unforum

[Syncopal]

Acti/Blizz and Real ID

[catherwood-offline]

Re: Acti/Blizz and Real ID

[Trillian]

Thanks for pointing out that discussion, I have only begun reading the thread but I'm already fascinated/horrified. I'm no Blizzard customer but even the mention of such plans would drive me away from them. Not only from their forum but also from their products.

[Syncopal]

Re: Acti/Blizz and Real ID

[Agent Lex]

As an aside, if you're all comfortable with it I'd like to know whether each poster who states their opinion here is male or female. Of course, since this is all about privacy I'm not about to go and tell you to do this, but it's a curiosity thing.

The reason I say this is basically because this is an issue that I think men and women have somewhat different standpoints on. As a man, I've never given a second thought to privacy issues such as this and still don't. Thus I'm apparently so far the only person in this thread who'd be happy to keep posting here if full names were suddenly a requirement. But I know that for women it's a different story, and more importantly a side I can never experience. Are there any women out there who would be fine attaching their name to posts, or is it just men?

As for part 2 of the question, I think initially online activity in general would face a massive slump if giving one's name with every online action were somehow enforced. But people would gradually start coming back. Probably not all, but most.

[Nighthawk]

I'm going to change my real name to be "Forum Administrator".

[Syncopal]

Agent Lex wrote:

[Pixiestix]

This is only half a win. While the forums will remain anon by using the basic suggestion MANY people have given Blizz, RealID still is in the game. As of the last thing I heard, it is still an opt out program, rather than opt in. There are still flaws allowing scripts that pull you RealID info for other users {including add-ons} without you being aware. They have still patnered with Facebook with intentions to become a social networking like experience. The privacy issues are still there - just not on the forums.

[Syncopal]

[Trillian]

[catherwood]

Here's another blog entry about the issue: Editorial: Don't forget Real ID's true goal

I've had this question of identy pop up before. I remember being accused of hiding behind a fake identity because I wanted to write something on a public [something, i can't remember now what] without giving my real name as the author. There's this notion that my avatar name is "fake", and that I can have only one "real" identity, one known to my employers and my government and my grocery store frequent buyer's club card. Well, dudes, I have multiple identities, all equally real, and I would welcome a universal login system that would help me present a consistent profile across all of my online haunts -- as long as I can remain catherwood (lowercase, too, please). That name has a history, a reputation, etc. ... (ok, i'm begining to rant and preach now, [/soapbox])

[Syncopal]

[MageSteff]

Would I post my real name.... probably not. I have a unique spelling to my first name that makes me more locatable than say someone who's name is Bob Smith.

@ Lex, I'm female, and that probably does affect my view as wackos (not people registered at this community, but lurkers who may have bad ideas) may try to prey on women, or on children. I also have a problem with RL ID for children as that is also an issue (wackos preying on them), and kids do play Blizzard games.

I also am worried about Identity Theft. I had someone steal my name and info once - a woman with a child running from an abusive spouse/boyfriend - she stayed at a woman's shelter and gave them my mother's name and phone number -and the shelter called her to check on if I arrived there safely needless to say my mom called me and quizzed me on her apparent grandchild! Thankfully nothing worse than that happened - and I would have allowed her to use my name if she had asked, but she didn't.

I do not think that Space would ever require people to use RL ID here, so I don't see that as an issue.