Welcome.

Welcome to my first blog. It is being constructed for my ICS 691 course, which is an in depth look at Social Networking. I typically don't engage in this type of activity as I work, so it will be interesting learning about this stuff.

Monday, April 20, 2009

Session 7 Part 1

Student: Thomas Harder
Instructor: Prof. Richard Gazan
Course: ICS 691 Social Networking
Assignment Session 7.1

Because I am not studying a particular site per se, it would be impossible to locate any governing documents. So, I choose to work with the governing documents for Second Life, as this is the social networking site with which I am most familiar.

There are four major documents mentioned in the paper by Justine Grimes for enacting governance in virtual worlds. These documents include Software Licenses, Terms of Service, Privacy Policies and Community Standards. While Mr. Grimes gives credit for Second Life for having two of these in fact it has all four. These documents are found in different locations. The software license is found while loading the software. The reader will have to try to install the Second Life software in order to read the whole license.
The privacy policy is found here - http://secondlife.com/corporate/privacy.php
The community standards are here - http://secondlife.com/corporate/cs.php

The TOS is here - http://secondlife.com/corporate/tos.php
These documents are quite different in terms of their language and length. The shortest and most readable documents are the Community Standards and the Privacy Policy. Both are approximately 2 pages and are written in concise English. The Terms of Service and the software license are both written in “Legalese”, the professional language of Lawyers. While the Community Standards are pretty clear, in some regions of Second Life there are additional standards applied by the community, such as the Gorean sections. These areas have additional standards that must be agreed to by the user prior to entry.
The interesting part of the documents is found in the Community Standards, in the Policies and Policing Section, recreated below. This is interesting because it spells out quite clearly some of the rogue actions and the results for such actions.
Policies and Policing
Global Standards, Local Ratings All areas of Second Life, including the www.secondlife.com website and the Second Life Forums, adhere to the same Community Standards. Locations within Second Life are noted as Safe or Unsafe and rated Mature (M) or non-Mature (PG), and behavior must conform to the local ratings. Any unrated area of Second Life or the Second Life website should be considered non-Mature (PG). Warning, Suspension, Banishment Second Life is a complex society, and it can take some time for new Residents to gain a full understanding of local customs and mores. Generally, violations of the Community Standards will first result in a Warning, followed by Suspension and eventual Banishment from Second Life. In-World Representatives, called Liaisons, may occasionally address disciplinary problems with a temporary removal from Second Life. Global Attacks Objects, scripts, or actions which broadly interfere with or disrupt the Second Life community, the Second Life servers or other systems related to Second Life will not be tolerated in any form. We will hold you responsible for any actions you take, or that are taken by objects or scripts that belong to you. Sandboxes are available for testing objects and scripts that have components that may be unmanageable or whose behavior you may not be able to predict. If you chose to use a script that substantially disrupts the operation of Second Life, disciplinary actions will result in a minimum two-week suspension, the possible loss of in-world inventory, and a review of your account for probable expulsion from Second Life. Alternate Accounts While Residents may choose to play Second Life with more than one account, specifically or consistently using an alternate account to harass other Residents or violate the Community Standards is not acceptable. Alternate accounts are generally treated as separate from a Resident's principal account, but misuse of alternate accounts can and will result in disciplinary action on the principal account. Buyer Beware Linden Lab does not exercise editorial control over the content of Second Life, and will make no specific efforts to review the textures, objects, sounds or other content created within Second Life. Additionally, Linden Lab does not certify or endorse the operation of in-world games, vending machines, or retail locations; refunds must be requested from the owners of these objects. Reporting Abuse Residents should report violations of the Community Standards using the Abuse Reporter tool located under the Help menu in the in-world tool bar. Every Abuse Report is individually investigated, and the identity of the reporter is kept strictly confidential

The Second Life site also includes a page dedicated to enforcement of the Community Standards. The Incident Report is neatly tucked away in the support section of the website http://secondlife.com/support/incidentreport.php. Here the users can read a very brief synopsis of incidents and the actions taken by the support personnel.
Finding three examples of breaking terms, with some explanation took a bit more searching.
The first article I found was a bit dated. This goes back to 2006 and seems fairly straight forward. An individual Marc Bragg was able to take advantage of an exploit that allowed him to assign a very low price to a piece of property and then buy it at that price. This exploit was viewed as a violation of the TOS and Linden Labs banned the offender. The offender was a lawyer, and took Linden Labs to court. After a 2.5 year battle the offender eventually won, and got his property and account back. I wonder however it was eventually worth it.
http://www.secondlifeinsider.com/2006/12/08/bragg-vs-linden-lab/
http://gameactivist.blogspot.com/2008/03/bragg-vs-linden.html
http://www.secondlifeherald.com/slh/2006/12/bragg_vs_linen_.html
This article does highlight the importance of the governing documents. Their essence is to spell out the binding agreements that are formed between a user and the software or service provider. Quite clearly it is very difficult to do this, and as this article shows, even too much protection can hurt the term writer. It also highlights how virtual worlds can impact the real world and vice versa, this was an issue mentioned in the article by Michael J. Madison.
The second article- Does Virtual Reality Need a Sheriff? http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/06/01/AR2007060102671.html. Again highlights the blurring of the real world with the virtual world. Although it does not name names, it does reveal the extent of the legal issues that a software provider such as Linden Labs has to be concerned with. In this case it is the laws surrounding child pornography, and the myriad of different laws written by different countries. The most interesting line is found at the end where the CEO is quoted as saying he would like the Second Life participants to form their own laws. I wonder if he would like his company to be subject to these laws. Or would he rather have Linden Labs subject to the Laws of the State of California? Is it possible that he hopes that the users would become self-aware as pointed out by Rich Gazan in the When Online Communities Become Self-Aware, or perhaps Second Life users have already knowingly reached that stage?
The last article was about a University site being deleted because of violations by University members. Some of the members of Woodbury University were known to belong to a grieffer group known as p/n.
http://binaryfootprint.blogspot.com/2007/07/on-saturday-woodbury-universitys-second.html
http://www.secondlifeherald.com/slh/2007/07/woodbury-univer.html
http://www.secondlifeherald.com/slh/2007/07/interview-with-.html
After Linden Labs notified the University of its impending doom, the University took steps to clean up its Second Life website. Because it was not contacted further by Linden Labs, the University assumed that its actions were acceptable and working. So, when Linden Labs deleted the Island, it came as quite a shock to the University.
This is an interesting article to find after reading the previous article about users being involved with developing the terms of service. It does raise the question of sincerity. But I think that until the TOS can be developed interactively, this is just Linden Labs being cautious.

References:
Madison, Michael J. (2006). Social Software, Groups, and Governance. Michigan State Law Review, Vol. 2006, p. 153. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=786404

Cosley, Dan, Dan Frankowski, Sara Kiesler, Loren Terveen, John Riedl (2005). How Oversight Improves Member-Maintained Communities. CHI 2005, April 2–7, 2005, Portland, Oregon.

Kollock, Peter and Marc Smith (1996). Managing the Virtual Commons: Cooperation and Conflict in Computer Communities. In: Susan Herring (ed.), Computer-Mediated Communication: Linguistic, Social, and Cross-Cultural Perspectives. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. 109-128. http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/soc/faculty/kollock/papers/vcommons.htm

Grimes, Justin, Paul Jaeger and Kenneth Fleischmann (2008). Obfuscatocracy: A stakeholder analysis of governing documents for virtual worlds. First Monday 13(9). http://firstmonday.org/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/2153/2029

Gazan, Rich (2009). When Online Communities Become Self-Aware. Proceedings of the 42nd Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, Waikoloa, HI, 5-8 January 2009.

Gazan, Rich (2007). Understanding the Rogue User. In: Diane Nahl and Dania Bilal, eds. Information & Emotion: The Emergent Affective Paradigm in Information Behavior Research and Theory. Medford, New Jersey: Information Today, 177-185.

Dibbell, Julian (2008). Mutilated Furries, Flying Phalluses: Put the Blame on Griefers, the Sociopaths of the Virtual World. Wired 16.02. http://www.wired.com/gaming/virtualworlds/magazine/16-02/mf_goons?currentPage=all

Reed, Mike (no date). Flame Warriors. http://redwing.hutman.net/~mreed/index.htm

4 comments:

  1. I think Second Life has become very unique as it evolved. The idea that you could have an entire virtual world with no real "purpose" is quite a feat, but giving users the ability to earn real money is an even bigger one. Not surprisingly, there are lots of legal issues that have come up, since anywhere people CAN make money, some will always try to make fast money. The Bragg case is a good example, but also begs the question where the line between breaking a rule and using the system to help reach personal goals. Most of us can agree an "exploit" is morally wrong, but what does the law think of that? You're definitely right about one thing -- 2.5 years to resolve that case? How could it be worth it?

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  2. I am not familiar with the Second Life, and I am impressed by the fact that it allows you to have more than one account. Yes of course, you can generate more than one account in many systems. But they treat each account individually. Here in Second Life, it seems that the system knows that these multi-accounts have the same owner. Misusing in one account will result in punishing in otjer accounts.

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  3. The Bragg vs. Linden Lab case really highlights the blurring boundaries between the real world and the virtual world, as you suggested. The article from Washington Post is right on point, as it centers on the question of whether Second Life (or virtual world communities in general) should enforce laws in real life. As karhai pointed out, I can see that Second Life is evolving into an entity that operates on its own administrative mechanism. The Incident Report page that chronicles rule-breaking behavior is a good example in this regard. I wonder, though, how many users are actually aware of and paying attention to the content (and the existence) of the governing documents and administrative records like the Incident Report.

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  4. I was discussing Second Life and the lady that made over a million dollars (US) in it with my friend the other day. We wondered who she owes taxes too since the money was generated in the game. I wonder how Linden Labs navigates these legal issues highlighted in the second article you mentioned.

    Since there exists a Linden to dollar conversion rate, any exploitations of SL involving land or Linden dollars has much more serious legal repercussions than in most other virtual worlds. I agree with you that it's questionable if such an endeavor was worth the time and effort.

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