when user come to do such illegal act, it is also linden who brought it by playing with the rules them self, and how many user lost linden with theire crashes, bugs, and low quality servers.

there is a reflexion to it also, if linden was honest i dont think other will trie to fraud them. any business when they start smelling the steak under there nose they think they have the absolute power…linden is one of them abusing of its power. i give right to Bragg, and second life mean what you cant do in real life you do it in second life, so linden they are going against theire own philosophy, and that is false statement that linden is making.

If bragg attemp to fraud that is the game, then why called second life, they need to change the meaning of the name and the name itself. Linden is more guilty then anyone in that view.

B

I can comment generally (off the cuff) on some of the legal issues. The main one for me is Linden’s seizing (by banning Bragg in their anger over his exploits) Bragg’s pre-existing legitimately purchased property (not the property he’s accused of obtaining by fraud, but the property he already owned having bought it at full price). This banning and seizure of “valuable property” (for lack of a better word, but it is of significant value) seems way out of line to me, and the Judge seems to have recognized this in striking parts of Linden’s ToS agreement. Linden should have been thanking Bragg for revealing the exploit (incredibly sloppy to have functional, accessible URLs just sitting out there!) and rewarding him in some way - that would’ve been my reaction as world-owner.

A lot of people have tried (and failed in the details of) the store analogy, and Dave pretty much nails it. Seems to me it’s like a “back room” of Linden’s store. There is a doorway without a door or barrier that leads to this back room. Linden ASSUMES you recognize the back room for what it is and won’t go back there, but doesn’t put up a door or a lock or a sign, they just assume you recognize this is off limits (by virtue of the URL not being public yet). However, the items back there are fully enabled for sale, in that Linden’s sales clerk will consummate the sale without a second glance if the item is brought to the cash register.

Bragg ignored Linden’s assumption, went into the back room (entered the non-public URL), brought out an item and the Linden clerkbot completed his transaction. Don’t get me wrong… I think he knew this wouldn’t stand - you can’t actually believe you’re entitled to a $1000 property for $1. But typing a URL into your browser (quite arguably) isn’t fraud. Nor (arguably) is completing a sale of what you find there, if the system allows you to do so.

There are (I assume, I think safely) fraud statutes in all 50 states, in addition to common law fraud recognized by civil courts without the necessity of a statute. The statute should usually provide the criminal penalties, and DECEPTION is normally one element of criminal fraud. That’s where Bragg’s argument is strongest, that he didn’t “deceive” anyone at any time - typing in a URL is not deception, nor is completing an allowed check-out process to buy the product. Fraud is also a civil “tort” - a legally redressable wrong. But again, it is difficult to pin down the element of deceit.

The theory that Linden can recover it’s property on is “mistake in contract” (for lack of remembering the proper term). Whenever there is a purchase-and-sale, there is a contract whether express or implied. A mistaken belief by one or both parties can sometimes void the contract. Ah, it’s right here in wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mistake_(contract_law). See the entry for “unilateral mistake”?

——–QUOTE——–
“A unilateral mistake is where only one party to a contract is mistaken as to the terms or subject-matter. The courts will uphold such a contract unless it was determined that the non-mistaken party was aware of the mistake and tried to take advantage of the mistake.”
—–END QUOTE—–

So… Linden was mistaken about it’s assigned price (shouldn’t have been $1) and about whether the item was actually for sale (it shouldn’t have been yet). Linden is the mistaken party. The non-mistaken party (Bragg) was aware of the mistake (this is a question of fact, but I will assume it is true as we all do) and tried to take advantage of the mistake. THUS, the court will NOT uphold the contract, and Bragg will have to give back “title” to the “property.” (If he’s already resold it, that’s another twist I won’t dive into - look up “bona fide purchaser for value.” Linden may have trouble recovering the property from the innocent third parties if they are indeed innocent, but may be able to recover the sale price from Bragg).

I haven’t looked at Linden’s answer and counter-suit. Did they plead mistake of contract? The Fraud claim *might* prevail, but I think they are going to have trouble proving the deception element.

And there is no way, IMO that Linden hangs on to Braggs previously legit-purchased property. They are either going to have to cash him (perhaps paying him a healthy sum for the potential of appreciation - though that gets into uncertain damages which is a legal no-no) or let him back online.

If I were the judge, I’d order Linden to return Bragg’s original (legit) property and let him back online, in return for Bragg’s paying Linden the profits he made from the $1 property he obtained and re-sold, and both parties’ promise to deal in good faith with each other in the future. Any violations could be brought back to the court for review. It wouldn’t surprise me at all to see the case turn out this way.

B

There’s also reports of others using the same method as Marc did to bid on the same parcels. Interestingly enough, these people seem to be absent (or well hidden) in this case. It seems the ToS should have also caused LL to ban these accounts, as well.

I’m going to have to disagree. I’ve always felt that it is not an exploit unless it is specifically said to be an exploit by the company. As an ex-EQ Guide, you give people one free pass. You catch them exploiting something minor (z-axis exploits, etc.) that’s known about, you tell them to knock it off and if you catch them doing it again (anywhere) they’ll have more serious things to deal with. Something major that is unknown (to the devs), they are, again, given a free pass. Report it right away, it gets fixed. However, you cannot charge someone for doing something that could possibly be “an accident” - IE, player always gets the benefit of the doubt (obviously, there are exceptions to this rule, but unless Bragg had a history of ’sploiting, it’s not important.)

So basically, Linden should’ve just said “Alright, we screwed the pooch on that one.” and fixed it. If they’re raking in the money like they are trying to make everyone think, then they shouldn’t realy miss $1500 - a drop in the bucket compared to the supposed multi-millions they’re making yearly.

It’s just another situation where companies forget that the player is the business and put themselves above the customer. Walmart didn’t get to be #1 by suing people who bought a $55 item that had been put into the computer for $5.50 (whether or not they knew it should be more than 5.50 is immaterial. If I see an xbox 360 game ring up for $5.50 I would point it out, but others may or may not be as honest). I work in retail and it happens all the time. In fact, it happened about two weeks ago. A pair of headphones marked for $39 had the price raised to $48 - but the person in charge of doing price changes on the floor either hadn’t gotten to it, or forgot. When the customer questioned the price, they were given the lower of the two. The price was immidately fixed, but that one person still got it for $9 less than it was supposed to have sold for.