As I predicted and apologized for in an earlier Rodo Report -

http://kotaku.com/5481543/judge-tosses-blind-gamers-suit-vs-sony

In October a visually-impaired gamer sued Sony, alleging that it wasn't fulfilling its responsibilities under U.S. law to provide access to the disabled. The reasoning depending on finding that Sony's products constitute a public accommodation. A judge said they aren't.

Plaintiff Alexander Stern sued Sony, Sony Computer Entertainment America and Sony Online Entertainment in federal court for the Central District of California, alleging that "his visual processing impairments prevent him from fully enjoying the video games manufactured by Sony, some of which are played on gaming systems with internet connections through which players in different locations can communicate and play with or against one another."

The court, in granting Sony's motion to dismiss on Feb. 8, refused to go so far as to say any game Sony currently makes constitutes a public accommodation. A public accommodation doesn't need to be publicly owned -very loosely speaking it can be a grocery store, hotel or office building whose use is generally available to the public. In a broad sense, we were talking about applying that standard to a virtual environment.

So as you can imagine, allowing the suit to proceed on this finding would have wide ramifications for games publishers. Instead, the court found Sony "is not a place of public accommodation," and therefore is not in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Disabled Gamer's Suit Against Sony Tossed [Game Politics] ENDQUOTE

This is the first I've heard of this.

I'm sensitive to people with disabilities and all but how, exactly was Sony supposed to make their games accessible to blind people?  They're video games, after all.  How do you make video that blind people can enjoy?  Are deaf people going to start suing the music industry now?

Weird.

There's a definite void of information here, as to the specific requests and nature of blindness.

Personally I think game makers should all be close-captioning their games for the deaf and providing color-blind options for the color blind. But while these things should happen, I'm not sure I feel they should be legally-enforced.

"Instead, the court found Sony "is not a place of public accommodation,"
I thought that this was common knowledge - Glad its official.

I remember reading about this on Digg. I'm actually surprised it took this long to get taken care of. *shrug*. I agree; however, that declaring a verdict in favor of the Plaintiff would have changed all MMORPGs, not just those by SoE. In the end, it was a difficult decision, but one that had to be made.

~Miles "Tails" Prower out! Catch me if you can!

Only in america.

Originally posted by Miles-Prower

I remember reading about this on Digg. I'm actually surprised it took this long to get taken care of. *shrug*. I agree; however, that declaring a verdict in favor of the Plaintiff would have changed all MMORPGs, not just those by SoE. In the end, it was a difficult decision, but one that had to be made.

~Miles "Tails" Prower out! Catch me if you can!

Had to be made? Why did it have to be made? How about deaf people and CD manufacturers? Does a decision need to be made there as well?  This is not the kind of shit the courts should be wasting their time on. Of course in the 9th circus court of California this is not surprising.

Maybe next he can sue the IOC because he wasn't able to enjoy the olympics fully because he couldn't see the events.

Or, he can sue a movie theatre because he wasn't able to enjoy the entire movie because he's blind.

Maybe, he can sue VolksWagon because he's unable to drive their cars safely.

...There are many things to like about the USA, but it's crap like this that wastes our time, taxpayers' money, and the time and money of the companies/individuals being sued for completely ridiculous reasons.

Personally I hope they start passing regulations to make it possible to counter-sue for legal fees when someone with a blatant B.S. case loses like this.

Originally posted by MavisP

Originally posted by Miles-Prower

I remember reading about this on Digg. I'm actually surprised it took this long to get taken care of. *shrug*. I agree; however, that declaring a verdict in favor of the Plaintiff would have changed all MMORPGs, not just those by SoE. In the end, it was a difficult decision, but one that had to be made.

~Miles "Tails" Prower out! Catch me if you can!

Had to be made? Why did it have to be made? How about deaf people and CD manufacturers? Does a decision need to be made there as well?  This is not the kind of shit the courts should be wasting their time on.

I agree that courts shouldn't have to make decisions based on this stuff, but I did not say anywhere in my post that I did agree they should. You are reading too far into it.

What I did say is that in this particular case, the right decision was made. What I also agree with is that there shouldn't have been a case at all.

I'm a fox, not a lawyer.

~Miles "Tails" Prower out! Catch me if you can!

Originally posted by brihtwulf

Maybe next he can sue the IOC because he wasn't able to enjoy the olympics fully because he couldn't see the events.

Or, he can sue a movie theatre because he wasn't able to enjoy the entire movie because he's blind.

Maybe, he can sue VolksWagon because he's unable to drive their cars safely.

...There are many things to like about the USA, but it's crap like this that wastes our time, taxpayers' money, and the time and money of the companies/individuals being sued for completely ridiculous reasons.

Personally I hope they start passing regulations to make it possible to counter-sue for legal fees when someone with a blatant B.S. case loses like this.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAMEN, Brigtwulf!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I think it would be different if the tech existed so the blind could see in a video game and SOE simply wasn't using it. Alas it's not the case.

Nub's

I feel for this guy, but sueing the game company isn't the right idea. Maybe he should think of a way to cure blindness.... or invent technology that allows him to play MMOs...

I realize a lot of MMO players have opinions about the moral and logical issues of disability rights legislation, but morality is not what changes the laws, political activism is what changes the laws.  People with disabilities accomplish things in the legal system because they are singularly dedicated: their lives can be completely dominated by their impairment, and so, in the last 20 years, they have more motivation to fight for what they want than anyone else has motivation to keep fighting against them.   It has always been this way, and the new development in the last 30 years is that people with disabilities have become as organized as they are motivated and vocal about their issues.

Disability rights issues are extremely complicated to address morally, but things become more simple if you just look at it from the point of view of democracy: what matters is what people want, not what is "right."   That sentence might seem very annoying to some, but as long as we are talking about politics and laws as opposed to academic philosophy, what people want/demand is separate from morality.

My disability is thankfully more mundane than blindness, I just have repetitive stress injuries.  This is why I choose to play Champions Online, since it works so well with a controller.  Most MMOs are inaccessible to me, as a physical issue (of course I try to setup with external programs and fancy controllers, it's just a delicate balance to find something that is comfortable for my hands for hours at a time).   I still enjoy fast paced skill based gaming, but can't play e.g. Darkfall or Global Agenda because they depend too much on mouse aim.

I watched this case carefully, because once accessibility considerations enter MMOs, I will be able to enjoy them much more.  I know a lot of people are thinking "ruin my game by watering it down for people with disabilities..."  Don't worry, most people with disabilities do not want to intrude or impose any more than they already have to (some think nothing of requesting services with an entitlement attitude, and there will always be those).  

In the next 10 years, I only hope to see progress of the following form: if there is something obvious that the devs can do to help disabled players, be it repetitive stress, visual/audio impairment, etc that they include these small features that will make a huge difference in quality of life for these players.   In other words, don't make repetitive button mashing required (or allow us to use an auto-bind program if you do), and include video options that put tags above important things (like pressing the Select button in FF7) for people with vision impairments.

In other words, the MMO industry (which is actually the virtual reality industry) is only in its infancy, and for now we can focus on minor improvements that make a world of difference for disabled folks but are hardly noticeable for abled folks.   Honestly, the ability to play Champions Online without pain is a really big deal for me, I can't imagine how much it would add to that blind fellows life if he could play EQ2 without constantly being reminded of his disability.   Impairments are physical, but they only become disabilities relative to society; humans can adjust completely to a loss of physical function, but most folks can't recover from the social consequences of disability (e.g. wheelchairs are quite pleasant to use, after 2 years you would be suprised at how normal they feel to use, but even after 10 years there is always a sinking feeling when you realize that stairs are required as the only way to get somewhere).  

This is totally absurd and stupid. There was not even a case to begin with. However, i commend the judge and lawyers for at least entertaining this guy. if it was me i would have told him to never waste my time again.

Just like the other poster said 'only in America'. Suing others is an industry itself.

Being blind is about the worse thing I can think of in the way of a disability. But at the same time, expecting blind people to be able to play video games and the makers of such games to be responsible to make it so is ludicrous. There are some things in this world that some people just cannot do. This case was about what all frivolous suits are about, the money.

I agree it would be different if the guy had come up with a way to make games more accessible to the visually impaired that was cost-effective to game developers.I believe most if not all game developers would embrace such software or make readily adapt their games to such hardware if it didn't hurt their bottom line too much.But as far as I know such software/hardware does not exist and you can't sue a game developer for not doing something that is not currently possible.

I do believe that stories like this from time to time remind the business community that there is a market here thats not being tapped.

Maybe it's not to expensive to help some dissabled to enjoy video games, and if so turn a better profit.

Nub's

It is generally not cost-effective from a logical point of view to build wheelchair accessible ramps, but businesses are forced to do so because of the American's with Disabilities Act.   This is why I recommend people to leave logic out, because logic is not the most  relevant thing in politics (annoying, I know, but true).  

For those who think that the plaintiff has no case, recall that We the people make the laws.  The laws are whatever we choose them to be.  Certainly after the ADA passed, we all must admit that people with disabilities are a powerful legislative lobby, and over time they are making continual progress on all their demands.  I see it as inevitable that eventually MMOs will be legally required to include accessibility features, for better or for worse that is certainly what is going to happen, based on my study of American politics and the Disability Rights Movement.  

Good for SOE. The sense of entitlement and need for special treatment by people absolutely astounds me.  Don't get me wrong, I feel terrible for people with disabilities, but the ones that believe the rest of the world should make unrealistic accommodations for them are ridiculous.

Just like when that idiot sued McDonalds because his own dumbass spilled coffee on himself and then sued because it was too hot. Did that fool think it was going to be cold? He probably would have sued if it was.

The stupidity of some people is staggering.