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Convicted for ingame stealing
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Ubiquitous Forum Alt
#41 - 2012-02-01 18:58:36 UTC
I referr you all to my previous post. I still think it sums this ENTIRE case up rather nicely, INCLUDING how it ties into EVE...

Quote:

3 things, then I suspect I'll be leaving this thread for good:

1) The case did establish that virtual items are "goods"
- But this is not news. EVE has LONG contented that all in game items are "goods"
- That is why they say that THEY OWN EVERYTHING. If it wasn't a "good", they couldn't own it, could they Roll

2) What made this a crime (you know, the things that go to COURT rather than being laughed at and forgotten):

3.6.3. The final complaint – manifestly aimed at the issue of unlawful appropriation – that taking virtual possessions from other players is one of the very objectives of RuneScape is incompatible with the fact, established by the Court of Appeal, that the rules of RuneScape do not cover taking objects in the manner employed by the defendant and the co-accused.

-Mind you, this means that ANYTHING covered by the rules IN ANY WAY is arguably not a crime - even cheating/hacking, as these generally have very clearly defined penalties in nearly every game (aka: the banhammer)
-Of course, in the case of hacking, local laws would supercede the game rules, so its still a crime if you can identify the culprit.
-Similarly, if any game was stupid enough to put rules in to cover physical violence of the sort used in this case, local laws would still apply IN ADDITION to the game's rules....but any case that is covered by the rules of the game and NOT illegal according to local laws is perfectly legal, even if it involves transferring virtual 'googs' without the owner's consent P

3) Obviously the OP is either a moron or a troll....My guess is both. Blink

I think that pretty well sums everything up. Cool


Obviously i was wrong about leaving the thread for good though...

I don't log in - I don't need to. My very existence griefs people. They see my name, and they instinctively fill with rage and indignation. Deny it all you want - but if you didn't care, you wouldn't have posted, would you?
Kara Roideater
#42 - 2012-02-01 19:15:30 UTC  |  Edited by: Kara Roideater
Ubiquitous Forum Alt wrote:
I referr you all to my previous post. I still think it sums this ENTIRE case up rather nicely, INCLUDING how it ties into EVE...

Quote:

3 things, then I suspect I'll be leaving this thread for good:

1) The case did establish that virtual items are "goods"
- But this is not news. EVE has LONG contented that all in game items are "goods"
- That is why they say that THEY OWN EVERYTHING. If it wasn't a "good", they couldn't own it, could they Roll

...


Obviously i was wrong about leaving the thread for good though...


You were also wrong about CCP owning everything (at least in the context of this ruling), if that is what you are saying. Runescape's ToS says exactly the same thing about ownership:

Quote:

You agree that all intellectual property or other rights in any game character, account and items are and will remain our property. Jagex owns all rights in the Jagex Products, and you are only granted permission to use such products, subject to and in accordance with these Terms and Conditions.

That provided no impediment to the court finding that the goods both belonged to the player (and not to Jagex) and had value. This is not old news (to me at least).
Henry Haphorn
Killer Yankee
#43 - 2012-02-01 19:16:07 UTC  |  Edited by: Henry Haphorn
Kara Roideater wrote:
Wow! A large number of idiots in this thread who seem to lose the ability to read when the material contains data they don't like.

What was this ruling? It was a ruling against an appeal. The appeal was against a lower court's conclusion that ' the virtual amulet and virtual mask in the online game RuneScape are goods which can be the object of theft within the meaning of article 310 of the Criminal Code'. The case has nothing to do with the violent means used to extract the goods out of game. It is entirely to do with whether the lower court was right to allow that the goods could be objects of theft. It does not just apply 'in this case' but will apply in all cases involving similar types of property.

Article 310 of the Criminal Code reads as follows:
'Any person who removes any good belonging wholly or partially to any other person with the intention of unlawfully appropriating it is guilty of theft and liable to a term of imprisonment not exceeding four years or a fourth category fine.'

So, two things here. Firstly, the court has accepted that, despite the Runescape EULA, ingame goods do belong to their ingame owner ('wholly or partly'). This is quite a big deal. A particularly interesting feature of the ruling is that it denies that virtual objects are just data (rather than goods), despite sharing characteristics with data. This might put a break on both the cry that 'It's all just pixels' and that 'the EULA says everything belongs to CCP so it must be true!'. At least one national court has decided at the highest level that this is not the case.

Secondly, the goods have to be removed unlawfully in order for their removal to constitute theft and nothing in this case suggests that removal via ingame means would constitute unlawful removal. One of the grounds for the appeal was that 'the appellant argues that taking away the virtual property of other players is one of RuneScape's very objectives'. The lower court had specifically ruled (and the supreme court agreed) that 'the rules of RuneScape do not cover obtaining objects in the manner that occurred in this case: the objects were taken from the victim outside the context of the game itself', strongly implying that no crime would have occurred if the theft had taken place within the context of allowable behaviour patterns in the game.


This^^

Quoted for truth.

EDIT:

@OP

If I was sitting next to you right now with both of our computers and we are both playing Eve at the same and I decide to attack your spaceship for the loot that you carried, do you think the courts would give a damn if the theft was committed in the context of the game? No.

Adapt or Die
Ubiquitous Forum Alt
#44 - 2012-02-01 19:42:37 UTC
Kara Roideater wrote:

That provided no impediment to the court finding that the goods both belonged to the player (and not to Jagex) and had value. This is not old news (to me at least).


That is because the defence did not bring the EULA into the case like they should have - they tried to make the argument that the items were not goods. Stupid defence attorneys who cba to research the game their case revolves around are a separate matter entirely.

Jagex didn't bother to intervene because quite honestly I doubt they even knew about the case until after it was over. However, had the case been against Jagex, that clause would have caused the theft charges to be dropped (obviously assault would have remained).

The clause is there to protect the game company, not the players. Without that clause, any time CCP took isk away from someone for RMT or any other reason, that person could legitimately take them to court for stealing their isk, and unless CCP could PROVE to the COURT that the player broke a rule with a clearly stated penalty of the isk/items being removed, the player would have legal grounds to SUE them for it and WIN.


Regardless of all of that, whether you knew it or not, nobody on an official level has ever disputed that virtual items are "goods"....

#2 is the far more relevant point to the discussion of video game "theft" being illegal.

I don't log in - I don't need to. My very existence griefs people. They see my name, and they instinctively fill with rage and indignation. Deny it all you want - but if you didn't care, you wouldn't have posted, would you?
Kara Roideater
#45 - 2012-02-01 19:52:32 UTC
Ubiquitous Forum Alt wrote:
Kara Roideater wrote:

That provided no impediment to the court finding that the goods both belonged to the player (and not to Jagex) and had value. This is not old news (to me at least).


That is because the defence did not bring the EULA into the case like they should have - they tried to make the argument that the items were not goods. Stupid defence attorneys who cba to research the game their case revolves around are a separate matter entirely.

Jagex didn't bother to intervene because quite honestly I doubt they even knew about the case until after it was over. However, had the case been against Jagex, that clause would have caused the theft charges to be dropped (obviously assault would have remained).

The clause is there to protect the game company, not the players. Without that clause, any time CCP took isk away from someone for RMT or any other reason, that person could legitimately take them to court for stealing their isk, and unless CCP could PROVE to the COURT that the player broke a rule with a clearly stated penalty of the isk/items being removed, the player would have legal grounds to SUE them for it and WIN.


Regardless of all of that, whether you knew it or not, nobody on an official level has ever disputed that virtual items are "goods"....

#2 is the far more relevant point to the discussion of video game "theft" being illegal.


You seem very sure of a lot of things. I'm sure you're not simply asserting your own opinion as fact and can provide some evidence to support these points.
Ubiquitous Forum Alt
#46 - 2012-02-01 21:17:06 UTC
Kara Roideater wrote:

You seem very sure of a lot of things. I'm sure you're not simply asserting your own opinion as fact and can provide some evidence to support these points.

Its not exactly like I'm pulling it all out of thin air you know...

The court's entire decision, complete with overly long legalese explanations of each and every little detail, is linked from the link if you bother to look at it. I quoted the part I was referring to.

Feel free to consult a lawyer if you want 100% assurance that I'm interpreting the legalese correctly...but I think it pretty much speaks for itself.

I don't log in - I don't need to. My very existence griefs people. They see my name, and they instinctively fill with rage and indignation. Deny it all you want - but if you didn't care, you wouldn't have posted, would you?
Drunken Bum
#47 - 2012-02-01 21:57:45 UTC
Having grown up around heroin junkies and other scumbags, hearing about two kids beating another one for his video game items still makes me a little sick. This entire planet needs to be nuked.

After the patch we're giving the market some gentle supply restriction, like tying one wrist to the bedpost loosely with soft silk rope. Just enough to make things a bit more exciting for the market, not enough to make a safeword necessary.  -Fozzie
Ubiquitous Forum Alt
#48 - 2012-02-01 22:01:28 UTC
Drunken Bum wrote:
Having grown up around ****** junkies and other scumbags, hearing about two kids beating another one for his video game items still makes me a little sick. This entire planet needs to be nuked.


Eh, I agree it is sick - and I would have pushed the assault with a deadly weapon angle and gone for some actual jail time - preferably even trying them as adults....

But I wouldn't go so far as nuking the planet - thats even dumber than what they did. And yes I know you were not speaking literally P

I don't log in - I don't need to. My very existence griefs people. They see my name, and they instinctively fill with rage and indignation. Deny it all you want - but if you didn't care, you wouldn't have posted, would you?
seany1212
M Y S T
#49 - 2012-02-01 22:06:51 UTC
Kara Roideater wrote:
Ubiquitous Forum Alt wrote:
Kara Roideater wrote:

That provided no impediment to the court finding that the goods both belonged to the player (and not to Jagex) and had value. This is not old news (to me at least).


That is because the defence did not bring the EULA into the case like they should have - they tried to make the argument that the items were not goods. Stupid defence attorneys who cba to research the game their case revolves around are a separate matter entirely.

Jagex didn't bother to intervene because quite honestly I doubt they even knew about the case until after it was over. However, had the case been against Jagex, that clause would have caused the theft charges to be dropped (obviously assault would have remained).

The clause is there to protect the game company, not the players. Without that clause, any time CCP took isk away from someone for RMT or any other reason, that person could legitimately take them to court for stealing their isk, and unless CCP could PROVE to the COURT that the player broke a rule with a clearly stated penalty of the isk/items being removed, the player would have legal grounds to SUE them for it and WIN.


Regardless of all of that, whether you knew it or not, nobody on an official level has ever disputed that virtual items are "goods"....

#2 is the far more relevant point to the discussion of video game "theft" being illegal.


You seem very sure of a lot of things. I'm sure you're not simply asserting your own opinion as fact and can provide some evidence to support these points.


There's plenty of clear points there, the media would have had a field day if the judge had dismissed the case, "im sorry they nearly knifed you little boy but the items they stole weren't real", dont be deluded, of course they were going to set an example in this case, it involves real life just as much as it involves in-game items but its been said in every thread made up on this crap that there's a difference between keeping something within a game and taking it outside into real-life Straight
KrakizBad
Section 8.
#50 - 2012-02-01 23:40:23 UTC
Holy crap I weep for our collective dead education systems.

If a dude comes to your house, beats you up, and forces you to transfer your items away, you might have a case in some courts.

The following things (non-exclusive) will not be covered by such a precedent:

You got can flipped and you're mad.
Goons recruitment scammed you out of your ISK and you're mad.
Ebil piwate forced you to pay a ransom in losec and you're mad.
You were dumb enough to fall for a Jita local scam and you're mad.
You failed to read a contract properly and you're mad.
Someone shot your shiny ship and you're mad.
Wardeccers held your corp ransom for weeks and you're mad.
You sold a ship for .01 ISK and you're mad.
You got trade window scammed out of PLEX and you're mad.

In short, your glee at the possibility of holding people accountable out of game for in-game actions as a legal shield for your carebearing is misplaced and buddy, it isn't going to work. At all.

However if you're so obtuse as to think that someone suicide ganking your hulk is worthy of legal action, I welcome your futile attempt to get a court to so much as HEAR your case, especially since the relative value of the damn thing (if it was recognized as an actual asset that you own, which it isn't) is less than $20.
Theodoric Darkwind
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#51 - 2012-02-02 02:46:03 UTC
I doubt this had anything to do with the "theft" of ingame items and more to do with .... "he was beaten and threatened with a knife to give them up". Its still an armed robbery, even if the stolen item was virtual, had they simply hacked his account and stole the items nothing would have happened, it was the RL violence that made it a RL crime.
Kara Roideater
#52 - 2012-02-02 09:29:01 UTC
Ubiquitous Forum Alt wrote:
Kara Roideater wrote:

You seem very sure of a lot of things. I'm sure you're not simply asserting your own opinion as fact and can provide some evidence to support these points.

Its not exactly like I'm pulling it all out of thin air you know...

The court's entire decision, complete with overly long legalese explanations of each and every little detail, is linked from the link if you bother to look at it. I quoted the part I was referring to.

Feel free to consult a lawyer if you want 100% assurance that I'm interpreting the legalese correctly...but I think it pretty much speaks for itself.

That's weird. It looked to me like you made an assertion about how the case would have gone if the appeal had been based on a different strategy, concluding that actually, despite the court finding the goods belonged to the victim they would have found otherwise if you had been there to lead the way. You provide nothing at all to support this claim and I see nothing in the judgement that suggests that ownership of the goods would have been denied to the victim on the basis of the EULA if only someone had been intelligent enough to draw the supreme court's attention to it. But, given your certainty, I'm sure you can cite precedents from other similar cases where things have been decided in the way that you indicate they would have been decided here if the EULA had been brought up.
Jhagiti Tyran
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#53 - 2012-02-02 10:07:15 UTC
A lot of the problems with this case was the fact the authority's avoided robbery charges because of the age of the kids involved. Charging the kid with robbery would have avoided the "who the items belonged to" issue, but its also more serious so they went with lesser charge of theft.
Ubiquitous Forum Alt
#54 - 2012-02-03 06:58:04 UTC
Kara Roideater wrote:
Ubiquitous Forum Alt wrote:
Kara Roideater wrote:

You seem very sure of a lot of things. I'm sure you're not simply asserting your own opinion as fact and can provide some evidence to support these points.

Its not exactly like I'm pulling it all out of thin air you know...

The court's entire decision, complete with overly long legalese explanations of each and every little detail, is linked from the link if you bother to look at it. I quoted the part I was referring to.

Feel free to consult a lawyer if you want 100% assurance that I'm interpreting the legalese correctly...but I think it pretty much speaks for itself.

That's weird. It looked to me like you made an assertion about how the case would have gone if the appeal had been based on a different strategy, concluding that actually, despite the court finding the goods belonged to the victim they would have found otherwise if you had been there to lead the way. You provide nothing at all to support this claim and I see nothing in the judgement that suggests that ownership of the goods would have been denied to the victim on the basis of the EULA if only someone had been intelligent enough to draw the supreme court's attention to it. But, given your certainty, I'm sure you can cite precedents from other similar cases where things have been decided in the way that you indicate they would have been decided here if the EULA had been brought up.


Well next time CCP takes away your isk feel free to sue them and let me know how the court case goes. As I said thats what the clause is in there to prevent....so thats how you can prove me wrong you silly ****

I don't log in - I don't need to. My very existence griefs people. They see my name, and they instinctively fill with rage and indignation. Deny it all you want - but if you didn't care, you wouldn't have posted, would you?
Ubiquitous Forum Alt
#55 - 2012-02-03 07:15:24 UTC
To use an analogy, in case its still too hard for you to understand:


  • Lets say you rent a car.
  • You drive the car to a store, and as you get out, someone holds a knife to your throat, takes the keys to the car, and drives away with it.
  • However, being an odd thief (to fit the analogy), they return the rental car to the company when they are done with it.


ArrowNow, MY position is that while they certainly threatened/assaulted you, and may have, in a VERY loose sense "stolen" *something* from you in the form of a service you had paid for.......They most certainly did NOT steal the car from you - because YOU NEVER ****ING OWNED IT. In fact, since the rental company got the car back, they will never know the difference. As far as they are concerned, no theft ever occurred.

ArrowYOUR POSITION, on the other hand, appears to be that by renting the car you somehow "owned" it, and that they STOLE YOUR CAR - so you propose that you can go ahead and charge them with 'Grand Theft: Auto' and obtain a conviction for that crime, so you aren't going to bother pushing the assault or robbery charges.


IdeaSee the difference now? If not I really don't think I can help you, see my advice above, and enjoy being counter-sued for legal expenses P

I don't log in - I don't need to. My very existence griefs people. They see my name, and they instinctively fill with rage and indignation. Deny it all you want - but if you didn't care, you wouldn't have posted, would you?
Sutskop
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#56 - 2012-02-03 09:31:39 UTC
Thank god 99% of us are not affected by funny Dutch court decisions ;)
Jhagiti Tyran
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#57 - 2012-02-03 10:20:03 UTC
Ubiquitous Forum Alt wrote:
To use an analogy, in case its still too hard for you to understand:


  • Lets say you rent a car.
  • You drive the car to a store, and as you get out, someone holds a knife to your throat, takes the keys to the car, and drives away with it.
  • However, being an odd thief (to fit the analogy), they return the rental car to the company when they are done with it.


ArrowNow, MY position is that while they certainly threatened/assaulted you, and may have, in a VERY loose sense "stolen" *something* from you in the form of a service you had paid for.......They most certainly did NOT steal the car from you - because YOU NEVER ****ING OWNED IT. In fact, since the rental company got the car back, they will never know the difference. As far as they are concerned, no theft ever occurred.

ArrowYOUR POSITION, on the other hand, appears to be that by renting the car you somehow "owned" it, and that they STOLE YOUR CAR - so you propose that you can go ahead and charge them with 'Grand Theft: Auto' and obtain a conviction for that crime, so you aren't going to bother pushing the assault or robbery charges.


IdeaSee the difference now? If not I really don't think I can help you, see my advice above, and enjoy being counter-sued for legal expenses P


Excluding the violent taking of the car (which is robbery) essentially taking a car and returning it is a very different crime, most country's have laws regarding "taking without owners consent". The wording might be a bit different but essentially it sets it aside from "theft" as theft is usually classified as "intending to permanently deprive the owner of the item".

Robbery is different still, robbery usually covers taking something from someone using either intimidation or force (armed or not) and doesn't count whether the property was ever returned or to be permanently stolen. Victims neither need to be in lawful possession of the items or even have value, it doesn't matter whether they belong to somebody else or in fact even if the stuff is contraband or if the victim had stolen them first. All that matters is the way they where taken from the victim.

Thats why in this case the real charge should have been robbery.
Ubiquitous Forum Alt
#58 - 2012-02-03 13:14:51 UTC  |  Edited by: Ubiquitous Forum Alt
Jhagiti Tyran wrote:


Excluding the violent taking of the car (which is robbery) essentially taking a car and returning it is a very different crime, most country's have laws regarding "taking without owners consent". The wording might be a bit different but essentially it sets it aside from "theft" as theft is usually classified as "intending to permanently deprive the owner of the item".

Robbery is different still, robbery usually covers taking something from someone using either intimidation or force (armed or not) and doesn't count whether the property was ever returned or to be permanently stolen. Victims neither need to be in lawful possession of the items or even have value, it doesn't matter whether they belong to somebody else or in fact even if the stuff is contraband or if the victim had stolen them first. All that matters is the way they where taken from the victim.

Thats why in this case the real charge should have been robbery.


EXACTLY - I am BY NO MEANS saying that no crime was committed. I'm just saying it should not have been prosecuted as THEFT of the items from the kid because:

1) HE DIDN'T ****ing OWN THEM, Jagex did.
and
2) There are several MORE SERIOUS charges which WERE valid and SHOULD have been pushed for - as the defendants MIGHT have learned something from some hard prison time, whereas they will learn NOTHING from some mandatory community service.

I don't log in - I don't need to. My very existence griefs people. They see my name, and they instinctively fill with rage and indignation. Deny it all you want - but if you didn't care, you wouldn't have posted, would you?
Ubiquitous Forum Alt
#59 - 2012-02-03 13:19:35 UTC
And just to clarify for anyone having trouble keeping up - the reason my hypothetical car thieves had to *return* the car is because ultimately the thieves in this case obviously didn't succeed in "taking" anything away from the *owner* (Jagex) - they merely took the items away from the "renter".

I don't log in - I don't need to. My very existence griefs people. They see my name, and they instinctively fill with rage and indignation. Deny it all you want - but if you didn't care, you wouldn't have posted, would you?
Jhagiti Tyran
Caldari Provisions
Caldari State
#60 - 2012-02-03 13:33:16 UTC
ANGRY CAPS.