Yes, if my classes weren't already big enough.

If you have World of Warcraft on the brains you aren’t the only one. 11 million others do too. Blizzard Entertainment announced the milestone today, a jump from 10 million reached back in January. With some rough math the ballpark figure in subscription revenue amounts to 11,000,000 x $14 x 12 months = US$1,848,000,000 a year. That’s a ton of dough but running an empire doesn’t come cheap with all the server maintenance, new WoW translations, and over 1,000 Blizzard employees on payroll. Oh yeah, not to mention the costs associated to Wrath of the Lich King, due out in Australia on November 14th.

There may be a possible discrepancy with active subscribers and the total number of accounts. Blizzard claims these are subscribers but don’t release the details on whether or not that number includes multi-account owners.

The revamped recruit-a-friend program introduced several months ago offers crazy incentives and many players opened second or third accounts to reap the rewards. As a result, the active subscription count could be inflated. There is some clarification on Blizzard’s end describing what qualifies as an official World of Warcraft subscription.

World of Warcraft subscribers include individuals who have paid a subscription fee or have an active prepaid card to play World of Warcraft, as well as those who have purchased the game and are within their free month of access. Internet Game Room players who have accessed the game over the last thirty days are also counted as subscribers. The above definition excludes all players under free promotional subscriptions, expired or cancelled subscriptions, and expired prepaid cards. Subscribers in licensees' territories are defined along the same rules.

If the 11 million number indeed accounts for unique subscription holders and doesn’t take into consideration multiple accounts owned by the same person - the number of active subscriptions could be much are larger. No matter the exact number or definition of subscriber versus active account, there is no denying World of Warcraft is a cash cow.