cmill78 wrote:
I do believe I stated: "The reason why Blizzard can, at any time, come down on a private server (whether the server makes a profit or not) is because they are not only using Blizzard's intellectual property without permission, but allowing players to access the intellectual property on non-official Blizzard servers". So I am not sure why you are pointing out something I already agree with and made comment on.
As it pertains to the EULA/TOS Blizzard has people 'agree' to; I fully understand that EU has different laws regarding stuff like this, but my point was that the EULA/TOS is not irrelevant because if it were, it would not need be part of the process any time a patch or expansion is applied to the game. It may not be the reason Blizzard can attack Nostalirus but it is certainly not irrelevant.
Sorry to say, but in practical terms both of those little things mean next to nothing. EULA/ToS is the same thing as a restaurant/bar code of dressing or conduct. The only sanction they can exert is restricting or terminating the service you get within the confines of the product/service.
In Blizzard's case, the worst they can do is permanently banning your account, which means.... nothing for so many of us who no longer play nor plan to play in retail. My account is at Burning Crusade level, having paid for both vanilla and BC, it has been inactive for years as I have no interest in playing any of the other expansions, nor do I plan to return to it when the world available to me is just 1-70 WoD.
They are welcome to ban it if they want, that's all their little napkin-written rules are worth. They do not result in any legal consequences, not more than entering a black tie restaurant in shorts would or yelling very loudly in a private meeting.
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The reason why players have to accept it everytime, is because by doing so, they accept their retail account has to abide certain rules or it gets banned. That's the extent of it. If they didn't have people sign it, any person who got banned could argue that he never agreed to behave in X or Y form.
That's it. It has no legal repercussions of any kind or sort.
Keep pissing against the wind!