News For Lunch 8/4/08

Posted on August 4, 2008 by Scott Jennings| 16 Comments

This is something new I’m going to try to impose some structure on my bloggery. I expect it to last about 3 days or so. It’s a wrapup of the day’s MMO news by noon Central, in bite-sized portions for your reading pleasure. I liked doing it a lot when I wrote lumthemad.net, because it wasn’t much work. ANYWAY.

MORE ABOUT GOLD FARMING THAN YOU EVER, EVER, EVER, EVER WANTED TO KNOW Courtesy of Terra Nova and someone who had a great idea about making their research paper involve World of Warcraft: “Gold Farming”: Real-World Production in Developing Countries for the Virtual Economies of Online Games

FINALLY, GOVERNMENT ON YOUR SIDE Illinois mandates that MMOs have to have a nice clear cancel button on their web site for when you, you know, want to cancel.  This was done when an Illinois state legislature tried to cancel his son’s Final Fantasy XI account and got hung up on the “come to the Square Enix offices in person, riding a chocobo” step. Thanks to the Internet not having an easy way to distinguish which customers are not in Illinois, expect all MMOs to remove the jumping-through-hoops thing soonest.

GREENSKINS WILL EAT YOUR BANDWIDTH AND/OR PUDDING Mythic puts up a webgame called “Road To War”, which allows you to do various things. I’d say more, but right now the various things it lets you do include seeing a “we’re sorry, our server died from ALL YOU BORED CUBICLE PEOPLE COMING AT ONCE” screen. Note that by the time you read this, it will probably be up and make me look like a blithering idiot, which is fine, because apparently you can get custard. More webgames should give you custard.

That’s it for today. It’s a short lunch. Today’s News For Lunch has been brought to you by McCain for President.

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  • Jimmy

    Your wired.com link in the Square Enix story is fubared, sir.

  • Scott Jennings

    Flixed!

  • http://hgamer.blogspot.com heartless_

    Your poster is incorrect as it should read “Paid for by EUROPE.”

    That is all.

  • Pat

    Does Final Fantasy still have that bullshit where if you cancel your “play online or whatever it was called” account, you have to buy a whole new game if you want to come back?

    Because that was freaking GENIUS. It’s a shame EverQuest has been at this for far longer and they keep making it EASY to come back. If only they knew!

  • faefrost

    While interesting, I can’t see the illinois law actually doing anything. I don’t believe any MMO provider hosts services or has a physical presense in Illinois. And while the law is a good idea, it would need to be passed on a federal level to actually do anything. Any company effected by the law can easily challenge it in Federal court. It would be overturned in a heartbeat as regulating interstate trade is a power reserves exclusively for the federal governments, and states are not allowed to interefer with it.

  • mystery

    The real story behind that Final Fantasy XI story is that …people still play Final Fantasy XI.

  • yunk

    I can’t believe anything got passed in Illinois at all. We still don’t have a budget again this year, (was supposed to done by May 31). We’re a 1 party state too… we make gridlock an artform!

    I’m still waiting for that change that Obama promised. So far it’s just mobbed up crooks running the state. sigh.

  • Iconic

    Square-Enix: Our customer service is even more painful than our game. Because that’s how we like it in Japan.

  • Boanerges

    @yunk: You do realize that Obama was forged in the middle of Illinois politics, right? That change he keeps talking about has “with a vengeance” as an asterisk, Speaks volumes that the IL state legislature is more concerned with canceling an MMO account than pressing state business.

  • yunk

    Yes, I do not necessarily think he’s corrupt, but the company you keep says something about you. He says he’ll change things, but he didn’t change anything here, and instead some of his friends are the biggest crooks in the state, or former terrorists. (his connections to both Rezko and Ayers are more than just standoffish business relationships, but they are close friends, esp with Rezko)

    People say “he had to do business with them to get ahead in Illinois, it means nothing” because our state is so corrupt, but that only makes it worse. It doesn’t mean nothing, it means a lot because Obama is the one claiming he’s different than all the others. Sure, 4-5 years ago the Machine didn’t like him, but that was then.

    Even if he’s not corrupt, if he truly stands for change, why did he associate with scum? Why did he not try to change or reform anything here? Why did he just go with the flow? And if he did that here, how do I know he won’t do the same in DC? Does anyone really think the powerbrokers in DC are going to let him take their power away? Especially when he didn’t even try when he had the chance to in Illinois?

  • Boanerges

    I think you misunderstand. I think that Obama is all about change. As in hard-left-turn change. Obama isn’t about reform or the second-coming image he portrays. He panders so blatantly (public campaign financing anyone?) and so swiftly (with a press that will never seriously question him) that you can’t help but wonder what lies beneath.

    Reform is not part of “change” in Obamaland.

  • Anon

    If you think Obama is anything other than the second coming of triangulating centrist Clintonism, you’re drinking somebody’s Kool-Aid.

    In the primaries, Obama ran on a platform that was to the right of Clinton or Edwards, Iraq notwithstanding, and he’s only cleaved further to the center since then. Obama supporters who think that he’s going to govern as a ‘progressive’ will be disappointed; Obama opposers who think he’s some sort of sinister crypto-Marxist are about as in touch with reality as those who think he’s a Muslim manchurian candidate.

    And the race is his to lose at this point, if “Obama is popular!” and “Obama is a politician!” are the hardest things he’s being hit with by the GOP. If I were the Republicans, I’d place more emphasis on the successful flip-flop strategy of 2004, although McCain isn’t innocent from those charges either. (Which is the same reason why I think they’ve avoided trying to paint Obama as a corrupt Chicago fixer: that’d shine the spotlight on McCain’s past ethical and political irregularities.)

  • http://www.wolfsheadonline.com/ Wolfshead

    You forgot to add that “he’s experienced…” in the picture. You do realize that by the time the election comes around this Novemeber he won’t have spent even 3 full years as a U.S. Senator — and half of that was spent running for president.

    I think Scott has more experience working on MMO’s then Barry Obama has spent in federal politics.

    Lum in 2008!!!

    Now was was the name of that Jimi Hendrix song again?

  • http://wowpanda.blogspot.com wowpanda

    “This was done when an Illinois state legislature tried to cancel his son’s Final Fantasy XI account and got hung up on the “come to the Square Enix offices in person, riding a chocobo” step.” That is funny.

    “I think Scott has more experience working on MMO’s then Barry Obama has spent in federal politics.” That just rocks :-)

    I don’t think experience matters that much though.

  • dieplskthxbai

    I read somewhere that Obamma-san had spent a total of 143 days in the Senate before he kicked off his presidential campaign. Then I went and did some research. Turns out that 143 days is a plausible number. 1 4 3 DAYS. It takes more than than to teach some folks how to change the toilet paper roll when they’re done with it…

    Now, on the other hand, McCain isn’t exactly a breath of fresh air, but he’s actually got some history behind him and we know where he’s been.

    Personally, I’ll be voting for an (I) candidate or not at all. This 2-party political system crap’s retarded…

    I mean really, the last time that we heard something about “…for the party…” it was only echoed by the sound of the Berlin Wall coming down in the background. Demos or Repubs doesn’t matter, they’re still go to the same beltway strip clubs with the same corrupting influences as their cross-aisle counterparts. It’s just a question of which rights you’d like to lose first, really.

    Republicans will come for your womens rights and your social welfare systems.

    Democrats will come for your guns and your God.

    And both will support waterboarding, in the end.

    Funny, it seems to me that we as a nation have already lost something which we’ll never get back. But at least we can bury ourselves in our MMO’s and not have to actually *watch* it happening to us all at once, right?

    Thank God for Amsterdam.

  • blachawk

    ‘Illinois state legislature”

    OK I’ll be a dick. Don’t you mean legislator?