Virtuality & law : a legal analysis of virtual worlds and the search for patrimonial rights in virtual property

Abstract

One day James came home to find all his possessions gone, his furniture had disappeared, the paintings that once adorned his wall that he had paid good money for had vanished, there was nothing left. Situations such as these occur every day in the real world, and the natural reaction would be for James to immediately go to the police, file a report, hopefully catch the thieves and reclaim his property. But James’ situation is slightly different. James is an avatar and he lives in a place called Second Life, an online-world where his property is not really considered by many as his property, and there are no virtual police that can find the thieves, and even if there were, there is no established legal regime to which he can resort and reclaim his property. Virtual Worlds today are a multi-billion euro industry, with millions of people inhabiting these virtual spaces on a daily basis. These inhabitants trade inside these worlds, form social bonds, and sometimes merely wile away the time tending to their little patch of virtual paradise. However the legal status of these worlds and of the virtual goods found therein is largely undefined, with courts and academic scholars trying to grapple with the concept of their virtual and intangible nature. If the activity in these worlds remain purely ‘in-world’, the lack of legal certainty would not seem to be much of a problem, it is however when these virtual realities spill over into the real world that trouble starts to brew in virtual paradise. With real world cases dealing with disputes ranging from virtual property claims, to virtual theft and one case even resulting in murder, one cannot deny the fact that this area of reality indeed requires some legal attention. In attempt to achieve some legal clarity, this thesis lays out the landscape that constitutes virtual worlds today. It further undertakes to define virtual property as it arises in the context of virtual worlds, and draw upon the differences and similarities between it, and its real world counterpart. Although not assuming to provide any definite solutions to the virtual world problem, this thesis brings to the attention of its readers the value and importance of these worlds, where things can go wrong, how foreign jurisdictions are attempting to tackle them and whether or not the current governance of such worlds is adequate or not.