Nope, this isn't about WoW. Sorry, this is about something else I came across, that makes me cringe.

I've been looking around, and I came across a MMO known as EVE Online. Okay, nifty. Looks interesting, you become a pilot and upgrade yourself and your ship as you explore the galaxy. Oh, and it's a single persistent world. No separate servers, no different 'shards', just one huge galaxy to explore, exploit, and engage in.

Read this article, and just gape in awe. Do I condone theft like this, even of digital goods (much like the ninja'ing of guild banks)? No. But I do have an immense respect for the dedication and work that it takes to so completely infiltrate an organization like the GHSC did.

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=180867

This guy hates applications. Unfortunately, he doesn't seem to get the purpose behind them. B⁴ has a wonderful post about why he SHOULD care. Yes, this is the same guy. Here's my quick rundown, and what said imbecile should pay attention to:

Guild applications are much like job applications, and both arose from the same need: the need to be selective about who to bring into the organization. It's not about WoW being a job, it's about wanting to find out before we bring you into our fold whether you're the type of person who is going to mesh with our group.

Most applications tend to have a few questions in common. They all have them in common for a reason.

1) What was your former guild?
This one is here because if we care enough to ask you to fill out an application, we darn well would like to speak to others about you, people who can give us some insight as to whether you're going to be a problem child. Nobody wants to learn about a ninja the hard way. If you're a childish moron, chances are we don't want you either. This question is for the purpose of finding out whether we even want to bother with the rest of your application.

2) Why did you leave your former guild?
This question serves two purposes. The first is to find out whether something happened to get you kicked or make you leave, or whether your interests no longer meshed with those of that guild. This can be nice to know, because if we know their goals are the same as ours, chances are you're not going to want to stay here long either. We'd rather not waste your time and ours.

The second reason is that it serves as a truth detector. We're going to check with your old guild and find out why you left. If their answer doesn't mesh with yours, then congrats! We just found out you're a potential liar, and are going to be wary of what else is said. Nobody likes being lied to, and doing so on an application for anything is going to get your application trashed. Doesn't matter if you're applying for a job flipping Warp Burgers, or trying to get funding to research the cure for cancer. (Actually, both of these serve as truth detectors, since we're going to armory your character and wowcensus your guild history anyway.)

3) Why do you want to join our guild?
If you just want phat loot, that's fine. Our guild, in particular, doesn't give a rip about loot. We see it as a tool to progress farther. We're not raiding just to get lots of purples, and if that's all you're there for, you might be in for a nasty shock when you don't get a piece of gear. It happens.

If you want phat loot, and don't have any (remember that Armory thing Blizzard has?), then you're telling us that you want us to gear you up, and we're going to laugh in your face, then I will personally use your application to start the fire next Saturday at The Barn. If you don't have the desire to get yourself geared up for Kara, you're nothing more than a leech. And leeches get a heavy dose of salt where I come from.

4) What times you are available for raiding?
If you're coming into our guild as a raider, you should be aware that currently we raid 3 nights a week, sometimes 4 if we don't finish up Kara. If you can't make those times, you don't get to raid. Sorry, that's just how it works. We don't do spur of the moment Kara groups anymore. However, by giving us this list of times, when we're setting up our next Kara group, we can determine when the best times are for raiding.

5) What class/spec/whatever are you?
Hm. This isn't all that hard to find out, but why should we waste our time doing the rest of our checking process if you're a rogue and we have 20 other dps members? The entire point of this process is that we don't want to waste our time, nor yours. And that's what will happen if you get an invite to our guild. DPS are always in supply. (It also lets us know whether to take you over that feral druid application that just got posted, who can act as a tank with his feral gear. Versatility will almost always win out in my book, though our guild policy is that you don't have to play any spec you don't want to.)

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"And seriously, if I suck, just kick me out and be done with it, but let's not pretend this is some elite group of combat hardened guerilla mercenaries you have here. It's fucking WoW, not rocket surgery."

Heh. Hehe. Ehehehehehe. Lemme get this straight. You want to join our guild, come into Kara with us, and have us waste our precious time dealing with your stupidity when we could have brought someone who knew what they were doing, and have downed who knows how many more bosses in a single night? Oh please.

"Hey f***stick, I know where the sinister strike button is. This isn't a formal request for grant funding to continued cancer research we're discussing. I want to push the 'hurt' button over and over while standing behind the dragon."

Oh where do we start...How about the fact that raiding isn't always about pushing the hurt button over and over (aside from the fact that the hurt button you're mashing isn't the right one)? Oh wait, you want us to heal you through Prince's Shadow Novas because you darn well don't think it's worth the time and lost dps to run out of the huge frigging explosion? You want us to waste our extremely limited time running back to the top of the frigging tower when we wipe because you overtook the tank in agro and caused him to get Enfeebled? Riiiiight.

The fact of the matter is, we get a VERY limited amount of time to raid per week. That's life. WoW ISN'T our job, it's a game. That means that when we DO get the chance to raid, we'd like it to go as smoothly as possible. I'd rather not have to deal with constantly healing your arse because you don't know how to use Omen. Yeah, you drop dead, and we can rez you. But that's at least a minute out of our raid time, which means there's one less minute that we can use to try and get a good enough mix of infernals to make Prince a workable target.

Long story short, we don't want our time wasted, on any of a number of things. Fill out the application, and deal with it. You can wait a day or two. I waited at least a month before I was eligible to join the guild I'm in now, and I love it. The wait is worth it, and if you don't think so, I don't think you're worth our time.