Ha ha ha omg. Give me a minute. Roflmao. Okay...phew. Alright, I am not even going to begin teaching contract theory here, but the short answer is that most ToS, EULA's, etc. are very one-sided and give the creator of the "contract" way too many rights. These are also known as "click through" contracts. I haven't done recent research on them, but about a year ago or so the validity of this type of contract was largely untested. In my own personal opinion, I feel they are untested because the companies don't want to find out whether they are really valid, and if so what limitations must be put on them.
Now can Blizzard destroy your account in a murloc minute with a generally arbitrary, or even capricious, finding? You bet your ass. This does not mean they can take you to court.
Now knowing that Blizzard has superior rights to basically make sure none of us ever play WoW again... I will discuss file formats, exporting, and the like.
First, limits to digital media are generally frowned upon by courts. It is a separate issue from a copyright. You cannot copyright something and then disallow someone from using it the way they want to (barring copyright infringemen). That means when you reverse engineer a file format you are not breaking any copyrights. You might very well (and probably are) breaking a click through contract you "signed." But, this does not necessarily make you liable beyond account destruction.
Now exporting ANYTHING out of the .mpq not through the WoW client (and this is mostly focused to yaz0r) is copyright infringement. It does not matter that you merely let them view the model and not export it. A digital copy has been created outside the terms of your license with Blizzard to use the model, whether that "file" is in your RAM or as a .3ds file. So yaz0r, you really have already crossed the line by just creating a model viewer. Going the extra few steps to make the copy you allowed be created more accessible probably will not matter. (Note screenshots are not copyright infringement, although they could be, because Blizzard gives you a license to create them.)
Now before you go try and delete everything let me tell you:
Fair Use.
The almighty bane of copyright holders. Now this area is so murky and gray in American law, it is about as concrete as a sponge. However, it is very powerful. It allows things like fan-fiction, educational "hacking," parody, etc. to exist without the creator worrying about being liable for copyright infringement.
I cannot say how well using the WoW Model Viewer and creating your own scenes fits into fair use. If it is mostly for your own personal enjoyment, I would say you are probably okay. I can say, that if you use your creations for any commercial means, you will not be protected.
The other murky thing is the Tier 6 armors and what not. I would keep this information close within this community, or to yourself. Blizzard could come at you and say you are really hurting their game, community, or sales by releasing that information prior to Blizzard, or releasing that information in a way not allowed.
That's the main thing I've been trying to say
![wTc[JediMaster]](/data/avatars/s/253/253790.jpg?1657227767){kind=avatar}
