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Isn't selling gold.... illegal ?
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Post by
Toxiciity
You know, 'your friend' is lucky, normally when you buy gold, you also buy a nice hack. Tell him to suck it up for trying to go around Blizzard, and accept his stupidity.
What ? when you buy gold you never turn your account over
Post by
91278
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
ChairmanKaga
Your use of "sane" implies that you don't think Blizzard should have a right of ownership to the virtual things they have created.
What do they own, exactly? Some ones and zeroes. If you call the police and say some guy scammed you out of gold in WoW, you're going to get laughed at and hung up on. Not necessarily in that order.
If it was as clear cut as you seem to think it is, the courts would have ruled on it long ago. The MMO genre has been around a lot longer than WoW and gold sellers are not anything new.
Post by
Xiamaru
Your use of "sane" implies that you don't think Blizzard should have a right of ownership to the virtual things they have created.
What do they own, exactly? Some ones and zeroes. If you call the police and say some guy scammed you out of gold in WoW, you're going to get laughed at and hung up on. Not necessarily in that order.
If it was as clear cut as you seem to think it is, the courts would have ruled on it long ago. The MMO genre has been around a lot longer than WoW and gold sellers are not anything new.
You don't understand Law, obviously.
Otherwise, sure, I will just crack the latest Windows 7 Ultimate pack. Hey, all they claim to own are ones and zeroes, the police will obviously just laugh at Microsoft if they called because you stole that. /Sarcasm
You logic is flawed at best. Ones and zeroes aren't something you can own, but the form which they take when used in programming is. As these ones and zeroes in WoW are part of the game, World of Warcraft, Blizzard do indeed own it, and have all rights to it. Misusing these codes, how insignificant it may seem to you, matters to them.
Post by
Interest
You know, 'your friend' is lucky, normally when you buy gold, you also buy a nice hack. Tell him to suck it up for trying to go around Blizzard, and accept his stupidity.
What ? when you buy gold you never turn your account over
When you go to the site you frequently get keylogged.
Post by
Xiamaru
You know, 'your friend' is lucky, normally when you buy gold, you also buy a nice hack. Tell him to suck it up for trying to go around Blizzard, and accept his stupidity.
What ? when you buy gold you never turn your account over
When you go to the site you frequently get keylogged.
Only applies if you computer lack proper Spyware and/or anti-virus programs. Get an Authenticator, and such sites wont be able to hack your account either way.
Post by
212003
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
91278
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Dosha
Buying or selling gold is not illegal. It is just against Blizzard's terms of service. You can buy all the gold your heart desires and never get into any legal trouble as far as the government goes. And if you pay for a service and dont recive it you can sue the company but in this case you will not win and will waste more money trying to sue. There is no way you can prove you did not recive the gold.
Post by
pezz
PS: If it
were
, not if it was. Such clauses use the subjunctive.
To be fair, the use of 'were' in the singular in subjunctive clauses is one for the very long list of 'English grammar rules that are wholly inexplicable.'
Post by
91278
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Squishalot
Blizz ToS (Gold selling part, that is) isn't really recognized as "breaking the law" outside of it's own services
Actually, the gold selling companies are selling a commodity to which they do not have any legal claim. WoW gold is, like everything else in WoW, Blizzard's property. In simple terms, they are selling stolen goods.
I wouldn't call it stolen, as blizzard is giving full permission to use it as they please, so long as they pay and abide by the terms.
It's more like selling a rented car.
I'm glad someone brought up the rented car analogy.
Please note - the gold sellers are not 'selling' the gold. In essence, Blizzard owns the gold, and gives people permission to use it. What the gold sellers are doing is giving you the permission to use the gold that they currently have permission to use.
Metaphorically speaking, they are allowing you to drive the rental car that they've got, for a fee. Because their rental car is nicer than your current rental car.
As a result, they are not selling goods, as they make no claims about the gold being your property post-transaction. This is why they use the disclaimer to say that they are selling time, not the gold, because the gold is not theirs to sell. This prevents them from being sued by governments for selling stolen property.
It also prevents them from being sued by people for non-receipt of gold due to Blizzard intercepting the transaction.
I know that there are a lot of really small random companies that are ISO9000 compliant. It wouldn't surprise me to find a gold selling company that farms gold legitimately that can produce audited logs of game time spent farming gold for each client and sent to them. An unedited video of the gold being sent would be evidence on the balance of probabilities, the minimum evidence requirement for many civil torts jurisdictions around the world.
Having said that, none of that prevents Blizzard from banning you, regardless. But I think Blizzard's apparent approach of intercepting, removing the gold and leaving your account untouched is better - longer subscriptions (accounts that are permabanned pay no money), gold farmers continue their subscriptions, and the gold being confiscated acts as yet another needed gold sink. It's win win for Blizzard.
Post by
281768
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
Squishalot
Having said that, none of that prevents Blizzard from banning you, regardless. But I think Blizzard's apparent approach of intercepting, removing the gold and leaving your account untouched is better - longer subscriptions (accounts that are permabanned pay no money), gold farmers continue their subscriptions, and the gold being confiscated acts as yet another needed gold sink. It's win win for Blizzard.
I disagree, the $30 dollars spent getting a new CD key is worth more than a one month recurring subscription. This new account after one month also then goes on to spend 15$.
You're assuming that the type of person who buys gold will be willing to grind their characters back up to 85.
Post by
lonewarrior
I am 100 % certain that people who honestly believe only "stupid players" gets hacked, have never tried getting hacked themselves.
I know someone who got hacked, who possess several anti-spyware/virus programs, never uses the internet browser for anything but flash games like Kongregate, (not even Wowhead O_o), who still got hacked. Likewise, couple of weeks ago, my brother got hacked too, and curiously, he was in posssession of an Authenticator.
Now, as much as I love the line "ONLI SDUPID PPL GET HAXXED, HAHA NooB" people like to throw around, the sheer stupidity of those comments pretty much invalidate anything else you have to say, how right it might otherwise have sounded. But hey, if you really want to be threated like an idiot, go ahead and presume the worst.
In the end, I don't think Blizzard would file lawsuits of any kind to all who deals with these things, buy or sell. It's like internet Piracy. Sony files a few, maybe 100.000 cases, were only maybe 30.000 are actually responded to. They then leave the rest alone, and take the other cases through court. They don't do this to make up for the loss they recieved. They do it only to make an example - to inspire a certain amount of "fear" in the populace of those sites, in order to make them stop with what they are doing.
Now a ban, that's a whole other story. I have once gotten a ban scheduled to be 6 months long, because of "Dubious contact with Gold Sellers". This dubious contact being me writing a reply to someone asking if I wanted to buy gold: "Of course, I'd LOVE to pay you for your service of allowing me to perma-ban your annoying spam-bot" (which I have macro'd on all character for easy reply, regardless of where I am, and regardless of the otherwise obvious fact that they probably wont even see the message), followed by a "report spam" click.
Blizzard can, and will, ban you. They need but the slightest idea you might, possibly, in the near future, or maybe even in the past, have had illegal contact with gold sellers. The banners mood most likely determines how easily your account is banned. Likewise for removing the ban - it may or may not require convincing of the employee you get in contact with. Some of them don't even ask questions, and simply unban your account. Others outright refuse, and would gladly spend half an hour asking questions, trying to dig up a confession that you did something you weren't allowed to do. As already stated, our nice ToA pretty much allows Blizzard to Permaban all accounts on all servers without warning, and we wouldn't be able to do #$%^ about it. Granted, that's very bad for business, which is why they don't even ban all accounts who are only "suspected" of gold selling.
I gotta say, I'm glad Blizzard takes interest in us. Blizzard really couldn't care less about this whole gold selling thing. Why? At best, it allows them to charge us a few months more from people farming for gold in order to get some epic mount of equally, but let's be honest here - Those people that care about that, would have stayed anyway. I actually believe Blizzard is only maintaining ADDITIONAL accounts by having Gold Sellers plague the game. This means the only reason Blizzard even cares, if because it makes us, the players who truly care about the game, happy. I can't see it in any other way, and if someone else can, feel free to enlighten me. I just fail to see where Blizzard loses anything.
Hate to quote such a huge post but anyway, I wouldn't quite call it stupidity...more like naivety or ignorance. You can't claim a person never did anything and got hacked. Somewhere along the line someone, whether knowingly or unknowingly, compromised the account.
Take a panoramic view of the situation and realize that accounts that are stolen are directly attacked for that sole purpose.
Think about it for a second...if it were a run of the mill private info stealer..he wouldn't announce himself in your computer..he would quietly stay stealth trying to steal as much personal info as he could(ie..credit cards,bank accounts). This crook isn't going to steal a worthless WoW account and lose access to your more valuable info.
The people targeting accounts want it specifically for the one tangible thing they can sell for real cash....gold. The ability to steal accounts has to be aided by the potential target. If these goons could do it all by themselves everyone would get hacked. If these guys could really infiltrate any computer, do you think they would waste their time stealing WoW accounts. O.o
Sorry..it doesn't work that way...thank god.
Your bro had and Authenticator...those can be hacked. There is old WoWhead post eluding to it.
Anti-everything...only if it's up 100% percent of the time. Use something like game booster and allow it to turn off your protection and then forget to restore normal mode before you browse and your protection is compromised. Even if it is up all the time, it's still no guarantee.
I agree we shouldn't call people stupid. But you want to tell me "I know someone who never did anything wrong and got hacked" well sorry to have to be the one to burst your bubble, but someone did do something wrong.
Post by
83344
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Post by
468639
This post was from a user who has deleted their account.
Post by
lonewarrior
lonewarrior, authenticators can't be "hacked". The codes can be intercepted by man-in-the-middle attacks, but that's much different from hacking. What most people call "hacking" is really just phishing, keylogging, and man-in-the-middle attacks, which are much simpler than breaking into Blizzard's systems just to get the login info for accounts.
Your right...but I'm just using the generic term being thrown around. Hacked=(compromised,stolen..etc)
Post by
Squishalot
I don't know much about econmy, law, or politics
This shows in your examples and your argument. Example 1 is illogical. $10 becomes $10 on your credit card? Huh?
Suppose you have $10 in your bank account. Bank starts off with $10 in cash, so there is $20 in the economy.
1) Spend $10 on your credit card. Bank still has $10 in assets (what you owe it), and loses the $10 in cash because it pays your bill, you owe bank $10, you have $10 in your bank account.
2) Withdraw $10 from your bank account. Bank has $10 in assets (what you owe it), you owe bank $10, you have $10 in cash.
3) Repay bank with the $10 cash. Bank still has $10 in assets (in cash), you have what you purchased.
On the seller's side:
1) You spent $10 on your credit card. Bank remits payment to Gold Seller's bank account.
2) ... that's it. Gold seller has $10.
Net result: Bank still has $10 in cash. You are $10 poorer. Gold seller is $10 richer. You have 100g on your character, being what you purchased. No economy crashing or anything. The cash economy still has $20 in it. No money was created or destroyed in the process.
There is nothing illegal about Blizzard selling game currency to people, or in fact, anybody selling game currency to people. The cash goes out of your pocket and into someone else's pocket. There is no requirement to have Blizzard be able to refund cash back to people for in-game money.
In fact, consider Second Life. There was actually an exchange rate between Linden Dollars and US Dollars that was well known and advertised. You could purchase in-game currency for real cash, and you could sell in-game currency for real-life money to other players via an currency exchange broker. Although this had other in-game implications (due to players setting up banking institutions in-game), such an arrangement isn't illegal, as far as I'm aware. The fact that the LindeX has survived the scrutiny that was applied in the wake of the in-game banking Ponzi scheme suggests that it's perfectly legal from a US law perspective.
Post by
lonewarrior
Alright...I'm confused...I understand that we can make a business for practically anything for america...and there are SOOOOO many gold sites these days...But isn't selling gold illegal ? Can't the gold site owners be arrested / sued for having such a business?
Personally, I wish Blizz would just fight the bill and finally just sell gold themselves (if they are not illegal doing it already) they'd make SO much money it'd be insane. Something simple like "realm transfer a character and get 100g free" or " $10=100g per" would make an excellent bargain imo.
Reason why Blizz will not allow this is because it goes against some kind of goverment law. You see, money can be reconfigured worldwide into anything, you can change 1000 zeni in Japan into 100 dollars in America and vice versa.
Thing is money cannot be reconfigured into something non physical without it being reconfigured into something physcial again.
Hard to udnerstand heres an example:
Example 1:
$10 becomes----> $10 on your credit card--> credit card goes to bank------> your bank now has $10 of account money----you withdraw $10 from your bank account, you now have $10 in your pocket. Bank gets paid you get repaid, everybody wins.
Example2:
You have $10---->10$ is on your credit card----> $10 goes to gold selling people for 100 gold -----> your WoW Character now has obtained 100g. Money cycle ends and only person who wins is your WoW character
Only way Example 2 can work without ruining the economy is by allowing players to refund their gold back to Blizzard for cash. But if they do that then it would be making gold a part of the world economy since money would then be allowed to be reconfigure into WoW spending gold and back, it would also open the network for other unrelated economies to merge causing the economy to become unstable (though this could also open up job possibilities), if anything it could be a bit messy starting off with an unpatterned economical future one the world cannot afford at this time.
I don't know much about econmy, law, or politics but this is the basic reason why Blizz refuses to make sellling gold illegal or why they themselves are not allowed to do it. And imo, the only way to make it even close to legal is to allow it in only one country so the merging of WoW gold and that countries money will not primarily effect the world economy (though any country will effect the world economy one way or the other this way is the least immediate effective, negatively).
Sorry...but this hurt my head.
A) example 1..you don't get repaid since you had to remove $10 dollars from your bank account. Your down $10. Also who ever you spent the $10 on when you used your credit card..they get the money. they continue to spend it cycle continues. In example 2 the gold sellers get the $10..they can spend it too...cycle continues. Ugh....
As for why they don't allow for gold selling...what are you going to spend it on?
Theoretically, if everyone just bought gold there would be nothing to spend it on.
It would remove the incentive to go out and do supply side professions(mining,skinning herbalism) and crafting professions. If everyone could just buy gold why bother to level anything.
Those that did provide mats would be able to charge exorbitant prices. Crafting gear will follow. The WoW economy would tank. Your gold becomes useless.
Making gold is a vital component of this game. People supply stuff...craft stuff...sell stuff. It builds an economy. This is not a shootem' up game. If you can't do it..then go play something like COD.
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