Bragg Vs Linden Lab

So, he used a flaw in the system to gain illegal access and used this for his own profits...
Which, i believe, is considered hacking a system, and a criminal offense.
LL decided (probably to prevent negative publicity), to not press charges, but to use their own TOS rulings and just ban the person.

This person then sued LL for misuse of their TOS and won. Which imho is a correct ruling.

So, basically now forcing LL to take the only option available, which is to press charges, get it into a criminal court, and have him convicted for hacking their system.
As he already publically confessed to his crime, this shouldn't be too complex a case to win. In the process he'll probably lose his license to practice law too.
Good riddance.

The main reason I don't see this happening though, is that LL will probably avoid any negative publicity concerning their levels of security, just to get even with a small time crook... ehm, lawyer.

The only really thing that we now know is that this judge says that a) the arbitration clause is not enforcible, and b) Philip Rosedale can be named in the law suit.

Let’s not forget that LL is still not making a profit on this project. That and population growth from the media hype has slowed. I feel that if people who are banned start to sue left and right it is very likely that Philip and LL will simply shut SL down and take their investment to a new open source project. Hey, let’s admit it, SL is not in any kind of situation where it can really go open source with the current platform. What Philip and LL should do is shut down SL, take their code with them, open a new open source firm and sell the source to their "3d web browser" and their "server software." They would make a hell of a lot more money, have wayyy fewer customers service issues, no law suites and none of you cry babies bitching and whining about their product.

If I were LL I would look at what is coming, lots of regulation, lawsuits and loss of investment. If I were LL I'd get out now, close the whole thing down and sell the "browser" and "server" software. Simple. And don’t blame it on LL; it is no more their fault than your own. This cash cow is about to be tipped...

Chip's summary is pretty accurate, however, I have to say I really like this "contract of adhesion" language being thrown around by the Judge.

I don't feel like such a peon any more!

http://insurance.cch.com/Rupps/contract-of-adhesion.htm

Hmmm, I think precedents can be set in lower level courts, they just have less credibility and are probably not completely binding, but are likely influential.

But, hey, IANAL too!

Sounds a lot like the release forms you have to sign before a surgery... and hope the doctor doesnt turn out to be a incompetent

Elinah

heh i said it a year ago....the LL ToS is not legal and contradicts itself, precedent or not, i bet LL gets real lawyers, if they havent done so by now, to revamp that PoS now.

I agree with you there Maggie, i am hoping that LL is forced by this to take action and redress those that they have unfairly treated and as has been said in the thread the value of virtual property hopefully will be addressed as none of us have a leg to stand on if LL throws its toys out of the pram and bans someone, just because they deem it the right thing to do.

For me i hope its the start of some changes to the way LL deals with its customer base at least now they are having to sit up and take notice and hopefully make some changes, either that or as has been said they shut down under a deluge of Law suits.

Peace

This case really disturbs me.

Let's see if I'm understanding this right - a person is allowed, according to this case, to hack a game, make illegal profits, and the game owners have no right to take those profits back.

Isn't that what this case says? To me that's a HORRIBLY sad statement about our legal system.

Almost. They didn't just recover what he 'allegedly stole' and the profits arising from the sale of said items - but took *everything* and closed his account.

I would tend to agree with you that when you break the rules that severely, you forfeit everything ... but remember the guy is a lawyer and will be trying every trick in his book - and no doubt has the support of his colleagues in the hope of making a name for him and his company.

Broccoli

He was slimey in SL too. I remember when this first happened, and even his girlfriend got banned over it. Was a right mess.

No, I don't think you're understanding this right.

According to this decision, LL does not have the right to demand arbitration if a user sues them. Also, Philip is little more than a carnival barker.

As for the rest of it -- there is no evidence Bragg did anything wrong. He didn't hack a game. He used a legitimate means of accessing a publicly available site ("reverse browsing" or typing in a URL manually has been ruled legitimate use of a system) to access LL's land auctions. He placed a bid on a sim he found there. The system accepted the bid and completed the auction after the nominal time (24h?). He paid for the sim, and it was transferred to him. Then LL felt bad about selling the sim, so they took back that sim and inappropriately took everything else the guy owned. And that's why they're being sued.

Not just LLs but ALL click through licenses and contracts are totally bogus. Someone needs to take one these stupid things all the way to the Supreme Court and get all of them invalidated. Nobody reads them and LL and Google and every other legal team in the world knows it. Yet still they persist in some kind of semi legal limbo because no-one has the cojones to challenge them.

No, it means that the TOS is a one side agreement and that the value of virtual goods acquired in SL can't be determined in such a way. The ruling states that the parties aren't on equal footing in the contract. The ruling puts all of us SL residents in a much stronger position.

The question of the court case was the value of virtual property. Marc's argument was that by SL advertising that you bought land to own, it became your property and it had value. He sites SL's advertising during the blitz last fall.

How he got the land will come up I'm sure to determine the extent of his compensation. However, entertaining the idea of the value of virtual property is huge. Marc can argue that land barons who acquired property by using bots and exploiting the system is the same as what he did. I actually don't like how either operate but I really have to stress that Marc's argument is that his virtual property has value and he is entitled to compensation. How much will depend on how much he acquired unethically and how much he had that was acquired in the proper way like houses, etc.

At least that is how I read it. I had the original lawsuit but I can't find it at the moment. Maybe someone else?

QFT

Thanks, I think its quite a fine topic too!

Well, I think this guy deserves what he got, however you are right, the law might not agree. I mean if I went into a Casino, bought $10K in chips, and cheated on a 10$ blackjack table, can they confiscate all $10K in chips?

I suppose it is possible Bragg might win, we can only hope he's awarded didly squat for his troubles.

Meh, I'd let him keep the land... and then use the slowest most unreliable server in the entire grid to host it for him.

Personally, the guys ethics maybe alittle grey, but I say more power to him. I've read alot of stories where LL has seized assets and banned accounts for no legit reason. Either because of some little loop hole, like the money given to them was stolen, so they get banned for being an accomplice even without prior knowledge or as simple as their network card was banned on another account so their account was banned and all assets seized. So if an unhonest person can get the courts on the side of the costumer and make LL realise they can't keep screwing over their customers, then its for the best. Honestly I hope more people that have lost money because of unfair bannings ect, go after LL for their lost money, this court case here has set presidence in that state atleast showing the LLs TOS is not a global shield, they can be held accountable if they don't do right by the customer.

Note to everyone here, this is not the end of this. He may still lose the case for using the exploit, the only thing the judge has decided here is that LL's TOS is not a shield all against everything. Which is the way it should be, a company should not be able to throw your rights away because you agree to terms that are unfair. SPECIFICALLY when they are changed after the fact. Its like buying a car, then one month after you have it, the dealership says you can't have drinks in the car because your still making payments.

And just to say I'm not totally hypocritical playing a game that I complain about the company that runs it. I think LL is pushing bounds of game developement and design, they have some great features in SL and they are showing they can keep producing farther. Its just the damn politics they choose, and the fact they won't listen to the customers that drives me up the wall.

Another interesting read I found about this case http://secondlife.typepad.com/

According to law, they probably can't take your $10K, but in practice, Vegas casinos are not known for scrupulous attention to law. Cheating a casino will get you kicked out and could get you a trip to your very own hole in the desert.

However, the analogy isn't that applicable. As this suit proceeds, I expect that Bragg may assert the common law principle of contract formation for his allegedly stolen sim(s). There was an "offer" by LL, an "acceptance" by Bragg, and "consideration" from Bragg to LL. Or in other words, had LL not taken Bragg's money, the case would be much more clear. LL's counter argument would likely be that it was a contractual "mistake".

There is a pretty good overview of contract law at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contract where all the words quoted above are explained in greater detail.

I find this case very interesting as it represents perhaps the first adjudication of the equity interest attached to virtual property. This issue will become ever more important in the coming decades and I'm glad that someone has posed the question to the judiciary. I'm far more interested in any principles that may come out of this suit than which party may prevail.

Me too, thanks for saying what I've been trying to say. I think it could mean that LL can't just shut down or adversely affect the value of our virtual holdings if the court decides in this case that virtual property has any value at all.

Remember though, there is a fine line here that isn't present in other games, all the data in your account is paid for with real funds, or created by you. So its not really deciding of virtual property has value, its deciding if your real money has value when used to purchase virtual property. So it won't set anything in terms of games like everquest or anything like that, because your virtual property there is not purchased with real funds, and is created by their respected companies.

Honestly I think this case will boil down to server usage and bandwidth rights, not virtual property.

But there are other purely-gamist games (Trickster Online, Audition, Achaea, There..) where content is purchased with real money too.

even though its considered "virtual assets". what LL and many here who are anti Bragg is that those "virtual assets" were purchased and procured with very real USD( or whatever monetary system is used). and that is the rub in this case: can LL virtually rob you of the money you invested into thier world? this case and that judge says no. hate the man for what he did, but don't forget the fact that if LL had of plugged that loophole in the first place, they wouldn't be here now.

I understand the "ruling" a little better now, and to me it opens up a really big can of worms.

Scenario: Six months ago, a user bought a sim. They set it up strictly for BDSM use. According to a recent blog, it's entirely possible that they could be banned for "generally offensive" content, and they lose their land.

Because of this ruling, would LL now be required to give them back the money they paid for the sim?

What's to prevent anyone from buying 5 islands, making $100,000 US from businesses on those islands, then posting kiddie porn on them to get banned. Does LL then have to give them back the thousands of $US they paid for those islands?

If you think it through, why should LL have to give money back to anyone who abuses the rules? If they give it to one, they have to give it to ALL. Where do you draw the line?

Think about it.