| Mail |
You might also like: WoW Insider, Massively, and more

Reader Comments (33)

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 7:12PM johnegold said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
I'm glad Blizzard was cool about it. It would've been odd because they never get mad over mods.

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 7:15PM RageOverdose said

  • 1 heart
  • Report
@johnegold

But they get pissed when it comes to IP.

Look at them in South Korea with the Brood War pro-scene, they've already started suing.

But it's good to see Blizzard not trying to destroy the mod. Too bad advertising it will be difficult, but if he changes the name then maybe it won't be so bad.
Reply

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 7:30PM Faenix said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
@RageOverdose

Cant blame them for protecting there IP
Reply

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 8:16PM Invigilator said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
@RageOverdose

If you don't protect the IP, you lose it.

Blizzard's incredible success is based on three IPs: Starcraft, Warcraft and Diablo. They can't afford to mess around with the IPs.

Hell, look at DOTA: was always a mod of a Blizzard game, only Valve thought they could zoom in and ninja the trademark. Blizzard should have had it trademarked first.
Reply

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 11:47PM RageOverdose said

  • Half a heart
  • Report
@Invigilator

It's kind of insulting to get downvoted for some odd reason then have two people confirm what I said, it's like insulting my intelligence or something.

Yeah, Blizzard is very protective of their IP's, I said that...Do people think I'm against it or something?


Reply

Posted: Jan 21st 2011 1:04PM Dismissile said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
@Invigilator

"If you don't protect the IP, you lose it."

I'm tired of this uninformed response. This only applies to trademarks. You don't lose your copyrights just because you don't sue someone into oblivion for making a tribute mod.
Reply

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 7:14PM KazamaSogetsu said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
Blizzard is cool about it, I bet the knee-jerk reaction came from Activision.

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 7:23PM ironneko said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
@KazamaSogetsu

Should be Actiblindness, honestly.
Reply

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 7:50PM BrianH said

  • 2.5 hearts
  • Report
@KazamaSogetsu

doesnt matter what activision thinks, activision does not own blizzard, it's a partnership, and blizzard is still pretty much to itself.
Reply

Posted: Jan 21st 2011 9:50AM tBanzai said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
@BrianH
Tell that to the CEO Activision planted into Blizzard.
Reply

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 7:15PM BIGGIESIZE89 said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
Im happy that Blizzard came out and explained their intentions so well. Thus story has ended on a very good note.

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 7:17PM stamps79 said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
Ryan, I think you should take a trip to Blizzard and if hired on, maybe you'll be apart of a team working on another MMO ( cough Star Craft)

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 7:59PM Gritzor said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
Where?
Reply

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 7:32PM SuperWoody64 said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
I bet Kotick is having a seizure right now.

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 7:41PM Lambrick said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
HA! like that guy would ever want to work with Riot Games if he got an offer from Blizzard.

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 7:43PM Shig said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
Good to see that Blizzard is cool about this whole thing, initial reports were a bit strange.

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 7:48PM The Joy of Cooking DeMat said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
And Ryan went to the Blizzard campus. Everybody there loved his work, and he loved the place there: he was a perfect fit. Suddenly, he was called to the building's top floor, so he went.

Once there, the receptionist smiled at him.
"Mr. Winzen, glad to meet you." she said, taking off her glasses and untying her gorgeous brown hair. He couldn't help but glance at her beautiful natural breasts while she did so. She stood up, and shook his hand. "I'm Steph. Mr. Morhaime is waiting for you inside."
"Th-thanks." Ryan said. He was sure that he was blushing.
-----
Ryan Winzen was now outside the Blizzard campus. He couldn't believe it. He had just been hired by Blizzard Entertainment, and met a beautiful woman to boot. He was reminscing about when he was first telling his friends about his idea to mod WoW to transform it into a StarCraft MMO, when he suddenly noticed a little piece of paper sticking out of his right pocket. He grabbed it, and read it. The paper had the name "Steph" written into it in black pen, and underneath it, a phone number.

Ryan smiled, and wandered off. Wandered off... into the future.

-----
"Thank you for the report, Mr. Smith." a man said, without turning around. He was still staring through the window that covered most of his office's back wall.

When the shoken up Mr. Smith left, the man, still without turning around, tightened his grip on the pen he was distractedly playing with. Suddenly, the hand holding the pen changed into a fist, and the pen broke under it's strength. The man now turned around, a furious expression on his face. Bobby Kotick was not amused.

Bobby Kotick was not amused at all.

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 7:57PM Drakkenfyre said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
"his idea to mod WoW to transform it into a StarCraft MMO"

It was a StarCraft 2 mod.
Reply

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 8:07PM MEMgrizzlies7 said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
@Drakkenfyre Wow, way to just rain on his parade. I thought it was a pretty great story.
Reply

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 8:19PM Drakkenfyre said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
Because stopping misconceptions now is how we avoid a thousand people a few weeks from now going "He was making a mod for WoW!"
Reply

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 8:32PM Special Agent Bob said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
@The Joy of Cooking DeMat
not gonna lie that was one of greatest and most well thought comments i have ever seen in a joystiq post, Bravo sir, Bravo indeed.
Reply

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 8:40PM dakoe3 said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
@The Joy of Cooking DeMat
lol what an anticlimactic ending.
Reply

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 8:45PM The Joy of Cooking DeMat said

  • 3 hearts
  • Report
@Drakkenfyre
...Shit.
Reply

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 8:28PM naginalf said

  • Half a heart
  • Report
See, Blizzard gets it. Microsoft gets it. What's up Sony? Anyone else see the correlation here. Independent developement = happy customers. Suing people after not having the foresight to predict a need for independent developement and having to do constant updates = angry customers, just look at all the angry customers on any geohot article's comments section, and I don't just mean people angry at Sony.

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 8:44PM naginalf said

  • Half a heart
  • Report
See, Blizzard gets it. Microsoft gets it. What's up Sony? Anyone else see the correlation here. Independent developement = happy customers. Suing people after not having the foresight to predict a need for independent developement and having to do constant updates = angry customers, just look at all the angry customers on any geohot article's comments section, and I don't just mean people angry at Sony.

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 9:11PM Xupmatoih said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
@naginalf See? Joystiq Doesn't get it. We are sick of the "Ads before Ads" on the vids and the cruel, cruel, Double-Posting.
Reply

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 9:17PM naginalf said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
@Xupmatoih That was my fault, sorry, I was perusing more than one tab at once and hit back on this one and thought I hadn't hit submit yet.
Reply

Posted: Jan 20th 2011 10:27PM 2late2die said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
Such an awesome story. The guy gets invited to visit Blizzard (mind you, as I understand they didn't mention a potential job interview, just campus visit) and possibly work for Riot. It's pretty much every modders dream. Good on him.

Posted: Jan 21st 2011 12:21AM Zeratul said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
Just going to throw out that the knee-jerk reaction was actually YouTube's part. YouTube automatically scans videos for copyright content and handles it according to a blanket decision by the company who owns the rights. In this case, Activision probably has "auto-takedown" set as their choice for content going online, and this fell under that net.

Posted: Jan 21st 2011 5:14AM Shinchi said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
AND there you go boys and girls, if you Really want to get into the Gaming Industry follow this mans foot steps.

Posted: Jan 21st 2011 6:49AM hiruuamon said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
I didn't know they had World of Starcraft trademarked...okay...so he just needs to modify the name on the mod and repost this stuff on youtube. I think it's going to be critical to continue to post the info on youtube to keep us abreast of how things are progressing. Blizzard was somewhat stuck, since they DID provide the tools and encourage people to mod the game.

Posted: Jan 21st 2011 8:05AM KvanCetre said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
Can't wait to see the senseless hate from Massively readers on this one.

But but but REAL ID AND SPARKLEPONY!

Posted: Jan 21st 2011 1:13PM Starsmore said

  • 2 hearts
  • Report
Ryan Winzen was offered a trip to Blizzard HQ, which he took them up on... but he never returned.

When contacted for a statement, a Blizzard PR rep said that Mr Winzen was kind, but declined their offer for a job, instead deciding to become a hermit and live in a cave.

"It's not like we killed him and mounted his head on Kotick's wall or anything..." the rep was quoted as saying.

Featured Stories

Engadget

Engadget

TUAW

TUAW

Massively

Massively

WoW

WoW