Open Source Uru Plans, the GOW perspective

[BAD]

I believe we should research any laws pertaining to that kind of thing no matter what country we end up having servers in. I'll make a small edit to show that. Mostly just to make sure we don't get into any trouble we aren't at least a little informed about.

[Chacal]

Yes, why not. Let's just all remember that US laws don't apply outside that particular country.

[J'Kla]

And of course the inverse is true and the player majority on MO:UL was allegedly two thirds USA.

It may be worth asking Cyan they have been down this road before us and have a lot of the answers already.

It may be as long as we exercise a duty of care and actively police the Shard excluding those that fail to comply then we may be fulfilling the remit. Just like Modding off any unsavoury images on a forum.

[Nalates]

J'Kla is right about the number of players being US based vs 'other' countries. But, that is not so much the issue for me. I would like to see everyone regardless of country of origin be able to play.

I think The challenge is not about avoiding the laws. I think Chacal is mistaken about how Title XIV applies to online games in foreign countries. The UK and other countries have laws with almost the exact same title and wording. It's not just an American thing. A violator from any country is pursued. International Treaties in support of international law enforcement efforts exist in most of the democratic countries. Many countries will extradite or prosecute violators of US laws that also break their local laws. Protecting children is a big issue.

A really big question is why anyone would want to circumvent the COPA (Title XIV) laws?

A next question is why would any shard operator want to risk their quality of life and be prosecuted for violating foreign commerce laws? Any one or group that comes together to put up a server and accept money will have liabilities and obligations. In a group each will have some individual responsibility and can be named in a suit or indictment. Civil suits have almost no restrictions on who can be named in the suit.

GT and Cyan had problems allowing the game in certain other countries because of various requirements and taxes in foreign countries. There are all sorts of restrictions and complications once one tries to go international. Accepting money, donations or fees, create all sorts of obligations and liabilities. While many are trying various ways to limit those liabilities, it is only once someone is harmed that we find out what works and what does not.

Once one participates in international commerce they become subject whole new sets of laws. If a foreign government decides to enforce some local law, one does not just get to ignore it. It becomes a matter of the home and foreign governments' decisions on what each thinks should be done. If they agree, the homeboy can be prosecuted.

Note: Since other posts refer to the sections of the outline, changing the numbering can mess up those posts.

[Chacal]

A really big question is why anyone would want to circumvent the COPA (Title XIV) laws?

I'll avoid the obvious philosophical discussion about abusive US laws in general and COPA in particular.

My point was that we should not consider this specific law, as it is a US law and we are not all US citizens. I suggest rephrasing the item as "Determine legal liability for server operators ."

It is clear the liability problem will have to be researched. If you are saying that, by offering a service from, say, South Africa, I have to comply with all exisiting laws in the world, then I don't see how anyone in the world can provide any service at all, and I don't see how anyone would want to run a Uru shard.

[Grogyan]

I know that most of these problems, and taxes mainly deal with the US and UK, NZ sits comfortably within those laws so there generally isn't any conflict, this is possibly why NZ was one of the countries that GameTap supported in international billing.

[J'Kla]

The tax issue usually arises out of profit. Provided fees only cover costs there's probably no tax liability (this is the wikipedia thing) as for child protection we would fall under the remit of taking all reasonable measures.

It is probably a good idea to seek some form of legal clarification.

The GameTap countries of distribution probably related to other titles on the GameTap library (not gospel just an idea). They had title to Uru via their agreement with Cyan unless that was blocked by UbiSoft tied into some sort of hangover from Prime.

If that were true it would probably still block the OS project.

[Nadnerb]

Shard owners would be providing a free service, much as they did during UU. Commerce laws would therefore not apply.

Shard owners should not be held liable for the actions of players using their shard. Ever. They are merely hosting a server. It would be like asking your ISP to monitor everything you use their servers for and prevent you from doing anything illegal. Unfortunately, some people seem to think that would be a good thing. It is not, it merely puts people who have done nothing wrong at risk.

[J'Kla]

During the UU time we tended to self police asking people to refrain from inappropriate language etc. It was on the whole O.K. when we did have inappropriate chat whatever there were generally chatlogs kept and and When this progressed into D'mala Cyan issued warnings as most people wanted to stay on for the GameTap experiment everyone appeared to comply.

On GameTap complaints were entered as tickets on the reporting system and warnings appeared to be heeded. We would need some means of sanction for what is openly considered bad behaviour.

Traffic monitoring of some sort so complaints could be followed up. If we were aware of a particular players' previous misbehaviour we would automatically start a chatlog. I was only ever aware of one infringement when a German player was annoyed at references to Hitler I know were inappropriate. I passed my copy of the log over and it stopped.

We may need some sort of joining statement akin to forum registration with a declaration of age remember large parts of Uru are chat room related.

[greendragoon]

Is hosting a Uru shard all that different from hosting a website forum. What restrictions are there here? Usually there is a legal notice that everyone who joins has to agree with.

As for policing the shard I guess we could use something similar to the resEngs from MOUL. Those that could enforce the policies.