It's a cultural representation that won't bear much weight for analysis (as I've said elsewhere).
The point always seems to come down to the demonstrable fact that while there are relative distinctions between the stakes that pertain to different actions in different places, this doesn't reliably map onto a bright line analytical distinction such as the magic circle suggests, even if social actors often appeal to as if there were so. Unlike Susan, I guess, I'm happy to see the *analytical* value of the 'magic circle' undercut quite effectively, as you do. I think the "magic circle" idea is one way to describe this change of context, that substantially changes the legal effect of an action.įascinating read, Josh. The actor whose character agrees to a contract with Dracula in a film is not (in real life) bound by that contract. If an actor and actress star in a film in which their characters get married, the actors do not become married in real life. The context seems to change the meaning of the action. Even when an action consists purely of speech, there's a difference between saying it a "normal" context and saying it as an actor in a play or film. laws against rape age of consent incest bestiality) Some sexual offenses depend on the gender of the person(s) involved - tricky if avatar gender isĢ. For example, is cybersex real sex, and to what extent do laws regulating sexual conduct apply to it? (e.g. There are grey areas between the poker game (real) and the killing of an avatar (not real). (Not just reading or writing a fiction about a character who is a poker player). dollars, you are actually playing poker for money. For example, if you play poker in Second Life with L$ you bought for real U.S. The strange thing is that some actions in a virtual world are real. So I think there's some mileage to the idea that actions portrayed in a virtual world are fictional, "not real", and hence not subject to the laws that would apply to them if they were real. As you say, when one avatar "kills" another in a virtual world, it is not a murder because no-one really dies. There's clearly a difference between actually, physically doing something and reading or writing a work of fiction in which a character does it. I think I mostly agree with what you're saying, but I'd like to defend some version of the "magic circle" idea.ġ. The debate, thus, should be shifted from whether law does (it does) or should (ok, more debatable) affect virtual worlds to what mechanisms we should adopt for sussing out what norms are emerging within virtual worlds, and which of those norms ought to be plugged into the socket in the law that courts reserve for community norms. There is no reason for courts to stop now. The common law has had a long practice of deferring to industry or community customs and practices. But that does not mean that we must give up everything that makes virtual worlds special. But a sad thing happens to frontiers - I mean, is Kansas City still the Wild, Wild West? Not so much.įor those who don't want to click through, the basic idea is this: Law already governs every aspect of virtual worlds - from the contract law invoked by EULAs, to tort laws premised on various theories of consent, to tax law, to criminal law. Virtual worlds have been our frontier for a long time.
There are a lot of really important reasons to create "law free" zones.
(2) I don't think I'm righter than anyone else. I do want to articulate a position that I think best describes the current and future relationships between law and virtual worlds. That is what this "paper," or "speech," or whatever, is, in intellectualized form. So, one thing that law professors don't really get to do is speak plainly.