Chinese Justice

[Occhidiangela]

On a seperate but related and more probable note, I could see in game harrassment going into a real court.
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What do you mean by harassment? General in game griefing? Account theft? Calling one another names? Spreading lies about another player via a "global" in game chat? Libel? Slander?

You don't see very many cases in court for welching on golf bets, nor handicap abuses. Why? There is already a recognized authority to arbitrate such disputes. In tournaments, (I refer here to amateur, since PGA is also a recognized governing body) there is a tournament committee to adjudicate such disputes. One has to agree to their authority to compete in the tournament. I*n non tournament matches, both parties understand "caveat emptor" on a golf wager. That said, if the Tournament committee acts fraudlently, then a case for fraud can be made. Fraud is fraud, regardless of the arena.

I expect that in an MMORPG, a leisure activity, disputes would be remanded to the authority of the "tournament committee" which of course is the company who runs the game. Jurisdiction should be held at "Game Master Level" or "Owner of the World" level. The ability to enforce rules is almost complete, unless one is up against a very talented hacker/cracker. Most of the cases I have heard of are the copyright infringement matters, where monetary loss/damage can be shown. When the game activity spills into RL activity (see the murder story a few years back in re Lineage) you are dealing with RL crime, for which there are RL statutes and procedures. The mitigation "he screwed me over in a computer game" is hardly going to stand up in court if you took a baseball bat to his head.

Consider the past few years, where certain assaults on the ice in NHL games have gone to court. (McSorley's is the latest I recall.) In each of those cases, the behavior was not only well outside the rules of the games, but criminal assault. It was also well documented on film, and well witnessed.

In an MMORPG setting, how visible is such harassment or abuse? How proveable is it in court of law, given that a defense attorney may be able to cast doubt regarding the authenticity of any amount of Computer generated evidence? How can one "prove" that a log file or screen shot has not been tampered with? How does one know it is unedited?

I'd personally rather see Game Authorities handle in game disputes. Our courts are busy enough as it is on more pressing matters than games.

Occhi