World of Warcraft just announced the Community Discords Program–a new way for Discord servers to bridge the gap between fan and developer–for its European community. However, joining this new program requires World of Warcraft fans to accept a lengthy agreement with some shady provisions in it.
EU players can sign their Discord servers up for the Community Discord through a relatively simple process. Once a server is approved and added to the program, members can benefit from direct presence from Blizzard community managers on their Discord. These servers may also benefit from other intermittent rewards, such as support for events and giveaways, Dev Q&As, avenues to provide feedback, interviews, and even early beta access to World of Warcraft products in the future.
That said, in order to join this program, fans must accept the Program Member Agreement. This contract is 16 pages worth of legal jargon one would normally expect from a ToS, but several questionable provisions can be found within the document. Program members must install bots and tracking software on their servers, which Blizzard reserves the right to use to scrape data and use it as they wish. Most concerningly, members of these servers can’t say anything negative about Blizzard or its products–a provision that doesn’t end if the agreement is terminated.
Were that not enough, World of Warcraft members who join this program also have to agree to never interface with any unions or similar guilds. Doing so results in a fine, plus “unlimited editing rights” on anything offered to the union. Considering the wording used in this provision, it seems clear Blizzard would try to punish players working with unions far more severely than the minimum $100 listed in it should players breach this part of the contract.
As one might imagine, players are not happy with World of Warcraft’s Discords Community Program. World of Warcraft fan and founder of the Acherus Death Knight community Magdalena vocally opposed the initiative, citing it as predatory and overly-controlling. They have no intention of joining the program, and encourage other World of Warcraft communities to read the ToS closely before applying.
Interestingly enough, this program is currently only available for European World of Warcraft fans at press time. It remains to be seen if Blizzard will try to launch the Community Discords Program for fans in the US or other parts of the world. If it does, hopefully World of Warcraft listens to the community and removes these troubling provisions before trying to implement the program to fans worldwide.
World of Warcraft is available now on PC
Source: World of Warcraft