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(Photo: Plankton 4:20)

I'm the director of digital communications at Time Warner Cable, and I'd like to bring some clarity to this discussion. We're happy to to take our lumps when we've earned them, but it doesn't seem to be the case in this instance.

Take a look at some of the traceroutes posted to the thread in question ... starting here, at comment #446: http://tinyurl.com/5gqe27

If you follow the commenter's posted trace results, you'll notice that it's only on TWC's Roadrunner (rr) network for the first 6 hops — with maximum response times of 10 ms. The response time jumps drastically at hop # 11 — when the trace is no longer on the Roadrunner network.

Scroll down further on the same page to comment #456, and you'll see something similar — a giant leap in lag times. However, this trace never touches our network. It starts at Verizon, goes to Alter.net at hop #5, and then jumps to ATT.net's network at hop #8. Hop #9 shows a response time of 114 ms — quite a jump from the 49ms at hop #8.

On the first page of the thread, you'll see something similar: http://tinyurl.com/3hfs9k

At comment #10, the lag time leaps from 18ms on our network at hop #6 to 150ms at hop #7 — on Level3, an Internet backbone.

At comment #18 (same page), the trace again never touches our network. The lag jumps from 15 ms at hop #3 to 261 ms at hop #4, while on the Verizon network. The hops vacillate between high and low response times throughout the trace.

Blizzard's comment at the top of the thread that "Unfortunately this means that the only commonality between all the players experiencing these disconnects and extreme latency is Time Warner/Road Runner" is a pretty interesting choice of words, in light of the fact that several of the troublesome traceroutes posted in the forum itself never touch our network.

Jeff Simmermon
Director, Digital Communications
Time Warner Cable

So, is Blizzard just trying to pass the buck to the best available scapegoat? If both companies aren't responsible for the lags and disconnects, whos is? Does anyone know how this crazy Internet works?

(Photo: ashley_dryden)

We don't play World of Warcraft, but if we did, it looks like we'd have to cancel Time Warner Cable and install FIOS in order to guarantee a connection to Blizzard's servers. That's what some East Coast WoW players are saying—they've been suffering disconnections and game-killing lags for months now, and Time Warner Cable seems unable to solve the problem. They swear they're not doing anything to disrupt or throttle gamers, and say that "customers who are having problems on the local level should contact customer service." Based on the 24-page thread on Blizzard's forums, TWC's customer service has yet to resolve the issue.

One Wow player wrote,

Everyone here is extremely frustrated because we want to play but can't get a connection to do so. Blizzard does what they can to help but the problem is the path to the servers not the servers themselves so we are sent to TWC. I'm sure everyone that has called has been asked to check thier connection, their router, their modem and their underwear color. The "techs" are outsourced and don't listen or don't understand English very well. How many of you have told the "tech" that you have tried their suggestions 100 times only to have them send you to http://speedtest.nyc.rr.com/ and say "See .. no problem with your connection"?

Maybe you should unplug your router for a few moments to reset it. LOOKIT ME I'M A TIME WARNER CABLE CSR.

Update: An alleged Time Warner Cable employee wrote to us this morning:

Without going into detail, I am an employee of Time Warner Cable. At this time, we are not aware of any issues with this. If possible, please urge anyone having this issue to contact us immediately using an online form. If we have account information, we can investigate the issue, but we do not block packets/servers/etc. that should be causing the issue. If anything, a recent system upgrade should be delivering faster speeds. Please, if possible, direct those with the issue here:

http://www.timewarnercable.com/nynj/customer/contactus/

"TWC Blamed for Internet Interference" [New York Post]
(Photo: thms.nl)

Our geeky, mouth-breathing brother site — long a source of bemusement and contempt to the editors at Consumerist as they wax on and long about imaginary elves that live inside their computer — have been on a roll with consumerist-releated complaints lately. We're starting to warm up to these guys.

This time, Florian Eckhardt over at Kotaku has described a problem transferring a character in World of Warcraft (one of those very games in which you play an imaginary elf who lives inside a computer) from one server to another. It appears that Blizzard's system for doing this has been broken for 9 days. Obnoxious, but the real kick in the pants is how Blizzard has been continuing to allow people to transfer characters and claiming there's nothing wrong in the system, leading to this:

Can you even imagine what would happen if a company like AOL or T-Mobile had a glitch like this, that resulted in bankrupting their customers? It defies belief. Even more amazing, it was only after a week of problems that Blizzard silently pulled the transfer system. Smooth, Blizzard. Smooth.

Nice Character Transfer System, Blizzard [Kotaku]

It all started when an avid World of Warcraft player on his way to Canada to visit a fellow player accidentally dropped his iPod in an airplane toilet. Unfortunately, he didn't realize the extra "plunk" as it dropped into the loo until sometime later, at which point, he alerted stewardesses.

But problem: stewardesses had already panicked about the mysterious electronic device in the toilet. And they'd called the feds. Over the airplane intercom, a grim voice cautioned people not to panic: "Folks, this is the captain. I don't want to alarm you, but we've found a suspicious device in the front lavatory. Now, we think it's probably nothing, but in this day and age ... you can never be too careful. We'll be landing at Ottawa, where we will await further instructions."

After the plane shrieked down for an emergency landing, the incredulous gamer was hauled under the spotlights and has his subversiveness sweat out of him, during which time they asked him about this magical online game called World of Warcraft and such hard-hitting questions like "Do you want a romantic relationship with the girl you're going to visit?" and "If you and she were drunk together, and she turned to you and said, "Let's go", what would you say?" Oh, and what he thought of 9/11 and Iran.

Our Kotaku sister, Eliza Gauger, says it best: Fuck the TSA.

I played WoW, I became a terrorist (story!) [World of Warcraft Forums] (via Kotaku)

Blizzard appears to already be caving on the issue, but Lambda Legal is going for the fatality, and our buddies over at Kotaku have posted the whole letter that was sent to Blizzard. We're glad to see Blizzard show some sense here: although protecting your users from harassment is a noble goal, this is the equivalent of telling blacks not to make their race known so that they can avoid virtual lynchings. Blizzard would be better off actively punishing the ubiquitous bigotry in their game than penalizing the victims.

Blizzard has come down hard on a BGLT (bi-sexual, gay, lesbian and transsexual/transvestite) friendly guild. Note the word friendly as opposed to 'exclusive'. In one bold move, Blizzard has come down hard in favor of the bigot status quo of its player base.

In Newsweekly has the detail:

Sara Andrews thought it was a big misunderstanding when she received an e-mail from a game master in Blizzard Entertainment's popular online role playing game "World of Warcraft" citing her for "Harassment - Sexual Orientation."

Andrews had posted that she was recruiting for a "GLBT friendly" guild in a general chat channel within the game.

Believing that her notice had been accidentally flagged, she e-mailed Blizzard to correct the problem. Blizzard, to Andrews' surprise, upheld the decision.

Other gay guilds have been alerted and are planning to request clarification on the policy from Blizzard.

Blizzard's policy on "Harassment - Sexual Orientation," which is set forth in the games' "Terms of Use" and cited in the e-mail to Andrews reads, "This category includes both clear and masked language which insultingly refers to any aspect of sexual orientation pertaining to themselves or other players."

Are you a lesbian friendly (and, really... who ISN'T?) Consumerist reader on Europe's Shadow Moon server, playing as Horde? Are you a passionate opponent of make-belief elf bigotry? Why not join in protest today!

But LegalAffairs.org has an interesting article up saying a real-world IRS tax might not only be justifiable, but forthcoming as these games become more ubiquitous. Here's how Julian Dibbell's accounting experiment starts:

JUNE 2003. I SET MYSELF THE FOLLOWING CHALLENGE, posting it on my web log for the world to see: "On April 15, 2004, I will truthfully report to the IRS that my primary source of income is the sale of imaginary goods and that I earn more from it, on a monthly basis, than I have ever earned as a professional writer."

In the course of this project, I made a total of $11,000 selling on eBay the items I won playing a game called Ultima Online, $3,900 of which was in the final, most profitable month. I reported my profit to the IRS, and I paid the requisite taxes. But after I did so, a troublesome set of questions continued to nag at me for which even IRS publication 525, entitled "Taxable and Nontaxable Income," couldn't provide answers.

This was remarkable, for publication 525 would appear to contain every conceivable form of income known to accounting. To read it once is to realize that you know nothing about income. Here you'll find a description of gains, ill-gotten and otherwise, so irregular that they can be taxed only according to that form of guesswork known as fair market value. Here are stocks, options, retirement watches, and stolen goods ("If you steal property, you must report its fair market value in your income in the year you steal it unless in the same year, you return it to its rightful owner").