[MUD-Dev] Ethical behavior ... a hijacking.

[Matt Mihaly]

On Thu, 7 Feb 2002, Koster, Raph wrote:
> From: Matt Mihaly
 
>> This is directed to John: Why would a single document be
>> desirable or necessary? I mean, the standing of individuals in
>> games is already contained in the legal codes of the various
>> countries of the world. And why would I, as a
>> developer/administrator, sign that kind of document, except as a
>> marketing ploy?

> I'm not John, but since I'm loony, I'll answer anyway. :)

> To cast it in another light--characters in an online roleplaying
> game are a record of activities undertaken by a user on a remote
> server. This is no different really from the records that make up
> your credit report, nor the records that make up your preferences
> at Amazon.com, nor the records which make up your bank
> transactions, nor the records which make up your typical /logs
> directory on any webserver. Some of these have legislation
> covering them, and some don't--but the laws are all different, and
> in some cases it's considered private info and in some cases it's
> not and in many cases, it is but it gets sold to the highest
> bidder anyway.

My point was that the -avatars- don't have any rights, and aren't
going to be getting any in the near future. They're just, as you
say, data records. The only rights the law is going to be concerned
with are people's rights as respects those records. The basic rights
of people are already established in most countries. It's now about
interpreting what those rights mean in light of the context of
online games.

--matt

_______________________________________________
MUD-Dev mailing list
MUD-Dev at kanga.nu
https://www.kanga.nu/lists/listinfo/mud-dev