'Second Life' publisher must go to court in property case

A property case against Second Life publisher Linden Lab filed in a Pennsylvania court will not be dismissed, a judge ruled Wednesday, according to Valleywag.

The case, which was filed May 1, 2006 by Pennsylvania attorney Mark Bragg, alleges that Linden Lab illegitimately took away the items in Bragg's account and banned him from Second Life after he used a cheat to build up his in-world inventory of virtual items in the process of amassing thousand dollars' worth of assets.

Now, Valleywag reports, the court has denied (click here for PDF) Linden Lab's request to dismiss the case, as well as its request to move the case to arbitration.

Many people are watching this case closely, because it represents the first virtual-world property dispute to make it this far in a legal proceeding. If the eventual result is a ruling that Linden Lab has to give back the property, valued at around $8,000, it could have major implications for Linden Lab and makers of online games like World of Warcraft and many others.

[csven]

Details Details

Could this line - "after he used a cheat to build up his in-world inventory of virtual items" - be any less accurate???

As I watched this unfold on the SL forums, what I recall is that the guy just accessed an auction webpage by typing in a URL.

- It *shouldn't* have been accessible because the auction hadn't begun, but it was.

- He *shouldn't* have taken advantage of this back door, but he did.

- Linden Lab *shouldn't* have accepted the bid(s) and taken his money, but they did.

- And after realizing their new auction system wasn't ready for primetime, they shouldn't have stripped his virtual assets, banned him, AND kept his money, but iirc that's exactly what they did because their ToS said they could.

And that, if I'm not mistaken, is closer to the truth of what happened.

[thenet411]

Absolute Rubbish

It is quite clear that Bragg is trying to bury the court, and Linden, with so much paper and legal theory that the case gets attention. The fact is that the guy used an exploit to gain property. If the ToS states (and remember, you agree to the ToS when you sign up) that if property is obtained in a way that violates the ToS, game over!

I cannot stand cases like this. The plaintiff is a worthless lawyer. The judge is even worse. From what I read, the judge is absolutely clueless of technical facts.

Put those two together and it is going to just be a zoo.