EVE General Discussion

Sheldon...

Also I sometimes run around low sec with an iteron full of plexes.

It's sort of analogous to mp3 file sharing. The artist still owns the original file-- that wasn't stolen. What has "stolen" was a copy of the file. The artist's right to control how his intellectual property is used and distributed was violated.

Same with gold farming. Blizzard created and owns the game code, which is the IP. It gave this woman a license to access and use the game code, after she agreed to the EULA. Assuming the EULA said, "No gold farming," she violated the license agreement. She therefore made real-money profit from violating her agreement with Blizzard and making illicit use of its game code.

Is that a crime? Could be, if the action violates an intellectual property statute. (Australia's? The U.S.'s? Probably either would apply). But it is for sure that she breached her contract with Blizzard. Therefore Blizzard could sue her for damages. The tricky part would be in determining how much damages Blizzard suffered, in terms of dollars. Damages of all of the gold bars? Some of them?

I have no argument on that point. If she has simply "misplaced" her gold or hired someone to "misplace" it for her, then she . . . should probably go to jail. What I think would be poetic justice is if the insurance company paid her claim in full and then she went to prison for grand larceny for stealing her own gold. My post was more towards the sentiment in this thread that gold farming constituted some sort of breach of morality.



It's not like MP3 "sharing". With an MP3, you can make infinite duplicates of the original, and thus cost the original producer the revenue from all the people who would conceivably have bought a copy of the MP3, but instead just downloaded (read: stole) a free copy. MP3 file sharing would be more similar to someone using a glitch in game to duplicate assets and then distributing them to all their "friends" for free.

In the case of gold farming, someone just makes a job of doing work that other people don't find enjoyable and would rather bypass by paying money. It's just the same as if you hired a gardener to plant an apple tree for you and to take care of it.

I think the issue would be whether or not a gaming company can impose limits on interactions between players (read: people) that extend beyond their game. Surely, a gaming company can advise and even request their players not to do certain things with respect to the game, and the players can choose to obey. Blizzard or CCP could demand players play naked. It doesn't mean I have to play naked. The question is: Should they be able to ban me for playing fully clothed?

As for violating intellectual property, hell naw. The "intellectual property" is data that is presumably stored at the gaming company's own facilities. It never leaves the store, so . . . how do you steal a can of soda that literally cannot be taken out of the store? If it were possible to park an internet spaceship or a dragon mount or some **** in your garage and ride it around town or even just take it to another game, then there would be something to be said for the theft of intellectual property. But, if players can transfer items between themselves through in game means, that makes the "theft of intellectual property" case even worse, since the gaming company explicitly ALLOWS and even FACILITATES the transfer of said intellectual property between players. So, then, it's just a matter of "Well, we didn't like how you did it, so we're going to punish you by breaching our contract with you.".

Damages: OMG, how do you even begin to quantify? To give in game items real-world currency values (by whatever means) would probably cause them to be subject to real-world property laws, so that's kind of out of the question. You'd probably have to base damages on a projected loss of business. Well, would player A have subscribed if they couldn't buy item X? Yes? For a longer or shorter period of time than they actually did? How much longer? Would player B, who supplied access to and usage of item X to player A have subscribed if they couldn't profit by doing so? Yes? Prove it. No? Then there is some offsetting benefit to the act of gold farming perpetrated by player B . . .

Guyz...it's just internet spaceships.

RMT does not hurt CCP.. seriously..

Sorry but you must be trolling as nobody can be THAT stupid ( I also suspect somebody who has been caught buying isk via a RMT and is butthurt)

Okay.. It hurts CCP because instead of somebody buying a PLEX from CCP, they are buying it from somebody else and that money does not go to CCP...

You see now, get it?

Think of all that isk that is being purchased from RMT sites.. not 1 penny goes to CCP.

Now think of all that extra revenue CCP could have if RMT did not exist and everybody who paid for isk buy purchasing a PLEX from CCP.

So tell everybody again how RMT does not hurt CCP, in turn Eve, in turn us the players?

Also I love how you have randomly plucked numbers out of arse, very entertaining :)

Why don't you contact the police & ask them? You can do that you know.

That's kind of my point. The only reason I could see the judge bringing it up would be if it was introduced into the case... as there is a COUNTER SUIT involved I think the defensive might have some information as to why gold farming should not be involved in regards to an insurance claim as she does have receipts and has bought the gold with all the proper paperwork documented.

She even alerted the ins company as to new acquisitions. Gold farming is irrelevant.

Suing someone that has no money is counter-productive.

E: Although the insurance company is doing that right now, so there you go.

Let's not derail the topic, but when you RESELL Plex, CCP has already gotten their money from it in the first transaction.

Plex is not player generated after all. It just changes hands. Whether it be from Joe's isk or Joe's cash, Steve, who is selling the plex, already bought it from CCP the first time.

Not a derail I hope, but interesting. China used prisoners in lucrative internet gaming work: labour camp detainees endure hard labour by day, online 'gold farming' by night. Another argument against gold farming and RMT.