Any Land Owners interested in a class action suit?

From the Blog:



Chilly's still up in arms about the gambling ban and how much it has hurt SL.

See the Blog here:

http://blog.secondlife.com/2008/04/15/second-life-economy-grows-15-from-q4-to-q1/

As much as I hope there is no one out there who will pony up $100 USD and hand it over to Chilly for this laughable scheme, I'll lay odds there are some out there who will....

Despite the ginko fraud, the banking fiasco, SL gambling, and all the other schemes to relieve ppl of their Lindens, there are always people whose eternal optimism will triumph over common sense and experience...

I actually had a RL friend send $3500 to Nigeria... When i asked him what on earth he was thinking, he said, "Well, it could have been true, you just never know!"

Arrrgghhh...

Can I meet your friend. I have a really good business investment.

All those issues are cover in TOS,
You should read it before you click "Agree"
Also they could use the TOS that you and every person that jumped on this to sue you in a court of law for even trying to sue them.
Do you think they did not have every part of the problems cover in it?
Do you notice the agreement changes as time has passed and you must agree to when connecting?
LL dose not just have that made by the new intern in the office.Layers make them for them.

I wonder if anyone thinking of doing this lawsuit stopped to think that LL more then likely had the TOS reviewed by a lawyer first?

That would make sense to do.

Even a land scammer in SL was able to beat LL in court due to an "unconscionable TOS."

Read what the judge said.




[url=http://secondlife.reuters.com/stories/2007/05/31/judge-rules-against-one-sided-tos-in-bragg-lawsuit[/url]


"Along the way Robreno declares the Second Life Terms of Service invalid, and indirectly, it would appear, the Terms of Service of most or all other Virtual Worlds and MMO's by precedent."

But clearly states in the ToS...




You are misusing the word asset. In this case asset is a term used to describe something that is connected to your avatar in a database relational sense. The avatar's assets are the data that the avatar has collected and added to it's asset list or 'inventory' which collectively constitutes your account.

As far as Lindens... as stated in the ToS....




I cannot comment on this as I wasn't around then... moving on to ...



Where to start... ok as far as the money impact, been here done that, investments and all things change, you read the terms, etc... you had a choice to spend that money, and you had to have known that any money you give to any company will benefit that company in whatever way that company sees fit. Moving on to transition the sims to people's local computers? You must have no concept of how the system works or you would realize this is simply not possible.



Again I wasn't around for this so I cannot comment on it so moving on....



Ok let's tackle these one at a time. As previously stated here the only thing a judge found to be wrong with the ToS was the clause about not allowing anyone to sue them. As also stated previously, just beacuse a single clause of a ToS is found to be null it does not nullify the rest of the ToS.

Breaking all kinds of laws, codes and rules? I don't see any of that going on. This has no basis and is shear fallacy. I don't get the printing lindens part, but in the ToS it clearly states...



It's the manage, regulate, control, modify and/or eliminate such Currency that is relevant here.



That's exactly the problem. The law does not concern itself with what you reasonably expected because your expectations are clearly more than was promised to you by LL when you signed up and agreed to the ToS. While what they did may or may not have been rude, it simply is not criminal and doesn't serve the basis for a lawsuit. It's amazing how much people think they are entitled when, if taken the time to read and understand the rules of the playing field, they would save themselves alot of aggravation and pain.



I'm not sure why LL cannot legally offer investments, or even if that is true, but as I read through all of the information regarding the system and it's legal notices, I see nothing that states to me that I am guaranteed to make any money by purchasing a sim. As far as keeping the system on their servers, isn't that the point? How much rampant cheating and other deliberate con jobs would go on if the end-users were able to interact with the grid on an administrative level? The thought that the system would by put into the hands of it's residents entirely is preposterous and I cannot understand why anyone would expect it to be otherwise.

Finally any smart attorney would never touch this with a ten foot pole, no matter how many people run screaming about how unfair it is. Life is unfair, things happen that we can't predict. No matter how much kool-aid you think we have all had to drink, it doesn't change any of this on a legal level. No matter how angry you get or how much you really, REALLY want it to be illegal or actionable civilly, it just isn't.

You're wasting your time, Bamm. Hit the ignore button. She makes arguments like this all the time. Don't even get her started on WoW.

Yes, but it is a Class Action LOLsuit we are talking about here..

Do keep up, Conan.

No no no. Don't say that. I thoroughly enjoy reading Bam's debating posts - I really do

Me too!

Woot page 20!

News flash: contracts of adhesion are not inherently unenforceable. You have plenty of these: with your utility companies, software companies, mortgage companies, and to some degree, your employment contract. There are lots of contracts with terms that you either take or leave and these are enforceable.

The ruling had two parts and the pertinent part is about the arbitration clause, ***not the TOS as a whole.*** The arbitration clause was found to be invalid but, because of a severability clause, it does not mean that the entire TOS is invalid. I am not going to go through it all here, but don't think that the TOS is a complete piece of crap that leaves LL without rights - all this ruling did was say that LL cannot have this host of one-sided remedies (freezing your accounts, etc.) and keep you from suing by going through an expensive arbitration. That's all. It makes no broader judgment about all the provisions of the TOS or their propriety.

Don't misunderstand me! I like Bam, too. Her post was spot on and well written. Rebecca's was dead wrong. I just feel like Bam is wasting her time with that argument, despite the fact that she's 100% correct. I get sort of a lawyer feel off of her. I wouldn't be surprised if she practices in real life, but I'll leave it up to her to confirm or deny that. At any rate, she's banging her head against the wall on this one.

Nothing personal, but what is with people thinking a "TOS" is automatically valid?

Getting someone to "agree" to anything is possible---doesn't means its really legal or valid. LL doesn't even really know the age of people clicking "I agree," much less their real identity.

When I read this kind of thing ---and it's not just on SL forums---- I see this--people seem to have this weirdly neo-conditioned idea, that a computer game TOS is like the constitution of the United States or something, or that it's automatically valid. It's no different then other kind of "disclaimers" or agreements companies can try to use, which when challenged are found not valid. Starts out as Boilerplate.

It is the law that you cannot sign away certain rights. I can draw up an agreement for you to sign that is contradictory, onesided and tells you, you have no rights, while I have no responsibility to perform in any way......but it would be a fake and not hold water.

You shall see it for yourself. I am surprised you don't already see it.

Thank you for saying this. I get so tired of seeing people on SL blogs, forums, what have you, claiming that a judge said the whole ToS is somehow illegal.

She's only 19 (she said that in another thread), and her debating posts are excellent.

Maybe you need to start on WOW. See what a real MMO company is like.

There's nothing that anyone has said which is equivalent to that nonsensical posture. The ToS is an agreement. You are free to disagree with it in whole or in part. However, by doing so, you MUST stop using the product/service. Period. End of story.

Now, you can say you "only agreed to part(s) of it" and try and go to court to get the part(s) of it you don't agree to overturned. However, I don't think there is much traction for a lot of the ToS in a court case, because a lot of it is about fairness and common sense; just ensconced in words to make sure that everyone is on the same page. I mean, are you going to disagree with (and go to court over) what basically amounts to "What is ours remains ours, and what is yours remains yours"? Good luck with that!



Well, if you are AGREEING to it, then it DOES make it both legal and valid. Yeah, sure, you can get your kid to click the button without you seeing it, but there is nothing preventing you from finding out what your kid made you agree to. There is also the fact that, if you use the service/product, then you are still agreeing. Agreement isn't a one-time thing; every time you log in, you are agreeing to the ToS again, and again, and again. LL doesn't exactly make it difficult to figure out what you are agreeing to, either.



That's your perception. However, as far as the people involved in the Agreement are concerned, it IS pretty much the equivalent to the Constitution of the US. The only real difference is that the Constitution is an automatic document which applies to everyone equally, whether they agree to it or not. In the case of the ToS, it is 100% optional. Agree to it, and you can use the product/service. Don't, and you can't. Seems simple enough to me.

Yeah, some "Agreements" have gone a little far in the past; just like LL's. The PARTS of the agreements which exceed statutory limitations on such agreements get reined in by the courts when challenged. However, ALL real agreements have a severability clause, which means that any part of the contract may be rendered null, and it has NO EFFECT on the rest of the agreement.



You most certainly can sign away all kinds of rights. There are a few inalienable ones you would never be held accountable for if you signed away and then didn't honor the agreement, but the vast majority of rights you have you can very easily sign away in a heartbeat, and it will be upheld by the courts.

Ever heard of a non-compete? A Non-Disclosure Agreement? How about a license for someone else to reproduce/sell your copyrighted works? All quite transferable.

It amazes me the self-destructive nature of LL's behavior and the amazing, lnow it all, pack mentality, kool-aid kids they fester.

Well, it is called personal honor. You abide by the terms or you don't "sign". Mr. Bragg is in my opinion a man with no honor. Which is why he took the actions he did.

That of course correct -- no matter what the TOS said exactly -- he did something wrong, and didn't like it when LL didn't let him get away with it.

Sadly it is lawyers of this attitude that give the hard working decent sort a bad name by association.

Dude or Dudette.........even a crooked land scammer won his case. Waketh up.

LL is in a real mess. Like it or lump it.

When all your Lindens vanish and all your land goes poof, even your avatar is history, then you can sit there and nobly say, how SL did no wrong and you were just a sucker making a bad investment.

He didn't "win his case" - he won a PROCEDURAL MOTION that would keep his case before the court. LL then decided to settle. No judgment was made about the TOS in its entirety. Stop ranting and raving and read the decision. You are an intelligent woman. Read it for yourself.

I can't really say I disagree with this. However, I can say that he did do us all a favor in getting that "binding 3rd-party arbitration" requirement clause overturned.

Not like it wouldn't have been overturned in any other real case brought against LL, though, which still doesn't make him any less of a douchebag for what he did.