"Gold Farming", "Power Leveling" and "RMT" are terms that, until recent times, had not been part of most MMORPG players' lexicons. Now, however, they're common phrases for nearly anyone in a vast array of games and virtual worlds. Last week, a federal district court made an important ruling that will affect millions of MMORPG players. Our weekly wrap-up will discuss that and other pending cases, and what they'll mean for Age of Conan players.
Last week, a federal judge for the U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona, issued an order in the case MDY Industries v. Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. (Vivendi Games was also a part to the case, on Blizzard's side). The order granted summary judgment to both MDY and Blizzard on various issues, but in essence was a huge legal victory for Blizzard. The 27 page opinion involves a lot of complex legal issues, but luckily we're here to give you the summary of what it means for you as a gamer, and for the industry as a whole.
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WHAT THIS MEANS FOR CONAN PLAYERS:
Now to the meat and potatoes. What does this mean for Age of Conan players? Well, for starters, it doesn't mean anything yet until this case is inevitably appealed to the Ninth Circuit. However, it bodes well for Funcom, and ill for hackers, gold farmers, and bot players. For one thing, it means you do not actually own your copy of Age of Conan. That's right, you too are a licensee for the same reasons that MDY was a licensee to Blizzard. And if you play the game in a way not in accordance with Funcom's rules, you will be a copyright infringer. That does not make sense on some level, in that if you play a character with an inappropriate name, you could be infringing copyright. But that's the way the law works in this case.
Second, it means there is active precedent and trend ruling against gold farmers and power levelers. It is much more likely that we will see more lawsuits from companies like Funcom or Blizzard against bot writers, gold farmers, and power levelers. This is especially well timed, because there is a case currently before the courts called Hernandez v. IGE, which is a lawsuit on behalf of all WoW players against the gold seller IGE for "diminishing their game experience". While the case is very legally interesting, it just got a huge boost in survivability (i.e., not so likely to be dismissed) due to the Blizzard/MDY ruling. This could mean a serious dropoff in gold farming in ALL MMORPGs. This all happens as WoW is reporting a huge drop in the amount of gold farming and a significant boost in the value of the gold, as well as some of the most expensive money sinks ever; while AOC is slashing prices on some of its basic mounts by over 50%. Interestingly enough, court documents in that case show companies like major investment bankers Goldman Sachs are investing and even buying out profitable gold farmers like IGE.
Hopefully the end result of this case will be an Age of Conan that is largely free from issues with gold farmers, power levelers, and spammers. We'll of course keep you updated as news on these cases comes out. So thanks for suffering your way through that long explanation above, and we hope you're now a little more aware about the legal issues surrounding this and other MMORPGs. What did you think?
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