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NCsoft Sued For Making Lineage II 'Too Addictive'
An anonymous reader writes "South Korean MMO game publisher NCsoft is finding itself facing another lawsuit, this time for making games that are 'too addictive.' US Lineage II player Craig Smallwood is suing the publisher for $3 million because he found himself playing Lineage II for 20,000 hours over a period of 5 years. At times, his average play session would persist for over 11 hours, crippling his life and ability to function. A federal judge is allowing the court case to go forward (PDF), stating that the plaintiff has a claim for negligence and gross negligence against the publisher."
I skimmed NCSoft's defense pdf (linked in the Wired article) and it winds up that the guy in question was involved in real-money transfers and had all of his accounts banned from Lineage II in 2009.
Could that possibly be the REAL reason he's suing?
Oh give me a break, it's such an echo chamber in here, the usual screeching about how horrible the courts are, without anyone even looking at what the judge actually did. The problem with this country isn't the judicial system, it's the ignorant people who go from zero to outraged in 5 seconds based on a slashdot summary written by some anonymous guy. The judge is ruled by the Federeal Rules of Civil Procedure. Those rules say you can't just throw out a lawsuit AT THE DISMISSAL STAGE simply because you don't think the plaintiff will win. To survive dismissal, all you have to do is draft your complaint in a way that, if the facts you allege are accepted as true, your claim can move on to the next stage. That's it. The judge isn't saying the guy's going to win, just that under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, promulgated by the Supreme Court, as authorized by Congress, he has to let the lawsuit go to the next stage.
When you do the following google search:
craig smallwood honolulu
it becomes evident that Mr. Smallwood has plenty of time on his hands to file lawsuits. This seems to put the lie to his claim that he is unable to function.
(If thats the case, can't every single smoker in the country sue the cigarette companies for 3 million dollars for every 5 years they smoked, essentially bankrupting that industry?)
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You must be pretty young or not from the US. The cigarette industry did get sued (quite a few times) and the biggest settlement was from 1998 where they effectively had to pay a bit over $200 billion over the next 25 years. The suit was 46 states versus the tobacco industry. You know all those "The Truth" ads? Those are funded by the tobacco companies.
The downside to this settlement is it also exempts the industry from further tort lawsuits (although, apparently not, there have been some since).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobacco_politics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobacco_Master_Settlement_Agreement
-- What did Spock find in Kirk's toilet? The captain's log.
In all fairness, the tobacco industries were sued for:
- withholding information on and downright lying about the addictiveness of nicotine.
- withholding information on and downright lying about the health consequences of smoking.
- adding artificial agents to make the product even more addictive.
- targeting their product at children while knowing damn well what smoking does to kids.
Selling an addictive product is one thing. Lying to congress, marketing at those who are considered incompetent(children) is an entirely different ballgame.
People replying to my sig annoy me. That's why I change it all the time.