On Name Changes and Death

Within our guild, within the last week, two of our high level members have had to change their names. Now, I understand that there are rules about names and representation (posted at the bottom for your "ref"rence), but there is something sad about the loss of a name. Our guild leader lost his name in a crazy set of duels--his opponent got pissed and turned him in for a name violation as a means of retaliation (and bad sportsmanship, I might add); another of our guildies had to change the ending of his name from an "s" to a "z." Both characters were in their 60s, level-wise, and had been playing for quite some time.

One saw it as a real loss, the other joked about it until he could smile again. I think the guild members didn't quite know what to do: we all keep slipping up and/or just using the old handles in guild chat.

Now I should explain two caveats here:

1. We all use alts and, as such change our names in the game quite regularly. But these characters come with different levels, different experiences, different histories.

2. A long time ago, in a guild far, far away, my guild leader robbed the bank, disbanded the guild and changed his name as a means of going underground (so as not to feel our guild wrath).

So what's in a name? In WoW: everything. You can choose to use an alt, you can go into hiding; but you can also be stripped of one of the only things that really distinguishes you within this online community. I'm still mourning Stealthfreak, and if this kind of erasure were to happen to feifer (or skrah), it would change everything. This ain't no Social Security card or driver's license: it's an existence, a living, a character in WoW--and my god, what else is there, anyway?

From WoW Terms of Use:

"In particular, you may not use any name:

1. Belonging to another person with the intent to impersonate that person, including without limitation a "Game Master" or any other employee or agent of Blizzard;
2. That incorporates vulgar language or which are otherwise offensive, defamatory, obscene, hateful, or racially, ethnically or otherwise objectionable;
3. Subject to the rights of any other person or entity without written authorization from that person or entity;
4. That belongs to a popular culture figure, celebrity, or media personality;
5. That is, contains, or is substantially similar to a trademark or service mark, whether registered or not;
6. Belonging to any religious figure or deity;
7. Taken from Blizzard's Warcraft products, including character names from the Warcraft series of novels;
8. Related to drugs, sex, alcohol, or criminal activity;
9. Comprised of partial or complete sentence (e.g., "Inyourface", "Welovebeef", etc);
10. Comprised of gibberish (e.g., "Asdfasdf", "Jjxccm", "Hvlldrm");
11. Referring to pop culture icons or personas (e.g. " "Britneyspears", "Austinpowers", "Batman")
12. That utilizes "Leet" or "Dudespeak" (e.g., "Roflcopter", "xxnewbxx", "Roxxoryou")
13. That incorporates titles. For purposes of this subsection, "titles" shall include without limitation 'rank' titles (e.g. , "CorporalTed," or "GeneralVlad"), monarchistic or fantasy titles (e.g., "KingMike", "LordSanchez"), and religious titles (e.g., "ThePope," or "Reverend Al").

You may not use a misspelling or an alternative spelling to circumvent the name restrictions listed above, nor can you have a "first" and "last" name that, when combined, violate the above name restrictions."