The UO " unpaid employee" lawsuit was certainly important. www.salon.com/tech/log/2000/09/21/ultima_volunteers/

The case was settled in favor of the employees aka unpaid volunteers. Good for them.

Unpaid volunteering for a "for profit company " is both ridiculous and absurd. Any company *cough cough* that doesn't pay such employees is unethical and should be ashamed.

Unethical perhaps, but not unheard of by far. Many persistent world games treat their gamemasters as unpaid volunteers. Funcom for instance did it for Age of Conan to cut down on paid GM staff (I should know, I was one). They farm the grunt work out to those guys and let the paid employees deal with other stuff. I can think of at least three other MMORPG's that do the same thing.

Originally posted by Stradden

Originally posted by Ghostmind

Originally posted by SWATJester

This article is absolutely rife with factual errors. The list of them has been outlined here: http://www.gameslaw.net/2009/09/01/five-silliest-mmo-lawsuits/

Seriously, there's almost nothing correct about this article.

 Calling Worlds.com a trademark case (it's not), not understanding what a trademark does, not noticing that the Square Enix case is a class action and that $5 million would go to ALL final fantasy XI players, etc. Shoddy work overall, absolutely shoddy.

Well, that was an interesting read.

Rebuttle?

Ok, I suppose I should probably step in here for a second.

First, I want to say that I think in hindsight, this article was probably mis-titled. It should have been Five Memorable MMO lawsuits.

Now, I understand that coming from a website that's dedicated to the law, and the law surrounding video games and virtual worlds is going to have a better grasp of the actual legalities surrounding these cases. I agreed with some of the criticism where obviously I didn't have their level of legal understanding (I thought I prefaced that pretty specifically at the top of the article), and apparently I confused some terms. So yeah, I agree with some of that. There's other stuff in that critique that I don't agree with, but it's completely their right to say whatever it is they want.

So, I apologize for not being up on my specific legalese and confusing some terms including, but I'm sure not limited to: trademark, and class action lawsuit. I'm also sorry for a misleading title.

With that said, I just want to reference back to the opening section of the column: "I am by no means a legal expert. I don’t even play one on TV, so I honestly can’t speak to the legalese involved in any of these cases so let’s all just sit down and have a good time, ok?

If your idea of a good time is to tear the thing apart, then awesome, have at it. These columns are meant to be fun. Other sections of the site are reserved for harder news. This column is, quite obviously and plainly stated, just for kicks.

A case of the hit dog barking the loudest? Sorry, but I have to agree with Jester there, it's one thing to get some legal terms wrong, it's another thing to pull wrong info out of dark places. Your article is really full of major errors, your "I am by no means a legal expert" doesn't cut it as an excuse for that. Neither is "oh it's just a column just for kicks". Making fun of people for doing the right thing is not kicks, it's stupid, plain and simple.

Besides, if you have absolutely no clue about the whats and whys of something, why do you feel you should write about it? And bashing at people for pointing out your errors doesn't speak for you either I'm afraid.

Originally posted by Fkinglinux

Originally posted by girlgeek

Originally posted by battleaxe

If people think so little of their time in your game that they'll let a bot play their character in order to advance, maybe you should look a bit harder at the fun factor of your game.  Most battlegrounds have a few characters AFK at the entrance to the battleground, which is no different in principle, yet Blizzard does nothing to stop it.

 

Yet another Blizzard-hater piece of propaganda. It's so "leet" and "kewl" to be a Blizzard-hater on MMORPG.com. Whoopedy doo....you gain 10 reputation points with the other WoW haters of a gaming forum.  /rolls eyes  Are they giving certificates of achievement or something for this now here on this site? It's really getting OLD.

First of all, the people that are botting in games (WoW in particular, but I have also seen bots in EVERY MMO I have played) are RARELY botting "in order to advance" their characters.  Most bots are farming gold to sell for real world cash.  And you ARE right....the people that run those bots  think "very little of the game," because to an opportunist that will go to any length, including breaking laws, just to make a buck....they not only think little of the games they're botting, but they think nothing of the other gamers playing the game either. They are basically self-absorbed individuals with no sense of real world integrity.  They don't care if it destroys the in game economy, or makes playing the game less enjoyable for those that play honestly and just want to enjoy the hobby that they pay a monthly fee to enjoy. The only thing they care about is their own financial interests, and legalities and other such "nonsense" make no difference to them. Essentially....they're just common cowardly criminals.

REAL gamers do not "let bots play their characters." That is the fodder of the gold farmer.  A REAL gamer that dislikes a game...just moves on and plays something else....OR....they come bitch about everything they hate about a game on MMORPG.com and otherwise "do nothing about it."  So while you're saying Blizzard does nothing about it (which is untrue)....consider that.  Apparently there are plenty of people still enjoying what Blizzard has made.  If you're not one of them....no big deal. Go play the games that you don't have any complaints about.....and good luck FINDING one of those games too.

 

 

 

I consider myself to be a real gamer, and after leveling several characters legit, decided to let glider do the work on future ones for me. I botted to advance, not for gold. But TBH, yes most modern MMO's have bots, why , because the game are so easy they don't require an intelligent human being to defeat the content, a mindless bot that repeatedly mashes the same button config will do just fine. You never saw bots in EQ classic, why? Because it was too hard. I'm not a WoW hater although I no longer play the game. Fact is, there is so much of an emphasis on end game, and "the game starts at max level" to make leveling any thing other than a cleverly disguised chore. That being said, at the time you didn't make enough money botting from 1-60 to endanger the economy, made just about enough to buy your epic mount. Also, while I'm not defending/condoning botting ,as much inflation as they cause by creating more money and devaluing it, they also introduce more BoE items to the system ,which is good for the AH consumer.

Fair enough.  I don't disagree with a LOT of what you say here, in fact.  However, I still wonder why people continue to play a game in  ANY manner if they're so bored with it. LOL  Seriously...I don't get that.  When I get bored with a game, I don't start using a bot....I go find a game that doesn't bore me.  And I will do that EVEN if it's only to take a BREAK from a game that has temporarily become boring.  But I suppose every gamer has their own "style" of dealing.

I played original EQ and UO also, and you're correct....never saw a bot. EQ2...is LOADED with them, by the way, sadly. Most modern MMOs are, just as you said.

I've played an awfully lot of MMOs, both paid and f2p, and honestly....I get bored eventually with EVERY SINGLE ONE. Some may take longer to wear on me tha others, but I always end up moving on to something else at some point, whether that's after years of playing, or months.

Anyway...good converation!  Thank you. :)

Yeah the worlds.com lawsuit is a joke.  The patent itself has no grounds to stand on with tons of prior history to invalidate it.  NCSoft should get damages from them for filing a nuisance lawsuit.  I just wish Congress would do something with the debacle the patent office has become.  Of course knowing Congress, they would probably make it worse.

I think Turbine's lawsuit has some teeth behind it.  The company who bought the Atari name has had some really questionable dealings with other companies.

---

Originally posted by Stradden

---

Originally posted by Ghostmind

---

Originally posted by SWATJester

This article is absolutely rife with factual errors. The list of them has been outlined here: http://www.gameslaw.net/2009/09/01/five-silliest-mmo-lawsuits/
Seriously, there's almost nothing correct about this article.
 Calling Worlds.com a trademark case (it's not), not understanding what a trademark does, not noticing that the Square Enix case is a class action and that $5 million would go to ALL final fantasy XI players, etc. Shoddy work overall, absolutely shoddy.

---

Well, that was an interesting read.
Rebuttle?

---

Ok, I suppose I should probably step in here for a second.
First, I want to say that I think in hindsight, this article was probably mis-titled. It should have been Five Memorable MMO lawsuits.
Now, I understand that coming from a website that's dedicated to the law, and the law surrounding video games and virtual worlds is going to have a better grasp of the actual legalities surrounding these cases. I agreed with some of the criticism where obviously I didn't have their level of legal understanding (I thought I prefaced that pretty specifically at the top of the article), and apparently I confused some terms. So yeah, I agree with some of that. There's other stuff in that critique that I don't agree with, but it's completely their right to say whatever it is they want.
So, I apologize for not being up on my specific legalese and confusing some terms including, but I'm sure not limited to: trademark, and class action lawsuit. I'm also sorry for a misleading title.
With that said, I just want to reference back to the opening section of the column: "I am by no means a legal expert. I don’t even play one on TV, so I honestly can’t speak to the legalese involved in any of these cases so let’s all just sit down and have a good time, ok?
If your idea of a good time is to tear the thing apart, then awesome, have at it. These columns are meant to be fun. Other sections of the site are reserved for harder news. This column is, quite obviously and plainly stated, just for kicks.

---

Don't let the bastards get to ya. It was an interesting read. This isn't the New York Times for christ sake.

A website devoted to "In-depth legal analysis and news for video games and virtual worlds"? Ooh boy, hold me back that sounds like the best site ever! (*sarcasm*)

You just keep doing what you do man, this site gets a ton more traffic than that crappy site and the guy's just looking for attention.

Originally posted by RedwoodSap

The UO " unpaid employee" lawsuit was certainly important. www.salon.com/tech/log/2000/09/21/ultima_volunteers/

The case was settled in favor of the employees aka unpaid volunteers. Good for them.

Unpaid volunteering for a "for profit company " is both ridiculous and absurd. Any company *cough cough* that doesn't pay such employees is unethical and should be ashamed.

Acutally I think that was probably the dumbest lawsuit yet in this genre.  99.9% of the volunteers enjoyed what they were doing and they were not unpaid as they got to play the game for free.  Removing them hurt the game.  So the idiots that brought the lawsuit just ruined it for the vast majority.  What the volunteers were doing was neither ridiculous nor absurd.  Typical response of someone on the outside completely misunderstanding the issues.

But I do agree that the lawsuit was more significant than some of those that are listed in the article in how it has effected the genre.

Great read.
A lot of good arguments from the posters too.
This is my favorite type of articles.

In the category of silly lawsuits:

Funcom got sued some years ago over the use the phrase "Rubi-Ka Rumble".

Quote by Game Director Colin "Means" Craig in the thread on his July 24th weekly letter:

http://forums.anarchy-online.com/showthread.php?p=5578312&highlight=rumble#post5578312

Quote:

"The "Get ready to rumble" guy sued us but good on that one...hard to forget that one. He has tradmarked all "fight related use of the word rumble". We won't be having anything "rumble related" any time ever again.
 

Originally posted by Ozmodan

Originally posted by RedwoodSap

The UO " unpaid employee" lawsuit was certainly important. www.salon.com/tech/log/2000/09/21/ultima_volunteers/

The case was settled in favor of the employees aka unpaid volunteers. Good for them.

Unpaid volunteering for a "for profit company " is both ridiculous and absurd. Any company *cough cough* that doesn't pay such employees is unethical and should be ashamed.

 

Acutally I think that was probably the dumbest lawsuit yet in this genre.  99.9% of the volunteers enjoyed what they were doing and they were not unpaid as they got to play the game for free.  Removing them hurt the game.  So the idiots that brought the lawsuit just ruined it for the vast majority.  What the volunteers were doing was neither ridiculous nor absurd.  Typical response of someone on the outside completely misunderstanding the issues.

But I do agree that the lawsuit was more significant than some of those that are listed in the article in how it has effected the genre.

QFT

I've seen so many times where people who are volunteering then try to sue for money. IF a company says we have work but would like you to do it for free, you have no right to money. If they promise money then don't pay up, fine, but to demand money that you agreed to not take? Sad... Intern programs are like this. Would I have loved to have gotten paid for being an intern at a law firm? Absolutely! But was it fact at the time that enough people wanted the position badly enough that people were willing to do it for free? It still is. Because of cut backs I'm out of the program, (still can't figure out how you can be too broke to afford free workers), but will return the second they let me or when I find another program. While I did get compensation in free gas money to and from work I never got paid and don't care because the experience is what I need more than anything.

Originally posted by brostyn

You're article is entitled "Five Sillies MMO Lawsuits", yet you put Blizzard vs. MMO Glider. You, then, go on to praise Blizzard for doing what you wish other companies would do, and end the paragraph by saying "So, I’m going to say something I don’t normally say: Good job Blizzard. Bravo."

 

Dude?

The title said most "memorable" lawsuits, not the most silly.  Author also said that "often" there are humor to be found and not "always".

Plus if you think about it, that lawsuit can be considered humorous in that it is completely fruitless attempt and Blizzard know it.  Even if they win against WoW glider, they cannot stop goldfarmers in WoW much less the entire mmorpg industry.  I do appreciate the fact they went for it, but truthfully the outcome is pretty much the same whether Blizzard win, lose, or settled.

Originally posted by linren

Originally posted by brostyn

You're article is entitled "Five Sillies MMO Lawsuits", yet you put Blizzard vs. MMO Glider. You, then, go on to praise Blizzard for doing what you wish other companies would do, and end the paragraph by saying "So, I’m going to say something I don’t normally say: Good job Blizzard. Bravo."

 

Dude?

 

The title said most "memorable" lawsuits, not the most silly.  Author also said that "often" there are humor to be found and not "always".

Plus if you think about it, that lawsuit can be considered humorous in that it is completely fruitless attempt and Blizzard know it.  Even if they win against WoW glider, they cannot stop goldfarmers in WoW much less the entire mmorpg industry.  I do appreciate the fact they went for it, but truthfully the outcome is pretty much the same whether Blizzard win, lose, or settled.

Read the thread before you jump down someone's throat, johnny-come-lately.

BTW, I did find the article humourous if not entirely factual. Not sure how you pulled that assumption out of your rear, since I made no comment one way or the other.

Originally posted by hogscraper

Originally posted by Ozmodan

Originally posted by RedwoodSap

The UO " unpaid employee" lawsuit was certainly important. www.salon.com/tech/log/2000/09/21/ultima_volunteers/

The case was settled in favor of the employees aka unpaid volunteers. Good for them.

Unpaid volunteering for a "for profit company " is both ridiculous and absurd. Any company *cough cough* that doesn't pay such employees is unethical and should be ashamed.

 

Acutally I think that was probably the dumbest lawsuit yet in this genre.  99.9% of the volunteers enjoyed what they were doing and they were not unpaid as they got to play the game for free.  Removing them hurt the game.  So the idiots that brought the lawsuit just ruined it for the vast majority.  What the volunteers were doing was neither ridiculous nor absurd.  Typical response of someone on the outside completely misunderstanding the issues.

But I do agree that the lawsuit was more significant than some of those that are listed in the article in how it has effected the genre.

QFT

I've seen so many times where people who are volunteering then try to sue for money. IF a company says we have work but would like you to do it for free, you have no right to money. If they promise money then don't pay up, fine, but to demand money that you agreed to not take? Sad... Intern programs are like this. Would I have loved to have gotten paid for being an intern at a law firm? Absolutely! But was it fact at the time that enough people wanted the position badly enough that people were willing to do it for free? It still is. Because of cut backs I'm out of the program, (still can't figure out how you can be too broke to afford free workers), but will return the second they let me or when I find another program. While I did get compensation in free gas money to and from work I never got paid and don't care because the experience is what I need more than anything.

Actually the sad part was the other side of the coin.  After the UO lawsuit... suddenly one day every volunteer in UO was without warning... transported to jail... and then watched as a script stripped their robe and powers... before they went link dead.

Everyone who wasn't logged in was locked out of the "volunteer account".  So suddenly the IRC channels they used were flooded as no one  knew wtf was going on...

All because of one person... those were some great programs and great people.  The "interest program" was the one I was directly involved with... and it was one of the most unique/fun things I have ever been able to do.

Yet I was no longer able to do it.. have a team etc.. because one individual sued a company over not being paid as a volunteer.  Yet I know they did pay her for a while but she was never an employee and they never had to... they were nice.  Then when they didn't want to do it she sued them... and they killed the programs as they decided there was to much liability.

That is the other side of the coin... and why it was one of the most selfish things (from my point of view) I've ever seen happen around a game.  She could have easily decided to no longer volunteer.. when they didn't want to compensate her.  If she had been an employee and "let go" she would have had no such option as a lawsuit... so really... nobody forced her to volunteer let alone keep logging in after they no longer wanted to compensate her to be a volunteer... /end rant

The Final Fantasy XI lawsuit was about SquareEnix deleting your characters if you take a break from the game, and not telling you about it upfront when you first subscribe.

Happened to a friend of mine.  Haven't played that game in years, so it's probably happened to me too by now. 

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6214710.html

Levelling in that game was hardcore too, it's not like playing WoW and "oh just roll another char and level to 80 in 2 weeks" kind of deal.  And each character in FFXI can have levels in all classes, so deleting 1 character there is like deleting 18 characters in other MMOs, literally.

No mention of Marvel Comics' lawsuit of City Of Heroes, because CoH players were using the awesome character editor to make tributes to their favoriteheroes?  I thought this was the height of stupid at the time.  Well, okay, stupid goes pretty high.

But it was a pretty transparent ploy to drain money from CoH/Cryptic, coincidentally as Marvel was preparing their own MMORPG.

Info here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_Heroes#Suit_by_Marvel

Originally posted by quix0te

No mention of Marvel Comics' lawsuit of City Of Heroes, because CoH players were using the awesome character editor to make tributes to their favoriteheroes?  I thought this was the height of stupid at the time.  Well, okay, stupid goes pretty high.

But it was a pretty transparent ploy to drain money from CoH/Cryptic, coincidentally as Marvel was preparing their own MMORPG.

Info here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_of_Heroes#Suit_by_Marvel

Darn, someone beat me to it, I was gonna mention that one.  I also wonder what Marvel might do to Cryptic once Champions is released, I dread to think.  Even though Cryptic was s'posed to be the ones working on Marvel's upcoming, now renamed to Champions, MMO, I'm pretty sure Marvel will want a slice of the pie once it shows any signs of success.

Originally posted by brostyn

Originally posted by linren

Originally posted by brostyn

You're article is entitled "Five Sillies MMO Lawsuits", yet you put Blizzard vs. MMO Glider. You, then, go on to praise Blizzard for doing what you wish other companies would do, and end the paragraph by saying "So, I’m going to say something I don’t normally say: Good job Blizzard. Bravo."

 

Dude?

 

The title said most "memorable" lawsuits, not the most silly.  Author also said that "often" there are humor to be found and not "always".

Plus if you think about it, that lawsuit can be considered humorous in that it is completely fruitless attempt and Blizzard know it.  Even if they win against WoW glider, they cannot stop goldfarmers in WoW much less the entire mmorpg industry.  I do appreciate the fact they went for it, but truthfully the outcome is pretty much the same whether Blizzard win, lose, or settled.

Read the thread before you jump down someone's throat, johnny-come-lately.

 

BTW, I did find the article humourous if not entirely factual. Not sure how you pulled that assumption out of your rear, since I made no comment one way or the other.

Re-read the whole thing just like the first time, but I don't see where I am wrong. 

The title reads "Five Memorable MMO Lawsuits", and the foreword was that lawsuits are SOMETIMES silly and the author mentioned it in the article too.  Unless you want to tell me that the author changed his title and foreword before I got here, then it is another issue.  Why can't someone praise Blizzard if the article was based on "Memorable".  Either read the title or tell me something that actually prove any sort of point.  Don't bother using factual errors as an argument, I was not talking about the validity of the article.

Another issue is why are you offended? If I was jumping down your throat then that was really too kind of a reply.  Plus what does the factual information have to do with what I pointed out?  I just pointed out it does NOT read "Five sillies MMO Lawsuits" in the title.

If you are telling me the author edited it after the fact, then let me know, but other wise I did nothing wrong and you simply got angery for some reason.

Don't bother picking at my comments if you are thinking about doing it, opinions can only be argued but serves no purpose.

Hm, I was reading the article and read the linked law suit papers for the Worlds.com thingie too - and wanted to comment that obviously the author did not read it himself. The linked material is just a continuation of a patent from 1996 and EQ was released in 1999 - with UO or Meridian not being a 3D mmorpg but a 2D mmorpg such not covered. So if SOE did not previously to 1996 publish anything about them doing a 3D mmorpg the question of the patent being correct or not is the biggest issue and might truly be a stumbling block for the industry ... 

Edit: Just saw that Dan rebuked the whole article already here http://www.gameslaw.net/2009/09/01/five-silliest-mmo-lawsuits/ so it's not just this which is factually wrong. Sorry Jon, badly researched. :-/

Originally posted by Valkyrie

Hm, I was reading the article and read the linked law suit papers for the Worlds.com thingie too - and wanted to comment that obviously the author did not read it himself. The linked material is just a continuation of a patent from 1996 and EQ was released in 1999 - with UO or Meridian not being a 3D mmorpg but a 2D mmorpg such not covered. So if SOE did not previously to 1996 publish anything about them doing a 3D mmorpg the question of the patent being correct or not is the biggest issue and might truly be a stumbling block for the industry ... 

 

Edit: Just saw that Dan rebuked the whole article already here http://www.gameslaw.net/2009/09/01/five-silliest-mmo-lawsuits/ so it's not just this which is factually wrong. Sorry Jon, badly researched. :-/

Sorry extremely vague patents like this just do not stand up in court.   There is enough prior history to invalidate it anyways.  Oh and BTW UO was most certainly 3D.

 Jon,

I agree with Richard Garriott on this one. Stock options and market conditions are a difficult thing to time, but one of the provisions in his contract was that he had to sell his company stock within a certain amount of time. The stock market, internationally as well as domestic was in a terrible state.

They could of given him  more time and maybe a better method of termination. I think he has a case for the loss on the shares. Other than that he is kinda flaky and maybe should of been working on TR instead of traipsing around in space, but I wasn't there in the boardroom. 

Ink