Comments on: Blizzard abandons DMCA threat over 'WoW' manual

Video game maker drops copyright complaints over eBay sale of "World of Warcraft" guide after advocacy group steps in.

[wowseller]

I did it for everyone

I did this for everyone, I could have settled with it all in my favor but I was willing to take it all the way to help out everyone, not just me. My site is http://www.ultimatewowguide.i8.com for those interested.

[bobby_brady]

Good to see the little guy stick up for our rights

esp since the DMCA was created and designed to slowly take away our rights.

[wowseller]

correction

by the comment

"I could have settled with it all in my favor but I was willing to take it all the way to help out everyone, not just me."

I meant I could have settled with the settlement in only my favor, not other peoples.

[LosDLosD]

Should've gone further

I don't understand why you didn't take it further, they should be severely punished for taking away your rights... They didn't even pay your or the group's expenses in this did they? :(

I wish you luck in your sales of the guide, if nothing else, maybe it at least got you a bit of extra sales on the attention from this (I'd have bought one, if I played WoW)

[leftfrog]

You rock!

Thanks for standing up to Blizzard! I hate companies that try and push the little guys around. I went through the same thing a few years ago when Hyperion tried to take my (then) long time domainname hyperion.com away from me. It felt great to stand up to them and win (they now have the domain, after buying it off me). The message to everyone is this: stand up for yourself, and they can't push you around!

[wowseller]

I did it for everyone

I did this for everyone, I could have settled with it all in my favor but I was willing to take it all the way to help out everyone, not just me. My site is http://www.ultimatewowguide.i8.com for those interested.

[bobby_brady]

Good to see the little guy stick up for our rights

esp since the DMCA was created and designed to slowly take away our rights.

[wowseller]

correction

by the comment

"I could have settled with it all in my favor but I was willing to take it all the way to help out everyone, not just me."

I meant I could have settled with the settlement in only my favor, not other peoples.

[LosDLosD]

Should've gone further

I don't understand why you didn't take it further, they should be severely punished for taking away your rights... They didn't even pay your or the group's expenses in this did they? :(

I wish you luck in your sales of the guide, if nothing else, maybe it at least got you a bit of extra sales on the attention from this (I'd have bought one, if I played WoW)

[leftfrog]

You rock!

Thanks for standing up to Blizzard! I hate companies that try and push the little guys around. I went through the same thing a few years ago when Hyperion tried to take my (then) long time domainname hyperion.com away from me. It felt great to stand up to them and win (they now have the domain, after buying it off me). The message to everyone is this: stand up for yourself, and they can't push you around!

[zaznet]

Glad to see this one over with...

While some will complain that he should have kept fighting this wasn't a type of class action suite so no real benefit would hit anyone but the plaintiff. That said, the litigation and settlement have forced the gaming industry to take a step back and look at their attitudes towards unofficial vendors of related products.

While officially licensed products can make good money for a company like Blizzard they aren't always the best source of information. Hopefully the settlement establishes a precedent that Blizzard and others will continue to follow that allows small independent companies to profit within this and other markets associated with games.

One such market I would like to see go further is the mod market. There are mod designers who create original 3D and 2D art as well as audio and music tracks for games. This is a labor of love but is also worth a lot of money if utilized correctly. Most video game license agreements limit you from being able to sell a mod for the game. This is preventing you from profiting on your own work but does result in more profits for the original game developer. Take a look at how far Half Life went with all the mods people created for it. Valve made a lot of money selling the original game so that players could use a mod that went on top of it that Valve had no part in producing. At the same time, those who put their time and energy into the mod were prevented from making anything out of their work.

[zaznet]

Glad to see this one over with...

While some will complain that he should have kept fighting this wasn't a type of class action suite so no real benefit would hit anyone but the plaintiff. That said, the litigation and settlement have forced the gaming industry to take a step back and look at their attitudes towards unofficial vendors of related products.

While officially licensed products can make good money for a company like Blizzard they aren't always the best source of information. Hopefully the settlement establishes a precedent that Blizzard and others will continue to follow that allows small independent companies to profit within this and other markets associated with games.

One such market I would like to see go further is the mod market. There are mod designers who create original 3D and 2D art as well as audio and music tracks for games. This is a labor of love but is also worth a lot of money if utilized correctly. Most video game license agreements limit you from being able to sell a mod for the game. This is preventing you from profiting on your own work but does result in more profits for the original game developer. Take a look at how far Half Life went with all the mods people created for it. Valve made a lot of money selling the original game so that players could use a mod that went on top of it that Valve had no part in producing. At the same time, those who put their time and energy into the mod were prevented from making anything out of their work.