Blizzard Tries To Forbid Open Sourcing Glider

ruphus13 notes a new development in Blizzard's case against MDY, which we discussed last week. Blizzard, the maker of World of Warcraft, has now requested another injunction — to prevent the open sourcing of Glider code. Quoting: "Blizzard has asked the court for a relatively unconventional order prohibiting MDY from making the source code for its MMO Glider software available to the public, and prohibiting MDY from helping people develop other World of Warcraft automation software. Blizzard had previously asked the court to shut down MDY's WoW operations in its motion for summary judgment, but the court's summary judgment order did not address Blizzard's request. Blizzard's requests to prohibit open-source release of MDY's software and prohibit MDY's assistance in development of independent WoW bots are new to this motion — and seem likely to raise eyebrows in the open source and digital rights advocacy camps."

I have a solution....

OOPS! we were hacked! our source code was stolen!

OMG!! It's all over pirate bay! sorry!

In other words, legally say "Blizzard.... Go To Hell."

Re:I have a solution....

OOPS! we were hacked! our source code was stolen!

OMG!! It's all over pirate bay! sorry!

In other words, legally say "Blizzard.... Go To Hell."

Except, it's not legal if MDY claims this happens in court, when in reality the story is a bit fabricated.

Also, doing so before the court has a chance to accept or deny Blizzard's request may not help MDY's case at all, and end up costing them.

Re:I have a solution....

Infact, such an act would probably end up with them being held in contempt of court of the original ruling, let alone this case.

Re:I have a solution....

Eventually, they will probably take Microsoft to court and demand that they remove things from the Windows API like ReadProcessMemory, SetWindowsHookEx and even SendKeys.

Re:I have a solution....

How about Blizzard just fixes their software not not allow cheating?

They do this all the time, and people are often banned for using cheats. WowGlider used to actively probe resident memory for the values of variables but now WoW checks for such activity, so Glider sacrificed accuracy for stealth by only passively watching memory and controlling the character based on various criteria. In the eyes of WoW's anti-cheating scheme, Glider really does appear to be ordinary user input - especially when the user stays at they keyboard, occasionally doing some human-like stuff such as chatting with friends.

Re:I have a solution....

It's not a *fix*, it's a design flaw.

From my experience as a MMO designer, battling automated play is actually a huge design problem. In many cases you don't want to do it by changing the code because the time and effort spent to do that are much better spent developing real game features. So in many games people take the easiest route and just outlaw automated gameplay instead of changing the design to make sure it is not possible to benefit much from it. Can't really blame anyone for that.

Still it doesn't change this Blizzard's request being utterly ridiculous. With all my genuine respect to the company, someone must have had a brainfart in this case.

Can they do that?

If the Glider software doesn't contain any copyright infringement (which MDY may be hard-pressed to prove - really, dunno), can Blizzard legally prevent them from Open Sourcing the software? It would seem to me that that's really not going to fly that well.

Re:Can they do that?

They can do whatever they can trick a judge to go along with.

Blizzard Open Source Cheats/Trainers not a Novelty

As I've delved into Diablo 2 once again (after watching the imho downright fantastic gameplay video of Diablo 3) over the last few days, I've seen with some amazement that some of the most widely used Battle.net cheats are actually licensed under the GNU GPL - there's even some kind of application framework for interacting with the game programmatically floating around on the web...
It's really interesting to see such development, because back in the days when I really was into all that gaming stuff, there was hardly ever a way to take a look how some trainer's/cheat's author does thing XY. Cool, in a way. :)

That said, I really, really despise cheating in multiplayer games.

wow,big mistake.

This can not help Blizzard in any way what so ever.

A) Glider isn't exactly hard to create.
B) Makes Blizzard look like bullies..again.
C) Now there are several people who are going to create a clone.
D) It's impact on the game, emotional views aside, isn't really that great.

Stopping Glider is a bandage on a bigger issue they refuse to actually address, farming.
Now, farming isn't nearly as bad as everyone makes it out to be. In MMO's that allowed groups to control areas, it was horrible, but you can't really do that in WoW.

Here are some thing they could do:
1) Don't let anyone mine/pick anything that there skill level makes gray to them.
2) put some random drift into movement.
3) limit the price you can sell something for on the AH to 10 times what a vendor would pay
4) don't allow the transfer of more then 100GP a time. Maybe a one time unlimited amount per month.

All of these would be pretty trivial to implement.

You cannot outlaw bots

Sure, you can ban bots and you can void licenses when you catch someone, but bottom line: People won't stop as long as two criterions are not matched

1. The game is interesting enough to be played instead of botted.
2. The game is complicated enough to make botting pointless.

Why do people bot? Two reasons. First, they're goldfarmers and want to make as much gold as possible without having to do it themselves. And second, some parts of the game are just boring tedium nobody wants to do but has to.

So what all comes down is time sinks. People want to avoid time sinks. They don't want to sit in one spot and farm the same crapmobs for hours to get their $number $item for $quest. That's boring and tedious. They don't want to farm $mob for gold to buy their mount, that's boring and tedious.

Give people what they want to play and you have no problem with bots. Simple as that. When you have a problem with people botting through your game, all it says is that you installed something in the game that should keep the people occupied but they generally hate to do it (aka time sink).

Re:You cannot outlaw bots

"People want to avoid time sinks."

Quote from /. [slashdot.org].

Well done.

CC.

Re:You cannot outlaw bots

I don't think you understand game psychology. There is a crossover between a smooth, slow progression and long-term enjoyability.

If a game had no grind, players would lose interest quickly--the rewards need to be spaced out and not constant. In order for a good experience to stand out from the grind, there has to be a grind.

If you give people "what they want to play", they will not enjoy it at all. I can give you a game that you win at the push of a button--no grind at all. Would that make you happy?

When I used to find myself spending too much time on any game, a truly reliable way to make me sick of it is to cheat--to get everything I want as fast as I want. End of all my interest in the game within a couple days to a week. (this is how I broke my original addictions to Diablo and Diablo years ago)

Sure you think you want to be handed all these things you cheat for, but if that was really all you wanted, why not play single player? There are massive, undetectable cheats for that.

The only reason to cheat on b.net is to compare yourself to people who don't--to somehow give yourself an edge up against those who don't because, hmm, because it makes you feel better about yourself maybe? That's just pathetic.

Think about it for a while. Analyze what you play and why you play it. From your statement you obviously play a lot, but do you ever really think about what you enjoy about gaming? What you really want? Again, from your email, I have to guess no...

it isnt

it doesnt infringe on anyone's copyrights.

the STUPID, the OVERLY MORONIC argument blizzard is using is that the program 'modifies the wow software running in THE MEMORY'.

of course, that is trying to fool the old, senile court judges. everyone who has used computers a bit knows that when a program runs in memory, MANY aspects of it are modified on constant basis, and a few million times a second or more. windows kernel code modifies the wow software running in the memory, wow software ITSELF modifies itself in the memory, its memory footprint changes, it reads and writes data from disk, and to network and modifies itself accordingly.

a computer's memory is something too complicated for a lawyer to fathom. they shouldnt sweat it.

Re:it isnt

Yup, but the problem is that unless it's overturn in appeal, then the judgment stands that this software (in whatever incarnation of licensing) is illegal. Open-sourcing online would basically be a war-call, basically putting it beyond anyone's ability to contain or control. However, doing so might also taint any other projects that make use of the code, as the argument "this software X uses software Y which was already ruled illegal in the courts."

Basically, opening the source would be just be a revenge move. It's good for those that want to mod/hack WoW, but bad for blizzard, not overly beneficial to the creator (not going to make them any cash), and not really beneficial to the image of FOSS community either.

Re:"illegal" open source software

I presume you do realize Blizzard's banning abilities only extend to WoW and that they can't actually ban you from real life?

The software was found not to violate any copyrights. It's not illegal. It only violates Blizzard's terms of service. They're free to ban your account for using the bot, but that's all.

Re:"illegal" open source software

Care to show me how this software is illegal?

It violates the TOS of another software product. That doesn't make the software illegal. I could write in my TOS that you must not run it on Windows, does that make Windows illegal? I kinda doubt it.

It violates the TOS of Blizzard to use the software in combination with WoW, which may void your license. But "illegal"? At least be correct with the terms you use, it's not like there's any lack of term confusion in the vicinity of copyrights, we don't need more people contributing to it.

Re:"illegal" open source software

IANAL, but I think the case is that it's not criminally illegal, but it does offer a basis to file a claim under contract law. If I recall correctly, it is something along the lines of a 3rd party willfully affecting a breach of contract.

Re:"illegal" open source software

It's really complicated. Whether by design or not, contract law is astoundingly complex and sometimes borderline irrational.

The basic point when it comes to 3rd party contract interference is intent. If you make a product or provide a service with the explicit intent of causing a breach of contract, the affected party can file a lawsuit claiming damages or requesting other court intervention.

Re:"illegal" open source software

I was bothered by the guessing involved in my previous answer, so I located the real answer:

(from a presentation based upon a textbook [pearsoncmg.com])

Intentional Interference with Contractual Relations
A tort that arises when a third party induces a contracting party to breach the contract with another party.
The following elements must be shown:
- A valid, enforceable contract between the contracting parties.
- Third-party knowledge of this contract.
- Third-party inducement to breach the contract.

Re:Do it

It's not what they did, it's how they did it. It's a damn shame that they chose to use the insane 'copyright on RAM contents' argument. They did have a reasonably legitimate complaint, since (as I understand it, at least) glider causes problems on their servers which they have authority over. Trying to tell people what they can and can't do with their own game installations on their own machines is an absolute joke, but trying to set terms for what people are allowed to do on a communal service with its own rules is fair enough.

To fulfil Slashdot tradition and make a somewhat clunky and inappropriate car analogy: I can attach rockets to my car and blast along at 300mph on my own land and it's none of the manufacturer's damn business. If I then paid them to take it on their test track which had a rule saying "No rocket cars" they'd be well within their rights to kick me out.

Right distinction, wrong point though.

Blizzard absolutely have a right to control what happens on their servers. Notice though that this injunction is not about their servers. It's about what code is released on the internet - which Blizzard doesn't own.

It's within their right to say "you can't use that code on our servers" - and they have a right to enforce that rule however they please (delete violating accounts or whatever). However, it's clearly not within their right to say "you can't use that code anywhere, or even have it, or even look at it."

Re:Do it

Curiosity... can you justify your argument in any practical way? If a bot plays 10 hours while I'm at work, and a college kid on break plays 10 hours while I'm at work, we both wind up in the same place at the same time. Neither of us has an advantage.

WoW leveling requires exactly zero skill, same with resource acquisition. Since leveling and resource acquisition in WoW is a matter of time expenditure - by design, mind you - why does it matter whether or not a player puts in that time, or a bot does?

Re:Right to Free/Open Speech

No, my rights and yours are universal. The government is involved because we create a government to protect our rights.

This "Conservative" ideology that "our rights apply only to protection from the government" is just wrong. The Constitution specifies, among other protected rights, that we cannot be slaves - prohibiting not just the government from owning slaves. The Constitution of course instructs the government to protect us from robbery, murder and all kinds of other deprivations of our rights.

Our rights are inalienable. Not just inalienable by the government, but by anyone. We create governments to protect us from that alienation, even while the governments we create are themselves not empowered, and often explicitly prohibited to be sure there's no confusion, to deprive us of those rights. But are created with the power to protect our rights.

Re:apparently lawyers are running blizzard now

If they don't want people to automate their games, maybe they should make their games less repetitive... instead of suing and banning people.

Surely, the development costs would be comparable to lawyer costs.