MMORPGs, company towns, and free speech

by Alphaville Herald on 01/08/04 at 1:33 pm

A few weeks ago we blogged Yale Professor Jack Balkin’s paper on free speech issues in the context of MMORPGs. Now attorney Peter Jenkins has contributed to the discussion on this topic with a paper in the Journal of Internet Law: “THE VIRTUAL WORLD AS A COMPANY TOWN: FREEDOM OF SPEECH IN MASSIVELY MULTIPLE ON-LINE ROLE PLAYING GAMES“. In it, he argues that virtual platforms like MMORPGs have replaced the company towns of days past. But if courts have upheld 1st ammendment rights in company towns, shouldn’t they likewise uphold them in MMORPGs? Also click here for Terra Nova discussion.

Here’s a nice passage from the article:

“In the 21st century, traditional company towns like Chickasaw, Alabama, where a corporation steps into the shoes of the state for purposes of the First Amendment, are almost non-existent. This paper postulates that they have been replaced by Massively Multiple Online Role Playing Games (MMORPG’s)… The paper emphasizes that the case law on freedom of speech in MMORPG’s will have a profound precedent setting effect on how the First Amendment is applied to [a] coming universal virtual platform, since the legal principles concerning new technologies tend to be set at an early stage of their development.”

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