#0 - July 8, 2010, 4:39 p.m.
There are still a lot of people who look down on and criticize gamers, and especially gamers who play World of Warcraft. Obviously WoW has changed a lot since vanilla and it's more casual players friendly, but it still has the reputation as the game the "ruins people's lives". Obviously that's a stereotype (one that I consider for the most part to be false), but it's still there. I'm not ashamed to play this game, and I tell people that I do, but some people (especially people with high paying and powerful jobs) could get public criticism for playing this game if their name was ever found on a forum. Any celebrities (WoW celebrities, or otherwise) may not want people to know everytime they make an opinion on something, because they could receive a lot of backlash from it.
There are still children who play this game. I don't have kids, but if I did I don't think I would be comfortable with them posting their real first and last name. Especially if someone who knew them "outed" them as kids, they could receive the negative remarks generally associated with children playing this game.
Women who play this game are still jumped upon (for the most part) whenever anyone finds out their gender. My wife plays this game, and has received sexist remarks on several occasions. Not to mention the fact that many "hard core" players refuse to accept the fact that she knows how to play the game just as well (or better) than they can. Real ID on forums would force women to reveal their gender publicly, and may cause people to, unfairly, discredit and ignore what they say. Just to be clear I'm not saying women don't know how to play. I know several who are better players than I am.
Lastly, and the part that bothers me the most is the fact that people who post for Technical Support on the forums are going to be forced to use Real ID. If you were only going to be forced to use your real first and last name on the other forums EXCEPT the Technical Support Forums, then I would be OK with it. Then people who were uncomfortable with posting could just not post. But if people are no longer comfortable with using the Technical Support Forums then there could be problems. I've used to Technical Support Forums before and more often than not the answer is buried in there somewhere. But it people are no longer comfortable to ask questions there (for the reasons stated above), and they must go to secondary websites and forums then I think players as a whole will suffer. We should be able to get all our questions answered, and problems fixed from within the WoW community and from Blizzard staff without fear of reprisal.
There were a few other reasons we discussed, but these were the main ones. Overall I think that Real ID on the forums will restrict people and make a lot of people uncomfortable to post. I think that some people (including myself) will just stop posting on the forums, which will lower the overall ingenuity, controversy, and community that you can currently find there. I'm not saying that as a threat, "if you don't fix this, then I'm never posting here again!". I'm not saying that at all. I just know that there are several more who have the same concerns I do, and feel they should be heard. Personally I would rather weather a bit of trolling before giving out private information that I wouldn't give to most of my guild mates. Real ID should be something we're willing to share with our friends, instead of having to be "outed" on a gaming forum.
Thank-you Blizzard staff for this great game, and I hope you take these concerns into account. Until Real ID these posts will be signed:
Zarrakk
