The Hyperinflation of 2010

[ringthree]

I'm still trying to understand why people are wasting their breath and bandwidth over copyright issues here.

Violations of terms of service are not copyright issues.

It has to do the with the strength of the claim that can be made to stop RMT from engaging in that practice.

[McGoonagle]

It has to do the with the strength of the claim that can be made to stop RMT from engaging in that practice.

As you have said yourself, it's a licensing issue. Your monthly fee buys you a license to play in the playground under the conditions set by the playground owner. If you violate those terms, your license can be revoked. Remember also that the license makes it quite clear that SE completely controls the playground.

RMTs may not have been specifically excluded in the original license, but that does not mean that RMTs do not violate the terms of service. If they are violating copyright to violate the terms of service, that is simply adding insult to injury.

[Bugpop]

As you have said yourself, it's a licensing issue. Your monthly fee buys you a license to play in the playground under the conditions set by the playground owner. If you violate those terms, your license can be revoked. Remember also that the license makes it quite clear that SE completely controls the playground.

RMTs may not have been specifically excluded in the original license, but that does not mean that RMTs do not violate the terms of service. If they are violating copyright to violate the terms of service, that is simply adding insult to injury.

Your playground analogy fits this situation reasonably well. I hope that others don't misunderstand my intentions here. While I don't have a problem with RMT, bots, or windower, I do feel that SE should have some protections regarding their game and how to promote gameplay and remove RMT. There are good reasons why RMT is bad for the game which don't have anything to do with the problems that RMT allegedly cause right now.

Here is the problem with licensed software. It has to do with a license agreement and meeting the terms before loading the software into RAM. The stance Blizzard takes is that they own the copy of WoW on the DVD you obtained at the store. They own the installed copy of WoW on your hard drive. They will permit an instance of their copy of WoW to be loaded into your memory only if you meet the conditions of the license agreement. If you load WoW into RAM and the conditions in the EULA are not met, Blizzard will claim copyright infringement.

This is considered a willful violation and considered a criminal violation of copyright law according to section 506(a)(1)(B) of the Copyright Law of the United States.

I think it is worth noting that SE's license agreements are not so bold as to label the software we posess as a license. There is no claim that we do not own the FFXI CD's/DVD's. The license agreement refers to purchased software. It seems to me that they make no claims about who retains ownership of the CD's and DVD's for the game. They seem to only make claims regarding their their rights to manage their subscription service. SE isn't quite so evil.

[McGoonagle]

Your playground analogy fits this situation reasonably well. I hope that others don't misunderstand my intentions here. While I don't have a problem with RMT, bots, or windower, I do feel that SE should have some protections regarding their game and how to promote gameplay and remove RMT. There are good reasons why RMT is bad for the game which don't have anything to do with the problems that RMT allegedly cause right now.

Here is the problem with licensed software. It has to do with a license agreement and meeting the terms before loading the software into RAM. The stance Blizzard takes is that they own the copy of WoW on the DVD you obtained at the store. They own the installed copy of WoW on your hard drive. They will permit an instance of their copy of WoW to be loaded into your memory only if you meet the conditions of the license agreement. If you load WoW into RAM and the conditions in the EULA are not met, Blizzard will claim copyright infringement.

This is considered a willful violation and considered a criminal violation of copyright law according to section 506(a)(1)(B) of the Copyright Law of the United States.

I think it is worth noting that SE's license agreements are not so bold as to label the software we posess as a license. There is no claim that we do not own the FFXI CD's/DVD's. The license agreement refers to purchased software. It seems to me that they make no claims about who retains ownership of the CD's and DVD's for the game. They seem to only make claims regarding their their rights to manage their subscription service. SE isn't quite so evil.

All of which may depend upon Japanese intellectual property law. It has a lot of differences from US law and they actually do an awful lot of cross-licensing of intellectual property (especially patented inventions.) Licensing practices and law may therefore limit what SE can protect by copyright, and may also be why they retain control over your character.

[Bugpop]

All of which may depend upon Japanese intellectual property law. It has a lot of differences from US law and they actually do an awful lot of cross-licensing of intellectual property (especially patented inventions.) Licensing practices and law may therefore limit what SE can protect by copyright, and may also be why they retain control over your character.

Japanese Intellectual Property law doesn't protect Japanese Intellectual Property in the United States. United States Intellectual Property law protects Japanese Intellectual Property in the United States.

We're talking about whether RMT is legal or not and whether it violates copyright law. If we take Blizzards stance that "[WoW] SOFTWARE IS LICENSED, NOT SOLD", that if a WoW player plans on violating the terms of the License agreement that player is forbidden from loading the software. The WoW EULA specifically states that "Any use of the Game in violation of the License Limitations will be regarded as an infringement of Blizzard's copyrights in and to the Game". SE doesn't have language in it's EULA's for FFXI and Playonline as strongly worded and nasty as Blizzard's. It does have a copyright violation provision but is vague.

In WoW vs. MDY (Glider), the district court sided with WoW however an appeal to the 9th Circuit Court of Appears has been filed by MDY attorneys. I think it will be interesting how the court rules because of past precedent set by this court. If you read my last few posts you will see the appeal filed by MDY attorneys.

[McGoonagle]

Japanese Intellectual Property law doesn't protect Japanese Intellectual Property in the United States. United States Intellectual Property law protects Japanese Intellectual Property in the United States.

But most RMTS aren't based in the US. Most are based in China, which does not recognized international copyright agreements.

[Bugpop]

But most RMTS aren't based in the US. Most are based in China, which does not recognized international copyright agreements.

U.S. Department of Commerce - International Trade Administration

Protecting Your Intellectual Property Rights in China
...

Though China is a party to international agreements to protect intellectual property (including WIPO, Bern Convention, Paris Convention, among others), a company must register its patents and trademarks with the appropriate Chinese agencies and authorities for those rights to be enforceable in China. Copyrights do not need to be registered but registration may be helpful in enforcement actions. A brief summary of China's patent, trademark, and copyright laws are described below.

...

China recognizes the international intellectual property. It would be helpful there was more enforcement. Why are you bringing up China? Now that you did bring up China I want to point out that China did not ban RMT. That means RMT is not copyright infringement in the U.S. nor China and RMT is not illegal in the U.S. or China.

[McGoonagle]

China recognizes the international intellectual property. It would be helpful there was more enforcement. Why are you bringing up China? Now that you did bring up China I want to point out that China did not ban RMT. That means RMT is not copyright infringement in the U.S. nor China and RMT is not illegal in the U.S. or China.

I speak from personal experience: they don't give a damn about enforcement to the point where their claims to be members of these agreements are quite laughable.

As for the rest of this straw man argument you've been running: RMT doesn't infringe laws liquor laws or FDA regulations either. That does not mean that it is legal.

The infringement is of the contract between the suppliers of the service and the user. When you click on the" accept" button you are agreeing to the terms of the contract with the supplier of the service. Those terms include everything that happens in Vanadiel staying in Vanadiel. You leave all the good stuff and the gil behind. You do not take it out and sell it for real money. That is where it begins, and that is where it ends. It is not a copyright matter.

[Bugpop]

I speak from personal experience: they don't give a damn about enforcement to the point where their claims to be members of these agreements are quite laughable.

As for the rest of this straw man argument you've been running: RMT doesn't infringe laws liquor laws or FDA regulations either. That does not mean that it is legal.

The infringement is of the contract between the suppliers of the service and the user. When you click on the" accept" button you are agreeing to the terms of the contract with the supplier of the service. Those terms include everything that happens in Vanadiel staying in Vanadiel. You leave all the good stuff and the gil behind. You do not take it out and sell it for real money. That is where it begins, and that is where it ends. It is not a copyright matter.

I don't recall anyone making a claim that RMT wasn't a breach of contract and shouldn't be grounds for termination. The only argument I made is that RMT is not illegal, illicit, or criminal. An argument that RMT is illegal, illicit, or criminal, is if there is a willful violation of copyright law.

RMT is at most a breach of contract. While a contract is a matter of law, a breach of contract isn't "against the law". I am not sure that RMT can be considered anything more than a minor breach of contract.

I'd shove the RMT portion of that deeper into the other two circles, honestly. RMT-botting to generate Gil for sale is done on a very large scale- even if that is less visible now from being shoved out of sight, courtesy of the STF. One guy in Windurst botting is easily a player as it is a generator for RMT funds. Remember those pics of dozens of keyboard-hammer names fishing up mithril swords? That's the real face of how much of the use of 3PP's to gather Gil is by comparison.

I certainly don't. I blame RMT's for use of botting and other exploitive methods on a massive, nigh industrial scale. The same efforts that cause barely a blip on the game economy when used by players turn into economic nightmare fuel when you've got folks running rotations on a network farm, feeding cash into the RMT pockets and hence the economy 24-7.

I don't agree. Players discover in-game ways to legitimately generate large amounts of gil. Players abuse these gil-fountains and the economy suffers.

[Waku]

As someone that has worked part time at a RMT company I can say without a doubt it broke several state & federal laws during half the days I worked there.

[McGoonagle]

I don't recall anyone making a claim that RMT wasn't a breach of contract and shouldn't be grounds for termination. The only argument I made is that RMT is not illegal, illicit, or criminal. An argument that RMT is illegal, illicit, or criminal, is if there is a willful violation of copyright law.

RMT is at most a breach of contract. While a contract is a matter of law, a breach of contract isn't "against the law". I am not sure that RMT can be considered anything more than a minor breach of contract.

What you claimed was that RMT is not illegal because it does not breach copyright. This, frankly, is daft. It is, as you agree, a contract violation. This is a civil wrong. That means that redress can be sought through the courts if necessary.

Now that you have agreed, I think you can stop wasting your time.

[Kyreth]

I don't agree. Players discover in-game ways to legitimately generate large amounts of gil. Players abuse these gil-fountains and the economy suffers.

Players actually sink considerable amounts of Gil in the process of producing it. Gold farming as a player doesn't (without getting your ass banned) involve 24-7 production of Gil, nor do regular players do nothing but generate Gil. The system is designed around players generating money and giving them good reasons to sink it.

RMT production is nothing like this. The accounts run constantly, automated and often unattended, and the sole purpose of this is to feed it into the game economy for $$$. They produce an excess of Gil and sink virtually none of it, which is where the economy goes to hell in a handbasket.

Take a silly example. One of my favorite spots to solo lower levels is the ruins under Sarutabaruta. I'd sit there doing my thing while a keyboard-smasher name monk botted his way through the goblins there, run out to Windurst to sell off, and poshack back to repeat the deal (warping up the "dead end" dropoff). For laughs, I had a couple of friends keep tabs on him.

He didn't log out for at least a week straight, cycling constantly between that one room and Windurst to sell, rinse-cycle-repeat. That's the kind of Gil generation RMT's manage (in this case on a relatively small scale), and that's where you see damaging behaviour happening for the game economy.

[Bugpop]

What you claimed was that RMT is not illegal because it does not breach copyright. This, frankly, is daft. It is, as you agree, a contract violation. This is a civil wrong. That means that redress can be sought through the courts if necessary.

Now that you have agreed, I think you can stop wasting your time.

The focus of the discussion was the legality of RMT because that was the point of contention up until you joined. I joined the discussion because I wanted to explain that RMT is not criminal. It is widely believed that RMT is "stealing" or infringing on Square Enix's copyright. It does neither.

In the U.S. Copyrights are not considerd to be moral or common rights and violations of Copyrights are not considered to be theft. Only by violating one of the exclusive rights granted to copyright holders can one be liable for copyright infringement. RMT does not infringe on any copyright because it does not violate any exclusive rights.

RMT could not be more than a minor breach of contract. The terms of the license agreement which prohibit RMT and using 3rd party software lack consideration. They are unenforceable and do not qualify as a civil wrong.

As someone that has worked part time at a RMT company I can say without a doubt it broke several state & federal laws during half the days I worked there.

Waku, you claim you transgressed laws but fail to name them.
ringthree and others claim RMT is illegal without claiming what laws are transgressed.

It may seem totally obvious to the two of you what laws are transgressed but I am unable to think of any that qualify. Please humor me and post them.

Players actually sink considerable amounts of Gil in the process of producing it. Gold farming as a player doesn't (without getting your ass banned) involve 24-7 production of Gil, nor do regular players do nothing but generate Gil. The system is designed around players generating money and giving them good reasons to sink it.

RMT production is nothing like this. The accounts run constantly, automated and often unattended, and the sole purpose of this is to feed it into the game economy for $$$. They produce an excess of Gil and sink virtually none of it, which is where the economy goes to hell in a handbasket.

Take a silly example. One of my favorite spots to solo lower levels is the ruins under Sarutabaruta. I'd sit there doing my thing while a keyboard-smasher name monk botted his way through the goblins there, run out to Windurst to sell off, and poshack back to repeat the deal (warping up the "dead end" dropoff). For laughs, I had a couple of friends keep tabs on him.

He didn't log out for at least a week straight, cycling constantly between that one room and Windurst to sell, rinse-cycle-repeat. That's the kind of Gil generation RMT's manage (in this case on a relatively small scale), and that's where you see damaging behaviour happening for the game economy.

There is no way for you to know if he is RMT. Do you suppose that players might use bots to farm gil? How are you able to know the scope and breadth of RMT? How are you able to know that this character is operated by a bot? I suppose that after reporting him he remains in-game? How are you able to know of ongoing investigations? How are you able to know investigation results? How are you able to know whether he is a genuine player that abides by the terms of service?

[McGoonagle]

The focus of the discussion was the legality of RMT because that was the point of contention up until you joined. I joined the discussion because I wanted to explain that RMT is not criminal. It is widely believed that RMT is "stealing" or infringing on Square Enix's copyright. It does neither.

Only RingThree was saying that. That does not constitute "widely believed."

RMT could not be more than a minor breach of contract. The terms of the license agreement which prohibit RMT and using 3rd party software lack consideration. They are unenforceable and do not qualify as a civil wrong.

So account banning does not count as enforcement?

[Bugpop]

Only RingThree was saying that. That does not constitute "widely believed."


So account banning does not count as enforcement?

I would rather not spend time validating my "widely believed" statement. What is the issue again? ringthree summed it up nicely. Also, a contract is an agreement which can be legally enforced. There may not be sufficient consideration for all the terms of the licence agreement to be enforced.

It has to do the with the strength of the claim that can be made to stop RMT from engaging in that practice.

McGoonagle, you claimed that my straw man argument is that RMT is not illegal because it is not against the copyright act. That is not my argument. My argument is that RMT is not illegal. When the issue of intellectual property rights came up I explained why copyright law does not prohibit RMT. We both agree on this.

Now please, if RMT is illegal based on some other law, please do us a favor and list the laws that RMT is believed to violate.

[Waku]

The majority of RMT sites require you to create an account with them, just a simple login ID and pw. Now say you buy gil, gold, whatever in a game. While SE has a little more protection with the crypic IDs, most games do not. If a delivery person noticed good gear on someone they delivered to, they would try to log into the game with the same login ID & pw that was used on the RMT site... yes LOTs of people are that stupid.

Then, if say, someone took delivery, and then reversed the charges with their CC company or Paypal saying it was never delivered, the managers would do insane shit. Usually they would call them threatening legal action and to call the police on them (they can't, they are selling shit that doesn't belong to them, and any judge would laugh them out of court), when that doesn't work which is most of the time... they try that same login ID & pw to log into their email, bank page, facebook, myspace, paypal, ... anything they can to get their money and then some back. At one point a manager logged into someone's Paypal account, and resent the money, then called the person saying they had talked with loss prevention at Paypal and that they had ruled in the RMT's favor and that there was nothing more they could do.

[Kyreth]

There is no way for you to know if he is RMT. Do you suppose that players might use bots to farm gil? How are you able to know the scope and breadth of RMT? How are you able to know that this character is operated by a bot? I suppose that after reporting him he remains in-game? How are you able to know of ongoing investigations? How are you able to know investigation results? How are you able to know whether he is a genuine player that abides by the terms of service?

Watching him poshack-teleport his way back into the area was a dead giveaway on violating the TOS. Knowing he was removed during the usual end of month account sweeps reinforces that. Watching him mindlessly attack targets I'd claimed and remaining utterly unresponsive to /say, /tells, or altering his behaviour makes for an excellent indication of botting.

How do I know the scope and breadth of RMT? I know how much gets removed from the game by STF sweeps, know that this isn't a 100% removal of RMT and can logically infer that despite these large-scale removals, RMT activity is minimally this large and certainly larger still. And I know that after said keyboard-smashname monk was removed, another one identical to it save for the name replaced it within a few days, doing the exact same thing, the exact same way, the same constant actions, over and over and over again.

Can I know perfectly and without fail that this is the case? No. But I can observe patterns of what I have known to be RMT, compare them to the actions of others, and make deductions based on those observations and comparisons.

[Yugl]

The majority of RMT sites require you to create an account with them, just a simple login ID and pw. Now say you buy gil, gold, whatever in a game. While SE has a little more protection with the crypic IDs, most games do not. If a delivery person noticed good gear on someone they delivered to, they would try to log into the game with the same login ID & pw that was used on the RMT site... yes LOTs of people are that stupid.

Then, if say, someone took delivery, and then reversed the charges with their CC company or Paypal saying it was never delivered, the managers would do insane shit. Usually they would call them threatening legal action and to call the police on them (they can't, they are selling shit that doesn't belong to them, and any judge would laugh them out of court), when that doesn't work which is most of the time... they try that same login ID & pw to log into their email, bank page, facebook, myspace, paypal, ... anything they can to get their money and then some back. At one point a manager logged into someone's Paypal account, and resent the money, then called the person saying they had talked with loss prevention at Paypal and that they had ruled in the RMT's favor and that there was nothing more they could do.

The problem with this argument is that it's not RMT itself that is illegal, but rather complementary actions of the RMT companies that are illegal. So if they were to sue your company for hacking into monetary accounts, then there would be a strong case, but RMT itself (As in selling gil) is apparently not an illegal act. However, that doesn't mean you couldn't attempt to broaden a precedent (Or create new ones) in order to include RMTing. The problem with that as the article demonstrated is that RMT isn't located within a single company or "group" and most of the sites are the middlemen in this ordeal.

[Bugpop]

The majority of RMT sites require you to create an account with them, just a simple login ID and pw. Now say you buy gil, gold, whatever in a game. While SE has a little more protection with the crypic IDs, most games do not. If a delivery person noticed good gear on someone they delivered to, they would try to log into the game with the same login ID & pw that was used on the RMT site... yes LOTs of people are that stupid.

Then, if say, someone took delivery, and then reversed the charges with their CC company or Paypal saying it was never delivered, the managers would do insane shit. Usually they would call them threatening legal action and to call the police on them (they can't, they are selling shit that doesn't belong to them, and any judge would laugh them out of court), when that doesn't work which is most of the time... they try that same login ID & pw to log into their email, bank page, facebook, myspace, paypal, ... anything they can to get their money and then some back. At one point a manager logged into someone's Paypal account, and resent the money, then called the person saying they had talked with loss prevention at Paypal and that they had ruled in the RMT's favor and that there was nothing more they could do.

Hm.

I am pondering whether we are lost in semantics but I don't think so. The claim that RMT is illegal because individuals in the RMT industry allegedly violate the law is not valid. We could say that the RMT industry is illegal if trading real money for virtual assets is criminalized.

We can't say that the corrugated metal pipe industry is immoral because some CMP salesmen decide to go to strip clubs on the weekend

Watching him poshack-teleport his way back into the area was a dead giveaway on violating the TOS. Knowing he was removed during the usual end of month account sweeps reinforces that. Watching him mindlessly attack targets I'd claimed and remaining utterly unresponsive to /say, /tells, or altering his behaviour makes for an excellent indication of botting.

How do I know the scope and breadth of RMT? I know how much gets removed from the game by STF sweeps, know that this isn't a 100% removal of RMT and can logically infer that despite these large-scale removals, RMT activity is minimally this large and certainly larger still. And I know that after said keyboard-smashname monk was removed, another one identical to it save for the name replaced it within a few days, doing the exact same thing, the exact same way, the same constant actions, over and over and over again.

Can I know perfectly and without fail that this is the case? No. But I can observe patterns of what I have known to be RMT, compare them to the actions of others, and make deductions based on those observations and comparisons.

I don't know if this has been adjusted yet. I made some searches but nothing seems to come up to lead me to believe it is not still in effect. and things seem to be unchanged.

For maybe 2 years now, a player can reasonably expect a return of investment of 2 million gil per month per account (125,000 gil per character per month) from gardening with wildgrass seeds (assuming you stick with water and lightning crystals). Thats $30 per month for 2 million gil.

I can't figure out why a person would want to bot through Horutoto Ruins when they could passively earn 2 mil per month without raising as much suspicion..

Lets assume 0.1% of accounts substantially abused this feature.
500 accounts @ 125,000 gil/month * 16 characters = 1 billion gil... all legit, no RMT

Lets say that another 1% abused this feature but only between 3 characters average max.
5000 accounts @ 125,000 gil/month * 3 characters = 1.875 billion gil per month... all legit

In this assumption 1.1% of the players are legitimately earning 2.875 billion gil... all legit

Lets say there are 500 RMT accounts that also abuse this feature. Thats another 1 billion gil per month.

So 3.875 billion gil per month is being generated by 1.2% of the accounts, all from selling wildgrass seed gardening results to NPC.

I bet much more is generated than that from wildgrass seeds gardening results. RMT isn't the problem. Players abusing legitimate in-game methods of producing gil is where the problem is.

Anyway if it has been adjusted that may explain why gil prices are going up.

[McGoonagle]

I would rather not spend time validating my "widely believed" statement.

Then you shouldn't have made it in the first place.

Now please, if RMT is illegal based on some other law, please do us a favor and list the laws that RMT is believed to violate.

Or you could stop trying to play polemic games.

What I said, and what you agreed with, is that RMTs are not a copyright violation, at least not in the US, but that they are a violation of the terms of service.

Rather than take a constructive approach to ending this discussion, you have assumed an authority, and one that I frankly do not find credible, to bully others into accepting your point of view.