Land Lawsuit Hits Linden Lab
A Pennsylvania lawyer has apparently filed suit against Linden Lab, makers of Second Life, over a land deal gone bad, according to this press release. [Via former Second Life Herald correspondent Neal Stewart, who flagged this post on Clickable Culture.] While the facts of the case are anything but clear, it does mark the first time that I know of that an SL resident has bothered to take legal action against the company. Look carefully at how the dispute is handled and how it is resolved, as it should provide important signposts on how such legal issues will be handled in future.
From the complainant, Marc Bragg:
Bragg learned of a way to purchase virtual land significantly below market values, and invested thousands of US dollars purchasing land in an attempt to resell this land at a profit. Bragg claims that employees of Linden Research, Inc., the company who creates, manages and maintains this online world, allowed the auction to be created, and after Bragg paid US dollars for the land, terminated Bragg’s account, without explanation, without citing any violation of community policy, and have since refused offer a credit or a refund. Bragg’s calls to customer service and Linden Lab’s legal counsel have gone unanswered. Bragg’s final option? Seek relief in a real world court.
Translation: Bragg seems to have found an exploit that allowed him to bid on land in Second Life that Linden Lab had not yet put up for sale. When the company got wind of it, they summarily banned his account.
If that’s what happened, it’s hard to believe that a court would find in Bragg’s favor. But how the case is handled by Linden Lab and by the courts will be telling. Odds are that the Lab will be characteristically tight-lipped — which won’t help them move forward with the cause of transparency and good governance, something they’d presumably like to see.
More important will be the courts’ reaction. Even if the case is thrown out, some decision could come down that will start to set a precedent on how the legal system will handle assets like virtual land. Unfortunately, Bragg can’t make the clear argument that he ever legally owned any land in SL, so a court’s ruling may steer clear of any disposition as to how “virtual” virtual land is. But — and this is all provided the case even makes it to a court — it will mark a first entry in a body of law that has yet to be written, but which will only become more important as virtual worlds become more and more a part of everyone’s lives.
Those of us who have land we like to see retain its value and acquire the legal rights of RL land in virtual worlds can only be annoyed that the first such test case of this notion of virtual property is a frivolous case, and even a harassment lawsuit, not a genuine case regarding any legitimate, universal issues.
The case is equivalent to a joyrider who found a car with the keys in it, took the car illegally for a spin, and then sold it for a song. When the police confiscate the hot car and find and arrest the joyrider, if the joyrider then sued the car owner and began hollering about his rights, we’d rightly see it as the actions of a meglomaniac trying to distract from his original crime of theft. Any claim that the negligence of the car owner in leaving the cars somehow vacates the culpability of the stealer wouldn’t hold up in court. Any notion that the joyrider should continue to enjoy the proceeds from the sale of his hot car wouldn’t hold up in court, either. That’s because courts in RL are “normal” and not populated by literalist, griefing, and trolling tekkies trying to pounce on exploits and exploit them , but generall by respected and reasonable judges weighing application of the law under the rule of law.
This joyrider on the Linden auctions found a car — land waiting for auction — with keys in it — the ID number for the auction that he could plug into the web browser. It’s not a hack, but it is an exploit, and it is theft. If you go out of turn of the auction using an exploit, and bid only $1 or $2 when the standard, established practice of the auction is to open up bids on whole sims at $1000, then you are stealing, pure and simple. The fact that you *can* steal something doesn’t mean it isn’t theft.
The judge may throw it out all together, or invoke the right of a private club like LL with private membership to set any rules it likes for its members, who abide by them. That includes expelling them “for any reason or no reason”. The judge is not likely to touch that, or go further.
If somehow that test is surmounted, by some legal strategem involving showing that a “club” with free and open membership isn’t like a private club, or that SL is a common carrier on the Internet, and not a private club only, or some other notion, then the next level would involve proving that the defendant was wronged when land that he seized through an exploit was then seized back from him. The police, or the legitimate car owner, will take back the joyrider’s stolen car, yes, that’s the breaks. Whatever ill-gotten proceeds he obtained from selling the hot car will likely be confiscated too.
I would have been so much happier if the first media-saturated, precedent-type case related to land and law in SL would have involved something like the stripping of people of land and assets over “speech crimes,” or the stripping of one person in a couple’s dispute of access to land they once paid tier on or had purchased originally, or the stripping of a group member ostracized by other people in the group of his land holdings, etc. There are plenty of cases like that to pick from in SL. None of those victims stepped up to a lawsuit, however, because they probably saw the futility — LL has very good lawyers an inhouse counsel, they are very determined to beat off frivolous, grand-standing lawsuits or indeed lawsuits of any kind, and they prove their determination by summarily banning those who try to get started on the litigatio route.
Actually, that is false information. Marc Bragg did NOT purchase THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS USING AN EXPLOIT. He purchased only ONE sim for $300.00. SO……you guys need to get the facts straight before you post false information. Marc Woebegone actually bought all of his many sims directly from linden labs a long time ago, none of which were bought for less that $1100.00.
So, this so called “exploit” is in fact NOT an exploit. In fact, because the land was selling and posted on Linden Labs’ website for $1, curiosity peaked for multiple players. Some of whom bid and others not. Some of the members that noticed the sims that sold for $1, actually asked Lindens’ in world “Live help” if this was possible to bid on these particular sims, one Linden employee answered, “happy bidding”. These particular land auctions were posted on webpages created by Linden labs, and any Second Life account holder could bid on them. So why exactly did the members’ accounts get put on hold? How is this a SL account holders responsibility to alarm Linden Labs that they “forgot” to post the auction. For such a large MMRPG (Massively Multiperson Role Playing Game) how can they make mistakes like this? I dont blame Marc Bragg for the lawsuit.
I don’t think anyone blames Marc for anything, Drea. As I say above, the facts are anything but clear. Right now there are only claims; it remains for a court to decide their merit. However it works out, it will be fascinating to those of us who follow virtual worlds closely.
I for one am certainly blaiming Marc Bragg. He is suing for thousands of dollars? Here is the link to Mr. Bragg’s website and specifically this case: http://www.chescolawyers.com/bragg.pdf
Linden Lab was sued on May 2, 2005 by attorney Marc Bragg claiming Linden Lab defrauded him of $8,000 worth of virtual property. Bragg accessed the auction pages from which regions of land are sold and, by directly entering region IDs into the auction system URL using the Linden provided indices, he was able to bid on regions thus buying one region for around US$300. After only one region was sold to him in this way, Linden Labs reclaimed all the regions and permanently banned Bragg’s account from the entire grid; Bragg claimed that this constituted illegally depriving him of the products for which he had paid.
Bragg withdrew the above action and on October 4, 2006, his attorney filed a new action in the Chester County Court of Common Pleas, West Chester, Pennsylvania at Docket No.: 06-08711 claiming the primary reason being that the fundamental rights of many players were involved. The lawsuit raises many important, but as yet, unaswered legal issues. The Complaint states ten counts: I – Violation of the Pennsylvania Unfair Trade Practices and Consumer Protection Law; II – Violation of the California Unfair and Deceptive Practices Act; III – Violation of the California Consumer Legal Remedies Act; IV – Fraud and/or Fraud in the Inducement; V – Violation of California Civil Code Sec. 1812.600; VI – Conversion; VII – Intentional Interference with Contractual Relations / Prospective Economic Advantage; VIII – Breach of Contract; IX – Unjust Enrichment; and X – Tortious Breach of the Covenant of Good Faith and Fair Dealing.
Bragg is represented by Jason A. Archinaco, Esquire of White and Williams, LLP., The Frick Building, Suite 1001, 437 Grant Street, Pittsburgh, PA., 15219. p: 412-566-3520
The complaint is available at http://secondlife.typepad.com