The title says it all. MMO-Champion, at the request of Blizzard, has removed all
Cataclysm alpha content from their site.
Boubouille posted a note on the main page saying that it'll all be back after the NDA is lifted. He and his moderators are also banning anyone who posts screenshots or links to client downloads/servers. We have previously talked about
what an NDA means and how it can be enforced.
Since WoW.com has not been hosting any alpha content, this will not affect our site.
Tags: breaking, cat-beta, cata-beta, cataclysm-beta, cataclysm-game, cataclysm-guide, cataclysm-news, expansion, expansion-three, next-xpac, third-expansion, world-of-warcraft-beta, world-of-warcraft-cataclysm, world-of-warcraft-cataclysm-beta, wow-4.0, wow-4.0.2, wow-beta, wow-cataclysm, wow-cataclysm-beta, wow-expansion, wow-expansion-beta, wow-guide, wow-third-expansion
Filed under: News items, Cataclysm
May 11th 2010 at 8:18PM 
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 7)
BoB May 11th 2010 8:23PM
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!
I love looking at the talent build for the druids! Solarbeam...I so naming my troll "Bulbasaur"
redothree May 11th 2010 8:37PM
Cataclysm alpha was merely a setback!
Banic Rhys May 12th 2010 12:24AM
Lucky for me I saved every last image that was posted on that site.
Greg May 11th 2010 8:26PM
Heehee "request" hahaha funny stuff; I'm sure it was a request :P
DeathPaladin May 11th 2010 8:40PM
Yes, it was a request. And it'll remain a request so long as you do what was requested.
Greg May 11th 2010 8:53PM
In the same way that a man with a gun "requests" your wallet :P. Why of course you don't HAVE to give him your wallet...
N-train May 11th 2010 9:03PM
Does it really matter? :-D
I think the damage (or "damage", if you prefer) has been done, MMO Champ made a "killing" already with this being up for almost a week. Plus it looked to me like everything worth showing was up on the site, and now it was just gonna sit there and chill until open beta.
In the end, I'm no lawyer, but a leak is a leak, and I don't think people who didn't sign an NDA have to follow by those rules. But again, its a gesture of show here, half the WoW world knows about these images already and taking them back won't erase it from people's memories.
Toddo May 11th 2010 9:09PM
I'm sure this "request" also consisted of legal involvement, and not a friendly email by some manager.
Hardly a request...
Hoggersbud May 11th 2010 10:39PM
We humbly request you do what we want or we shall be forced to unleash our horde of lawyers upon you like a pack of Core Hounds upon your meaty flesh.
Please don't make us do that. We'd really hate to get the blood out of the carpet again.
Bronwyn May 11th 2010 11:07PM
I'm with N-train. The people who didn't sign an NDA aren't bound by the same rules, which I believe is why MMO-C posted the stuff in the first place. However, I do think that they like to "play nice" with Blizz so they took the stuff down.
Joshxo May 12th 2010 12:19AM
Here's the deal, Boub didn't sign an nda and prob could've kept the info up, but, I'm sure he has a great relationship with people in blizz who feed him info all the time. To not take down the info he would be risking getting future info and exclusive inside information.
I'm sure blizz gives boub stuff to leak when they want to build hype, this wasn't info they wanted out.
theRaptor May 12th 2010 12:20AM
MMO-C might not be under the Cataclysm alpha NDA but the people who run it play WoW and do have to comply with the EULA and TOS. They might also be caught up in the legal process of trying to trace who did the leak (MMO-C has inside sources that are probably violating their employment contracts), and possibly sued for distributing "trade secrets" or copyright infringement (for the leaked client) or various DMCA charges.
MMO-C would probably legally be alright but they are a hobby site and I doubt the guys who run it want to waste months of their lives and tens of thousands of dollars defending themselves in court.
Just because something is legal doesn't mean you can't be sued for it.
J_hellman69 May 11th 2010 8:40PM
About time. As much fun as finding all this stuff out was, its blizzards content that they worked hard on, and they should have every right to release it how the see fit
Itanius May 11th 2010 11:00PM
What took so long, I wonder? Considering the enormous popularity of MMO Champion, isn't it really too late for any type of damage control?
theRaptor May 12th 2010 12:49AM
Blizzard's lawyers might not be the litigious a-holes that other companies have in their legal department and so might have, you know, checked that they were in the right to send a cease-and-desist letter? Or Blizzard management spent time considering the PR impact of sending the c-n-d?
Their is a reason Blizzard is fairly well regarded by the gaming community and it isn't just because of the quality of their games. Blizzard will bring the RL banhammer down but they don't throw it around casually.
Thundrcrackr May 12th 2010 11:06AM
It did kind of make their daily Cataclysm screenshots pointless. :D
Special K May 12th 2010 11:06AM
Amen. Plus, now I won't be mega tempted to look at spoilers!
Xhris May 12th 2010 11:41AM
Very much agreed with this. I enjoy reading on upcoming stuff as much as the next guy, but MMO-C was really pushing it IMHO. That NDA isn't there just for show, and Blizzard's CnD proves it.
theminifig May 11th 2010 8:26PM
They should have known better.
NDA : Non-Disclosure Agreement.
What do you not understand about that?
They're damn lucky Blizzard didn't come down with their lawyer team.
Falcon6 May 11th 2010 8:29PM
Boub probably thought he was in the clear. He was posting beforehand how he didn't plan to post any alpha screens due to the NDA, and maybe he just didn't see it.
Either way, it created a huge boom of interest for his site (which is already popular enough, I'm sure), and for Blizzard, too...that's why the conspiracy theorist in me thinks Blizzard was just letting them post it for a while, then sent out the NDA, just to create hype. I think this has happened with Wrath before, too.