Online Gamer Wins Virtual Theft Lawsuit

ThePretender writes "A Reuters article details the story of (what I believe is) the first online-gaming lawsuit won regarding virtual theft, with a Chinese court ordering a game company to 'return hard-won virtual property to a player whose game account was looted by a hacker'. Apparently, the article feels the need to throw in that the RedMoon-playing gamer's looted booty included 'a make-believe stockpile of bio-chemical weapons' for some reason... 'I exchanged the equipment with my labour, time, wisdom and money, and of course they are my belongings,' said Li Hongchen (the gamer) and the courts agreed, ordering the game company to restore his bounty." We've covered earlier stages of this lawsuit in the past.

Comments

Let me get this straight...

[wowbagger]

OK, let me get this straight:

Person spends long hours working with computer.
Person creates virtual object.
Person loses virtual object due to crackers exploiting software bug.
Person sues maker of software for restoration of virtual object.
Person wins in court.

OK....

So, can a person sue Microsoft to restore all the word processing documents they have lost due to crashes? Can they sue Microsoft for the files lost when a web site is defaced due to an IIS bug?

Begin RANT:

All these stories of people getting so wrapped up in various online games just indicate to me that some people have
a) Too DAMN much time on their hands, and
b) a complete ABSENCE of a sense of proportion.

Just 200 years ago, most people were too focused on TRYING TO STAY ALIVE.

Now we have people with nothing better to do than to sue other people over make-believe!

Is that progress, or what?

(and that question is asked in all seriousness - I tend toward "or what" myself....)

Tax It

[Cajun Hell]

If it can be stolen, then it's property. If it's property, then it can be taxed. Also, increases are income, and that can be taxed too.

Clever thinking, Chinese government.