AtoZVirtualWorlds

Legal activitiy AtoZ in last several months (by its nature selective)

A-Avatar (lawsuits in Madden, Guitar Hero, and Second Life for actions of avatars)

B – Banned in Games (lawsuits by Estavillo vs Sony, SD Cal Estavillo v. Sony Computer Entm’t Am. Inc., 2009 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 86821; along with others)

C-China – China shuts down World of Warcraft… twice. (Good story on Gamasutra)

D - Developer’s Corner ( a regular feature on this blog spotlighting a developer’s role in promoting fun and reducing lawsuits)

E-Everquest (the first, the groundbreaker)

F-Facebook (lawsuits over privacy and “scamming” games cause major changes in the principles on the Facebook platform)

G-Gamer’s Rights (Here, and on my own site)

H Harassment (Sexual) Article in the Guardian.

I- In-game bank (In Eve Online, a real in-world bank is embezzled)

J – Joystiq legal - still the best read every week; blazes the trail

K-Kurt Cobain …. his use in video game causes controversy and widespread comment about use of dead celebrities in video games

L-Lineage (the largest MMO in China)

M – Madden Football (sued by retired players for using their likenesses)

N-No Doubt …. sues Activision, is sued by Activision (lawsuit here)

O – online petition (for online game, Modern Warfare 2); gamers try to launch intiative for dedicated servers outside Activision control (FAILED)

P – Playstation Network (sued for updates which crippled add-on firmware)

Q – Questing – In WOW, Shacknews has an article about 9 problems of questing [[Author's Note - seriously, unless Qbert was sued in the last six months, just scraps here]].

R - Runescape; Jagex is the parent of Runescape

S – Second Life… a slow year for litigation, but these important lawsuits worth note (Bragg v Linden Labs, No. 06-08711, for land taken by LL, citation here)

T – Turbine sues Atari ; also Turbine mentioned here

U – User Interface; usability From the always worthwhile Gamasutra, a daily read.

V-Voice Actors (voting to decline union’s recommendation for new agreement)

W-World of Warcraft (sues to close Wow Glider add-on as an illegal “bot”; Virtually Blind still your best source)

X – Xbox; 1 million Xbox users banned

Y – Youth market; youth endangered

Z- Zynga (sues former developer for trade secrets)

My apologies to “bots”, “Lords of the Rings Online”, “virtual goods”, and others for the 26-sided tyrrany and limitations of the alphabet. Additions and corrections welcome; but if you think this type of a list is easy (complete with relevant links) try just doing a list with household goods.

Jay Moffitt is a Tennessee attorney. This blog is for entertainment and educational purposes only and does not consitute legal advice or create an attorney/client relationship. Jay Moffitt is not certified as a specialist in this area by Tennessee and Tennessee does not certify specialists in this practice area. All comments will be answered promptly and courteously as long as they are germane to the discussion and do not contain specific game names or incidents.

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