Recently, Blizzard's lawyers took notice of Turtle WoW. The unofficial server is very popular, and after the "happy letter," players began to worry, but the modders refused to shut down the project.
Now the Turtle WoW team has reminded us of themselves again. The developers made a counter-offer to the creators of World of Warcraft — they asked Blizzard to consider creating an official ecosystem for licensing fan-run servers:
«Many successful games have their own modding community. It's part of the gaming culture and a testament to the quality of the game and the enthusiasm of the community. The World of Warcraft modding community is thriving, and as new tools emerge, it will only grow. Your stories have inspired this creativity, and we hope Blizzard will embrace fan-created content as its legacy, rather than alienating this passionate community.»
In the letter, Turtle WoW cited GTA 5 (RP-platform FiveM); Valve (disclosed Source source code); Bethesda (Skyrim) also works with the mod community as examples of successful collaboration between developers and modders.