Big Business: First, the anti-virus; now, anti-games

Sorry everyone, but at the rate that things are going, this might just mean no more LAN parties and/or Molten Core runs from the office from now on. Some employers are starting to call on other companies such as Sophos PLC and Websense Inc. who specialize in weeding out and completely stopping games from getting into the office network. And with the demand for those said game-exterminators, you might want to just consider playing at a friend’s instead.

Anyway, the reason for this is basically a barrage of complaints from employers who say that whole networks are getting bogged down by games that are being played using office resources. They have reason to be concerned, too, because of the resulting drop in productivity, to the point that they are starting to treat games like viruses and malware. In fact, there is already a piece of security software out there which, by reading the signature of specific programs, can stop a game from launching.

On the other hand, there are other employers who are comfortable with their workers playing casual games from time to time, as it helps keep morale high, PLUS some games have actually been proven to help with mental alertness, among other things.

But we think that you just really can’t blame a company who doesn’t want multiple copies of Oblivion (on the highest settings, too) running on the network.

Sorry everyone, but at the rate that things are going, this might just mean no more LAN parties and/or Molten Core runs from the office from now on. Some employers are starting to call on other companies such as Sophos PLC and Websense Inc. who specialize in weeding out and completely stopping games from getting into the office network. And with the demand for those said game-exterminators, you might want to just consider playing at a friend’s instead.

Anyway, the reason for this is basically a barrage of complaints from employers who say that whole networks are getting bogged down by games that are being played using office resources. They have reason to be concerned, too, because of the resulting drop in productivity, to the point that they are starting to treat games like viruses and malware. In fact, there is already a piece of security software out there which, by reading the signature of specific programs, can stop a game from launching.

On the other hand, there are other employers who are comfortable with their workers playing casual games from time to time, as it helps keep morale high, PLUS some games have actually been proven to help with mental alertness, among other things.

But we think that you just really can’t blame a company who doesn’t want multiple copies of Oblivion (on the highest settings, too) running on the network.