[MUD-Dev] BIZ: Who owns my sword?

[Dave Rickey]

From: "Ren Reynolds" <ren at aldermangroup.com>

> Just a new thoughts on EULAs as they have been referenced here and
> there.

> Statements of the form: 'blar blar swords, player-characters, etc
> are our property' - are in my view pretty much meaningless. Sure
> such things can be written down, but as virtual objects are not
> property in a legal sense, assertions of right have no force.

It's being treated as a case of intellectual property law.  To the
extent that database entries have value under current law, the value
derives from the way in which they are referenced and organized.
Since in MMO's this is the product of the actions of players, the
EULA asserts that any property interest this re-arrangement might
create is assigned to the operator of the game (I am not a lawyer,
but this is the explanation I've been given by those that are).  The
legal theory is that the entries themselves (which happen to look
like blar-blar swords, characters, etc., when viewed through the
client) have no value in and of themselves at all, and therefore
ownership does not apply.

If the courts granted ownership of the database entries to the
players who control their arrangement, then the ability of game
operators to influence or control that arrangement could be sharply
curtailed.  The alternative is to treat them as financial
instruments (equally virtual, but with a great deal more legal
precedent).  But that's an even *bigger* potential mess (how would
you like to have to vet your game design with the SEC?).

> However I can see that most virtual objects will be property in
> the near future. Law will follow practice some how. I'm more
> bother about avatars but that's because of a whole set of reasons
> to do with the commoditization of identity that I won't bore
> people with.

As I understand it, "Ownership" in the legal sense as it refers to
things implies control, ability to transfer to others, ability to
deny the use of to others.  Certainly players have control and
ability to deny access or transfer that control to other players
both their avatars and the "contents" of those avatars.  Real money
is trading hands, real control is being transferred, and at some
point the courts are going to step in and start imposing rules on
those transfers and how we (as developers) handle them.
Unfortunately, the general treatment of this prospect by those with
the most at stake (executives of online game operators) is something
close to "LA LA LA, I CAN'T HEAR YOU" with fingers in their ears.
Everybody is either waiting for the first crisis, and hoping the
train wrecks into somebody *else*, or thinking that those who seem
to worry about it are just playing Chicken Little.

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