Regardless of how you feel about WowMatrix, many, many players use it to keep their UI up-to-date. Unfortunately for those people, Curse and WowInterface chose today to take concerted efforts to block the use of WowMatrix with the addons they host. You can read their reasoning here, straight out of Kaelten’s and Cairenn’s mouths. From a running-a-business standpoint, it’s hard to argue that they aren’t justified, but it will nonetheless result in a lot of disappointment and frustration among players.
“Yeah yeah yeah, blah blah, get to the important question: What does this mean for me, your sites’ user?” For the majority of users it should be completely transparent, you should not notice any difference whatsoever, other than improved site responsiveness during patch days. We hope that we will be able to revert the changes made to our sites eventually, if WowMatrix ever stops violating authors’ copyright and ceases stealing our bandwidth and other resources.
If you were previously using WowMatrix to keep your addons updated, please use our official updaters (Curse, WoWInterface). You may also mark addons as favorites on both WoWInterface and Curse in order to be alerted when they are updated.
Kaelten
Administrator, Curse & WowAceCairenn
Administrator, WoWInterface
Those links can provide you with alternative updater tools that are specific to each site, and while they may not do things the same way as WowMatrix or be quite as convenient, they will get you by in the meantime. The Curse Client in particular has dramatically improved since their merger with WowAce, and I know that Shirik on WowInterface’s staff has something in the works for a fresh new WI client to replace the old one with some exciting new features. Whether this means WowMatrix is down for the count remains to be seen, but the team behind WowMatrix has a history of finding, ahem “creative detours” to bypass similar measures taken in the past.
The comments on this notice will remain open, but the staff here at NSUI will be monitoring them closely, and anything that isn’t deemed constructive will be deleted with extreme prejudice. Please keep discussions civil and suggestions helpful. Giving us other alternative ways to update your addons are great. Telling us “Yeah, down with WowMatrix!” or “Wow, Curse/WowInt sucks!” are not great. Having said that, how will you keep your addons updated now? Will anything change for you? Do you like to do it yourself? We want to hear what you think!
Found a cool addon? Want to share a UI tip? In the mood to contribute a guest post? Have some ideas for future posts? Feel free to 
I had trouble getting some of my addons to update/download with the curse client last night but today it’s fine. I’m sure when it gets to later in the day/evening their traffic will pick back up and people will start to have problems. But that’s just the way it is after big patches.
@Frogi
The 3.1 list that WI had up had exactly 2 of my 150 addons. The rest I can’t get to because of the internal server error. They always have a low bandwidth page on and around patch days. So farm I have been able to update the addons whose authors have their own sites (Auctioneer, Gatherer, DBM, Tuller, Fizzwidget, and tekkub, and the like. Curse and WI have been absolutely useless to me.
Ilthalto: You should read up on Slashdot then, where the current author of QuestHelper posted on there basically saying just that.
I understand that there’s plenty of work that goes behind creating an addon; in fact, I met my husband through a text based game that he helped co-create and put hundreds of hours into creating coding for a game that’s played by thousands at most. And you know what? Despite all the hours of work that he had helped put into it, he not only didn’t expect payment but he also realized that it’s not a full time job. Unless you are very fortunate, very lucky, or very determined to outright charge for services, creating an addon is not a full time job, and expecting that getting enough people to donate will let you make the maintainence of such coding a full time job is foolish.
You want to insult me, call me ignorant, claim that I don’t support authors for all of their HARD work? Fine, say what you want concerning that. But if they want to try to bully people and guilting them into donating and in viewing their ads so that they can treat the addon like it’s a full time job, then I’d rather not have the most up to date versions, which I usually don’t care about anyway because I rarely notice the minor tweaks that do end up being made. And the funnier thing is that WoWMatrix does provide me with information as to who created the addon, and I’ve used the program for about a year and always noted this feature.
First: I use Firefox with AdBlock Plus, NoScript, and FlashBlock, so I haven’t seen an ad anywhere in months. Because of that, their logic doesn’t apply to me. Having said that:
Me: Hey look! The WoWAce downloader is cool!
WoWAce: We don’t want you to use it anymore use Curse instead!!
Verdict: :(
Curse: Try our downloader, it’s really cool!
Me: Hey! This thing doesn’t work and it broke half of my addons!
Verdict: :(
Curse: Download this Addon. It has our “Wrath ready” Seal of approval!
Me: Hey, this is the same version as teh old one and it still doesn’t work!
Verdict: :(
Curse: We don’t want people using WoWMatrix. It kills kittens.
Curse: Use our New New Downloader. It’s Cool!
Curse: Hey! Where are you going? Come back!!!
Verdict: I’m done with all of these sites. From now on, I will ONLY download mods written by people that distribute them themselves. Either that, or I’ll write them myself and host them on a site like FileFront or something that wasn’t setup explicitly to leech money out of the WoW community.
I really don’t feel that Curse and Co. are any better or different than the WoWMatrix people.
If you think Curse and company are hosting WoW Addons because they “love the community” and all that other nonsense, then you haven’t been paying attention for the last few years.
Between Carbonite, the QuestHelper guy, and now Curse and Co, I won’t be surprised to see the hammer come down even harder in the near future on ANY site that tries to “monetize” their “contributions” to the WoW Community.
All this drama over money causes frustration for the players that Blizz ultimately hears about through complaints or people just getting fed up who then decide to /unsubscribe. If Blizz forces these sites to cut their financial ties to the addons and data mining, then the drama mysteriously goes away and things are much quieter in the long run.
I’ll be glad when the hobbyists take back the mod community. All these vultures need to buzz off.
@frogi
Years ago ui.worldofwar.net used to release “simple” lists for patch days…
The statement(s) from ZorbaTHut mentioned by Q are found here. I haven’t finished reading them all yet.
@Q:
I don’t think the author of QuestHelper or his views really represent the rest of the author community in the slightest. He and the author of nUI are the only ones I know that are very vocal about getting donations to maintain the functionality of their addons. Most of the really good stuff is still coming out of the WowAce community, most of whom still only accept donations, they do not get in your face about them and they do not threaten anything should they be withheld. Maybe I’m just thick-skinned, but any examples of “bullying and guilting” going on have been few and far between. The only one that even really comes to mind was the in-game ads snafu, which I believe was the Carbonite team. They were paying more than one full-time salary. Apparently QuestHelper was too, and so does nUI. The vast majority of the rest of addons as well as their respective authors do not fit these profiles. It is still by and large a hobby for most of them. It’s like blogging, some authors happen to make money while doing their hobby.
I’ve never felt that treating addons as a legitimate job was a good thing. That much time, money and effort would be better spent getting a “real” job. I haven’t used nUI or QuestHelper in part because of their authors’ attitudes in this vein of thought. The rest is just because I don’t find them useful and looking at any of their Lua code scares the bejeezus out of me. I do use Carbonite sometimes when leveling or PvPing in the battlegrounds.
Aye I know about the worldofwar lists and small number of updated addons but its the day of the patch remember. Give it a week and we’ll see but that isn’t what this post is about guys so back on topic was only saying to try and help you fellow disgruntled add-on’ers.
And worldofwar used to be such a good site then WowHead came along.
Arsenal winning 3-0, get in.
To Curse’s credit, @hthieblot, Founder & CEO, is very active on Twitter today, answering peoples’ concerns. I find that very encouraging.
Kestrel’s last blog post..The Masters
I completely agree with PopeJamal. I love how Curse says “Come use our client!” Of course, the client is a buggy beta that will become unavailable except to PAID Curse subscribers in a few months. No one is “stealing” your bandwidth.
If I go to Curse, know that I have AdBlockPlus turned on and I’m not seeing or clicking any of your ads anyway.
And even though WoWMatrix is “scraping” your pages, it is TRIVIAL to write a scraper that only grabs the text content and not any of the graphics/ads/javascript/etc.
Hi guys,
Sorry for not logging in properly to comment, site is being goofy, anyways…
I’d previously written the posts talking about WoWMatrix and it’s advantages and disadvantages. When it comes down to it, proper research and knowledge of an addon is the user’s responsibility. One way or another you will get your addons and you will use them. It doesn’t really matter where they came from.
WoWMatrix made things a little bit easier for some, and for others, they just plain didn’t like it. It’s overwith now and the 3rd party client is not usable for the time being.
If you enjoyed WoWMatrix, then the closest thing to it is the Curse Client. Please do go pick it up, it works the same way WoWMatrix did.
As for opinions on the matter? I plead the 5th.
Andrea’s last blog post..Death Knight Spec: Blood
Great “divide and conquer” job by Curse:
1) Team up with WoW Interface
2) Backstab WoW Matrix
3) Knew in advance WoW Interface’s servers would crumble under the additional traffic
4) Kill two birds with one stone
5) We’re forced to use Curse as the only addon “provider”
In the end, it’s a shame that the best wow addon update client on both Windows and Mac OS may be gone.
I can only wish that Blizzard takes note of how many of its customers have been affected by this mess and decides to incorporate better UI within its own game, or better yet to dedicate a portion of their website for addons and developpers so we won’t have to go to Curse.
RIP WoW Matrix
RIP WoW Interface
RIP Curse?
You read the WoW forums, there are plenty of addon authors right now who are basically chastising people for not donating or for going through WoWMatrix and not wanting to deal with the crap that sites like Curse, WoWInterface and the like “offer”.
Again, I understand that they put in a lot of time and effort, but I also know people who have put in work on things that require much more coding, time, energy, and costs, and you know what? They do all that AND have a full time job elsewhere, because those people are very much aware that creating a product for use online for free is not a viable way to live. Ultimately, things like addons are created because someone wants to create them and have others use them.. if they get some sort of donations or something like that, fine, but the expectation feels more like they want us the users to support them to make it a full time job.
I’ve also seen some of the other author complaints. They claim that WoWMatrix has altered their coding, which I question only because of the claims by Curse and WoWInterface that WoWMatrix is just taking the addons from their sites. They claim that they aren’t being given credit, when I can look on the addons I have through WoWMatrix and see who the authors are, and in some cases even be sent to a PayPal link to donate. They also say that WoWMatrix doesn’t give them any revenue for their addon downloads, when really Curse and WoWInterface don’t give the authors money for hosting the addons either.
Last I checked, WoW Interface and Curse give addon authors a place to store their stuff without having to resort to finding their own webhosts or setting up their own websites and having to promote their addons on the WoW forums.
Curse and WI offer two centralized locations for players to go to in order to get addons and learn about new ones. That’s all I know.
Other popular addons such as Spartan UI and Deadly Boss Mods have actually taken the time to setup their own domains for their own authors. Not everyone has the time, ability, or dedication to do that. Curse and WoW Interface takes care of the hosting issues and word of mouth/marketing issues for them. I would rather visit one centralized location for all my addons then having to go hunt down site after site after site.
I’ve been using the Curse client since the WoWAce/Curse merge. I loved the old wowace updater, it had 90-95% of my mods at the time on it. When it moved to Curse I still found most of them, had to disable the dataminer addon, had to dig to find or correctly identify some of the addons. A few were there but not immediately recognized by the new client. With that sorted out I’ve soldiered on since then with very little issue. Patch days would roll on by I’d hit the trusty updater and bam, everything was good (mostly). I’d try checking the site and get the busy’s but meh, the updater was working. Now I learn of the WowInterface updater, cool beans, that’s where the other 5-10% of my addons were from, cake now. I happen to have a laptop I can play WoW on that I don’t care too much if/when I screw the UI up so I use it for trials and experimentation before commiting to my main PC. Now someone above mentioned the two clients conflicting and overwriting each other. This would be your fault for not watching what was going on. You’re looking for the big, easy “Update Everything” button that just doesn’t exist. Both sites have a lot over overlap, on my Laptop I decided to see how much of my stuff was on WI, turns out I still seem to have more Curse exclusive stuff, but each has certain mods that are hosted by them THEN mirrored to the other. I have now got both clients rigged to be primary for certain mods and ignore the rest. This was pretty simple to do and now they live in Harmony and I get the latest mods without having to hit the website in the low-bandwidth post-patch wasteland.
TLDR: Both clients work fine, don’t expect to install them and hit go and come up with a working UI. I never used WoWMatrix but I’m betting it would destroy a UI just as fast if you didn’t spend a bit of time configuring it first too.
Regardless of anything, Curse and WoW Interface are the ones paying for the bandwidth and hosting the mods that WoW Matrix was scooping. If they want ads on their sites to help pay for this, that is their prerogative. If you want to surf those sites with AdBlock, that’s cool too.
We quoted an analogy above about how WoWMatrix was doing business, A Cafe with wifi access, new guys open up next door and start taking over clientele (no issues here, this is business) AND selling access to the other guy’s wifi (Here is the issue)
@ Matticus – WoWMatrix also offers hosting for author’s files. It’s right there in their FAQ.
@ Auberon – “We quoted an analogy above about how WoWMatrix was doing business, A Cafe with wifi access, new guys open up next door and start taking over clientele (no issues here, this is business) AND selling access to the other guy’s wifi (Here is the issue)”
The problem with your analogy is that WoWMatrix isn’t selling anything. All they are doing is letting their customers use the neighbor’s wifi and (maybe) just saying it’s theirs. Which, let’s face it, in the real world the new guy couldn’t stop his customers from using the cafe’s wifi without lining his walls with lead.
Oh, and-
“You’re looking for the big, easy “Update Everything†button that just doesn’t exist. ”
Funny, WoWMatrix was just that…
@hostile:
I’m not seeing anything regarding WowMatrix hosting any downloads themselves on the page at http://www.wowmatrix.com/faq/. Did I miss it somewhere?
Actually, I suppose this passage might give that idea:
Whether they’re actually hosting anybody’s files is beyond me, though.
It’s the 2nd to last question in the FAQ:
“Q. I am an AddOn author. How do I get my AddOn listed in WowMatrix?
A. You may contact us at any time via the Feedback Form at our website. Please include the name(s) of the AddOn(s) and the webpage URL(s) at which you normally post the latest version(s) of your AddOn(s).
In addition, we can (if you like) link to your Donations page from within the updater and on our website, and optionally, if bandwidth usage is a concern for you, host your AddOn(s) on our servers at no charge.”
http://www.wowmatrix.com/faq/
They claim wowmatrix is dead, I beg to differ – It is far better at tracking updated addons than the curse client. It can’t do the update anymore, but neither can the curse client at the moment.
“They claim wowmatrix is dead, I beg to differ – It is far better at tracking updated addons than the curse client. It can’t do the update anymore, but neither can the curse client at the moment.”
I’ve been using the client for months, we had some network saturation issues over the last few days, but now that those are behind us, the client is working fine.
@hostile:
They also claim they don’t host addons that they shouldn’t in their FAQ.
As of this morning they’re hosting copyrighted addons without the authors permission. This is clearly blatant theft and confirms their lack of authors rights.
Unless wowmatrix is claiming that the addons are their own, and not the original author’s, then it’s not theft…
@hostile:
How is it not theft? They are distributing intellectual property without express permission from its owner and author. It’s a little bit like downloading a published book in digital form, although it’s not a perfect analogy, because there’s monetary value involved there. But the person who uploads said torrent and seeds the file isn’t claiming the work as his own, while still distributing the work without permission.
But obviously if they are not removing addons at the author’s request than there is a problem.
@hostile
How can you claim that WowMatrix claiming they wrote Omen would be cool?
Huh? When and where did WowMatrix claim to have written Omen?
If you go to their site, it says “Popular and Useful World of Warcraft AddOns Supported by WowMatrix” Not written by, supported by.
@Ithato
To be honest I don’t really know how to respond to that. Yes it’s all intellectual property but one is produced solely for profit and one is not. Does it make it less evil to steal something that is not for profit? Of course not, but Wowmatrix is making these same author’s work more visible.
Aside from any claims about Wowmatrix removing author and donation info (which I have yet to see any actual proof of other than the claims of Curse/WoWInterface) – Ultimately how is Wowmatrix actually hurting the authors by making their addons more accessible?
So far this entire series of drama has been very one-sided, we only hear the Curse/WoWInterface side of the story. I’m not entirely convinced (yet) that Wowmatrix is the devil that Curse and WoWInterface are making them out to be but unless Wowmatrix decides to “fight back” or release their side then who knows. I will say, their silence doesn’t hold a lot of promise.
The only reason that I even care about all this is because WoWmatrix is the only addon site that’s given a damn about the Mac users.
@Kaelten
What?!?
http://www.pwnyguild.com/images/omen.jpg
That’s the same author that Curse shows. Want to try again?
I clicked through about 30 other random mods in Wowmatrix and ALL of them showed the correct author information.
It’s crap like this that makes me not want to believe a word that comes out of the Curse staff’s mouths…
I went back and re-read Keltean’s post and I may have taken it the wrong way. If so, my apologies.
That being said, you’re going to have to show me where I said what you are claiming…
@hostile,
I was responding to “Unless wowmatrix is claiming that the addons are their own, and not the original author’s, then it’s not theft…” from your post earlier.
Bottom line they are hosting omen without Xinhuan’s permission.
Which you can confirm: http://www.curse.com/articles/curse-en-news/437537.aspx
This is a clear violation of Xinhaun’s rights. It is blatantly illegal.
in case you’re having a hard time finding it, Xinhuan posted:
“Hi, author of Omen here!
I have been told that Omen v3.0.7 is available for download at
oscar5.wowmatrix.com/…/Omen.3.0.7.zip
This is definitely without my permission, as Omen is under no license and is thus “All rights reserved”. Only Curse, WowInterface and French company Canal Jeux Vidéo has my permission to distribute Omen.”
Fair enough, thanks for the link.
I’d like to hear Xinhuan’s reasoning for not wanting his mod to be available on Wowmatrix though. I guess I just don’t understand why his mod getting more exposure is a bad thing. Is this his way of siding with Curse in this whole debacle?
@hostile,
No, many authors have in the past requested to be removed and were ignored as well. It is the authors ultimate decision to where they want to host their files.
Many other sites have tried this type of thing in the past and time and again the authors have banded together and issued dmca takedowns and the like to force their property from being distributed without their permission.
Ok, but that still doesn’t really answer my question.
If a site is giving you credit for your work why would you not want them to get the word out about your addon? Again, I have yet to see any instance of wowmatrix removing author information in their client.
I guess isn’t the point of writing an addon to get it into as many user’s hands as possible? Otherwise why bother putting it online at all?
Is it simply a matter of making a point to ask wowmatrix to take it down, “because they didn’t ask me first?”. Is this sticking point more important than the original purpose of creating the addon to begin with? The first thing I learned in my journalism classes in college was, “it’s always better to ask for forgiveness than for permission.” A little cynical I know, hehe, but if what you are saying is true they aren’t even asking for forgiveness and that’s troublesome. If wowmatrix is truly not honoring these requests then there really isn’t much else to say.
I do give you credit and appreciate you making yourself available to respond to the blog comments like this. I just wish, if wowmatrix’s intentions are pure/honorable/etc, that they would make some kind of public statement. But maybe their silence is all the response that the community needs.
(Please excuse any spelling or grammar errors, I’m posting from my bb on my way home.)
Those are question for authors, not hosting sites.
As an addon author, I reserve the right to dictate hosting. Such is my right and there are various reasons, including controlling the distribution and ensuring support is quality. Also being able to respond to my users in a timely fashion.
Many addon authors aren’t in it for the popularity. Many of us just do it because we enjoy it and want to, sharing it is just a bonus.
The assumptions that we’re all in it to get our 15 mins of fame by having as much exposure and users as possible is invalid. Some are in it for those reasons, many are not.
And yes, many authors if burned by a site acting as it should not and then being elusive about it they will not allow a site to host any more of it.
Comments on this post are now closed. Thanks for reading!
[...] not going to get into the whole WoWMatrix vs. Curse and WoW Interface discussion; it’s more than adequately covered at NoStockUI. Suffice to say, I’m satisfied with [...]