bow to the overlords and get a phone. It’s the unfortunate way of the future, never leave home without it.
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Weird…I’m curious what text is so important to put in that you just won’t ever create groups anymore because you can’t input said text.
All I do is M+ and I don’t think the custom text has ever once influenced my decision to apply to a group. If it’s an important message… you can just, you know, say it in the party chat. Like I join groups and right away state if I haven’t tanked it at that level – then the PL decides to keep me or not. Using party chat is always neat.
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Right?
If I had to guess-timate my own personal phone usage, out of a “pie” of 100%…
- 85% of the screen-time spent in Chrome/random web-browsing/forums
- 5% of screen-time mindlessly killing time/scrolling Facebook
- 7% screen-time browsing Youtube
- 2.9% screen-time in other random apps like Docs, Calculator, etc
- 0.1% screen-time actually making calls or texting
I think it’s funny that they’re referred to as phones to be honest, they’re basically just handheld internet browsers in practice 
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Ok sorry all. The dungeon lvl is based on the keys I have on me. Still be nice to be able to put in some notes. Not the end of the world, as I can run some dungeons. As for the phone, I don’t do social media and I can use internet at home.
Things advance. Technology evolves. When internet started being a thing, there were many who did not want the internet. They didnt need it. They thought it was invasive, or dangerous, needlessly expensive. Now some aspects of that are true. Look even further back. When landline telephones first started, they were expensive, needless, and intrusive. Mail worked fine. If it was an emergency, there was telegraph. Why do we need a phone in our house.
Now as other people have posted, many companies are starting to use authenticators to verify secure email, payments, purchases… ect. All done through apps on a cellular phone. Cellular phones have advanced and continue to do so. As others have said, they have many convenient and beneficial advantages. This is where Technology is currently going.
So here you are. The company has done their research and decided that encouraging its customers to use a free authenticator to secure their account is the best decision. They can still play without, but in order to encourage them to secure their accounts, there will be some minor inconveniences if they dont.
By not using a cellular phone you are choosing not to have access to these services. Therefore you are accepting of the inconveniences. If you choose to not have a cellular phone, you are accepting the consequences of not having one.
You can turn your location off. You do not have to store credit card information. There are safety measures in place. You are more likely to have your credit card information stolen from using that card at a business, than you are from shopping at reputable online stores.
And for people who cannot afford a cell phone, as others have pointed out, there are bare bones basic plans for $9.99 to $19.99 a month. If that is not affordable, then being angry that a largely paid monthly video game requires having a cell phone to use its authenticator, should be pretty far down your priority list. Working on improving your financial situation should be higher.
And if you can afford internet. And the sub and expansions but not a phone, then you cannot afford internet, the sub and the expansions. If you farm gold to pay the sub, and for the expansions but still cant afford a phone, then you cant afford to play the game, and the time and energy you put into farming gold, would be better placed in finding ways to improve your financial situation.
As for tracking your location. If you have a drivers license, or receive mail, it is easy to find where you live. If you use your credit card to make purchases, your movements can be tracked. If you get a paycheck, where you work can be tracked. Having your location on your phone, isnt really that intrusive. And in more ways it is a lot safer to have your location on, and be able to be tracked and found if someone is looking for you.
Long story short. It is your decision. And by making the decision you accept the consequences or benefits of doing so.
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I really don’t care about the Authenticator. What I’m mad about is a game I’ve played for 14 years, now requires a Cell Phone to access, be it, a small feature in the game. Today Is just an Authenticator, what is it gonna be a few months from now. I got rid of a cell 5 years ago and I do not miss it.
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well… poop. But thinking about it, that makes sense.
I can hear this picture.
Good luck with that battery, the newest ones they made are already past their shelf life.
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Right?
With so many systems requiring 2FA to log in, sometimes requiring an SMS text, it’s actually detrimental to not have one at this point.
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BEEEEP BOOOOOOP BADING BADING BADING KSSHSHHSHSHSHSHHSHSHT khssshshshhshshshshshshsht. WAHWAWAWAWAWAWAWAWAWAAWAWAWWW
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As amusing as that thought is it’s wrong. They started rolling out the sms protect nonsense years before that gaff. It’s about cutting support costs or was at the start. People lost their authenticators and Blizzard had to go through this whole rigmarole of verifying them which cost support agent time to take the authenticator off so they decided to require mobile numbers, so if some sap player loses their authenticator and doesn’t have the restore codes they can just get a text to fix it.
Issue is of course SMS is not secure, can be hijacked, spoofed, etc and US and other nation’s national information regulatory and standards commissions have urged everyone to move away from using SMS for authentication (and yes, being able to bypass ToTP authentication via it counts as using it). They’ve been urging this since the mid-early 2010s but Blizzard doesn’t care.
What I think they should have done, what I would have done is instituted two things. I would have sent a yearly reminder email reminding players to keep their authenticator restore codes safe and handy and I would have instituted a fee for recovery and removal if players failed to do that. I’d be reasonable about it, $25 and make $20 of that applicable as a coupon to a digital purchase in the blizzard store to encourage returning players not to just roll a new account.
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You are correct, but what the cell phone has in spades over land line, it loses in privacy. So there’s that.
As a fellow time traveler I am always happy to run into another time traveler. I will say it’s incredibly rare to meet a time traveler from the past, though.
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Some old people think they’re awesome by saying they don’t have the latest technological gadget or don’t participate in the latest fad. The funny thing is nobody thinks they’re awesome and they’re just hindering themselves.
There’s going to come a point where it’s not going to be worth it for cable companies to maintain the equipment for landlines because most people that are not shaking their canes at the sky have switched to cell phones. They’ll be SOL when that happens but I guess they can switch to the good ol’ stand by of smoke signals to complain about young people.
And it’s funny to see them complain about cell phones tracking them… from their computer. “The Man” already has their info from Amazon, WoW, Wal Mart, etc.
(And this is coming from someone old enough to have used a rotary phone and a tube tv with maybe 5 channels.)
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Go with time and buy a phone…
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Sadly even if you still have / use a physical authenticator you can’t edit M key stuff. Not sure why you aren’t able to but seems they want you to use 2 factor via phone. I can see in some ways why but wish they still offered physical authenticators and that they would suffice for the 2FA for the game.
You mean you choose to play other games that aren’t mobile only.
This is NOT TRUE.
I don’t have an auth either, and I post groups all the time.
The only, ONLY thing you can’t make are M+ groups. And in the grand scheme of things, that’s not a big deal. I’ve gotten KSH/Portals through pugging.
You don’t NEED an authenticator. We’re halfway into this thread, no one has yet to mention this fact, and here you are posting nonsense that still doesn’t have a reply calling you out.
YOU DON’T NEED AN AUTHENTICATOR TO MAKE GROUPS … for anything other than M+.
This thread is ridiculous.
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I fully expect landlines to be phased out in the not too distance future.
voip is not accepted by blizzard. until recently they only accepted expensive post paid cellphone plans.
you’ll be sorely disappointed.
because blizzard is cheap and lazy and doesnt want to pay the money for the physical ones.