gambling & rented plot plz give legal advise

Apparently the USA Congress has passed the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 that makes internet gambling illegal.

I am an european citizen, leaving in European soil but have rented plot of land in sL that i am renting. I found out today that my tenant is using it as a gambling facility, filled with slot machines.

Can that be considered illegal? If so, am i responsible as i am only renting the plot? Do i need to expel that tenant? Would really appreciate some SERIOUS legal advise as i don t want to be involved with anything considered illegal. Thank you.

First, I would very strongly advise that you seek legal advice from a qualified attorney, not from the users of these forums, although a few of them *are* attorneys.

Second, If you actually own the land, then yes, you are ultimately responsible for what takes place on that land, particularly in this case, since you have full knowledge of the activity.

Linden Lab's position, to date, on gambling establishments on the grid is that operators are not permitted to use Lab provided search mechanisms (land name/description, classifieds) to advertise the activity. They haven't (yet) been banned outright. Figure out how comfortable you are in following that lead, and for now, allowing them to stay. In the end, if you actually own the land, your conscience should be your ultimate guide - expel them if you're not well with it.

Thank you for your wise advise, Zaphod Kotobide. After some consideration i asked the tenant to remove all traces of gambling from the land, wich made me loose a great tenant........But i don t want anything remotelly illegal going on in my land,

I'm not a lawyer or attorney, but common sense tells me... you are an EU citizen, period. You're not required to abide by US laws. The TOS says that all members should abide to and respect local law... wherever they happen to be. For instance, if you and your tenant are EU citizens and reside in the EU. As far as I know, online gambling has not been banned by EU laws. Any prosecution coming from US would seem unenforceable, because not only you're not breaking any of your local laws, but you're out of the prosecutor's jurisdiction. That's the reason why cruise ships open their Kaseenos only and when they are out of US territorial waters. If your tenant is a US resident, then he/she is responsible for complying with his/her local laws and within US jurisdiction. Anyone has a more educated guess?...Anyone?

Don't ask for legal advice here. You need to get real advice form a real lawyer.

That said, even in the US in is unclear if this law applies to SL or not. Many think it does, but it has never been tested and there are very strong arguments that would support that the law doesn't apply to SL. Either way, how much risk do you want to take?

Hello everybody,

most countries in the EU treat it like this:
Your computer, your responsibility.

Everything that is downloaded into your computers memory is your responsibility and you can be held liable for that. Which is the law in Germany anyways and that is what binds me for example.

DON'T take this as a 'go free on dubious things'! A forumspost is NO legaly advice.

To be sure, do as Zaphod said: Contact an Attorney, best one specialized in e-trade and such things.

Regards,
Lillyann

Why take the risk, or why spending lots of money or time to find legal advise?

Refund the rent, update your covenant and find another tenant.

From my recollection, the laws apply where the 'source' is. I.E. The servers providing you with that service, from which those laws can be broken, are considered '1st layer'.
That's why so many online gambling service companies moved a lot of their servers 'off shore' to escape certain taxes and laws.
However the 'internet' laws changed to support the notion that it is with the end user to abide by local laws and taxes, as the 'client' software resides on your PC and in your country.
Don't quote me on this, because it does require participating countries to agree to this 'international' law. Some still argue its the shared resonsibility of both the country with the servers, and the laws of the 'client' software AND those countries that act inbetween as a pipeline to transmit the data (the internet).

Makes you wonder how they control that one?

So far LL have ony outlawed the advertising of gambling. They have been talking to the authorities regarding gambling, if it were illegal for you to have gambling on your land, then I'd hazard a guess that LL would have included gambling in the recent "Safer place" blog.

A US resident gambling on your land may find themselves in breach of their law, this is where it could get a bit messy but as internet gambling is not illegal worldwide, I'd say the onus is on the people who live in places where internet gambling is illegal, not to participate, rather than on you.

Can you get in trouble legally offline? Probably not. You are an EU citizen and it's not illegal where you live. You will probably never wind up in court for it.

Can LL get in legal trouble for allowing you to run a gambling establishment on *their* US servers- where it is presumably illegal- you bet. They might wind up in court for having gambling establishments.

Is there a possibility of LL shutting down your account or your tenet (or any number of other in world punishments or penalties) for putting up something that is illegal which they can be held responsible for- yes.

Is LL currently prosecuting accounts/tenants of gambling establishments- yes, in a limited fashion by removing the ability to advertise them. While they're not doing anything further- it's in their rights to do pretty much anything to your account and the ToS and recently blog updates have made pretty much anything that started off questionable inadvisable.

You follow your own, local laws and you follow the laws of wherever the server is physically located, which happens to be the US.

European or not, you are running a casino on US soil. If the US considers that to be illegal, then that does become your problem.

First of all, IANAL. Secondly, there is no way I would allow gambling on my land in Second Life simply because the simulator containing my land and the software which enables gambling, is being hosted on physical computer hardware in the United States of America.

Even the big gambling companies moved their servers outside the US when it was outlawed there.

I might consider it if my sim was hosted on computer hardware outside US territory, but even then it could be problematic because the Federal Authorities have already gone after offshore gambling operators for taking bets from US citizens.

It is the rest of the world's job to protect Americans from themselves apparently.

I guess this will all change again, once the server code becomes open source and other people/companies can host their own sims.. and so the problem becomes deeper.... no 'drinking' on this sim, not kissing on 'sundays' on this sim.. no spitting on the sidewalk on this sim.. <sigh>