The Five Indicia of Virtual Property

[Excerpt] “Many Americans use “it” every day. Although it is intangible, it may be worth thousands of dollars. Because we can both control it and prevent other people from controlling it, we assume, without much thought, that we own it. Sometimes we pay someone a monthly fee to hold it for us. Sometimes, simply by using it, we increase its value. When we finish using it, we often sell it. “It” is virtual property, and it may take the form of an email address, a website, a bidding agent, a video game character, or any number of other intangible, digital commodities. If it were to be damaged or stolen, the immediate questions would be: (1) how should a court identify it; and (2) what degree of legal protection should it receive? Because no court or legislature in the United States yet has recognized virtual property interests, a combination of contract and custom currently controls the relationship between Internet users and service providers. […] The question therefore becomes, how should courts identify protectable virtual property interests? Partially due to the dramatic success of Massively Multiplayer Online Games (MMOGs)9 and the rise of secondary markets for virtual characters and treasures from those games, a recent frenzy of legal scholarship has struggled to resolve this question. This note supports the legal recognition of virtual property interests, as already convincingly justified by the legal analogy to traditional property interests set forth by Professor Joshua Fairfield, buttressed by the practical reality that virtual property has significant economic value. Building on these rationales, this note proposes five indicia, common to most forms of virtual property, which a court should use to identify legally protectable virtual property interests on the Internet. These indicia are: (1) rivalry; (2) persistence; (3) interconnectivity; (4) secondary markets; and (5) value-added-by-users. This note cautions, however, against applying this newfound definition indiscriminately against the interests of the very entities without whom the property would not exist: the businesses hosting the remotely accessed computer resources (i.e., the service providers). […] Part III of this note applies the five indicia to the well-established framework of traditional property to illustrate this balancing process. Throughout the development of the law in this area, courts must retain the freedom and flexibility to craft appropriate equitable remedies on a case-by-case basis, and special attention should be directed to the practical issues commonly faced by Internet service providers. The ultimate purpose of virtual property jurisprudence should be to strike a balance that provides legal redress to users whose legitimate virtual property interests have been violated while simultaneously reducing liability and disincentives to service providers who promote and sustain the growth of the Internet.

The Cowl - v.66 - n.25 - Apr 18, 2002

The Cowl - student newspaper of Providence College. Vol 66 - No. 25 - April 18, 2002. 32 pages

The Poor and Marginalized Among Us: Contingent Faculty in Jesuit Universities

Faculty of institutions of higher learning have an opportunity to discuss, debate,and discern how to create workplaces that are just and inclusive.As members of Jesuit institutions, wehave a moral obligation to do so. How, then, can Jesuit universities justify the poor treatment of contingent faculty, who are now a majority not just in our institutions but in the country as a whole? Tenure-track employment is a fading tradition in universities throughout the United States. The data also show that non-tenure-track faculty, particularly the growing number of part-time adjunct faculty, constitute a population of marginalized, often poor,employees working alongside more privileged colleagues. Furthermore, the data show that the burden of inequality falls more heavily on women and people of color. How do Jesuit values and the mission statements of Jesuit universities guide us in this situation? How do Catholic social teaching principles help us to see and articulate the current situation more clearly, and find a path to more just and equitable employment in Jesuit higher education

Histories of hating

This roundtable discussion presents a dialogue between digital culture scholars on the seemingly increased presence of hating and hate speech online. Revolving primarily around the recent #GamerGate campaign of intensely misogynistic discourse aimed at women in video games, the discussion suggests that the current moment for hate online needs to be situated historically. From the perspective of intersecting cultural histories of hate speech, discrimination, and networked communication, we interrogate the ontological specificity of online hating before going on to explore potential responses to the harmful consequences of hateful speech. Finally, a research agenda for furthering the historical understandings of contemporary online hating is suggested in order to address the urgent need for scholarly interventions into the exclusionary cultures of networked media

The Faculty Notebook, September 2017

The Faculty Notebook is published periodically by the Office of the Provost at Gettysburg College to bring to the attention of the campus community accomplishments and activities of academic interest. Faculty are encouraged to submit materials for consideration for publication to the Associate Provost for Faculty Development. Copies of this publication are available at the Office of the Provost

Reform proposals from developing Asia: finding a win-win strategy

Recipient countries and creditors have different perspectives on proposals for reform of the international financial architecture. The difference arises from varying perceptions of the causes of the East Asian crisis. Creditors emphasize inappropriate policies of borrowing countries, and inadequacies in financial sectors. Recipient countries point to evidence of incorrect monetary policy advice, of contagion and herd behavior. If reforms include items from both sets this would maximize future benefits from financial flows. Statements from Asian policy makers and academics indicate that these countries remain committed to globalization and financial reform and are willing to adopt policies from the first set. If the balance of global power allows creditors to escape policies from the second set, it will harm them in the long run. Greater understanding of these technical aspects, stronger Asian regional groups and coalitions with other reformist groups and academics increase the chances of a more balanced set of reforms.International financial architecture, East Asian crisis, creditor view, debtor view, balanced reform, crisis warning

'The Greek Fall: Simulacral Thanatotourism in Europe'

The paper explores the socio-cultural dynamics of Greek demonstrations in 2011, suggesting that their function exceeds that of social movements as we know them. A form of what I term ‘simulacral thanatotourism’, including marches and demonstrations to Greek cities in protest for austerity measures, actualised in this context a form of mourning about the end of Greece’s place in European polity. This mourning, which places Greece at the centre of a withering European democratic cosmos, inspires in today’s dystopian Greek Raum two conflicting forms of social action: one is geared towards consumption of the country’s political history in terms similar to those we examine as ‘tourism’. This symbolic consumption of history re-writes the European past from a Greek standpoint while simultaneously promoting relevant entrepreneurial initiatives – in particular, the global circulation of imagery linked to riots and protests and thus the movement of the abject aspects of Greek culture in global spaces. The second form of action is directed against the image of contemporary Greece as a corrupt topos that does not deserve a place in Europe’s political Paradise; this places the blame for the nation’s demise on its political factions. The two forms of action may be antithetical but do coexist in Greek social movements to the date, articulating a cosmology of nostalgia for Greece as an idyllic tourist object. The paper explores these themes through the proliferation of imagery in recent demonstrations, highlighting how a tourist-like marketing of activist visual culture partakes in reproductions of theological ideas rooted in Europeanist discourse

The causes and economic consequences of envy.

In this lecture I first give an explanation for invidious preferences based on the (evolutionary) competition for resources. Then I show that these preferences have wide ranging and empirically relevant effects on labor markets, such as: workplace skill segregation, gradual promotions, wage increases that have no relation with productivity and downward wage flexibility. I suggest that labor and human resource economics can benefit from including envy into the standard set of factors considered in their theoretical and empirical models.Envy; Interdependent preferences; Skill segregation; Wage dynamics; Wage dispersion; Internal labor market; Recursive contracts;