Tomorrow when Patch 1.13.3 rolls out Blizzard will be changing the LUA API to disable addons from being able to communicate via custom chat channels. This change does not affect addons that use party, raid, raid, guild, or whisper chat logs.
This change will limit or disable addons such as Honor Spy, which is an addon receiving a lot of negative feedback on community forums for enabling the ability to become aware of playing you normally would not know were nearby.
Additionally they will be enabling addons the ability to communicate via say and yell allowing addons to communicate with players in the immediate vicinity.
With the release of World of Warcraft Classic 1.13.3, we’re making a change to disallow calling C_ChatInfo.SendAddonMessage with the CHANNEL ChatType. This will prevent addons from communicating over custom, player-created chat channels.
Addons will still be able to communicate using PARTY, RAID, GUILD, and WHISPER in the same ways that they can now. Additionally, we are going to test a change to permit C_ChatInfo.SendAddonMessage to be called with SAY and YELL, allowing your addons to communicate with players in your immediate vicinity.
We support using addons to customize your gameplay experience. However, we also want to ensure that we preserve the social dynamics that make Classic what it is. Ultimately, we decided that the ability for addons to send invisible messages to large, arbitrary groups of players all across Azeroth was something that risked undermining those social dynamics.
Thank you!