Two bills dealing with video games were recently introduced in the New York State Assembly. Bill A00547, introduced by Keith Wright, prohibits the sale to minors of certain rated video games containing a rating that reflects content of various degrees of profanity, racist stereotypes or derogatory language, and/or actions toward a specific group of persons. This bill would prohibit the sale to minors of games which depict, advocate or glamorize things such as the commission of violent crimes, suicide, sexual violence, violent racism or religious violence. It would also require retailers to check ID for game buyers who appear to be 30 or younger. Bill A02024, introduced by Aurelia Greene, prohibits the sale of mature or violent video games to minors, and provides for the display of such videos in a manner to preclude access by minors (in other words, retailers would have to keep mature-themed games in a separate area that minors cannot access). Both bills have been referred to the NY Assembly’s Committee on Consumer Affairs and Protection. Bill A00547:http://tinyurl.com/yfy66n Coverage of Bill A00547:http://tinyurl.com/y4ad9f (GamePolitics) Bill A02024: http://tinyurl.com/yc9x6o Coverage of Bill A02024:http://tinyurl.com/y4ownw(GamePolitics) (This posting was written byAndreas Loberat Schulte Riesenkampff in Germany.) Publishers' hopes for additional revenues created through product placement in games get a slash back with some recent decisions coming from Germany. In Europe, many forms of product placement are currently illegal. While the European Parliament favors a liberalization, the German parliament wants to maintain the strict rules currently applicable in Europe's largest economy. A Munich court has decided recently that publishers may have to pay back product placement revenues to the advertisers even if the product placement was provided as agreed. Europeans assume that the customer may be mislead by product placement, which is considered as a form of camouflaged advertising. Publsihers targeting an international audience are therefore well-advised to consider European legislation when designing the product placement, and when drafting the relevant advertising agreements. The Munich case number is BayObLG München 29 U 4412/05. …and more about the thousands of digital flying penises. Guntram Graef, husband of Ailin Graef, better known asSecond Life's real estate mogul Anshe Chung, has withdrawn a complaint filed under theDigital Millenium Copyrightagainst YouTube for copyright infringement, after YouTube allowed clips to be posted of his wife's avatar being attacked by "a barrage of digital flying penises." The, ahem, "attack" was launched by griefers during an appearance by Anshe Chung in CNET'sSecond Lifebureau for an interview. Chung is a controversial figure inSecond Lifebecause of her dominance in the real estate market (the Graefs claim over US$1,000,000 in real-life assets arising from the value of their virtual properties, and boast that they currently employ 30 persons full-time in their studio in China to manage Chung's empire) and her omnipresent advertising presence. Graef told CNET that he withdrew the complaint because "the real issue at hand wasn't at all about copyright," but about the offensive nature of the video and the trauma of seeing his wife's avatar sullied in such a manner. Graef complained that there was no other way to compel YouTube to take down the video clip, and that theDMCAclaim was a last resort. YouTube has since taken down the video for violating its terms of service. An article about the infamous penis attack is available athttp://urlsnip.com/347194. More coverage athttp://urlsnip.com/723898. Fenner Investments, a Texas company, has sued all three console makers for violating its patent for a “Low-Voltage Joystick Port Interfaceâ€. The patent in question was originally developed by Lucent Technologies in 1998 and it is unclear how the patent was ultimately acquired by Fenner. The law suit does not specify which consoles or controllers are alleged to violate the patent, nor does it set out the quantum of damages sought by Ferrier. Nintendo and Microsoft have not responded to inquiries about the lawsuit, while a Sony rep has declined to comment on the pending litigation. Coverage at:http://tinyurl.com/yhxj96 (Gamespot) In an Today Gamasutra published a feature on the contract and the dispute. The feature includes some comments from us, and (perhaps more interesting for you) also includes a copy of the actual development agreement between the parties. The feature is available here: http://tinyurl.com/wpx8j (Gamasutra) Second Life publisher Linden Lab has released virtual world’s viewer as open source software, and intends to do the same with the server software that runs the virtual world itself. Linden Lab released the viewer software under the open source General Public Licence (GPL), which allows anyone to view, change and distribute source code, but requires anyone who distributes modified software to make the changes available as well. Linden Lab will require programmers to sign a contributor agreement which gives Linden Lab joint ownership of the software; Linden Lab will also maintain control of an official version of the viewer software. This is a big step in the games industry, as most large game companies prefer to keep their code proprietary. However, Linden Lab believes that Second Life lends itself to an open source approach, and also believes that it still has significant income potential even if software is open source. Coverage from News.comhere. Linden Lab press releasehere.