Yesterday there was a public earnings call for Activision, with a heavy emphasis on Blizzard Entertainment, everyone's favorite MMO developer and keeper of the reigns of the Diablo and StarCraft franchises. There were a couple interesting pieces of information to note regarding Blizzard.

First off, it was brought to light that World of Warcraft has lost approximately 600,000 subscribers. The MMO is now sitting at 11.4 million subscriptions worldwide, down from 12 million last year. Note that during this time a major expansion was released, as well. However, a pretty decent competitor rose up in the form of RIFT, as well, which likely drew away a number of WoW subscribers, at least for a while. Does that bode well for the game itself? Only time will tell.

Secondly, they announced that the Diablo III internal beta had just started, and that an external beta will begin sometime later this year, in Q3 2011. So, if you're a fan of that franchise, keep an eye out for those events as we move through the Summer.