Supreme Court to decide hte future of Video Games

[nothingclever]

Originally Posted by mercury01

Dark fire will not avail you, Flame of Ud?n! Go back to the Shadow!

I was hoping for exactly this, a million kudos to you good person.

[CyberFox]

If you live in CA, There's a way to preseve freedom even for the video game industry.. voting!!

as in vote Leland Yee out of office!

[MadDocofGrowth]

Here is the bill purposed
http://www.mediacoalition.org/mediai...179%5B1%5D.pdf

Basically if your under 18 no "violent" video games for you.


.....To some of us 'older' video game players it..might be doing us a favor (lol) ? >_>;
..only played Halo reach for 5minutes today and the only time i will have on it, there was a kid screaming my ears were nearing bleeding point D=

[Clickme]

Out of the countless hours I've played reach since hte midnight launch, I've only had one bad experience with an annoying kid.

Anywho, the case opens on November 2nd. Recently there was a protest of sorts involving mailing your broken controllers to senator Lee, the one who created the bill, with the words "I believe in the first amendment" on them. The man received hundreds of packages XD

[jolem]

Doing that doesn't seem to help our situation. It feels like all that would've done was give him more ammo to use against us.

Originally Posted by MadDocofGrowth

Here is the bill purposed
http://www.mediacoalition.org/mediai...179%5B1%5D.pdf

Basically if your under 18 no "violent" video games for you.


.....To some of us 'older' video game players it..might be doing us a favor (lol) ? >_>;
..only played Halo reach for 5minutes today and the only time i will have on it, there was a kid screaming my ears were nearing bleeding point D=

Okay that really depends on how they determine on what is "violent" for them. Because that's one of the points of the ESRB rating system, are they debating on changing that? If not, that doesn't really make much sense for me to have them do something like that.

[TF-Viewer]

Originally Posted by Clickme

Out of the countless hours I've played reach since hte midnight launch, I've only had one bad experience with an annoying kid.

Whenever I play I always do it in party chat with friends, we never hear the annoying kids, the loudmouth elitists who think they're the best in the world, or the whiners. Having the separate voice channel is awesome.

[Clickme]

That's becasue they are honestly looking at both sides and takig hte time to resolve this once and for all. Afterall, the Supreme Court isn't just a yea or neay, it's the final word o nthe matter. It has to be done right.

and after reading the transcripts, I'm delighted by teh Justices sense of humor and willingness to flat out call Bullshit on the points. They really are takign things for what they are adn not lettign people hide behind anything.

[Clickme]

Yeah. Some of hte highlights from the highlights:



[Morazzini: ...

...So this morning, California asks this Court to adopt a rule of law that permits States to restrict minors' ability to purchase deviant, violent video games that the legislature has determined can be harmful to the development -

Justice Antonin Scalia: What's a deviant — a deviant, violent video game? As opposed to what? A normal violent video game?

Morazzini: Yes, Your Honor. Deviant would be departing from established norms.

Scalia: There are established norms of violence?

Morazzini: Well, I think if we look back -

Scalia: Some of the Grimm's fairy tales are quite grim, to tell you the truth.

Morazzini: Agreed, Your Honor. But the level of violence -

Scalia: Are they okay? Are you going to ban them, too?]

==============

[Kagan: Suppose a new study suggested that movies were just as violent. Then, presumably, California could regulate movies just as it could regulate video games?

Morazzini: Well, Your Honor, there is scientific literature out there regarding the impact of violent media on children. In fact, for decades, the President, Congress, the FTC, parenting groups, have been uniquely concerned with the level of violent media available to minors that they have ready access to.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor: I don't think; is that answering Justice Kagan's question? One of the studies, the Anderson study, says that the effect of violence is the same for a Bugs Bunny episode as it is for a violent video. So can the legislature now, because it has that study, say we can outlaw Bugs Bunny?

Morazzini: No —]

======================

[Kagan: Well, so how do we separate violent games that are covered from violent games just as violent that are not covered?

Morazinni: Well, Your Honor, I think a jury could be instructed with expert testimony, with video clips of game play, and to judge for themselves whether -

Scalia: I'm not concerned about the jury judging. I'm concerned about the producer of the games who has to know what he has to do in order to comply with the law. And you are telling me, well a jury can — of course a jury can make up its mind, I'm sure. But a law that has criminal penalties has to be clear. And how is the manufacturer to know whether a particular violent game is covered or not?

Morazinni: Well, Your Honor -

Scalia: Does he convene his own jury and try it before — you know, I really wouldn't know what to do as a manufacturer.

Morazinni: Justice Scalia, I am convinced that the video game industry will know what to do. They rate their video games every day on the basis of violence. They rate them for the intensity of the violence.]

==============

[Sotomayor: Would a video game that portrayed a Vulcan as opposed to a human being, being maimed and tortured, would that be covered by the act?

Morazzini: No, it wouldn't, Your Honor, because the act is only directed towards the range of options that are able to be inflicted on a human being.

Sotomayor: So if the video producer says this is not a human being, it's an android computer simulated person, then all they have to do is put a little artificial feature on the creature and they could sell the video game?

Morazzini: Under the act, yes, because California's concern, I think this is one of the reasons that sex and violence are so similar, these are base physical acts we are talking about, Justice Sotomayor. So limiting, narrowing our law here in California, there in California to violence — violent depictions against human beings.

Sotomayor: So what happens when the character gets maimed, head chopped off and immediately after it happens they spring back to life and they continue their battle. Is that covered by your act? Because they haven't been maimed and killed forever. Just temporarily.

Morazzini: I would think so. The intent of the law is to limit minors' access to those games.]


============


More can be read here: http://kotaku.com/5679655/highlights...ideo-game-case

and in all fairness they are jsut as hard o the video game industry in questioning, but the video game supporters have much better answers lol.

[sodacat]

Originally Posted by kapol

I understand that, but 4 months is a long time to consider one matter. Yes, it's a very important one, but I know I would forget most of the argument within a month at most. I guess that's why I'm not on the supreme court though. ;p

For California this is fast. Really fast.

[FullMetalX]

I highly doubt that...though the problem is that just reading words on paper doesn't tell the whole story and can be interpreted in different ways. Personally, I felt they grilled both sides equally.

Also, the decision isn't expected to come till June actually. And, for the Supreme Court, that's not a long time.

[King Aragorn]

I have to say, I'm a bit lax on my knowledge of current video games, but I understand what's going on, and I think it's wrong.

A point of reference I have for this whole thing is the infamous Comics Code. You know, that ridiculous and unforgiving rating system for comic books, the one that introduced all the Silver Age stupidity and prevented writers from doing decent stories for years? Thankfully, nowadays, the Comic Code is no more, writers are free to write good stories, and each parent has the right to decide which comic can he/she buy for his/her son.

My point is: I don't want a Comics Code for videogames. I want parents to have their freedom to choose which games to buy for their sons, and I want developers to have creative freedom.

[sodacat]

You must be lax, because the ESRB, which has existed since the mid 90s, is the exact same as the CCA. For that matter, it's the same as the Hayes Code too. There's never been a government controlled office to control media (well, I guess the FBI kind of does when it randomly screens pornography for obscenity, but anyways).

There is absolutely no way that such an office would be set up today, in the modern political climate. Who is going to vote in favor of it? Scalia won't. The reason they were "harsh" in their questioning is so that they can be sure of any constitutional issues. They're not supposed to be voting based on their preconceived notions, so of course they'll be asking questions.