"I was just keepin' the seat warm for ya, Mr. Morhaime, I swear!"
Apparently, crime does pay — that is, until you get caught! Private servers in-and-of-themselves aren’t a pox on the gaming community. For instance, they’ve been used by die-hard fans of certain titles to continue playing online long after official servers have been shut down. But that changes when you’re jacking users from a still-active, and very popular MMORPG.
Such was the idea of one Alyson Reeves, who operated her server under the name of Scape Gaming. There are plenty of private servers out there, so you might be wondering why Reeves was singled out by Blizzard? Well, not only was she allowing her users to circumvent the customary subscription fee normally required to play the game, but she was charging them money for effortless level-ups and rare items, all under the guise of “donations.” According to data obtained through PayPal, this makeshift cash shop earned Reeves at least $3,052,339 in revenue. Continue Reading
