From the point of view of designers and developers of virtual worlds, one of the most unnerving points raised at the State of Play conference last year was that their views concerning virtual property might be irrelevant. As our own Dan Hunter described it, a judge might easily apply the "If it looks like a duck" argument to rule that virtual property is just another example of real property and should be treated as such.
I was wondering just how far this argument could be taken, though.
For example, here in the UK we have "right to buy" laws. If you rent a house for long enough, you can buy it - whether the owner wants you to or not. 1,300,000 people bought their houses from local authorities this way. Could people use similar arguments to claim ownership of virtual houses they were renting (either from other players or from the virtual world itself)? What about other legal principles - "squatters' rights", for example, or encroachment?
Does the "If it looks like a duck" argument still work here? What other laws attached to certain kinds of property law might also apply? Does the "If it looks like a duck" argument extend to those, too?
Just how far do you have to go before you can say, "Hmm, you know, this doesn't look, walk or quack like a duck..."?
Why only take it that far?
Why should the fact items are buyable and sellable in a game (and that this can be abused outside of it) make them the only aspect of the game which can be forcibly taken out of the developers control?
I would hope any aspect in the game the players want treated in accordance with real life standards outside the game can be forced into conformity in the same manner. That is, if the entitlement faction that wish to make game economies forced into the way they desire to use it get their way.
Posted by: Roger Taylor | Apr 17, 2004 at 13:14
I think the owner of the game/equipment should be able to retain ownership of the property.
I understand that people place a large amount of time into aquiring virtual toys (I am as guilty as most who play), but the fact that the items can be reproduced and destroyed at will by the company in charge kind of dictates that they should retain ownership and buying/selling rights for use of that virtual property.
The companies are providing a service and a sandbox to play in, nothing more. Inevitably, these games *will* pass out of existence. Cycles of technology and popularity will extinguish old games as new ones are created. Right now, we are in the middle of a period of decline, with companies either folding or reducing the offerings they present to their players. Where would a bankruptcy leave a player who "owns" a piece of virtual property? How would one give a player their property when they have become disgruntled and decide to leave for *insert next big game*? (Yes, I know IGE/Yantis exist. They are not exactly what I feel is needed to solve this situation because, in my opinion, they do not own the property they sell.) You surely would not refund their subscription, or you might as well not sell your game service at all.
I guess it will come down to a court case in the US or UK to make a decision on the validity of the EULA and what rights a subscriber can expect.
Hm. I seem to have rambled. Sorry.
Posted by: Savage_X | Apr 17, 2004 at 14:03
I won't go off on another of my "ownership" rants... but I will raise a question...
Property rights are different in different countries... so if I'm in the U.K. (I'm not but go with me here) and I play a game where the VW servers are located in the U.S. which property rights apply? The country I'm playing in... or the country the game is in?
or... a third option... is not the virtual world itself a country with it's own rulers and laws? They have economies and Ed has proven there is an "exchange rate" for most VW's (approved or not)... TSO has proven VW's can have governing bodies (though even in TSO most all games the owning company still retains final ultimate power).
So if VW's can be considered "countries" we can consider our subscription a sort of dual citizenship... while we are playing the game we are inhabitants of this digital country while our physical selves remains an inhabitant of our first country.
With this idea in mind wouldn't any judgments on virtual property by real world governments be moot? It's like a guy from Brussels buying a car from a guy in Luxembourg and then suing the seller in a Taiwanese court.
Conversely – is it really appropriate to say virtual items are real property and then not acknowledge virtual worlds as real places?
Of course then one might be able to acknowledge avatars as real people and thus make a PvP killing a punishable crime….
Should we then consider NPC’s real people too?
Posted by: Sourtone | Apr 17, 2004 at 23:09
>Roger wrote: Why should the fact items are buyable and sellable in a game (and that this can be abused outside of it) make them the only aspect of the game which can be forcibly taken out of the developers control?
Well I suppose already the fact items can be bought and sold for real cash is the main problem. The act of selling or buying for real cash gives these items a value. And this value has several other implications:
*the loss of an item implies a property loss with a clear value, who will refund it?
*who owns the valuable item? higher is the value higher will be the fight about ownership
etc.
*a closure of a shard or game would imply the loss of items and characters and virtual properties. As the virtual objects have a value, who will refund the loss? The game publisher? the game developer? No one?
Is the standard TSO (normally forbidding trade of ingame items for real cash and therefore trying to avoid virtual items to acquire a real value) enough to defeat the soon to come lawsuits? (it is just a question of time and of gaming closing. E&B could be the beginning, who knows)
Could make sense for MMOG publishers and developers to look for a country whose legislation prevents or limit litigations about virtual property (does someone know if one exists?) and take it as home country for the company handling, publishing and hosting the game.
Posted by: Luca Girardo | Apr 18, 2004 at 02:53
Savage X>I think the owner of the game/equipment should be able to retain ownership of the property.
So do I, but that wasn't what I was asking. The point is that a judge could easily say that virtual property is sufficiently isomorphic with real property to be treated as if it were real property. There's clearly a limit to this isomorphism (in-world "death" isn't the same as real-world murder), but where is that limit? How far might a judge go in equating the virtual with the real?
Richard
Posted by: Richard Bartle | Apr 18, 2004 at 06:53
‘it looks like a duck’ is a very bad argument. It looks neutral and descriptive but is in fact laden with value judgements.
The argument says: Kind A are traded, Kind B are traded, therefore A and B are equivalent.
OK, so if we say: Act X is done by humans, Act Y is done by humans; then X and Y are equivalent. Well sure they are in the respect that they are both done by humans, but X might be petting kittens and Y might be torture.
Returning to trading, even if we make the narrower claim at A and B are both property in sole virtue of the fact that they are traded then anything that is traded is property i.e. we have to include drugs, organs, children etc into this category.
So the argument is really making a strong value claim – it is not simply saying that trading in a thing occurs but making the leap that in addition to a social practice that might be associated with that thing, trading in that thing is acceptable to society as a whole (or at least that bit of society that the decision maker thinks matters).
What’s more, in our specific case the very same argument can be used against item trading, as we can simply say person P owns a thing, person Q sells that thing to person R, and P keeps the money – well that looks like theft to me.
Posted by: Ren | Apr 18, 2004 at 07:01
Sourtone>Property rights are different in different countries... so if I'm in the U.K. (I'm not but go with me here) and I play a game where the VW servers are located in the U.S. which property rights apply?
This is the issue of jurisdiction. It gets hairier than this, in that "the servers" may be distributed across national boundaries so you can't actually be sure in which real-world country the code for the part of the VW youre in is running.
Nevertheless, you as an individual will be in a RL country or be a citizen of a RL country that has laws about what you can do even when you're not in that country. You would need a very good defence, for example, to get away with knowingly indulging in cybersex with a minor. Let's suppose, then, that a judge decides that the law applies to you even if you don't think it should.
So, to restate the original question: given that RL laws apply to you, and that a judge says they also apply to VW property, what other aspects of VWs might also be considered as mapping one-to-one onto reality and therefore also subject to laws formulated for reality?
Richard
Posted by: Richard Bartle | Apr 18, 2004 at 07:16
Well regardless of your country of residence in terms of the legal jurisdiction of virtual property rights, I would think the final authority of said property would lie where the property resides. In fantasy land. Therefore, all jurisdiction for said fantasies reside there as well.
A judge in the UK or the US may one day decide that John Smith owns the Elven cottage in the graceful land of Treewind, but that would quickly be appealed and overturned by the High Court of Elvish Magisters who probably have 20,000 years of ancestral rights to said dwelling, and would nullify the ruling immeadiatly, while admonishing the wizard Drizt for his delusions of grandeur of make beleive human courts and Kingdoms that no Elf has ever heard of.
Posted by: Chris Mancil | Apr 18, 2004 at 13:03
Hehe, I think it would pretty hard for a real life court to subpoena an Elf. What about their rights? =p
Posted by: Chris Mancil | Apr 18, 2004 at 13:14
Can we draw any parallels between virtual world currency and established non-legal tender currency like Frequent Flyer Miles? FFMs have a real world value and you can also argue that FFMs are tied to a specific company.
I'm not entirely sure about this, but one situation that comes to mind is that in the event that the airline's server crashes and the data is unrecoverable, aren't customers allowed to demand some sort of remedy with proof by way of paper FF statements?
If you CAN draw a relevant comparison, then what rights do customers have to their FFMs 1) when the airline is still operating, and 2) when the airline goes out of business
Posted by: Mark F | Apr 18, 2004 at 14:08
Richard> There's clearly a limit to this isomorphism (in-world "death" isn't the same as real-world murder), but where is that limit? How far might a judge go in equating the virtual with the real?
I think the limit should be what the company that controls the IP allows. A solid test of the EULA should make companies stop waffling and help set a precedent for guidelines of what a customer can and cannot expect.
I guess my opinion is that there is no correlation between virtual worlds and real worlds, and that any attempt to link the two is flawed and misguided.
As far as a judge making a correlation, as an American, I would have to say that the legal system here enables too many silly lawsuits to discount the possibility that a judge somewhere will try to apply real world justice to toon world crimes.
Posted by: Savage_X | Apr 18, 2004 at 16:31
Savage_X > A solid test of the EULA should make companies stop waffling and help set a precedent for guidelines of what a customer can and cannot expect.
Historically there has been an economic issue here – that it would never be worth a single player taking a games company to court over the EULA as any given players assets (should the be deemed their property) are insignificant in comparison with the cost of the case. Plus it seems unlikely that any damages could be claimed to cover the legal fee in a no-win no-fee type situation.
However with companies starting to enter the market there is a possibility that someone might go head to head with a game company and sort this out.
There have of course been cases in the past but I’ve never felt that any of them have been resolved in a legally satisfactory way i.e. a way that makes the law unambiguous with respect to virtual items.
Posted by: Ren | Apr 18, 2004 at 16:50
Ren>There have of course been cases in the past but I’ve never felt that any of them have been resolved in a legally satisfactory way i.e. a way that makes the law unambiguous with respect to virtual items.
I agree, I think the true test of the legal end of the EULA in the US will be a company actively going after a broker like IGE/Yantis, who could bring a significant legal fund to the table and has a significant amount to lose.
Posted by: Savage_X | Apr 18, 2004 at 17:11
MMOs still fall under international commercial laws when a contractual agreement forms the business-client relationship. Usually this contract is termed a User Agreemnent, Terms of Service, End-User License Agreement, or something along those lines.
International commerce largely relies on the good faith of nations to honor the laws and practices of other nations, and because international contract standards have been set and are widely accepted.
There is no law which defines virtual property. However, the virtual property is considered part of the content that the MMO service provides, and the developer retains all rights regarding content.
As far as nations are concerned, that contract is binding to all parties.
Posted by: Will Leverett | Apr 18, 2004 at 17:19
Will Leverett > There is no law which defines virtual property.
If this is the case then you can’t contract for it can you?
>However, the virtual property is considered part of the content that the MMO service provides, and the developer retains all rights regarding content.
Er, but you just said that it wasn’t defined in law, so if it does not exist how can you 'consider' it one way or the other?
Actually all kinds of virtual property is defined in law, it’s what Intellectual Property law is all about. In fact much real property law is actually about rights rather than the actual objects of those rights. What are not specifically defined are the kinds virtual objects that are at question here, but the closeness with other types of well understood non-physical objects are important.
And sure, we know what is says in the various EULAs but don’t believe everything that you see written down: either in a Blog or a contract.
Or more formally, there are questions of the enforceability of EULA clauses and questions about extra-contractual matters - specifically look up things like abuse of copyright cases where no-one question what the contract says or means, they contract whether a party has the right to say, mean or enforce it.
Posted by: Ren | Apr 18, 2004 at 18:44
Squatting, boundaries, Right To Buy, are all present because they relate to land used as a prinicple residence. This is a case of the government deciding some social good (Everyone having affordable housing) outweighs the rights of the individual.
Thus, even if Virtual Property is considered entirely isomorphic to Real Property, we are not going to see such laws enacted on it unless one can show such a substantial social good.
The moral for the game companies is to not overly abuse their privelages, or they will be taken away. But, as the loss of my housing in UO is inifinitely less harmful than the loss of my housing in the real world, it would take considerable effort on the pat of the company to commit sufficient social ills to trigger the government into action.
I don't think "ownership" implies "can do whatever one wants". We are always limitted by whatever the rest of the world tells us to do :> (This goes both ways - if I consider myself entitled to in game items, I can't claim I can then do whatever I want with them. (Ie: Use them to perform a game breaking bug))
Luca> "Well I suppose already the fact items can be bought and sold for real cash is the main problem."
Even if no one traded items on Ebay, they would still have cash value. Sure, we would be less likely to be aware of it, or to be able to calculate a GDP. But it wouldn't be worth $0 just because no one trades it. Exercise for the reader: What is the marginal cost of a human life in your country? On average, how much is your government willing to spend to save a single life?
- Brask Mumei
Posted by: Brask Mumei | Apr 18, 2004 at 19:05
Brask Mumei> Even if no one traded items on Ebay, they would still have cash value. Sure, we would be less likely to be aware of it, or to be able to calculate a GDP. But it wouldn't be worth $0 just because no one trades it.
Eh? If I have something and no one will purchase it off me or I can’t raise capital on it then, right at this moment, it doesn’t have cash value to me does it?
Now it might for the game company as it might be considered part of the asset base that they could sell if they sold the game – but not to me.
>Exercise for the reader: What is the marginal cost of a human life in your country? On average, how much is your government willing to spend to save a single life?
I think that probably depends almost as much on who you are as where you are.
Posted by: Ren | Apr 18, 2004 at 19:17
Ren> "Eh? If I have something and no one will purchase it off me or I can’t raise capital on it then, right at this moment, it doesn’t have cash value to me does it?"
I obviously didn't say what I meant clearly.
My point was even without ebay, you *could* raise capital on it. (The demand would be there even if no one was currently servicing it). Having people actively trading X on an open market makes it very clear that X has a price. But, lack of people trading doesn't mean that there is no value. Thus, the problem isn't trading on ebay. That is the symptom of the problem: virtual items in EQ have excessive valuation for "just a game".
Ren> "I think that probably depends almost as much on who you are as where you are."
Of course. I don't have a group of secret service agents following me around ready to take a bullet for me. But even for average joes like myself, there are huge variances in the amount that will be paid. A higher price is paid to prevent high profile deaths than low profile deaths, for example.
- Brask Mumei
Posted by: Brask Mumei | Apr 18, 2004 at 20:08
Ren >> Er, but you just said that it wasn’t defined in law, so if it does not exist how can you 'consider' it one way or the other?
Virtual property will be defined in the licensing agreement (EULA) by the game publisher. Usually this is defined as part of "Content" in the EULA.
Most EULAs for MMOs are quite similar. All of them I have researched reserve all rights over the content the game provides to the publisher (I have not seen Project Entropia which is likely to be quite different).
Ren >> Actually all kinds of virtual property is defined in law, it’s what Intellectual Property law is all about. In fact much real property law is actually about rights rather than the actual objects of those rights.
There are no laws directly governing virtual property. That's because at its core it is nothing more than code which is the product of the publisher, loosely and indirectly protected by IP law.
Ren >> And sure, we know what is says in the various EULAs but don’t believe everything that you see written down: either in a Blog or a contract.
Or more formally, there are questions of the enforceability of EULA clauses and questions about extra-contractual matters.
Game publishers aren't being arbitrary when reserving all rights over any content shipped with or created by their game. There would be a Pandora's Box of issues stemming from it, far too many to start listing here, but the primary one would regard liability concerns.
Transferring any level of ownership rights to the user would result in either an entirely new form of MMO service that is quite unlike the ones we have today or it would shut down completely.
Posted by: Will Leverett | Apr 19, 2004 at 01:15
Chris Mancil>A judge in the UK or the US may one day decide that John Smith owns the Elven cottage in the graceful land of Treewind, but that would quickly be appealed and overturned by the High Court of Elvish Magisters
The cottage is in the virtual world, the virtual world is in the real world: the real world wins. A RL judge can enforce RL judgments in VWs; a VW judge has no ability to enforce anything beyond the boundaries of the VW.
Richard
Posted by: Richard Bartle | Apr 19, 2004 at 02:37
Savage X>I guess my opinion is that there is no correlation between virtual worlds and real worlds, and that any attempt to link the two is flawed and misguided.
Mine too, except when the developers of the VW make that link as part of the VW design.
>the legal system here enables too many silly lawsuits to discount the possibility that a judge somewhere will try to apply real world justice to toon world crimes.
This is what I was trying to get at: how far can the argument "virtual property owned by your character is the same as real property owned by you" be sustained?
If someone claims they own a piece of virtual property against the developers' wishes, they must be working from some logical premiss. We've already had discussions about the validity of this premiss, and few people who believe that eBaying is A Good Thing changed their minds. OK, so if these people can't be persuaded that their concept of virtual property is flawed, let's take their premiss and apply it until we reach its limit.
The most basic "I own it" argument is that no matter what the developers say, to the players it looks like this virtual property stuff is just like real property, therefore it is. This argument can be applied in other situations: virtual reputation looks just like real reputation; virtual skills look just like real skills; virtual racism looks just like real racism; virtual incest looks just like real incest; virtual laws look just like real laws; etc..
How far would someone who believes "virtual property looks just like real property, therefore it is" be prepared to go in accepting matching claims before some other factor stopped them? And what might that other factor be?
Richard
Posted by: Richard Bartle | Apr 19, 2004 at 02:57
Richard,
Dan did a PhD at Cambridge on the use of cognitive science models to understand analogic reasoning in law. I don't think his thesis is online, but here's a paper of his on how the concept of real physical space has been (mis)applied to "cyberspace":
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=306662
I don't know how Dan meant to use the "duck" line, but when I talked about ducks at the State of Play, I was talking descriptively, not prescriptively. Judges often flip-flop, in the case of new technologies, between treating virtual things much like their real counterparts and treating them as something different. Obviously, a virtual sword is *not* a physical sword and should *not* be equated with a physical sword, by a player or by a court.
As Rene Magritte said a while ago "This is not a pipe" Replace "pipe" with "sword" and that *should* be the starting point for the intelligent discussion of "who owns my sword", with all due respect to ducks and non-ducks.
The second point is that we're talking about games governed by game rules. Basketballs *are* real property. Real basketballs appear to be owned, within the context of the basketball game, by separate teams and they appear to be "stolen" (again within the game) by the opposing teams. This obviously isn't legal theft and it does not mean that the team that controls the ball owns the ball, despite the fact that the ball is clearly property.
Posted by: greglas | Apr 19, 2004 at 09:47
Richard,
What concerns me is the possibility of someone suing me for real damages for the loss of a game article or a character death.
Allowing any sort of connection between a virtual world and the real world openst the door for that situation to happen. Lawyers are really good at making connections between cause and effect if they think they can profit greatly.
I think the guy who is selling stuff on his own oon Ebay is fine, he's more of a hobbyist, but the companies like IGE and Yantis are causing more damage and opening this can of worms farther than Ebayers at this point.
Posted by: SavageX | Apr 19, 2004 at 10:47
I think that it may look like a duck, but only in a cursory way. Duck decoys look like ducks, but only certain rules apply (they are a certain size and shape, and they float on water BUT they don't feel pain or eat).
The physics and structure of reality of VWs only bears a resemblance to RL reality and is different in many significant ways. Death and theft work differently, for example - if you die, you can be respawned even if the VW ruleset has permadeath, and if I steal your basketball, there exist people with the ability to create you a new one indistinguishable from the old. Even the very existence of the world is dependent on a steady supply of 120v AC power :) (in the US)
So I think any statement that RL reality is isomorphic to VW reality is a chimera. At best they have only certain attributes in common.
Posted by: Jayce | Apr 19, 2004 at 10:56
Greglas>I don't know how Dan meant to use the "duck" line, but when I talked about ducks at the State of Play, I was talking descriptively, not prescriptively
It was my impression that Dan was talking descriptively, too, ie. telling us that this is what a judge might well say (while not necessarily agreeing with it himself).
This being the case, hadn't we maybe better get our response worked out ready for the awful day when a judge does indeed make the "walks like a duck" argument? Given that all articles in newspapers and magazines on the subject give the impression that commodification is routine, we can't be complacent that we'll get the "right" decision.
>This obviously isn't legal theft and it does not mean that the team that controls the ball owns the ball, despite the fact that the ball is clearly property.
Yes, I know all this. However, as far as virtual worlds are concerned, we do have people buying and selling the basketballs (or, more sophisticatedly, paying the people who currently have control of the ball to hand it over to them).
I've no objection to this if the developers (as keepers of the game rules) want it. Julian's UO trades are fine by me.
I do object when the developers don't want it. I want to make sure that when IGE (say) and SOE (say) go head to head, the judge doesn't just look at the volume of trade and figure, "well, it looks like property...".
I know what the judgment should be, but I want to try make sure it will be that.
Richard
Posted by: Richard Bartle | Apr 19, 2004 at 11:09
We'll just have to develop a body of court decisions (even small claims court) that will nudge the public and judicial opinion in the right direction. Maybe the question will reach the US Supreme Court or an international court system one day.
Frank
Posted by: magicback | Apr 19, 2004 at 11:17
For the sake of argument, consider a "deadbeat dad" claiming no assets/income as cause for not making child support payments.
How much of a leap would it take for the court to claim that the dad's lvl 65 chars and equipment are assets that could be divested (through ebay) to pay his bill? ;-)
Posted by: Ian McGee | Apr 19, 2004 at 13:16
Bah! Clearly there is an absurd limit to all this, right?
Say I play a game of super-monster-edition Parker Brother's Monopoly with several of you, and accumulate a large amount of game money and several little plastic houses and hotels. Is someone really saying that I can pocket the little pastel colored bills and bright colored houses as I have some sort of property rights over them, just because they have time-investment value to me?
Do we really think “The Monopoly Defense” I just made wouldn't tear someone’s case, suing to 'own' their virtual property's case to itty bitty shreds?
[Note: I am not saying that virtual items don't have value. I am saying that there are very real limits on real-world demands to redeem/secure that value.]
I say the "duck" our stuff walks like is the "Board/Video Game" duck.
My definition of a game playing, as I think regular folks see it:
Game playing is a social contract between the players (and sometimes the game developer), each party brings to the table their time and tokens (money/objects.). The purpose of this gathering is explicitly entertainment. Some parties are expected to provide more entertainment value than others, but there are explicit rules as to who may do what with the game tokens. These rules are usually set down by the game developer, but are sometimes amended by the players by consensus. Any party may leave the game, and may take some tokens with them, according to those rules.
What mucks up fitting MMORPGs into this description is that much of the social contract is transformed into real quasi-real “TOS” and real “License” contracts, protecting the parties (esp. the developer) by explicitly stating what belongs to who (the player owns nothing) and entreating the users to play nice. But, honestly, these meta-rules have always been true for most games: “My game, my house, (my rules), play nice.”
Randy
Posted by: F. Randall Farmer | Apr 19, 2004 at 13:28
SavageX: What concerns me is the possibility of someone suing me for real damages for the loss of a game article or a character death.
I suppose the problem could be limited if the loss of game article or a character death is happeining within the "game rules" beside the fact we would need to define what is a game rule in the MMOG context.
But what if the loss of the item or character is caused by a software error or a system error? That could be a large problem.
And what if the MMOG publisher decides to close the game? For sure there is a loss.
Khefri
Posted by: Luca Girardo | Apr 19, 2004 at 13:35
Richard> The cottage is in the virtual world, the virtual world is in the real world: the real world wins. A RL judge can enforce RL judgments in VWs; a VW judge has no ability to enforce anything beyond the boundaries of the VW.<
*Laughs*
Sorry I totally disagree. In the real world there is no cottage. Just like there are no Elfs, and no elven courts. Except in the North Pole.
At best you have a database object, at worst a few lines of code that produces an aesthetic effect in conjunction with other proprietary data (art assets, ground/sky textures, grid coordinates, server code, drivers, hardware, internet connections, electricity, etc) that when combined together produces a cottage-like mirage.
An end user can no more claim right to that data, any more than they could sue HBO for ownership rights to a Sopranos espidode. They subscribe to HBO, the only watch Sopranos, in fact that watch it so much they feel they have certain rights to it.
Well, I suppose they could sue for the right to re-sale the Sopranos episode to another HBO subscriber but it doesn't pass the laugh test.
Real real life courts have testimony, witnesses, evidence, and proof. And for someone to claim they have rights to a virtual cottage, must have some legal basis for that claim.
- "I use it so much it feels like mine"
- "Only my access key/account can use this asset, though I must pay them each month for this access, that money doesn't mean they own it, I own it real life, thats just a fantasy tax!"
That really doesn't pass the laugh test.
Even if A RL judge says "ok user, you own this". What do they feel they own? The screenshot of the effect? The programming code? The textures? The Art object? The grid coordinates? The server stream? How do you legally define and enforce rights in a temporarily existant fantasy place?
- Do we put that code on a disk and say good bye user, your banned now. E-mail them a nice screenshot?
- Fed-ex a property deed (written in Elvish though) with a screenshot of the property to the former user?
I assure you that no company would continue doing business with a person who sued them. If forced, I assume we could place invincible GOD mobs in the house? Or a death zone that instakills all that come within 2 screens of the house (except for the owner elf character, who could stay alive in the house but never leave it without dieing and respawning inside the house.) Fun stuff like that. Would we also be legally required to leave the world's rules exactly the same as before the lawsuit? Can we put it all under water because an act of God (CCR 17) caused tidal movements to shift?
Again, I'm laughing, because only in MMO's do people buy into the fantasy that they 'truly have rights' to things that don't exist and that they did not create, nor own the legal intellectual property rights.
But this isn't about ownership at all and has never been about ownership. Its about money. And the right for a user to claim ownership of copyrighted data to sell and profit from.
Posted by: Chris Mancil | Apr 19, 2004 at 15:44
Chris M >> An end user can no more claim right to that data, any more than they could sue HBO for ownership rights to a Sopranos espidode. They subscribe to HBO, the only watch Sopranos, in fact that watch it so much they feel they have certain rights to it.
Well said. Another example would be sporting events which usually give a disclaimer that "Any copying, rebroadcast, redistribution, or retransmission of today's game any of the contents of this service without the expressed written consent of (the home team) and the National Basketball Association."
But using this argument I could say that just because I pay to go to a Houston Rockets game, or pay for their broadcasts, I should be able to make money off of it.
"Hey, I like the Houston Rockets. I watch them, I buy their gear, I go to a couple games a year, I have the NBA Pass which gives me all of their broadcasts on digital cable. I should be able to have some rights to tape and resell the broadcast. After all I have put time and money into their product, thereforce I have a vested emotional and financial interest. "
But the Rockets games are not items - they are events. I pay to enjoy the event, not for the right to access and trade the item as I see fit.
MMOs are exactly like that. You aren't paying for rights to the game or for virtual properties in and of the game; you are paying for access to the events that the game world provides.
And btw this is OT but the Rockets will beat the Lakers tonight. :)
Posted by: Will Leverett | Apr 19, 2004 at 18:04
Me>The cottage is in the virtual world, the virtual world is in the real world: the real world wins. A RL judge can enforce RL judgments in VWs; a VW judge has no ability to enforce anything beyond the boundaries of the VW.
Chris Mancil>Sorry I totally disagree. In the real world there is no cottage.
In the real world there is no anything except sub-atomic particles. It's only because you view those as collecting to form energy and matter, and interpret particular configurations of energy and matter to be "objects", that you can say a cottage in the real world exists.
In virtual worlds, the objects are emergent consequences of the interaction of computer code and data. People ascribe meaning to these configurations, just as they do to matter/energy in the real world. They recognise that there is a difference between this kind of object and the kind they deal with normally, so they call them "virtual objects".
The point I was making is that virtual objects only exist because of reality. Without the real, there could be no virtual. Furthermore, virtual worlds only exist with the consent of the real world: virtual world servers can be switched off, but reality's servers can't be (at least not by us). Reality owns (maybe that should be pwns) virtuality.
Thus, a RL judge can enforce a judgement in a virtual world. A VW judge can perhaps enforce a judgement in a virtual world, but they can only enforce it in the real world if the real world agrees. This is the point I was making, in response to your suggestion that final authority for law in a virtual world would rest within that virtual world. It doesn't.
I concur with the rest of your post, so I think we may be talking at cross purposes here.
Metaphysically speaking, of course, there is no such thing as number, as law, as love: these are all constructions of the human mind. So are objects, so are virtual objects; the only thing you can be sure exists is you yourself. From this perspective, all life is an illusion and virtual objects are merely an illusion within an illusion.
Richard
Posted by: Richard Bartle | Apr 20, 2004 at 03:52
Randy> "Do we really think “The Monopoly Defense” I just made wouldn't tear someone’s case, suing to 'own' their virtual property's case to itty bitty shreds"
On the property/not property question, the funny thing is that the Monopoly pieces are actually property (they are chattels) -- so if you're analogizing the little tokens (dog, shoe, hat, etc.) to virtual items, then you've already made a big (and questionable) leap toward saying virtual property = real property.
On the ownership question (which is a really a very very separate question), what would really tear the case to shreds would be an agreement between the designer and the player in which the player agreed, in exchange for playing, that the player would claim no ownership interest.
One of the primary things that courts do is to enforce civil contracts. As a general matter, a court will only refuse to enforce a contract when there is some compelling social policy reason for not doing so.
Posted by: greglas | Apr 20, 2004 at 09:32
greglas>what would really tear the case to shreds would be an agreement between the designer and the player in which the player agreed, in exchange for playing, that the player would claim no ownership interest.
In some places, players have an ownership interest whether they like it or not.
In much of the EU, for example, rights of integrity and or attribution are considered basic human rights that can't be signed away. A player may claim that although they don't own the virtual laser effect they created, they nevertheless want their name to be shown on it every time it appears (this could be after it's been integrated into thousands of other effects), oh, and they don't want it being used to accompany blasters because that would make out they were pro-violence and impugn their honour (this is after people have used the effect to make 90 different types of blaster).
Richard
Posted by: Richard Bartle | Apr 20, 2004 at 10:04
A comment and a question:
Chris, if the cottage is recognized as property and, more specifically, as property owned by the player AND the judge determines that real world property law applies to it (to some degree or other), then other real-world property rights might also come into play.
For example, right of access. If I own a parcel of land and there's no access to it (e.g. driveway) from the road that passes near, I will have a right of access OVER SOMEONE ELSE'S PROPERTY to access my parcel. I will be allowed, by law, to walk through my neighbor's property (or use my neighbor's driveway if that can provide me with sufficient access) to get to my piece of land.
Imagine that a real world judge says your virtual cottage is owned by you and carries with it comparable rights as befit a real-world parcel. Then, by that decree, the game company could no more refuse or restrict your access than someone can in the real world. Hence, it would be illegal for the company to refuse your subscription or change the physics of the world in the locality of your cottage.
This example does illustrate some of the inherent problems with the "duck principle" that Richard is discussing. Personally, I hope no court is so willing to use that principle and 'give' all virtual property the same rights and privileges as we have for real world property. Bye bye game developers and bye bye persistent-world games.
(Although this is a common legal answer to such questions and topics as this...) Maybe what we need is a carefully-crafted new form of law to govern virtual property. It could borrow aspects of real world property law but not provide all of the same rights and privileges. Granted, then pops up the question of enforcement and jurisdiction and the whole thing goes somewhere in a handbasket. But it's difficult to apply any real world laws wholesale to an entirely new venue of not only property but places, ideas and expressions.
My question, although moderately tengentially related at best, is whether copyright law might already govern some of the ownership (not property) questions. I assume most game developers/operators have their code copyrighted or can/will/do claim a copyright in and to their code. If so, how can anyone else own any portions of that code? Yes, yes, fair use, blah, blah (not to be too dismissive but rather only to recognize the fly in the ointment, even if I think the fly is a fake plastic one) but notwithstanding that, and also notwithstanding that individual users cannot separate "their" portions of the code and/or copy and/or use them independently, why not? Couldn't copyright law say "too bad, they have a copyright, they own this expression, you have no rights in or to it, you are the weakest link, goodbye?"
Posted by: Alan Stern | Apr 20, 2004 at 10:14
Richard> "In much of the EU, for example, rights of integrity and or attribution are considered basic human rights that can't be signed away."
Good point, but luckily we don't have to worry about those silly moral rights on this side of the pond any more. ;-)
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=000&invol=02-428
(I'm writing something about Dastar & attribution interests at the moment...)
I don't know very much about how attribution rights play out in practice in the UK -- but when you speak of "the virtual laser effect they created," I think we're moving toward questions of ownership over original user-created content, which (I think) is not what most devs are concerned about when they say player ownership = bad. (Most Diku MUDish VWs just don't let players create virtual laser effects.)
Posted by: greglas | Apr 20, 2004 at 10:16
Richard> In the real world there is no anything except sub-atomic particles.
Touche Richard ;) Though I started enjoying myself too much I think, another interesting side bar to the discussion about enforcement goes back to your original response about a VW court not haveing any enforcement power in the real world.
While that is certainly true, they would most certainly have enforcement in the VW world, which is where the property or items reside. If a subscriber were to win such a court battle, it would be interesting to see the fall out inside of a game world where different rules and powers exist. Like turning a virtual cottage into a virtual prison.
Snaky? Yes.
Ethical? On the same level as the Plaintiff.
Would it be Legal? ...uhhh, Court Case Round 2.
- Chris
Posted by: Chris Mancil | Apr 20, 2004 at 10:39
Alan S>My question, although moderately tengentially related at best, is whether copyright law might already govern some of the ownership (not property) questions. I assume most game developers/operators have their code copyrighted or can/will/do claim a copyright in and to their code. If so, how can anyone else own any portions of that code?
That really is the central question at the debate. From a Game Developer's view: there are no items just effects produced by code. To the end user, there is no code at all - only what the see, hear, and interact with. I think the final results of any legal battle will be determined by what is considered the property - the ingredients, or the effects? Perhaps both.
The Music and Film industries certainly have a strong opinion as to the "effect" side of content, and who owns all rights to it. And there is a large amount of case law and decisions regarding that media.
The Pharmacutical industry certainly has an extremely large legal investment in the "ingredients" side of their business. And the effects of their products can keep people literally - alive. Yet that effect does not give the end user any additional rights to that drug, even if their life depends on it. Think about that for a minute.
In fact it seems that the only time end-users have rights concerning ownership of commercial interests is when there are damages, public health or environmental damages, discrimination, obstruction of justice, fraud, or privacy violations. The fact that computer technology allows interaction and imitation to such a level that customers are extremely more likely to form real life emotional attachments to things, does not make it any more realistic a legal matter. Because if you apply the same legal-circumstances to any other industry in the real world - the law suits would make people literally laugh, up and down laugh.
Posted by: Chris Mancil | Apr 20, 2004 at 10:58
Sure the Game Company has copyright in code, but is the fact of an instance of an item a matter of code?
Instances of items and the in-game possession of those items come from a mixture of code, action and database entries. That is, if we look at the db for a given character, while the schema is defined by the Game Company most of the attributes are defined either directly by specific choices made by the player or are a result of a players actions.
So once can’t simply look to copyright in code. Though one can argue that there the relevant right (if you are in the US) is that in a collection, if so we initially have a position of joint ownership which is then operated on by the ELA (if we believe it is enforceable) and the rights of the player are transferred to the Game Developer (well other contracting party which might be the publisher).
Posted by: Ren | Apr 20, 2004 at 11:29
Greg> Good point, but luckily we don't have to worry about those silly moral rights on this side of the pond any more. ;-)
I’ll read the reference, but I thought that although it liked to ignore Moral Rights, the US was actually obligated by treaties to recognise them – er, from memory isn’t this in the Berne Convention (looking it up, its: Article 6bis (1)).
Posted by: Ren | Apr 20, 2004 at 11:49
Btw, I'm talking exclusively with regards to US (Copyright) law.
Ren> Instances of items and the in-game possession of those items come from a mixture of code, action and database entries. That is, if we look at the db for a given character, while the schema is defined by the Game Company most of the attributes are defined either directly by specific choices made by the player or are a result of a players actions.
If all of the items and characters are generated by the copyrighted code, regardless of who provides the impetus for the creation (who pushes the button), then why can't the generated items/chars be protected by that copyright? Especially as the items/chars are iterations of portions of the code. So what if a player killed the monster that dropped the bow of elven might or crafted the sword of godliness? It all comes from the game code which is protected.
Also, why must it be a copyright for a collection? It's the code that's being protected, not anyone else's contribution (that is to say, creative input). Only if there is an element of a 3rd party's creative input would a collection copyright apply. - e.g. Comic books with letters pages - See Gaiman v. McFarlane , 360 F.3d 644 (C.A.7 Feb. 24, 2004).
Posted by: Alan Stern | Apr 20, 2004 at 11:57
Ren> the US was actually obligated by treaties to recognise them
Yes, well we *do* recognize them under VARA in the case of, e.g, "a painting, drawing, print, or sculpture, existing in a single copy, in a limited edition of 200 copies or fewer that are signed and consecutively numbered by the author... [etc.]"
And yes, we are a signatory to Berne, but our treaty obligations are domestically implemented by Congress, and Congress passed VARA.
You should check out Dastar.
Posted by: greglas | Apr 20, 2004 at 12:03
Greg>You should check out Dastar.
Will do, thanks.
Sounds like UK derogation on EU laws i.e. we fully sign up, then take out all those rights that the government decides its citizens just don’t need.
Posted by: Ren | Apr 20, 2004 at 12:13
Alan> It's the code that's being protected, not anyone else's contribution (that is to say, creative input).
Because it’s the instance of an item not the proto-type that we are discussing here, and these are not simply a matter of code.
If it is simply a matter of code, then how come Microsoft does not own the copyright of every word document you create? A word document is simply a combination of code and some user input, an combination of letters and spaces that someone can create is potentially there in MS Word just as any combination of items etc, so OK you might argue the case for an individual gold coin but when you have something as complex as a character, how come that’s not just like a word document?
Posted by: Ren | Apr 20, 2004 at 12:14
Ren > If it is simply a matter of code, then how come Microsoft does not own the copyright of every word document you create? A word document is simply a combination of code and some user input, an combination of letters and spaces that someone can create is potentially there in MS Word just as any combination of items etc, so OK you might argue the case for an individual gold coin but when you have something as complex as a character, how come that’s not just like a word document?
Because their EULA does not stipulate that they have the rights to a document you creat. It states:
"All title and intellectual property rights in and to the content that is not contained in the Software Product, but may be accessed through use of the Software Product, is the property of the respective content owners and may be protected by applicable copyright or other intellectual property laws and treaties."
An MMO EULA, on the other hand, specifically makes you agree that anything Content created as a result of game mechanics is still property of the game.
Posted by: Will Leverett | Apr 20, 2004 at 14:23
OK, so what if MS changed it?
Posted by: Ren | Apr 20, 2004 at 14:45
Alan and Will> IANAL (although I seem to be spending more of my time lately talking to and with them) but it seems that EULA's need to force users to transfer IP rights rather than releasing them. Photoshop's, for example, says nothing about the content created within it. I suspect that Word's has the section it does because I have heard from several sources that MS considered trying to force users of their software to grant rights to MS.
Things get even more interesting when the users are creating original content or importing content from the real world. Obviously, Second Life has both of those situations and we felt that it was very important to allow users to retain their IP rights. Even if we wanted to keep IP rights -- which we don't -- in SL, where users actually create new content using atomistic construction techniques -- this is very different from crafting which I've covered at length elsewhere -- it would be difficult to argue the kind of copyright extension from our base code that Alan mentions.
Posted by: Cory Ondrejka | Apr 20, 2004 at 15:32
Will> "An MMO EULA, on the other hand, specifically makes you agree that anything Content created as a result of game mechanics is still property of the game."
Inside the game in Ultima Online there are books. In these books I have written short stories. Why does EA gain full ownership of these stories? Technically, I can't post these stories on a webpage, because doing so would violate _EA_s rights.
- Brask Mumei
Posted by: Brask Mumei | Apr 20, 2004 at 15:58
Ren > OK, so what if MS changed it?
They have the right to stipulate the terms of use for their product. The user can choose to use it or decline it and use a different product.
Brask > Inside the game in Ultima Online there are books. In these books I have written short stories. Why does EA gain full ownership of these stories? Technically, I can't post these stories on a webpage, because doing so would violate _EA_s rights.
Actually the UO Terms of Service allows you to post the stories on a webpage - you just couldn't make money off of it.
Additionally it provides that when you provide content to the game, you are granting EA the rights to use that content in any manner that they see fit.
The word "ownership" is pretty taboo when it comes to EULAs I've found. It's too black and white... there's much more gray involved. :)
Posted by: Will Leverett | Apr 20, 2004 at 19:20
At first, I thought the MS Word example to be a bit simplistic as it would amount to a copyright to whatever language the software uses but, as compared with other contexts, I suppose it's not as crazy as I might hope.
In posing the copyright question, my intent was not to draw in EULAs and ToS but rather to pose an alternate way of looking at protecting software.
Posted by: Alan Stern | Apr 20, 2004 at 23:39
Chris Mancil>While that is certainly true, they would most certainly have enforcement in the VW world, which is where the property or items reside. If a subscriber were to win such a court battle, it would be interesting to see the fall out inside of a game world where different rules and powers exist. Like turning a virtual cottage into a virtual prison.
If a court inside a VW ordered something to happen, whether it did happen or not depends on whether the code already exists to support it happening. If it does, then OK, that's part of the virtual world and the court has authority; if it doesn't, then the court is reliant on the developers to make the necessary changes.
If a player didn't like what the VW court decided, then they may decide to go to a RL court. The RL court can order the VW developer to comply with its ruling, which may entail making changes to the VW.
Now if the developers try to subvert the RL court order, they can be taken right back to RL court and ordered to unsubvert it. "Yes, you own the cottage - but now it's a prison, ha ha" will lead to a swift appearance before a grumpy judge asking why you think this isn't a form of contempt.
Richard
Posted by: Richard Bartle | Apr 21, 2004 at 03:26
Ren> If it is simply a matter of code, then how come Microsoft does not own the copyright of every word document you create? A word document is simply a combination of code and some user input, an combination of letters and spaces that someone can create is potentially there in MS Word just as any combination of items etc, so OK you might argue the case for an individual gold coin but when you have something as complex as a character, how come that’s not just like a word document? >>
Wow that really threw me a curveball, very nice example. Although the EULA was stated previously I would say offhand that in relation to MMO's the comparison to Microsoft Word would probably only work in regards to Word Templates. MS provides a certain amount of prebuilt office templates from work orders to resumes, I don't beleive they would allow you to own and resell one of those templates, instanced or not.
In my mind items and in-game assets are basically pre-built templates that are provided as part of the software, whether they be instanced or not. Could you sell an altered Template though? I really don't know. I doubt too many poeple would be willing to find out unless they had a few million dollars to blow on legal expenses for a few years.
Posted by: Chris Mancil | Apr 21, 2004 at 13:14
Richard> Now if the developers try to subvert the RL court order, they can be taken right back to RL court and ordered to unsubvert it. "Yes, you own the cottage - but now it's a prison, ha ha" will lead to a swift appearance before a grumpy judge asking why you think this isn't a form of contempt.<<
As I said its difficult ground. What part of something do they own? Does a court order apply to a combination of technology that produces an item or code? Or does it defacto give the user ownership of the entire game, which is what you sort of imply here.
By that reasoning, a Company could also be held in contempt for extreme lag, power outages, non-payment of fees by the user, price increases, or game/server closure. To say nothing of new patches, expansions etc, that could affect the user.
But right now no one cares Richard (industry side), because we aren't really talking about that much money in comparison. Its starting to get larger, and the money from buying and selling virtual items is absolutely attracting corporate attention. But once any Corporation, or the Industry starts being challenged about their ownership - seriously challenged - I think we will be talking about a whole new thing.
And because this is s murky and extremely shaky legal argument to begin with, I imagine that short-term this wlll be decided by who has the most money for the best legal resources. Unless there is a millionaire who wants to toss away a bunch of commas to fund a virtual rights crusade in Court, I have an unshakeable cynisim about the validity of this issue and debate. Not that it isn't a fun debate - I've had plenty of fun these past few days. Thanks!
Posted by: Chris Mancil | Apr 21, 2004 at 13:31
I go over to your house and we play a nice game of Monopoly.
I get to buy all the good properties and eventually win the game with thousands in monopoly money.
Do I then get to take those properties, money, and game pieces with me because I put in the time investment to "earn" them? Do you owe me some recompense because I win? Of course not - it's a game and it's not my game.
If one of the other players agrees to sell me his game pieces or one of his properties does that make the piece or the property "mine" - of course not... they still belong to the owner of the game. I'm the fool who's paying someone else to give me their game pieces.
All virtual items are "game pieces" - no more no less. Yes, you have to work to obtain some of them and to get better ones. But if I work in Monopoly to obtain a hotel on boardwalk it's still not "my" game piece... it belongs to whoever owns the game. If another player had boardwalk and I give him $30 RL dollars for him to give it to me... not only is that outside the rules of the game (though not strictly prohibited) the boardwalk card and game STILL belong to someone else - all you’re buying is use of that item.
Your 49.95 buys you the client software and the box it comes in and, typically, your first month or so of play. Your $13.95, or whatever, gives you permission to use their servers to play the game and manipulate the game pieces. The game pieces still belong to the people who own the game however - the game company. If you give some other player real money in exchange for a virtual item you are only buying the use of that item. You’re not buying ownership since the person who sold it to you didn't own it either.
Posted by: Sourtone | Apr 21, 2004 at 14:02
Sourtone> Do I then get to take those properties, money, and game pieces with me because I put in the time investment to "earn" them? Do you owe me some recompense because I win?
Probably not.
>Of course not - it's a game and it's not my game.
But this is not the reason.
Poker is a game, I beat you at poker and get some funny coloured little disks, and sure I want cash for them!
Though i dont think according to the casino i own them - but are you sure you actually own the currency in you pocket, you own the value, but do you own the token?
The only reason that you cannot convert your monopoly money into ‘real’ money is that this practice is not accepted, they do not have generally accepted value. The reason that we have having this discussion is that with game like EQ the token are accepted as real value by enough people. And hay its not like you can take these tokens of value away from EQ is it so you are never attempting to own the token.
Posted by: Ren | Apr 21, 2004 at 16:32
Chris > In my mind items and in-game assets are basically pre-built templates that are provided as part of the software, whether they be instanced or not.
Sure, that’s why I shifted the argument to character rather than things like individual instances of individual things. Sooner or later down this road one gets into a creativity / originality argument, and complexity is an aspect of that.
My, thought experiment is:- what is MS changed the EULA for Word such that rights for all content created with it from that point on were attributed to MS (OK if you are in the EU exempt Moral Rights – OK)?
Would this stand up in court? Are the really no limits to what can be done with a EULA?
If there is a limit, is it applicable to EQ and the rest?
Ren
Posted by: Ren | Apr 21, 2004 at 16:38
The point isn't what the real world value for these things are - merely the value between two players. Virtual items have no real world value either except between two players as the items have no value outside the gamespace - just like in Monopoly. Poker chips only have a value because the casino assigns them one. Take them outside the casino and the chips only have value to other people willing to go to that casino. Our currency only has value because the world markets say it does. Take you currency to another planet and it's value drops to nil.
None of that was my point however. My point is that the sword you loot from a corpse or buy from a vendor or make by putting the right materials in a box and hitting "combine" doesn't belong to you. Thus when you sell it you are selling something that doesn't belong to you. So someone is willing to give you money for it? The wanting of a thing doesn't make that thing yours... it's the agreement of the owner to release ownership of that item to the buyer. You aren't the owner so you can't release any ownership... you are merely the user. You can release your use of the item to the other person but upon receipt they merely become the user... still not the owner.
It's funny how this issue has come full circle... from game companies considering suing players for selling virtual items to players thinking of suing companies because they now think the items belong to them.
Posted by: Sourtone | Apr 21, 2004 at 17:50
Chris Mancil>Does a court order apply to a combination of technology that produces an item or code?
It applies to whatever the courts say it applies to. That doesn't mean it has to be right or make sense.
>But right now no one cares Richard (industry side), because we aren't really talking about that much money in comparison.
Right now is when the precedents are going to be set. If we don't care now, we're going to regret it when we DO care but it's too late to change anything.
Richard
Posted by: Richard Bartle | Apr 22, 2004 at 04:26
I'm coming late to this thread, but I think the judge needs to hear an argument that play spaces are special to humans and need to be preserved as such.
Posted by: Edward Castronova | Apr 22, 2004 at 10:46
I agree.
To use a less fancy formulation than I did above: the whole duck thing is really a recognition of value, in this case monetary. But there are other values we can recognise, such as the sanctity of play spaces.
The problem is that the way that the discourse goes, as soon as you introduce cash issues, all the other values seem to go out of the window.
Or to use my blunt formulation of this: just because you can buy and sell something, does not mean you should.
Posted by: Ren | Apr 22, 2004 at 12:29
In response to ownership of player-written books:
Wil> "Actually the UO Terms of Service allows you to post the stories on a webpage - you just couldn't make money off of it."
> "Additionally it provides that when you provide content to the game, you are granting EA the rights to use that content in any manner that they see fit."
In other words, I have lost all my rights to my work, despite the fact that I was *paying* EA to produce that work? Doesn't this violate the idea of quid-pro-quo?
You seem to suggest that Microsoft *could* sneak into their EULA a clause that grants them full ownership of all generated documents. And such a clause would be binding (the only limitation would be that presumeably people would quickly stop using Word). I personally think that such a clause would be struck down in court. Especially if it were via a EULA, which are dubious click-through contracts to begin with.
If I were working for EA as a writer and wrote books, I would understand how they would gain rights and I would lose my rights to resale, etc. I do not understand how paying EA the privelage of playing on their servers could result in a similar loss of IP rights on my creations. I can certainly understand how certain morale and duplication rights are ceded (EA cannot be considered guilty of copyright violation by copying the in game books in game). But things get a bit more murky when EA takes my in game books and publishes them on paper for profit.
We are not yet at a point where this sort of problem is likely to occur, as the sort of in game books being written by the likes of me aren't great works :> But I'd just like to point out that the IP sword cuts both ways. I bring IP to UO - my character's behaviour, for example, may be modeled on some character I developed out of game. Can I no longer use that character in out of game fiction because EA now has full rights to it? Can EA use my character in their fiction without my permission? (Ie: I create a character as popular as Lord British, so they decide to run an event without my permission using my character)
If I create a Sim0ne star in game, who owns that likeness? (Not the art assets! Those are the games, of course.)
I think most EULAs have gone too hardline against IP, due to fears of people demanding their virtual swords. I think the right answer there is to mail them the data base entries :> After all, in the case of my character or my books, receiving the data base entry would be sufficient data.
- Brask Mumei
Posted by: Brask Mumei | Apr 22, 2004 at 13:01
Brask > You seem to suggest that Microsoft *could* sneak into their EULA a clause that grants them full ownership of all generated documents. And such a clause would be binding (the only limitation would be that presumeably people would quickly stop using Word). I personally think that such a clause would be struck down in court.
They could , but I too agree that MS would have such a EULA struck down, mostly because they do not stipulate that there will be massive future changes to the way that Word works with content that is provided. Would that happen, it becomes subject to a whole new different area of legal concerns as the product would then be significantly different than what the user agreed to.
Brask > I do not understand how paying EA the privelage of playing on their servers could result in a similar loss of IP rights on my creations.
EA's EULA gives them the right to use and sell content that you publish. Whether people think that is unfair or not isn't the point. If a player does not agree to the terms, then they should not play the game. If they choose to play, then they are subject to all of its rules. It's not anything up for debate.
Are EULA's too strict? Possibly. But it's important to remember that what is at stake here is control of assets.
What if a player was given ownership rights over a sword worth X number of dollars because it was overpowered? A company couldn't patch a fix to the sword without compensating the person who "owned" it. Yet they are still accountable for the problem.
It's just a Pandora's Box, IMO. The reason these EULAs exist on most MMOs is to prevent such problems. If those are up-ended, it's likely that they get out of the MMO business.
Posted by: Will Leverett | Apr 22, 2004 at 14:43
Will> EA's EULA gives them the right to use and sell content that you publish.
Will> What if a player was given ownership rights over a sword worth X number of dollars because it was overpowered?
I really don't see the link here. I'm not asking for ownership rights of the pixels of the book, but the text. I'm not asking for ownership of the bits defining the character, but the IP associated with the character (backstory, experiences in game, etc).
A draconian EULA is not needed to prevent the virtual sword problem. If anything, a draconian EULA will just hasten the day that these IP concerns end up in court, as it increases the gap between what people *think* they are paying for and what they *are* paying for.
This is why I applauded Second Life's move to recognize the IP that players bring to the table.
- Brask Mumei
Posted by: Brask Mumei | Apr 22, 2004 at 16:43
Will> What if a player was given ownership rights over a sword worth X number of dollars because it was overpowered?
Brask > I really don't see the link here. I'm not asking for ownership rights of the pixels of the book, but the text. I'm not asking for ownership of the bits defining the character, but the IP associated with the character (backstory, experiences in game, etc).
I did a bad job using the example - apologies. Let me try again. :)
Let's say you are granted IP rights regarding the sword. Let's assume the sword is the best in the land - no other sword comes close to being so accurate or to doing the same damage. It is superior in every respect.
That superiority is part of the IP behind the sword.
But now let's assume that the sword was unknowingly designed with a bug. It was never supposed to be that strong or accurate. In fact, the sword's very existence is a game-balancing issue, and it is causing havoc in the game.
The company cannot change the sword because you have the IP rights to it. Should they choose to do it, they would have to compensate you for it.
That liability is what I am getting at - when companies allow players to have IP rights to their content, they are responsible and accountable to making sure the player's rights are preserved.
If a company offers a static, unchanging world except for that which players bring content, transferring IP rights is a possibility. But a company that wishes to publish upgrades, features, and generally have a dynamic and growing universe by introducing its own content does not have this option.
Posted by: Will Leverett | Apr 22, 2004 at 22:26
Will> The [buggy] sword's very existence is a game-balancing issue, and it is causing havoc in the game.
I think that's the reason that full user-created content doesn't work well in VWs designated as games. You can sometimes get something like user-created content out of emergent/unanticipated strategy decisions (like the rocket-jump) -- but for the most part, we see user-created content in MMORPGs existing only as chrome (avatar names, faces, costume designs in COH). Chrome doesn't effect gameplay.
But... in 2L and other non-game VWs, the issue of balance isn't as important -- at least one need not make sure everyone has an equal chance of getting rat 13w+.
Posted by: greglas | Apr 23, 2004 at 09:21
Will> The company cannot change the sword because you have the IP rights to it. Should they choose to do it, they would have to compensate you for it.
I really don't see why they'd have to compensate me. There are two cases:
1) The sword was designed by the game company, so there is no reason why I'd have IP rights to it. Thus, they can change it to their hearts content.
2) The sword was designed in game by me, to such an extent that I could claim IP rights to the design of the sword. This merely means I have rights to the scripts, variables, etc. It in no way would prevent the company from changing their server to no longer process my scripts.
For example, say I write a C++ program in MSVC. I have the IP rights to the program. A new version of MSVC is published which prevents my program from compiling. I do not think I could in anyway claim compensation!
This boils down to the "Mail them a CD of the database entry" answer. If receiving the database entry would satisfy the customer, we are talking about IP rights. If not, (ie, the value of the sword is tied to rarity in game), we are talking about something different from IP.
I've always felt that is where the: "The sword is our IP, so Ebay is illegal" falls down. People are not selling on Ebay the graphics of the sword, or the proc effects (which are the IP of the sword). Those are sold in Alkazaam style websites (If Sony cared about IP, that is who is profitting from their IP!). They are selling rights to instances of the sword in the virtual world. This is a resale of licenses, not a resale of copywritten IP.
- Brask Mumei
Posted by: Brask Mumei | Apr 23, 2004 at 10:52
They would not have to compensate you if you didn't make a stink about it. But that's certainly going to happen when you have any IP rights involved - they would certainly have to if you showed that your financial status of the object which you had the IP rights to was degraded by their actions.
And that is the core of the argument of these EULAs: they secure the right to change the game as they see best for the overall service, not as how each user feels would be best for them individually.
Posted by: Will Leverett | Apr 23, 2004 at 11:46
If this really becomes a legal issue and a liability for companies all you'll see is a reduction in the amount of content players can create - no more custom stat swords, no more in-game player journals.
Instead of juggling these issues ad infinitum they'll simply cut out the features like a cancer.
Posted by: Sourtone | Apr 23, 2004 at 12:51
Step back a minute folks. You are arguing about the relative value of two distinctly different things. Follow along with me here please.
- The game company owns the hardware. Stipulated. I don't think the most hardened Ebayer would argue that.
- The game company owns the basic code (if proprietary) that the game runs on. Stipulated. Can anyone see a valid argument against this?
- The game company owns the specific code that runs the game, therefore the game company also owns the derivative effects of that code, i.e. the illusions that are designed to give the false impression that a sword exists. I would say yes to this one. I think most reasonable people would say yes to this one.
- The game company owns the virtual sword. Nope. The question is meaningless, and this is where people are obfusticating the issue. There is no sword. There never was a sword. The sword does not exist, never did exist, and could not possible be made to exist unless and until someone invents the equivalent of a Star Trek Replicator. There is no sword. What exists is light pixels on a screen that align themselves in patterns which give the illusionary appearance of a sword. But people, infused with an intoxicating suspension of disbelief, have forgotten where the lines are drawn. Some folks have psych issues and lose touch with the edges of reality. They need to go take a cold shower and go outside more.
- The game company owns the sword, but the player is selling the sword on Ebay, therefore the player is stealing something from the game company. Nope. The player is not selling the sword. The sword does not exist, therefore the sword cannot be sold. The sword never did exist, therefore the player cannot be deprived of property that never existed. All that ever did exist, shared fantasy notwithstanding, was computer code that manipulated the flow of electrons striking a screen. No sword. No one ever had it, no one ever will. It ain't there. [i] The sword does not exist. There [b] IS NO SWORD [/b] [/i]
- But here is the rub people. What the player sells on Ebay is not a virtual sword. What the player sells on Ebay is [i] The Right To Access The Game Company Hardware Via The Game Code [/i]. Nothing more nor less than that.
The player is not selling a sword that never existed. The player is selling the commercially purchased right to access a sevice that they contracted for.
The closes real world equivalent I can think of is sub-letting an apartment. When you rent an apartment you may, or may not, have the right to rent it out to a friend if you decide to move.
Say you get married and buy a house. Do you have the right to rent the apartment out to a friend to finish out the duration of the lease? Depends on how the laws are written in your area as well as the terms of the lease agreement. But there is no hard and fast standard. It depends on where you live and who you rented it from.
However, if the rental agreement specifically grants you the right to sub-let, then I see no possible objection to auctioning off the right to inhabit it on Ebay. To me this is effectively equivalent to hanging a sign in the window. If the lease agreement specifically says no to sub-letting, then Then you have a potential conflict.
Y'all need to step back and separate your emotions from the question. Game companies appear to have become so hot and bothered at the very suggestion that someone might appropriate THEIR property that they lose perspective. No one is taking anything from the game companies, because the game companies never created any real item that could be stolen.
Now, if someone writes a novel and bases it on a specific quest line that originated in EQ or UO, I could see claims of copyright infringmenet. But that is not what is happening.
What is happening is that people, paying customers, are sub-letting their right of access to their paid for accounts (or portions thereof) in return for real world currency. Do they have the right to do this? I don't know.
But I do know that the discussion will never be settled until people let go of the fantasy that there actually is sword, or house, or Elf that is being sold. There isn't. What is being sold is the ability to access the game hardware via the game software. Sometimes the entire account is sub-let (character sale). Sometimes only part of an account is sub-let (gold farming). But nothing is being sold.
Copyright law is another matter entirely. Original works belong to the creator, whoever they are. But that has nothing whatsover to do with what is happening on Ebay. What is happening on Ebay is that some of the tenants are auctioning off sub-leases on their rental property and the landlords are ticked about it. That is all.
No sword to sell, no house to burn down, no Elf to abuse. Only the right to access hardware via software code.
Posted by: B.Smith | Apr 25, 2004 at 15:35
B. Smith> The sword does not exist. There IS NO SWORD .
Yes there is. Meaningful existence, like value, is largely a social construct.
B. Smith> Y'all need to step back and separate your emotions from the question.
Yes. Arguments to the effect that these things 'aren't real' or 'don't exist' are comforting to current worldviews but they are also ultimately misleading. We need to have the courage to say "the gold piece has value," even though the implications are frightening. They will be even more frightening if we deny what is happening and miss our opportunity to make sense of the future, whatever shape it is going to take.
Posted by: Edward Castronova | Apr 25, 2004 at 16:21
Edward Castronova:
"B. Smith> The sword does not exist. There IS NO SWORD .
Yes there is. Meaningful existence, like value, is largely a social construct."
Are you saying that the sword exists because a group of people believe that it exists? Sounds like Terry Pratchett's gods on the discworld. They only exist because people believe in them. When belief fades, so do the discworld gods.
If you are saying that consensus reality can be altered by a deliberate act of communal will, we have a problem. A big one. If this is true, then we certainly should never have stopped burning witches.
"B. Smith> Y'all need to step back and separate your emotions from the question.
Yes. Arguments to the effect that these things 'aren't real' or 'don't exist' are comforting to current worldviews but they are also ultimately misleading. We need to have the courage to say "the gold piece has value," even though the implications are frightening. They will be even more frightening if we deny what is happening and miss our opportunity to make sense of the future, whatever shape it is going to take."
Uh...no disrespect instended. But the future is going to be largely shaped by people who consider MMOGs a waste of time and/or money. The gold piece has value? Surely, if you and Fred agree that there is a gold piece there (ala emperor's clothes) then you two can agree on a value for said imaginary gold coin if it suits you. However I, who does not see the gold coin, am not bound by your shared fantasy.
If my invisible 6 ft. pet rabbit craps on your lawn, am I liable in a court for damages?
Posted by: B.Smith | Apr 25, 2004 at 21:30
Dear B.Smith,
MMOG virtual objects may not have the RL substantiation as other virtual objects or store of value such:
1. frequent flyer or other loyalty points
2. Euro before there was an actual paper currency
3. legal constructs such as corporations with independent (its of owners) legal rights
4. digital copies of IP (such as perfect digital copy of the Mona Lisa, music, etc.)
While there here are no strong rulings on the status of virtual objects in MMOG domain, saying that "it does not exist" does not make it a Economic reality as "it does exisit."
Economic activity still occurs while many may consider MMOG a game, an activity of leisure, or as entertainment. Even trade in unsanctioned or unlawful goods such as illegal drugs still occurs, regardless of the legal status granted to said ojects.
So, at least for me, economic activity gives the object some substantiation of economic reality.
We don't have a Monty Python Duck Test yet, but it's entertaining talking about what a Duck Test will look like.
Frank
Posted by: magicback | Apr 25, 2004 at 22:04
Dear magicback:
The point I was trying to make, and evidently failed to make, is that the "virtual items" (an oxymoron if there ever was one) do not have any independently verifiable existence outside of the shared fantasy that encloses the game. Without the game, and the shared fantasy of the player's imaginations, the items do not exist.
To someone outside the game, these "items" have no verifiable existence. RE: The items on your list:
"1. frequent flyer or other loyalty points"
This is a verifiable contract to provide a real world service. There is no debatable question that the airplanes do in fact exist. Whether you want to acknowledge them or not, they can still run over you if you stand in front of them.
"2. Euro before there was an actual paper currency"
Currency is a medium of exchange. All currency is symbolic, however it has a verifiable real world connection. A currency that is backed by the "full faith and credit" of a nation is a documented contract between the nation in question and the person holding the currency. Whether the currency is in the form of paper, coin, bank card, scribbled bank check, or whatever. It has a verifiable connection to reality.
For example, if I want to buy some spearpoints off Thag, I might try to trade him some baskets. But Thag doesn't need a basket, he needs a loincloth. SO I have to hike across the ridge, through the next valley, past the sabretooth lair, around the swamp and up the next hill to visit Sag, who makes loincloths. I trade him a basket, get a loincloth, and hike back to Thag for a spearpoint.
A currency is a common medium of exchange which simplifies the public bookeeping as to who owes how much of what to who.
"3. legal constructs such as corporations with independent (its of owners) legal rights"
Corporations are verifialbe entities made up of verifiable humans. The corporation is another name for gang, or clan, or faction, or whatever other label you choose to apply to a group of humans who have banded together to make common cause for a common purpose. No one can deny the existence of the people who form the corporation.
"4. digital copies of IP (such as perfect digital copy of the Mona Lisa, music, etc.)"
The Mona Lisa is a physical object. Music is a verifiable set of air wave vibrations. They both have objective existence regardless any group of people who might decide to declare them imaginary. They exist. As Galileo said, it still moves.
The virtual items of a game are valid only in the context of the game. I am NOT referring to such things as art, or poetry, or in-game stories because these things have a verifiable existence. By this I mean that they can be brought out into the real world and still be the same thing. Not true for the imaginary gold coin.
Posted by: B.Smith | Apr 25, 2004 at 23:32
So, your test, if I am not mistaken, is the ability to "be brought out into the real world and still be the same thing". In other words: "independently verifiable existence outside of the shared fantasy that encloses the game."
Sounds like a good "duck" test.
So, can you evaluate the following design:
Each item you buy in the fantasy world entitles you to a RL certificate that indicates that you "own" the virtual object. The RL certificate is structured such that it will satisfy current contract and property laws. However, no physical certificate will be issued. Instead, a custodian will track it in their databases.
Usage:
When Earth & Beyond closes the virtual objects enclosed in the game will "disapper". However, RL certificates are issued for each objects. They can be redeemed into RL cash at 1 cent per object or transfered to another VW the objects are substantiated beyond the enclosure of the original "fantasy" world.
Now, given some liberty on other issues, does the linkage between the virtual object and RL certificate substantiate the virtual object? Will this design satisfy most "duck" tests?
Also, what is the difference between physical theme park tokens and online theme park tokens?
Frank
Posted by: magicback | Apr 26, 2004 at 01:19
Mr. B.Smith,
I did note that "MMOG virtual objects may not have the RL substantiation as other virtual objects or store of value..."
The question I ponder is whether "economic activity" substantiate the virtual objects. I tend to think so.
Your "independently verifiable existence" test is relatively a tougher test.
Frank
Posted by: magicback | Apr 26, 2004 at 01:21
B.Smith>By this I mean that they can be brought out into the real world and still be the same thing. Not true for the imaginary gold coin.
Here's something that, by definition, can't be brought into the real world: eternal salvation in the afterlife. Anything of the afterlife brought into the real world would cease to be afterlife and instead become real world. Therefore, any concept valid only in the afterlife (eg. eternal salvation) can never be part of real life.
Nevertheless, for centuries Popes sold indulgences to wealthy people that guaranteed salvation in the afterlife. Saying "Salvation in the afterlife does not exist: there IS NO SALVATION" would have led to a swift trip to the stake. The reason that the system was stopped was because it was felt to be unfair to the righteous, rather than because it was dealing in the insubstantial.
People are perfectly able to trade in things that can never have any basis in the real world. Don't worry about it.
Richard
Posted by: Richard Bartle | Apr 26, 2004 at 04:15
B. Smith > However I, who does not see the gold coin, am not bound by your shared fantasy.
And I'm sure you must have realized by now that the money in your bank account only has value because of a shared fantasy too. Since you're backing out of all these silly fantasies, you probably don't need it any more, do you.
Hey I just had an idea. I'm one of these silly, looney, fantasy types, I actually like dollars, I kind of collect them, you see, just to indulge my passion for immersive shared dreaming...really, I'm quite embarassed to say it... but anyway, if you don't believe in the dollars you happen to own, well, can I have them?
Posted by: Edward Castronova | Apr 26, 2004 at 11:48
Ted,
I think B.Smith's argument is that no one has come forth to "back" the virtual objects. Most developers and traders are not.
It's similar to the argument people made when the US Dollar was taken off the gold standard. I don't know my economic history so well, but I assume there was a lot of noise regarding that move.
As for Richard's example of Indulgences, the Church surely backed them, no?
Frank
Posted by: magicback | Apr 26, 2004 at 12:08
Frank> I think B.Smith's argument is that no one has come forth to "back" the virtual objects.
This is an interesting thing to note. Fairly often, when talking to designers and VCs who are thinking of implementing some kind of social software concept with an in-game economy, I encounter this idea of money being backed by something: gold, labor hours, processor cycles, something. Before I was into games, I'd get these rant letters (later emails) from folks who are just really worked up about the idea that the dollar has no 'backing' and wanted every economist in the world to know it. It just really bugs some people that money isn't real. It would be interesting to consider what kinds of life paths and mind-changing events lead to this deep emotional discomfort over the idea that the dollar isn't based on anything, isn't backed by anything, isn't tied to the value of anything else.
But you know, even in a gold-based system, most of the money isn't backed by anything.
Here's how gold-backed systems work: A owns 100 pounds of gold. He puts it in B's bank. Whenever he needs money, he goes to B's bank and withdraws some of his gold. When he has more gold to carry around than he wants, he drops it off in the bank. Over time, B notices that A usually keeps 90 pounds of gold in the vault. And the lowest the account ever got was 70 pounds. So B thinks, wow, there's at least 70 pounds of gold sitting here. I could just take that and use it, couldn't I, subject to 2 restrictions: 1. A must never notice a thing. 2. If A wants all of it back, I have to give it to him. B then develops a system for using A's gold that meets these requirements: He loans A's gold out to other people for short periods of time. He makes sure to keep 30 pounds in A's account always, in case A wants it, but the other 70 goes out to someone else. And he makes it a short term loan so that if A ever wants to close his account, B can just wait for the loans to come in and hand over all 100 pounds.
Great so far. Now suppose B has hundreds of accounts with gold deposits, and that there are hundreds of banks just like B's. Because of the first thing - B having many accounts, not just A's - B can actually make really long term loans. It doesn't matter if A wants to close his account at any time; B can just cover the 100 pounds with gold from someone else's account. B ends up thinking mostly about his overall reserves - what percent of deposits he actually keeps on hand, in case someone wanders in and wants to withdraw some or all of their gold. The reserves are typically way below 10 percent. But let's say that all of the B-type banks stick to a 10 percent rule: for every 10 pounds of gold that gets deposited, they loan out 9 and keep 1 in the vault.
And because of the second thing - there are lots of banks doing this - we can see that this system generates lots of fake money. Here's how. Think of the banking system as a whole. Let's say C moves into the area from abroad and has 100 pounds of gold with him. He deposits it in a bank. The bank keeps 10 pounds and loans out 90 pounds to D. Now, what does D do? He either buys something, or he puts his money in the bank until he needs it. If he buys something, say, from E, what does E do? He either buys something, say, from F, or puts his money in the bank until he needs it. Similarly, F either buys something from another person, or puts his money in the bank. Can you see that eventually, almost all the 90 pounds ends up back in the banking system somewhere? The only money that remains out of the system is cash-in-pocket, the money people are carrying around.
Let's ignore the cash for a second, since it's actually a really small fraction of all the money that's out there.
In that case, what has happened is this: C came in with 100 pounds of gold, he deposited it into a bank, the bank loaned 90 of it to D. Now somethign interesting has happened: the bank has created money out of thin air. Think about it: when C arrived, he added 100 pounds of gold. And he has a bank account statement that reads "Account of C: Balance: 100 pounds." But look, D happens to have 90 pounds in his hand. So from 100 pounds, we got 190 pounds of money.
(Yes, the bank balance of C is actually money. He can write checks on that balance, and the checks will be accepted as payment for goods - so long as C's bank has enough reserves, again, to cover the demands of people who come up and want to cash out.)
Voila, we got money that is 'backed' by gold - but really isn't backed by it at all.
And the process doesn't end there. D's 90 pounds go back into the banking system eventually, where a further 81 pounds are loaned again (ten percent being held in reserve). The 81 pounds also go back into the system, from which 72 pounds are loaned again. When these go back, 63 pounds get loaned. And so on. When the cycle ends, we have 100 pounds of new gold reserves, but we get 1,000 pounds of money.
The point being: even if there were no paper money, just gold pieces, money would still be 90 percent virtual.
So thinking about it, what really does 'back' a currency? There is only one thing: confidence. Everyone in the system must be confident that the various promises - "I will pay back my loan," "My check is good," "Your money that's on deposit will be here for you when you want it," and so on - will be kept.
There was a historical moment in the early 20th century when banking experts were able to make policymakers understand how ephemeral money really is, even under a gold standard. And indeed, they could see that tying the amount of money to the world's stock of a single good, such as gold, is a dumb idea. The amount of money is and should be completely in the hands of monetary policymakers. It has a correct level, and one that is highly unlikely to be met by the production of gold in the world. Gold ir produced according to the short-run incentives of gold producers, but the money supply should be set according to the state of the macroeconomy. By the 1970s, most experts and policymakers understood that the value of money is a social construct, indeed a very important one, that could and should be altered by the state. Over the next few decades, there was a debate about whether the money managers should be a political appointee or an independent entity. The Bundesbank (Ger.), for example, was fiercely independent and a great warrior against inflation, even at the cost of millions of jobs. Other countries tied their money supply to the political system and experienced chaos. In the US, there came a moment when the Federal Reserve, under Paul Volcker, realized that inflation had to be clamped down whatever the cost in terms of popularity of the sitting president. Thus came the Reagan/Thatcher era.
What's the point for virtual worlds?
1. No money is ever backed by anything. Value is a social construct. There's no difference between the gold piece and the dollar. Money is worth what people exchange for it.
2. It's not a good idea to put the level of the money supply in the hands of players. The money supply has to be managed by some central authority, or the economy is unlikely to evolve as desired.
Posted by: Edward Castronova | Apr 26, 2004 at 13:29
The Church would back indulgence by saying sure enough, you're forgiven. The question was whether God agreed - Martin Luther et al thought no. Indulgences were thought to be insubstantial regardless of one's belief in God. And you thought VWs were abstract.
Perhaps someone with more economics background could explain why the gold standard keeps coming up when talking about the "real" value of currency. So what if I used to be able to turn in my dollars for gold, how does that help me eat or stay warm? It's just that historically gold was "valued", meaning many people wanted it and would exchange things you needed for it. Nowadays if I find some gold walking down the street I think "great, now I can turn this in for some cash", which is actually valuable in the real sense of the word. Value is what people want -> if people want it, it has value, it doesn't get any more concrete than that.
If I can turn gold coins I discover in Norath into paying my rent easier than I could gold coins from a sunken galleon, which is more real? Higher up Maslow's hierarchy, if finding a "Sword of $10 on Ebayness" makes me feel better than finding a $10 bill, which is more real?
Posted by: Staarkhand | Apr 26, 2004 at 13:34
Pwnt by Ted getting to the Post button. Thanks for saying that much better than I tried.
Posted by: Staarkhand | Apr 26, 2004 at 13:45
Ted> "There's no difference between the gold piece and the dollar."
Yay!
I'd go farther, and claim that EA does "back" the UO gold piece. While they are not willing to exchange it for bars of RL gold, or any other tangible object, they are solely responsible for it's continued existence. When one invests in UO gold, one is relying on EA to not shut down the servers or print billions of new UO gold. Furthermore, they have *are* willing to accept it in exchange for certain in-game items.
- Brask Mumei
Posted by: Brask Mumei | Apr 26, 2004 at 17:01
What does URL mean? well im very interested in this i love love it
Posted by: James | Oct 06, 2006 at 11:41