out fox the net

All it takes sometimes it a person that has a need to hide online, maybe from pears at work or students at school, no one really knows why these people throw themselves in World of Warcraft. Who knows how a game addiction develops. Scientists are beginning to study the phenomena is just now. You could say that its a bit late when you think about the gamers that died the past years while they were playing all kinds of online games. Maybe the reason that young girl in South Korea was hiding online in World of Warcraft was because she was being neglected, we will never know. Then there was that man that was found dehydrated while playing an online game and probably in hiding from something in the real world.

Lets take a closer look

Having a World of Warcraft addiction is not very different from other types of addictions seen in certain persons. The majority of people playing this game online will never have any form of problem at all, the small group of persons who are addicted to World of Warcraft and use it to hide online would have used any game for this purpose. The moment they are away from the game you will see that they start to show signs of withdrawal symptoms. Irritation and anxiousness will start to show and the need to get back online as quick as possible. This group of people have deep psychological issues and these will set them up to become addicted and it could have been anything in which they would be able to hide and create their own world, the game is not to be blamed for this. And we are talking a few dozen against millions and millions of people who go about the game in mostly a normal manner.

Some things that would give away a (starting) addiction would be if a school going person would start to miss classes or gets to school late on a regular basis, homework not getting done etc. etc. Although these could also be signs of depressions the two, depression and hiding in an online world, could be linked together. As a family or friend, the best thing to do is to seek professional help. We need to get the person involved back to what we call a normal and healthy life and away from the keyboard.

Being a World of Warcraft addict in itself is not a bad thing, hiding in an online world for a little bit is not that bad either. Their is a very small change that people cross over the border and become a problem case in which there is an even smaller change of it becoming a cause of dead scenario. If you notice a friend or family member playing online and starting to become addicted to these type of games then take their minds of the game by doing something completely different. And you should always consider getting advice from a professional.

Always remember, when you read these kinds of news items, that it is about a very small group compared to the millions and millions of World of Warcraft 'addicts' that are happy playing the game almost every day.

So you like chasing monsters, you need action and never pass off a chance for some adventure and yes, you play World of Warcraft because it is an exiting and original game, this is exactly the reason it is still that very popular online role playing game. It is such a unique game because of it's multiplayer online format. The fact that you need a PC to play this game makes it perfect if you want to create some art work with World of Warcraft as the main theme.

Art pictures, a way to remember

This game is very dynamic and there will always be moments that you are in a situation that will not happen again but you would like to have something to remember it by. Being a role playing game that is very, as said before, dynamic not found in other games. The perfect option in this game is that you take a snapshot of those moments of the game that you would like to take a look at later on. If you have an editing program like photoshop, gimp or something else why not create some art pics of World of Warcraft? Some would say that you are involved with the game but those people just do not understand the pleasure one can have from playing an online game. So never let yourself be discouraged by anyone if you want to keep some screenshots of those perfect moments you spend online in the World of Warcraft.

Need to settle a dispute

If only the online world would be better then the offline world normally is, but it is not. So as in the offline world there can be times that you need to settle a dispute with someone else, and having some screenshots to prove your point and case can be very helpful in those situations. There will always be people that will say that those pictures can be fabricated but an official that has the power to make decisions and who is unbiased will know what those pictures are worth.

Some of the other places

Why limit yourself to only your art pics of World of Warcraft of your online sessions? If you do a search there are a lot resources where you can get other art pictures, you will be amazed at the amount you will find. There are a lot of picture galleries where you can find graphic and art work from other players and a lot of times they are free of charge. Why not do some trading with other players, find forums online where you can post your screenshots and show the online community what you have achieved in World of Warcraft.

Maybe you want to have some nice artwork as your desktop background but you are not that artistic or creative, then you could always take a few screenshots and ask someone who has those capabilities to create a desktop background for you so you can look at those nice moments of your online live when your desktop is visible.

I recently started up World of Warcraft again after a months long break from the game. It is still a fun game and taking a break from it has made it even more enjoyable.

Since I am starting some new characters, I've been working through the low level game again. Up until about level 30 or 40 playing the same quests yet again is wearing thin. So I've set out to find faster ways through the lower levels.

After experimenting with a few different game add-ons and doing some research I have found some faster than average ways to level up.

What I have learned, I present in my short Warcraft Leveling Guide. Check it out. Navigation through the guide is on the left sidebar of the site. As I develop new methods and learn more, I'll build it up.

I hope you find it helpful.

Today, June 28, 2007 at about 5pm, Out Fox the Net enjoyed its 100,000 page view. Thanks for everyone who has come to visit.

OFtN (Out Fox the Net) started about 2 ½ years ago. Here is how it happened.

I met someone online who was interested in a certain web based marketing tool. Being a programmer and having been involved with the web for a long time, I understood just what he wanted and why. In essence the tool, when given a list of websites, would determine and rank which of them were most popular i.e. had the most traffic, highest page rank etc. I registered the OFtN domain and put the tool up in a password protected area.

The guy was very happy with it and suggested that we open a “for pay” service with it. That didn’t sound like a bad idea at all so I started to develop a better interface for it and some supplementary tools to go along with it. That also was working out pretty well until one day…

…completely out of the blue, the guy accused me of “stealing” his ideas and cutting him out of the business he had developed… and on a public message board we both visited frequently. Total paranoid delusions coming from this guy who had been so friendly up until then. Keep in mind that no one except he and I had ever even seen the tool at that point – it was never opened to the public and hadn’t made 1 cent.

Well anyway, to cut a short story short, I posted a calm reply and told him I was done working on the project and was returning “his precious ideas” unused.

But I still had the domain and nothing to do with it.

Over the next year or so, I would occasionally come up with an idea and make a half-hearted attempt at implementing it. Webmasters tools, news aggregator and nothing much of interest.

And then. I bought World of Warcraft.

After disappearing into WoW for several months I came back with some unique techniques for making money in the game. Hmm, Out Fox the Net and crazy money making scams, hmm, goes together like peanut butter and chocolate.

So I wrote up my World of Warcraft money making guide and posted about it on the official WoW web forums. Bam, 100 people showed up and read every page. Then people started to link to it from their guild boards.

Then it got 'ed.

Then it got posted to Digg.

Then Dan Hunter from Terranova contacted me to do an interview.

Then a BBC reporter contacted me to collect information for an article.

Final run down:

• Age of Site: 2 ½ years
• Unique visitors: 27,856
• Page Views: 100,004
• Time spent correcting spelling mistakes: 312 hours
• Number of times site has been completely deleted: 3
• Most unusual visitor location: Greenland
• Number of pages average visitor reads: 3.6

The site has cost me about $239.85 in domain name registration and web hosting costs. Altogether I have made about $196.38 from it.

Prices exclude my blood, sweat and tears