The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld a previous ruling that those who bought and played World of Warcraft did not actually own the software, but were merely licensing the game, per the included End User Licensing Agreement.

The case in question deals with a third-party program that allowed gamers to play World of Warcraft without being at their computer. Certain tasks were automated, allowing players to level up and gain currency without having to actually play the game. In a previous ruling it was claimed that by using this program the EULA was broken, thus the player was violating copyright by accessing the game. The Ninth Circuit Court did not uphold that aspect of the case.

"The license term that forbade WoW players from using Glider was a covenant—a promise not to do something—rather than a condition—limiting the scope of the copyright license," the EFF explained in its commentary about the ruling. It may seem like hairs are being split, but this limits this ability of copyright holders to punish those who break the licensing agreements with copyright infringement lawsuits.

This isn't helpful for the defendants, as they're still liable for the program that broke the EULA in the first place, but it's a small victory for everyone else. The larger problem is that the courts can't seem to agree on what constitutes copyright infringement in cases such as this, which may indicate this issue will need to be resolved by the Supreme Court.