If you happen to be working on a World of Warcraft iPhone app, you should probably stop now, because apparently, Blizzard has started sending out a new batch of cease and desist orders to independent developers selling WoW-related iPhone apps. WoW Insider reports the developer of an unofficial WoW Armory app (Warcraft Characters) has received a C&D letter from Blizzard requesting he immediately pull his app from the Apple store. Now, whether this had to do with the fact that the app cost .99 cents isn’t clear, but there are a couple free apps still available at the app store, so it might have something to do with it.
Now, as WoW Insider points out, this isn’t the first time Blizzard has gone after outside developers. However, given the recent rumors about an actual iPhone version of WoW being in the works, generated in large part by a video posted over at Touch Arcade that showed a mobile version of WoW being played on an iPhone, Blizzard’s activity on the C&D front seems to suggest something is most likely in the pipeline. Then again, they could just be trying to crack down on people siphoning off revenue earned by infringing on Blizzard’s intellectual property.
Adding to the overall “Isn’t that interesting?” factor of all this, is that last week, Booyah (a start-up founded by former bigwigs from Blizzard Entertainment and Insomniac Games) secured $4.5 million to develop what sounded quite a bit like a WoW-ish, MMO experience for the iPhone and iPod Touch. Of course, that assessment is purely speculative at this point, given the rather vague description provided by Booyah about their project. Nevertheless, it still makes for good conversation.
Is the world ready for two PC/Mac-calibur, mobile MMO's?
