out a few details. I see your point about the white pages and it not happening. As mentioned in my paragraph above, many people have no reason to. MANY crimes are a fit of emotion. If you upset someone enough, or hurt someone enough, they often go to great lengths to have those feelings changed, or..."evened".
You may have indeed given YOUR real name. But I'd like to point you to this link
http://seewhatyoudidthere.com/2010/07/07/realid-changes-the-very-real-ease-of-stalking-in-the-internet-age/
This guy found all this information about one person, and he wasn't in a fit of emotion. He wasn't planning on hurting anyone. He was proving how easy it is to do so. And he could pay money to find out even more.
The biggest problem I see, is their blantent disregard for a persons choice of privacy over making more money with facebook. Who cares that someone might get hurt as long as they get more publicity and money coming in. They aren't doing this to "clear up the forums". They are doing this JUST for money. Plain and Simple.
With this change, Some total douchebag can sit on the WoW forums, reading peoples names, getting their info, and nothing can be done about that. They can hurt with no retaliation. I think that's MUCH worse then bliz...I mean activision taking players of the game to Mod the forums FOR FREE to as they say "clean up the forums". Such BS.
http://seewhatyoudidthere.com/2010/07/07/realid-changes-the-very-real-ease-of-stalking-in-the-internet-age/
So this proves that some guy on the Internet can write a blog entry and make up any kind of story he wants to say his opinion is right. It proved nothing legit.
Yeah except ... Real ID isn't going to stop trolling
Before Real ID: Troll gets banned from the WoW forums. Troll creates new account and continues trolling.
With Real ID: Troll gets banned from the WoW forums. Troll creates new account, with a false name, and continues trolling.
I'm going to expect to see a lot of "celebrity" names come the Real ID changes. You know that's what the trolls are going to do. Sad part is, people actually pay just to troll on a forum. A bad one at that.
the problem is that if you have a unique name, you are at greater risk. I typed my name out on google and there was like 1 person with my name in the us.....so i guess i cant post on the blizzard forum.
I guess not. ::sigh:: It's not like you'll be missing much anyway. It'll still be a cesspool.
this is true.....i dont play luckily. Now if the mmos i played currently started doing that too (eve/lotro/TOR) i would quit them in a heart beat. I enjoy forums, i run my own guild one....but at the same time i dont want my name plastered everywhere. I try not to be a douche most of the time, and i just enjoy the social aspect of it all.
Do like many of us do...make use of forums like the ones here on MMORPG.com. They are better than official forums. They are not so heavily censored and it is easier to deal with trolls. Just put them on ignore.
Like many I completely and whole heartedly disagree with what they're doing.
Hmm... what to do, what to do...
Step 1. Cancel 4.5 year subscription: Check
Step 2. Cancel plans to purchase SC II and next xpac: Check
Step 3. Post my displeasure where it might actually be noticed by Activision-Blizzard AND their shareholders: Check
But where might they notice? Only one of the largest (if not, the largest) business related news medium: The Wall Street Journal.
Take a look and voice your opinion here:
http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2010/07/07/real-names-rile-online-warlocks-and-wizards/
Agreed man. I don't see TOR going this route, thankfully. When I did play WoW, I only made post to bump guild recruitment, but I feel that you shouldn't have to give up personal information to make legit post, like recruitment, bugs, etc. I do applaud Blizzard's intent in this, by trying to get some control over their forums, but they should have went about it another way.
Perhaps a merged accounts forum account. Like the battle.net, so that you only ever have 1 account and it can be rated up or down. So, really low rated players could be monitored better and perhaps have their post faded, like they will with the forum change Blizzard intends to implement.
(Akiraosc)
lets put it this way.
I kill player x in pvp....say i destroy a really expensive faction fitted t2 ship in eve.
Player X gets pissed (and is a bit of a sociopath in real life) enough to check out my guild recruitment page which has my real name on it since (hypothetically) eve forums use realID.
Types my name into google knowing i am that character.
Only 1 of me pops up.
Knows where i live and my phone number.
comprende?
Well since you do not seem to care about sharing info on this forum, would you mind if I hired a private investigator to use the info you have shared to find you. I am willing to spend my life savings and the money I need too, till he finds out where you live, where you work, and so on and so forth. Then I can be your own personal stalker (which ever girl needs), and I will admire you and cherish you from a far. Then one day I will snap and we can make front news with a good old fashioned murder suicide. Sound like a deal? Of course I am joking. Although I am willing to bet that with enough money and time a PI could find you based on just the info you have told us on this site. I do not share my name on forums, so I can see why some would be upset about what Blizz is doing. Although I really do not care either, I try to look at the good side of people and put trust that they are not a raving manic when I talk to them.
Its not just players, if they do go through with having Blizzard employee's names listed (which I highly doubt, seeing all the feedback about employee security risk) then those employees are at high risk of being targeted. One has been already if you read into this issue any. How hard would it be to target someone when you have their first and last name, narrowed down living location, the name of their place of work, etc. Granted a lot of names where already given out, like Tom Chilton, etc, but the fact remains. If people want to prove a point, or get motivated by all of this to harass a Blizzard employee, (god forbid even more malicious and violent) then it will be even easier than ever before.
I hope nothing happens to anyone out of this. I have had disagreements with Activision-Blizzard many of times, but they're just people like ourselves and don't deserve anything past verbal.
/out of this thread.
Peace
(Akiraosc)
There is no chance of that happening to Blizzard for a very long time, even with this system in place.