Cristalle

No, the key is to eliminate the wager.

People play games of chance for nothing all the time, and it's legal because there is nothing at stake. It's not "gambling" until something is at stake.

There are people who would pay an entry fee to a complex if it allowed them to play for money, but with nothing up front per game.

As for the law and the spirit: all that ultimately matters is the letter, thanks to the concept of impossibility. Wanting something to be a crime that isn't a crime doesn't make it a crime.

Taken together, the Z scheme is much more like pure gambling than charging an entry fee, because the entry fee method doesn't rely on chips or games of skill, and doesn't require you to play. Shoot, you could be there for some other event, e.g, live music or an art display.

Joshua Nightshade

Did you guys even read the announcement?

It's Lindens OR THEIR EQUIVALENTS.

Z-stupidity that is transferable back into L$ at a 1:1 ratio is, ding ding, STILL AN EQUIVALENT!

And I looked at the games, they are identical to pre-ban gambling. There's wagering. With Z-stupid-bucks. And to get legitimate money, you play a stupid game that you have to be the sortof idiot who thinks this stuff doesn't challenge the ban to fail.

Don't worry, I've been getting the actual LL legal team and the actual policy makers involved in this, simply because lying dipshits shouldn't be able to advertise themselves off the basis of an incorrect liaison's words.

Cristalle

Charging people to enter your land is a feature of the game.

What they do on it is a distinctly different question. That is why eliminating the wager works.

Not every game of chance = gambling because no wager = no gambling, but gambling always involves a wager of something.

The swapping for Z scheme, I don't buy. The Z have value, even though they are not transferable, because they can be redeemed for L, which have value. Fungibility for another item that is fungible for money creates something of value, and I'm surprised that LL's attorneys fell for it.

Ciaran Laval

It would only be an equivalent if you could buy L$ with Z$. As you can't directly do that then it's clearly not an equivalent.

Ciaran Laval

The pay to access scheme equals wager/chance/value. The item you win would still have to have either no value or be won via a skill game.

The payment to access still constitutes a wager.

If you're going for chance games then either the input or the output have to have no value.

Joshua Nightshade

No, that's completely incorrect.

Cristalle

Access to land is distinct from a wager. Paying for access is a flat fee and involves no risk. You're in or you're not. The outcome is certain.

What you do on the land is different from accessing it at all.

A wager is a bet and involves risk. You wager Z, L, or your transferable item, whatever. Getting into the facility is not a wager.

Colette Meiji

They key to surviving the gambling law is for SL to develop the following reputation.

"Hey SL? SL sucks you cant even gamble there."

Because then we are guaranteed no one will tell the CC companies to shut the money off.

Ciaran Laval

The forced payment to access makes it a wager. RL companies often have promotions on their products where you can win this, that and the other and in the small print on the promotion you'll find something like "No purchase neccessary".

Forcing payment constitutes pay to play.

Ciaran Laval

They want gambling back and it will come back, hopefully this time it will be legal gambling.

Cristalle

You have a strange idea of what a wager is.

Ciaran Laval

You have a strange idea of what a wager isn't

Cristalle

If payment to enter = a wager, then we're doing lots of betting any time we pay a cover charge.

Colette Meiji

Scroll up to the stuff from last night ..

This system isn't legal ..

Its a bunch of legal things strung together to do something that when taken as a whole is illegal.

If they combined what those two separate machines did into one machine it would have been an illegal machine.

------------

LL may want gambling back - but I hope they aren't stupid enough to risk *any* attention from the feds or make one of the CC companies nervous.

Ciaran Laval

If the cover charge is to allow you to gamble then yes, that's the stake money.

Ciaran Laval

As far as I'm concerned gambling in Second Life has never been legal, but that's a whole different kettle of fish.

I'm not sure what they've got up their sleeves but Zee's comment suggests they're looking at ways of ensuring Americans won't be able to engage in the activities. If I was a gambling man, and I am, I'd say they'll be looking at a third party company to get involved.

Cristalle

No, you pay for a service. It is flat fee and there is no risk. It doesn't matter what you do, it's gone. What you do thereafter is your business.

We have already had this discussion before. And we already know what wagering means in terms of the policy, and access to land isn't it. Of course, all this means nothing until a court says otherwise.

Colette Meiji

Again, scroll up

Gigs actually went there and tried it , he made a profit

Joshua Nightshade

That people have to be this evasive, slimy and skeevy to operate just demonstrates they know they are doing something wrong.

Cristalle

Gigs did not go to a place that used a land-based access control. He wagered Zs to play and cut out early. That's life. It happens.

Joshua Nightshade

"Land-based control" is irrelevant.

Colette Meiji

That makes no sense

So everyone who cuts out early will win?

and everyone who stays long will lose?

Joshua Nightshade

Hey guys, I'm opening a new sim. It's L$100 to enter, and once you get there, what you do is your business!

It just so happens that the sim is FULL OF CHILD PORNOGRAPHY! Isn't that awesome? Watch little Susie take it hardcore in an interracial gangbang with six other guys! Boys more your deal? Bobby can't wait to show his baseball coach some balls of his own!

And because you pay to enter it's TOTALLY ALLOWED BY LL!

Cristalle

Hardly. You keep conflating the issue, whereas I see them as being distinct actions. You either see it or you don't, and that goes both ways.

Honestly, I am done, there is nothing else to say. It is a pointless argument anyway, no one is going to change anyone's mind.

Joshua Nightshade

I'm not "conflating the issue," I'm responding to reality, while you're trying your best to claim you have legality on semantics and loopholes.