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Blizzard new chat launch

http://cache.gawkerassets.com/assets...cross-game.jpg

New World Of Warcraft Patch Enables Cross-Game Chat

http://kotaku.com/5570868/new-world-...ross+game-chat

Quote:

Blizzard's 3.3.5 patch for World of Warcraft went live yesterday, enabling the new Battle.net Real ID feature, allowing for cross-faction, cross-server, and when StarCraft II comes out, cross-game chat.

Real ID is a layer of friends list on top of the one World of Warcraft players are used to. Instead of tagging another character name as a friend, players can now tag the Battle.net ID of their friends, keeping in touch with them no matter where they are playing on the Battle.net network.

Say your guild is getting ready for a raid, but your healer is off playing StarCraft II. Not only will you be able to see what he or she is doing (should they allow it), you'll be able to drop them a line telling them to get their sorry asses in gear.

It also means that once you add a Real ID friend, you don't have to worry about adding all of their alts to your list as well. Real ID friends can even send out broadcast messages across their entire friend network, which sounds amazingly annoying, though perfect for dramatic "quitting the game" notices.

For those who'd rather have everyone known them as Porksword, the mighty Orc warrior, the Real ID feature is completely optional.

This is one of the first steps in integrating World of Warcraft with Battle.net, bringing players of all Blizzard games together in one big community.

Check out the Real ID page on Battle.net for more information on the feature, and visit the World of Warcraft patch notes page for more on patch 3.3.5, which also introduces the Ruby Sanctum raid dungeon.

I downloaded the patch via WoW last night, and tried it out a little bit. The realID feature is going to be awesome. I'm going to love chatbombinb WoW raids while playing Starcraft 2. It's actually a good idea, and i'm sure was suggested years ago but now with the new Battle.net up and ready, and the launch of Starcraft 2 next month they found time to get things going. I'm also curious to see how they will incorporate realID to different platforms in the future. Possible AIM? Facebook IM? cellphone APP? I have a feeling they aren't going to stay at the platform they're at now, but expand on it in the coming years.

Go check it out if you haven't already.

Blizzard has a Mobile Auction House program for Iphones and Droid phones. It's pretty nifty. I would not be suprised if they eventually launched some other stuff as well. I remember bots connecting to starcraft back in the day without actually running starcraft, so who knows. I look forward to it :)

Ah, I seen that on the news feed the other day. Some sort of app you can run for a mobile auction house setting up is a cool idea, I might actually check it out sometime now that I've got a droid :)

Anyways, i've gotten a bit used to the new chat system over the weekend. the realID setup is nice, and is going to incorporate very well into the trio of blizzard games. You can set little 'status' updates like you can on Facebook/Twitter that is broadcast to your other realID friends. You can setup chats with multiple friends, and it's very clean and works well.

This may cause some fun for raiders when they want to disappear, but their guild leader/raid leader has their realID's and see them on another game/account when they're supposed to be raiding, but I guess we'll see in time.

I loved the old batte.net system on Starcraft and Diablo II. Spamming /f m with random shit or only hearing half of someones conversation with a stranger was probably the most entertaining part of the game. Unless I haven't found out how yet, the only way to do that is to change your broadcast message on your friends list, but whoever is on your list with only get a momentary bleep with the message, then they'd have to go onto their friends list to view it. The chatroom function needs a little more work too. You can only invite 2 more of your friends in a channel. They also need to fix the way the RealID text appears. It looks so... jagged.

It is defnitly a great system though. I look forward to see how it develops.

i'm sure with the release of starcraft 2 they'll have a newly vamped system along with new tweaks and features.

Here's a nice little view from the other side of the excitement, that really bring up some good points about security. Maybe they're secretly making the push to get everyone to purchase authenticators?

WoW Real ID: A Really Bad Idea

http://antivirus.about.com/b/2010/06...y-bad-idea.htm

Quote:

WoW scams have plagued World of Warcraft players, both in-game and out. That's why it's been so surprising (and disturbing) to see Blizzard continually roll out changes that directly put gamers in harm's way.

In the Fall of 2009 Blizzard implemented a forced merge of World of Warcraft accounts into a single login through battle.net. This single login requires the user's current email address as the account/login name. It also merges all account activity, including CD keys, credit card or other payment method, physical addresses, and other related information.

In other words, a veritable pond of data for scammers to phish - and the only information they have to guess now is the password. The account name is pretty much there for the taking. Had your email account hacked? Better kiss your level 80 and WoW gold goodbye.

In January 2010, Blizzard followed up with solemn pronouncements such as "account security is one of our top priorities" and "keeping your account safe and secure is an important goal for us".

Unfortunately, talk is cheap and actions speak louder than words. It's apparently not that important to them.

Despite Blizzard itself attesting that two of the top three most common account compromises originate from phishing and shared account information, they still opted to roll out Real ID.

Here are a couple of snippets about the new Battle.net Real ID program:

"...when you click on one of your Real ID friends, you will be able to see the names of his or her other Real ID friends, even if you are not Real ID friends with those players yourself."

"...your mutual Real ID friends, as well as their Real ID friends, will be able to see your first and last name (the name registered to the Battle.net account)."

"...Real ID friends will see detailed Rich Presence information (what character the Real ID friend is playing, what they are doing within that game, etc.) and will be able to view and send Broadcast messages to other Real ID friends."

And this is all cross-game, cross-realm, and cross-alts. Just what already heavily targeted players need, right? A merge of WoW/Battle.net/StarCraft with Facebook-style social networking? Facepalm might have been a better term to describe Real ID given its potential for scams. Especially since Blizzard rolled out the change without any provision to protect minors whatsoever:

Will parents be able to manage whether their children are able to use Real ID?
We plan to update our Parental Controls with tools that will allow parents to manage their children's use of Real ID. We'll have more details to share in the future.

Nice. So some time in the future, Blizzard might start looking at considering security seriously. In the meantime, the unmanaged Real ID program makes it even easier for scammers to socially engineer players AND it adds potential stalking to the list of concerns. With no provision to protect minors whatsoever.

Thanks, Blizz...Not!