Toys for Kids & Adults

Court orders winding up of Digital Jesters

In the UK, the High Court has granted an order for the winding-up of Digital Jesters,after the firm was sued by several developers for breach of contract and failure to pay monies.  Now, the developers and other creditors are considering further legal action against the directors of Digital Jesters, which may compromise their impending move to Myriad Interactive, which took over much of DJ last year…

Coverage at:http://shorl.com/fovabaprastoja

DISCRIMINATION IN THE MMO WORLD

“Wanna join our group? Then prove you can speak English.” 

Chinese-speaking World of Warcraft (WOW) players are complaining that they’re being discriminated because they can’t speak English. They say other WOW players won’t let them joint their groups because they assume non-English speaking players aren’t true players–they’re gold-miners who are earning booty for their employers or themselves to auction. Is there any potential liability here?

Canada and most of its provinces and territories have human rights legislation that prohibits discrimination on various grounds such as race or ancestry. The legislation applies to specific activities, such as employment, tenancy, publishing and providing services to the public.  

It’s often OK to discriminate on other grounds that aren’t prohibited by the legislation (for example, you can probably discriminate against people with green hair, as long as you equally discriminate between men and women with green hair). So the first issue is whether Blizzard (the publisher of WOW) or the other players are discriminating on the basis of any prohibited ground. Here, the basis of discrimination is language, not race or ancestry. This will likely make it difficult for the legislation to apply because language isn't a named ground of discrimination.  But that said, the Supreme Court of Canada has previously read-in unnamed grounds of discrimination (such as sexual orientation), so there's always an argument that language discrimination should be read-into the legislation.

The second issue is whether Blizzard or the English-speaking players are discriminating in the course of any of the specified activities. Here, the only activity that appears to apply is “providing services to the public”. The players probably aren’t providing services to the public, and although Blizzard is probably providing services to the public, it’s not the one doing the discrimination.

In short: it would probably be tough to argue that the discrimination is prohibited by Canadian law. That said, it doesn’t mean the discrimination is acceptable. There may be other ways to address it. For example, Blizzard has apolicyprohibiting the use of language that promotes racial or ethnic hatred. And Blizzard’s terms of use are broad enough that Blizzard might be able to argue that the discrimination is prohibited by contract

Coverage of the WOW discrimination is here: http://www.shorl.com/bafokafavufe

Yet Another Study Says Video Games Not So Good For You

Here's another post for the "Make up your mind, people!" section of the blog.  Back in the fall of 2005, we told you hereandherehow studies had linked video game playing to violent behavior, and how yet more studies (where do they find the time?!) had dismissed the idea as preposterous.  A new study from the University of Missouri-Columbia hasweighed in on the subjectand found a causal link between video games and aggressive behavior.  In the study, the brain activity of game players was monitored, focusing on the P300 response, which reflects the emotional impact of the image.  Video game players were found to have a diminished response when shown images of real-life violence.  Personally, I don't know how you can tell it's video games and not violent movies, TV shows, comic books, websites and whathaveyou that are causing this "diminished response," but maybe that's why I'm not a scientist.

The full report will be published in the Journal of Experimental Social Science this year. 

Additional coverage at:http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn8449

And now for something completely different: study says video games educational

As part of EA and NestaFuturelab's Teaching With Games project, a study published this week says U.K. teachers support the use of video games in education.

1,000 primary and secondary school teachers in the U.K. participated in the EA-sponsored study and 60% said they would use video games as an "interactive way" to motivate and engage students in learning.  The study says 91% of teachers agreed that video games have some educational benefits, including aiding in the development of motor-cognitive skills, higher-order thinking and  the ability to accumulate topic-specific knowledge.

The Teaching With Games Project is investigating the potential uses for and implications of video games in classrooms.

Coverage at:http://www.nestafuturelab.org/research/teachingwithgames.htm

XBOX PIRATES AND MODDERS ARE INDICTED

The owners of a video game store in California were recently indicted for allegedly copying XBOX games and installing them on modded consoles. 

Video game piracy is obviously an infringement of copyright, and it might also be a criminal offence. Likewise, circumventing copy protection technology can violate US copyright law. Canada does not yet have anti-circumvention legislation; however, Canada’sproposed amendments to the Copyright Actdo currently contain anti-circumvention provsions.

Coverage here:http://www.shorl.com/bejubugrekuko