Law, culture and massively multiplayer online games

Abstract

Massively multiplayer online games (MMOGs) are now a major international phenomena. Millions of people can play together online, readily navigating boundaries between nations, languages and legal jurisdictions. The communities around some of these games are huge, of a size equivalent to a large city or small nation. This article explores three themes, labelled for conceptual purposes ‘games as legal spaces’, ‘games need lawyers’, and ‘lawyers need games’. It argues that games are inherently legal spaces, infused with legal-ness in a variety of ways; that more direct engagement from the legal community would be of tremendous value in making these systems, and the entertainment spaces which they regulate, ‘better’; and that we have a great deal to learn about law and about the regulation of the online space from games. The article concludes with the proposition that there is an opportunity for impactful knowledge exchange between legal scholars, MMOG developers and publishers, and the gaming community.

Keywords:

• massively multiplayer online games
• regulation
• EVE Online

Notes

1. In the Netherlands in 2012, for example, it was decided that items in the online game Runescape could be subject to theft, resulting in a conviction (http://www.rechtspraak.nl/Organisatie/Hoge-Raad/Supreme-court/Summaries-of-some-important-rulings-of-the-Supreme-Court/Pages/Extractfromthejudgment.aspx). Elsewhere, the US provides examples of disagreements between Second Life provider Linden Labs and the users of that virtual world, regarding land ownership (Bragg v. Linden Research, Inc., 487 F.Supp.2d 593 (E.D. Pa. 2007)) and intellectual property (Eros LLC vs Linden Research, Inc., No. CV 09 04269 (N.D. Cal., complaint 15 September 2009, dismissal 16 March 2011), available at http://dockets.justia.com/docket/california/candce/4:2009cv04269/219418/). UK examples are lacking, but Regina vs Ashley Mitchell: Exeter Crown Court, 3 February 2011, dealt with the illicit appropriation of virtual poker chips from Zynga, and their sale for real world money. Notably, this was not considered theft, and the defendant was charged under the Computer Misuse Act 1990, s.1 and with converting criminal property.

2. The community of experts at the Terra Nova blog, historically focused on games and virtual worlds, have had extensive discussions on this issue (for example http://terranova.blogs.com/terra_nova/2008/02/why-not-qualify.html and http://terranova.blogs.com/terra_nova/2011/02/not-all-created-equal.html), and Greg Lastowka and Dan Hunter have offered a thorough reflection on how engagements over virtual property might occur (2004). Elsewhere, Angela Adrian has argued that ‘participants in virtual worlds should not be left without legal recourse for the simple fact that the real-world result cannot be reconciled with the persistent world result’ (Adrian 2010, 647), and Julian Dibbell has suggested that law enforcement agencies cannot simply dismiss these cases due to a perceived lack of real world value (McCarthy 2006, 2).

3. It should be noted that the consequences of player dissatisfaction in MMOGs differ from those in a real-world legal context. In extreme cases, players may stop playing or, at least, cease participating in the parts of the game that are governed in a way they dislike. This has a cost both in cultural terms (with less participation resulting in less cultural activity) but also in economic terms (a small player base means a smaller economic base for the company providing the game, whether income is gained through subscriptions, advertising or micro-transactions). Players may also be vocal in their complaints about the system, taking to public fora to complain, management of which incurs a customer service cost for the provider.

4. Note that this use of criminal is descriptive rather than accurate.

5. Lehdonvirta and Ernkvist (2011) demonstrate the scale of the market, and its growth both in numerical and financial terms. Beyond purely economic significance, the value of these game practices can also be seen in other areas, for example in management expertise (IBM 2007).