WoW streamers who "sell" weakauras

[Specialka]

If ethics mattered in business, our entire economy as we know it would collapse.

A little ethic would not hurt but you would not understand. With ppl like you, if there was no law against rape, it would not bother you to practice it. That's a shame.

[Dylamoo]

This isn't petty at all . Honestly if that's how a lot of people feel. The people who make these weak auras should never even give these out period. People who do feel entitlement should fend for themselves and make their own. It's not that hard, if you haven't got the time then that's not anyone's problem to solve for you. Several points have been made about why it's not against tos so no it's not a big deal they use it as a means to get more subscribers, if anything I applaud them for being resourceful.

[shade3891]

So I do wonder what does the weakaura look like. How special could it be..

Screenshot anyone?

[Onikaroshi]

This.

Since they're not breaking ToS, they can do what they want. And honestly, selling Weakauras is such a dumb idea. Weakauras both don't kill the boss for you, and don't make the boss any easier - It just tells you when stuff happens. You're basically paying for an addon - One which, with a little time and effort, you could write yourself, or just listen to DBM which already does this for free.

Of any of the paid services people offer for WoW, Weakauras is probably the one I'm least worried about.

That said: Go ahead and post them somewhere public, OP. There is literally nothing stopping you, and they certainly can't stop you - What are they going to do, sue you and find out addons aren't able to be copyrighted and be out legal fees?

Honestly the boss weakaura's are free, people just pay because they like that particular set of UI weakauras (buffs, health, etc).

[Mozu]

A little ethic would not hurt but you would not understand. With ppl like you, if there was no law against rape, it would not bother you to practice it. That's a shame.

Yes, comparing business ethics to rape really shows how far outside reality you operate.

[Specialka]

Yes, comparing business ethics to rape really shows how far outside reality you operate.

That means you are not able to put barrier for yourself when there is not already one.

[bullseyed]

What's the worst that can happen, they find out who you are and block you from discord?

As crappy as "sub for weakauras" is there's nothing wrong with it, they're not going against ToS by selling an addon, they're selling a script for that addon. It's the same way Zygor and the like get away with it, the addon itself is free, the scripts are paid.

It is against the TOS, it just isn't worth Blizzard's time to chase it down.

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In this case they are bound by Blizzard's UI policy for Add-Ons.

1) Add-ons must be free of charge.
All add-ons must be distributed free of charge. Developers may not create "premium" versions of add-ons with additional for-pay features, charge money to download an add-on, charge for services related to the add-on, or otherwise require some form of monetary compensation to download or access an add-on.

2) Add-on code must be completely visible.
The programming code of an add-on must in no way be hidden or obfuscated, and must be freely accessible to and viewable by the general public.

5) Add-ons may not solicit donations.
Add-ons may not include requests for donations. We recognize the immense amount of effort and resources that go into developing an add-on; however, such requests should be limited to the add-on website or distribution site and should not appear in the game.

https://us.battle.net/forums/en/wow/topic/1021053914


Now, Weak Aura 2 is the actual addon, but because it's just a framework that orchestrates other scripts, even the "shareable" strings are subject to the policy.
In fact, the whole "sharing" feature is built on encoding and obfuscating the string, which isn't really allowed.

So the correct course of action is to report this to Blizzard.

The important line is:

Developers may not create "premium" versions of add-ons with additional for-pay features

Anyone writing a script for an addon is a developer and they are selling a premium version with additional for pay features.

[Kithelle]

They won't be able to find out who I am. I can grantee that. I just want everyone to be able to use these weak auras without paying real money,

If you aren't worried then I'd say distribute it if you wish.

[Polarthief]

It's totally exploiting a loophole since the addon-maker(s) gets nothing, but people who use the addon to make custom bits of the addon are totally allowed payment. It should absolutely be an all-or-nothing rule. Zygor is the most loop-hole exploiting ever since the people who made the addon are also the ones SELLING A PREMIUM VERSION, even though that's not allowed by Blizzard's rule. Most illogical.

Asking for donations is one thing, and IMO should be allowed (even though it's not) in-game, as long as it's not super obvious and annoying, like popping up randomly asking for donations to make the annoying thing go away.

I do believe that addon-makers (and the people who make the scripts) should be paid for their hard work, but only if it's all of them or none of them, not "some of them at Blizzard's discretion".

- - - Updated - - -

The important line is:

Developers may not create "premium" versions of add-ons with additional for-pay features

Anyone writing a script for an addon is a developer and they are selling a premium version with additional for pay features.

WeakAuras is one thing since anyone can make a script for it, not just the addon-maker. Zygor's 100% absolutely has "premium" additions that you can purchase. How Blizzard thinks otherwise tells me they might be profiting from it in secrecy. The two are night-and-day different to me. If the WA author suddenly decided to make a handful of new options for WA but locked them behind a paywall, that's absolutely a premium version. I don't see how Zygor's is allowed to get away with it.

[Amerissis]

Whyyyyy are people necroing this thread?

[Powerogue]

I've managed without that addon since vanilla. What is so special that people would actually pay just for a custom setup of it? Seems ludicrous to me. Trying to google some pictures and their screens look cluttered as hell.

[klaps_05]

We are entering a time of orgs actually controlling addon creators and paying them off to work specifically for the guild. While Method and Limit are in the spotlight with Bigwigs and DBM, what about other guilds that also try to get some good ranking like Pieces and others? Sure addons will be released eventually, but this means Limit and Method claim exclusive rights first and then in a few months release the actual Mythic timers. Does contracting addon authors to only work for your guild for the month of the race really fair and ethical competition-wise?

[Cathbadh]

That's not the point. The point is we need to stop people from profiting off something that should be free. Imagine if every addon creator in wow charged you $5 to download their addon. It's absurd.

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Who are you to demand someone else's work product for free?

[Poe]

Why I'm still getting mention notifications from a 7+ month old thread, I'll never know.

[VooDsXo]

They won't be able to find out who I am. I can grantee that. I just want everyone to be able to use these weak auras without paying real money,

Well, regardless of what you want and how "grey" it may or may not be to give something as a bonus let's not forget Sloot likely has no commercials for subs, several Emotes, and other benefits adding in his personal strings for WA...Idk how "grey" that is compared to taking what he did and then giving it away under some robin hood principle.

P.s. you can already find clones and his actual WA's posted all over for free.

[klaps_05]

Sloot likely has no commercials for subs, several Emotes, and other benefits adding in his personal strings for WA.

The only way to charge people for your addons which generally is not allowed is to put it behind the Sub package - the sub package doesnt give you the streamers UI, it gives you access to his Subs discord, where you can talk to the streamer, ask advice, oh and find his UI strings, along the usual twitch package of emotes, sub giveaways, etc. I think thats perfectly fine, but the creators of Weakauras or Elvui should at least get royalties from the money all people make based on their addons. I have never heard a streamer say "thanks for subbing, heres my weakauras, but heres also WeakAuras' patreon, the guys who make it possible to even make your auras".

[Poe]

Welcome to forums.

It's not meant to be a quick conversation that peters out in a day. People are free to keep posting as long as they like - Until the thread is archived or necro'd. But a thread has to die to be necro'd.

The thread went 7 months with no bump... I'd call that dead.

[Spazzix]

People take time to create something and ask you to compensate them when you want to utilize what they've created.
If you don't like it, make your own.

Getting WAs without paying is scummy. Redistributing (okay, Robin Hood) a streamer's WeakAura scripts without consent is the most scummy/closest to illegal thing happening in all of this.

The really nice thing about coding here is that you can create things out of nothing—at the expense of noone. They aren't hoarding all the magical WA code sauce, so there's no "fairness" or moral argument to be made.

[therealbowser]

They are definitely entitled to do so, and I don't use weak auras, but I can guarantee that if there was a streamer pushing this kind of shit (not offering it for sale, but advertising it regularly) there would be a 0% chance I'd ever watch anything they had again. Not because the practice is 'wrong', but because the level of monetization would kill any enjoyment I could have from watching... and that seems like a stretch as well, as it's been a long time since I've seen a streamer entertaining enough to watch for more than a couple minutes straight.

I feel the same way about people who beg for donations every other breath (I don't have an issue with them thanking people individually however, that's up to them).

I'm just saying, since this thread was dug up anyways.

[deenman]

Who are you to demand someone else's work product for free?

uhm...its blizzards rule that they need to be free?