EVE Information Portal

In regards to the incident of prevailing discussion, CCP absolutely made the right decision. I applaud their actions. It is both wrong and illegal to incite someone to kill themselves. In fact, I would go further to say that they should make themselves aware of the extent of the problem. I am not an attorney and all statements I make herein are to be regarded as my personal opinion, but if I were their attorney I would advise them to include the specific language "cyberbullying" and "encouraging self-harm or harm to others" in their TOS. They should also, IMO, include language to the effect that violation of the Hate Crimes Prevention Act is also a violation of the TOS. This would help cover them should someone who is mentally ill harm themselves, although I would imagine proactive measures would be the best assurance of limitation of liability.

When people are online they tend to forget they live under the rule of law. As it pertains to the encouragement of suicide, United States case law has generally treated it as mala in se. In Burnett v. People (Ill.) 68 N. E. 505, 66 L. R. A. 304, 98 Am. St. Rep. 206 – a case of a suicide pact – the court held that the accomplice was in fact a principal in the offense, and that it was in and of itself, a natural crime to encourage another to commit the act of suicide. According to the legal precedent I was able to dig up in ~5min if you are an adult and incite someone to kill themselves you could be adjudicated guilty of murder.

If you are a minor such an incident might be covered under cyberbullying legislation, if you're lucky and don't get charged as an adult. In the U.S. cyberbullying is an illegal activity. All 50 states have cyberbullying laws. In most states it is a misdemeanor. A couple states, like Missouri, have upgraded it to a felony.

The fact is, if you take things too far and someone does hurt themselves, there will probably be media attention. In that case you will be judged first in the court of public opinion, and then in a court of law. You will find that while the people you have surrounded yourself with may not see anything wrong with your behavior the society you live in will not tolerate cyberbullying and certainly not incitement to commit suicide. These laws are the will of not 10,000 gamers, but hundreds of millions of citizens. Whether it is covered as part of the agreement you have made with the game owners is irrelevant.

Like it or not, agree with it or don't, but follow it or risk it. The consequences for the intentional or accidental serious injury or death of a person will be followed by actions against you by law enforcement. If your own conscious is not enough to prevent you from being a shmuck or you don't understand why it is considered wrong to be a shmuck, you would do yourself a favor by remembering that everything you do online is recorded.

Its not an invalidation of a election to remove someone for violating terms of agreement anyways. CCP provided drinks cuz they are cool, the Mittani said stupid crap because he can't hold his liquor. During a live broadcast. During a pivotal year in the development of the company. The inherent cruelty of Eve remains intact .. the **** got a time out for pete's sake and gave up the chair his own self.

Learn how to hold your booze.

As far as I see the matter at hand, CCP and Mittani reacted both in a sensible way, assuming, that the chain of events was as it was later stated. What was being said by the Mittani is an clearly unaccepteble public call to force someone into harming himself in reallife. Yes, it was a bad idea to give sensible informations about his real identity in the ingame bio. And yes, it might help future matters to clarify the TOS for such events as the fanfest. The fact that he was drunk (upon which he shouldn't have been allowed to speak officially as a CSM member), was taken into account by not banning him from future CSMs. Thus a wellrounded decission was taken by both sides.
Those crying out about this, state that they perceive the RL wellbeing of other people of no importance to them. While EVE is perceived as an harsh universe, contrasting most other mmos out there, which I find to be refreshing, the line has to be drawn when it comes to potential RL consequences. Given the publicness of the incident and the prominence of the actor, CCP had no choice but to step in. Wether or not the votes he received are worthless now, lies in the hands of the other CSM members.

Goon subscriptions.

A 30-day ban is nothing compared to what he pulled off against that guy. Good lord was this weak...

heh

Took a break for a bit, just after the election...

Come back, and find mittens has flushed over 10k votes down the toilet, or actually gs as a whole flushed the votes.

Good stuff, maybe next time these people will vote for a more mature candidate.


Anyone want to put the D back into Democracy already?
(You know who to vote for next year)

KONY 2012