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Class 6 – 10/21/15: “Frictions & Fictions: Consumer Contracts & Creative Constraints ” & Roch Ripley

By Jon Festinger on October 26, 2015

Slides and video below:

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jon

 

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News of the Week; October 21, 2015

By Jon Festinger on October 23, 2015

GAMES

  1. 2K Games takes heat for using game journalist’s likeness in ‘WWE 2K16’ video
  2. 12 arrested in eSports match fixing scandal – Report
  3. Egyptian TV News Uses Video Game Footage As Proof Of Russian Precision Strikes Against ISIL
  4. Konami Ingeniously Fuses Two Things Everybody Hates: Insurance And In-Game Microtransactions
  5. Payday 2 players in revolt over micro-transactions
  6. Payday 2 rolls back microtransactions after fan outrage
  7. Square Enix Tries Being Cool And Embraces Fan-Conversion Of Original Deus Ex
  8. Ending the Cycle of Abuse in Publisher-Developer Relationships
  9. For Brianna Wu, VR offers a chance to broaden gaming and escape Internet hate
  10. The Natural: The Trouble Portraying Blackness in Video Games
  11. Why Did Hideo Kojima Leave Konami?
  12. It’s OK everyone, Kojima hasn’t left Konami—he’s just “on vacation”
  13. Vivendi buys stakes in Ubisoft, Gameloft
  14. Ubisoft: “We’re going to fight to preserve our independence” – CEO Yves Guillemot reassures staff about “unwelcome” Vivendi share purchase
  15. Nexon sells shares in NCSoft, ending takeover bid
  16. EA not interested in remakes – Moore
  17. Star Citizen hits 1 million backers, entire game unlocked for all
  18. China now leads the world in game revenues – Newzoo
  19. 82% of Brazilians 18-59 play games – NPD
  20. 5 Reasons Why The TPP Is Scary And Gross For Games  

DIGITAL

  1. Guy Who Won Original Right To Be Forgotten Case Loses His Attempt To Have New Story About His Past Forgotten
  2. Tim Berners-Lee: ‘Just Say No’ To Facebook’s Plan To Bastardize The Internet
  3. Appeals court rules that Google book scanning is fair use: After nearly a decade of litigation, a landmark win.
  4. Google’s audacious project that scanned millions of books has been declared legal
  5. Appeals Court Gives Google A Clear And Total Fair Use Win On Book Scanning
  6. Factor four: the most interesting part of the Google Books decision (Rebecca Tushnet)
  7. Authors Guild v. Google, Inc. (United States Court Of Appeals For The Second Circuit) October 16, 2015
  8. Commenting on Viral Video Is Fair Use–Equals Three v. Jukin Media
  9. By-passing paywall and circumventing TPM sinks fair dealing defense: Blacklock’s Reporter v CVA (Barry Sookman)
  10. Another Censorious Copyright Case Results In a Big Fee Shift–Inglewood v. Teixeira (Eric Goldman)
  11. ACLU Supports Apple in Case Raising Key Legal Question For Age of Encryption
  12. Apple Tells Judge FBI’s Phone Unlocking Demands ‘Burdensome’ At Present, ‘Impossible’ In The Future
  13. Apple CEO Tim Cook blasts encryption backdoors: “It’s in everyone’s best interest that everybody is blocked out,” Cook said.
  14. Sony Pictures settles employee class action lawsuit over The Interview hack: Company could pay up to $8 million (£5.1 million) to employees affected by the breach.
  15. Microsoft wants US government to obey EU privacy laws: Company’s chief legal officer says “privacy is a fundamental human right.”
  16. German parliament passes new, comprehensive data retention law: Requires that all telecoms & Internet metadata be held on air-gapped servers in Germany.
  17. Fallout from EU-US Safe Harbor ruling will be dramatic and far-reaching: Clever ruling by the Court of Justice will be almost impossible to circumvent.
  18. Data Transfers from EU to US “unlawful”; EU Signals Enforcement Actions Possible After January, 2016
  19. TPP IP chapter summary released – are more IP changes coming?
  20. USTR Fishing For Academics To Astroturf In Favor Of TPP
  21. Why Internet Users Should be Very Angry about the TPP
  22. Amazon sues 1,114 reviewers, some selling their opinions for $5
  23. False reviews equal real fine – Bell Canada agrees to pay $1.25 million penalty for misleading online 
  24. Canada’s Biggest Net Neutrality Offender Rogers Has Change Of Heart After Having Its Traffic Discriminated Against
  25. Amazon AppStore and Google Play Defeat Lawsuit Over Infringing App Name
  26. The Rise and Fall of the Conservatives’ Digital Policy
  27. The Cable Industry Thinks Cord Cutting’s A Fad That Will End Once Millennials Procreate
  28. ‘I thought the tech world would be full of new voices and people. It hasn’t happened. The number of women in the sector is tiny. It’s such a waste’
  29. African governments are stepping up surveillance of their own people
  30. AdBlock Plus tried to expand its empire by buying adblocking app Purify
  31. Viacom Once Sued YouTube For A Billion Dollars; Now It’s Just Released Over 100 Movies For Free On YouTube
  32. Assistant Attorney General Bill Baer Delivers Keynote Address at the Future of Video Competition and Regulation Conference Hosted by Duke Law School
  33. UK High Court rules Uber’s app is legal in London
  34. Microsoft Researchers Are Working on Multi-Person Virtual Reality
  35. Why It’s OK to Block Ads
  36. Women In The Developing World Are 50% Less Likely To Access The Internet As Men
  37. How Social Media Fuels China’s Growing Love of Cosmetic Surgery
  38. How Can We Achieve Age Diversity in Silicon Valley?
  39. The first rule of zero-days is no one talks about zero-days (so we’ll explain): Just as defenders find their feet, lawmakers move to outlaw security research entirely.

CREATIVITY

  1. American Publishers Take a Stand Against Censorship in China
  2. The Timothy McVeigh case and its impact on media law
  3. How The Fast Times Of The Paparazzi Came To A Screeching Halt: In the end, the paparazzi machine that came to dominate the early 2000s was no match for the Great Recession, celebrity revolt, and the rise of social media.
  4. Barney Fife comparison does not equal defamation
  5. ROBOJOURNALISM: I just wrote 7 blog posts in less than 3 seconds. Here’s the secret.
  6. Tracing the long, strange history of ‘Tom’s Diner’: A 30-year journey from café curio to 2015 chart-topper
  7. Drawing a Line in the Floor—Courts Are Struggling With the Overlap Between Design Patent and Copyright
  8. In fashion, cultural appropriation is either very wrong or very right

jon

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Class 6 Guest Speaker: Roch Ripley

By Jon Festinger on October 18, 2015

roch.ripley

Roch Ripley is a great friend and co-author of the 2nd Edition of Video Game. He is a partner in Gowlings’ Vancouver office and is co-chair of their Technology Industry Group. He has been an Adjunct Professor in this course and has always been very supportive of it. Roch will share his perspectives on a variety of topics, most especially on End User License Agreements.

Roch is a serious fan of the Street Fighter video game series.

To borrow from the Gowlings bio of him:

“His areas of expertise include computer-implemented and software technologies, integrated devices, clean technologies and electronics. A registered patent agent in both Canada and the United States, Roch has significant experience drafting and prosecuting both domestic and foreign patent applications, opining on patent infringement and validity, conducting technology audits and advising on how to utilize copyrights, trade-marks, industrial designs, and trade secrets in addition to patents to best protect technology. To help his clients profit from intellectual property, Roch drafts technology licenses and development agreements, handles intellectual property aspects of technology company financings and enforces intellectual property rights against infringing parties.

PAPERS & PRESENTATIONS• Co-author, “T-shirt tempest tests copyright law,” Vancouver Sun, February 2013• Adjunct professor at the University of British Columbia teaching Law 450: Video Game Law with Jon Festinger (Spring 2013)• Video Game Law, 2nd ed., Markham, ON: LexisNexis, 2012. Co-authored by Jon Festinger and Chris Metcalfe• Author of summaries for the Canadian Bar Association Intellectual Property Review, including: “Use of Term “Substantial Payment” Renders Settlement Document Unenforceable” (Feb. 2011); “Federal Court of Appeal Clarifies Meaning of Patentable Subject Matter” (Nov. 2011); “Court Rejects Opposition of WRANGLER Mark Based on Lack of Confusion” (June 2010); and “Court Decides What Evidence to Admit Pursuant to Rule 289” (May 2009)• “The Interconnection of Intellectual Property and Cultural Property.” Protection of First Nations Cultural Heritage: Laws, Policy, and Reform. Eds. Robert Paterson, Catherine Bell. Vancouver, BC: UBC Press, 2009. Chapter co-authored with Robert G. Howell”

jon

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Class 5 – 10/14/15: “Consumers & Users As Creators & Connectors” & Mavis Dixon

By Jon Festinger on October 18, 2015

Video and PowerPoints below. A few little sound glitches and, yes, I did decide to rename my slides after the fact…

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jon

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News of the Week; October 14, 2015

By Jon Festinger on October 18, 2015

GAMES

  1. Can Apple stop you re-downloading a delisted game?
  2. Call of Duty dev apologizes for fake terrorist “news” Twitter promo: Marketing stunt featured live updates on fictional attack in Singapore.
  3. Zynga launches gamified ads: Sponsored Play program puts ad games within games, touted as “the next wave in mobile advertising”
  4. O’Bannon v. NCAA
  5. Popular FIFA YouTubers Hit By Cyber-Thieves
  6. Xbox chief: We want to regain trust more than we want to beat Sony
  7. Bandai Namco pulls plug on Rise of Incarnates
  8. Brianna Wu: “I see a generation with almost no innovation”
  9. Faster In The Head: Can Video Games Make Soccer Players Better?
  10. Riot Games bans G2A esports sponsorship
  11. How are eSports gamers different?: EEDAR research finds competitive gamers skew male, are younger, more social, more likely to work out than their counterparts
  12. BBC Three to stream League of Legends World Championship
  13. ESA butts heads with UN over online harassment report
  14. Researchers examine placebo effect in video games
  15. UK government’s Games Prototype Fund launches today
  16. Cemu, the first working Nintendo Wii U emulator, publicly released 

DIGITAL

  1. Canada Caves on Copyright in TPP: Commits to Longer Term, Urge ISPs to Block Content (Michael Geist)
  2.  Once More: The TPP Agreement Is Not A Free Trade Agreement, It’s A Protectionist Anti-Free Trade Agreement
  3. The Final Leaked TPP Text is All That We Feared (EFF)
  4. Trans-Pacific Partnership text won’t be available before election
  5. How the TPP Puts Canadian Privacy at Risk (Michael Geist)
  6. Why the TPP Creates a Backdoor Copyright Takedown System in Canada (Michael Geist)
  7. Consideration of fair use before sending a DMCA takedown
  8. DMCA Considerations Following the “Dancing Baby Case” – Lenz v. Universal Music Corp.
  9. Chinese Web censorship may have claimed another victim: Apple News – The New York Times says Apple is the latest company to remove features due to local law.
  10. Here’s why Deadspin is right, and the NFL and Twitter are wrong
  11. New EU Law Will Tell U.S. What Can Be Said — And Built — On the Internet
  12. Spies and internet giants are in the same business: surveillance. But we can stop them
  13. Female technology journalists report abuse is still the name of the game: Women in tech forced to disguise their identity – and even quit the industry – after facing threats online, study finds
  14. Obama administration won’t seek encryption-backdoor legislation
  15. In China, Your Credit Score Is Now Affected By Your Political Opinions – And Your Friends’ Political Opinions
  16. Behind the European Privacy Ruling That’s Confounding Silicon Valley
  17. Facebook’s Stop and Frisk: How its terrible real name policy put this feminist from India in danger.
  18. The Murky Ethics of Publishing Data on Russian Servicemen ‘Bombing Syria’
  19. The Cyber Activists Who Want to Shut Down ISIS: Somewhere in Europe, a man who goes by the name “Mikro” spends his days and nights targeting Islamic State supporters on Twitter.
  20. Arrest and Prison Time for Journalists and Bloggers over Facebook Posts in Lebanon
  21. Linkedin “Add Connection” costs them $13 million
  22. Bell Canada reaches agreement with Competition Bureau over online reviews
  23. Periscope, Meerkat, HBO and the Live-Stream Dilemma
  24. Dumbing down your smart TV: California prohibits the use of voice recognition for advertising purposes
  25. Our double lives: Dark realities behind ‘perfect’ online profiles
  26. Raiders of the Lost Web: If a Pulitzer-finalist 34-part series of investigative journalism can vanish from the web, anything can.
  27. The Future of Transparency in the Music Biz — and the World: The trend for more openness is directly related to the rise of the web, and a broader desire for more accountability in general
  28. The Carrot Or The Stick?: Innovation vs. Anti-Piracy Enforcement
  29. New patent lawsuits down, driven by drop in East Texas “troll” cases
  30. Quantifying and Visualizing the Reddit Hivemind
  31. The Hacking Quandary
  32. Sports video clips are now ubiquitous on social media. Can the NFL put the genie back in the bottle
  33. How Has Technology Changed the Concept of Community?: For some, making connections has become easier, but others say that life has become more isolated.
  34. Are you happy now? The uncertain future of emotion analytics 

CREATIVITY

  1. Guru denied copyright protection for Bikram yoga sequence of postures
  2. Moschino sued for misappropriating graffiti
  3. One Reason You Might Still Be Paying $120 for a TI-89 Calculator: Copyright
  4. Appeals court hits largest public patent troll with $1.4M fee
  5. To the Batmobile, let’s go! A review of copyrightable subject matter
  6. When bands meet brands: the mutual benefits of music partnerships

jon

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Ace Attorneys: Technology and Change

By jose on October 14, 2015

Ludology Research

Seven Interdisciplinary Papers on Technology & Change
1) Claudio Feijoo et al, “Mobile gaming: Industry challenges and policy implications”, online: (2012) 36 Telecommunications Policy 212 <http://ac.els-cdn.com/S0308596111002242/1-s2.0-S0308596111002242-main.pdf?_tid=1ec6e6f8-72a5-11e5-84d2-00000aab0f6c&acdnat=1444849101_8793eb880405667bdf2dcbb12a587f68>.

2) Elizabeth Evans, “The economics of free: Freemium games, branding and the impatience economy”, online: (2015) 1:18 Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies 1 <http://con.sagepub.com/content/early/2015/02/09/1354856514567052.full.pdf+html>.

3) Kelly Bergstrom, “Disavowing ‘That Guy’: Identity construction and massively multiplayer online game players”, online: (2014) 1:17 Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies 1 <http://con.sagepub.com/content/early/2014/12/05/1354856514560314.full.pdf+html>.

4) Robyn Schell et al, “Social benefits of playing Wii bowling for older adults”, online: (2015) 1:23 Games and Culture 1 <http://gac.sagepub.com/content/early/2015/09/24/1555412015607313.full.pdf+html>.

5) William D Russell & Mark Newton, “Short-term psychological effects of interactive video game technology Exercise on mood and attention”, online: (2008) 11:2 Educational Technology & Society 294 <http://web.a.ebscohost.com/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?sid=69b686a2-6762-4a50-99dc-2dab4774d552%40sessionmgr4003&vid=1&hid=4109>.

6) Valerie Insinna, “Contracts highlight growing role of video game training”, National Defense (2013), online: <http://web.b.ebscohost.com.ezproxy.library.ubc.ca/ehost/detail/detail?vid=6&sid=594f6a1e-c91d-4fc0-86d1-cfb48e3d1e78%40sessionmgr112&hid=124&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZSZzY29wZT1zaXRl#AN=91689936&db=a9h>.

7) Hunter G Hoffman et al, “Feasibility of articulated arm mounted oculus rift virtual reality goggles for adjunctive pain control during occupational therapy in pediatric burn patients”, online: (2014) 17:6 Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking 397 <http://online.liebertpub.com/doi/pdf/10.1089/cyber.2014.0058>.

 

Brief Synopsis of the Most Important Papers
Feasibility of articulated arm mounted oculus rift virtual reality goggles for adjunctive pain control during occupational therapy in pediatric burn patients

This case study provides preliminary evidence for a therapeutic application of “virtual reality gaming” for pain management in burn victims. Currently, the standard of care for pain management in burn victims involves the use of medication. Burn victims often report increased levels of pain during wound debridement when relying on pharmacologies for pain management, which is what prompted this case study to use psychological interventions to assist standard pharmacological analgesics for pain management.

The experimenters used Oculus Rift goggles to immerse an 11-year-old male burn victim into a virtual world. The case study spanned three days where the patient received physical therapy with no VR but standard pain medications, with both VR and pain medications, and a third day again with no VR but standard pain medications. The patient reported decreased levels of pain during day 2, where he received physical therapy using the virtual reality goggles in conjunction with his standard pain medications. He reported being “completely inside the computer generated world as if it was a place he visited”. As VR technology continues to develop, this readily available and inexpensive tech could become an effective way to manage pain.
The economics of free: Freemium games, branding and the impatience economy

The gaming industry has dramatically changed and expanded with the emergence of ‘causal’ and ‘free to play’ games. This article examines three specific ‘freemium’ games, exploring how they combine established branding strategies with gameplay methods that monetize player impatience in a changing gaming landscape. One example is that these games often monetize the player’s desire to reduce the time away from the game. By building in deliberate periods of waiting into the gameplay and combining that with limited time offers, the developers seek to generate and exploit a ‘get-it-now’ attitude.

The appearance of an open source philosophy and brand or time-based monetization strategies are becoming foundational pillars of the casual gaming market. Over time, game studies will more fully turn its attention to the impact of such commercial sensibilities on game production and design and fully question what freemium games can reveal about the nature of gameplay and the games industry in the face of changing technology and consumer preferences.

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Knights of Allardia: Video Game Violence

By Luke Effa on October 14, 2015

Ludology Research 1

 

Effects of Violent video Games on Aggressive Behavior, Aggressive Cognition, Aggressive Affect, Physiological Arousal, and Prosocial Behaviour: A Meta-Analytic Review of the Scientific Literature – Craig A. Anderson and Brad J. Bushman (Iowa State University)

http://pss.sagepub.com/content/12/5/353.full.pdf+html

Evidence for publication bias in video game violence effects literature: A meta-analytic Review – Christopher J. Ferguson

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1359178907000055

Is video game violence bad? – Christopher J. Ferguson

https://thepsychologist.bps.org.uk/volume-27/edition-5/video-game-violence-bad

Are Violent Video Games Harmful? – Guy Porter

http://apy.sagepub.com/content/15/5/422.ful

Video Games and Aggressive Thoughts, Feelings, and Behavior in the Laboratory and in Life – Craig A. Anderson

http://web.b.ebscohost.com/ehost/detail/detail?sid=e984a076-6999-4456-af94-97e4fdae5d66%40sessionmgr111&vid=1&hid=105&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZSZzY29wZT1zaXRl#AN=2000-08135-012&db=pdh

Video Games Do Affect Social Outcomes: A Meta-Analytic Review of the Effects of Violent and Prosocial Video Game Play by Tobias Greitemeyer and Dirk O. Mügge

http://psp.sagepub.com/content/early/2014/01/22/0146167213520459.full.pdf+html

The Effect of Video Game Competition and Violence on Aggressive Behavior: Which Characteristic Has the Greatest Influence? – Paul J. C. Adachi and Teena Willoughby

https://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/releases/vio-1-4-259.pdf

Ludology Research 2

 

Video Games Do Affect Social Outcomes: A Meta-Analytic Review of the Effects of Violent and Prosocial Video Game Play – Tobias Greitemeyer and Dirk O. Mügge

http://psp.sagepub.com/content/early/2014/01/22/0146167213520459.full.pdf+html

This article sets out a meta-analytical test of the idea that depending on their content, video games do affect social outcomes. Data from 98 independent studies with 36,965 participants revealed that for both violent video games and prosocial video games, there was a significant association with social outcomes. Whereas violent video games increase aggression and aggression-related variables and decrease prosocial outcomes, prosocial video games have the opposite effects. Furthermore the authors noted that recent findings suggest that cooperative play in violent video games (as opposed to playing alone) counteracts the negative effects of violent video game play. The effects of violent video game play on aggression might be attenuated by playing the game cooperatively. Also, it is noteworthy that most violent video games have some pro-social content (e.g. killing enemies to save the world)

 
This paper provides a more nuanced view on the effects of playing video games. There are both risks and opportunities to be gained from playing video games depending on its characteristics (violent or pro-social).

 

The Effect of Video Game Competition and Violence on Aggressive Behavior: Which Characteristic Has the Greatest Influence? – Paul J. C. Adachi and Teena Willoughby https://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/releases/vio-1-4-259.pdf

This study set out to isolate the effect of video game violence and competitiveness on aggressive behavior, it used two separate studies to do so. In study 1, a violent and nonviolent game were matched on competitiveness, difficulty and pace of action, and the effect of each game on aggressive behaviour was then compared. In study 2, competitiveness was isolated by matching games on difficulty, and pace of action, and systematically controlling for violence.

 
They found that video game violence was not sufficient to elevate aggressive behavior compared with a nonviolent video game, and that more competitive games produce greater levels of aggressive behavior, irrespective of the amount of violence in the games. It appears that competition, not violence, may be the video game characteristic that has the greatest influence on aggressive behavior.

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Remanie: Modding

By david klaponski on October 14, 2015

This url does not meet the site security guidelines.

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Guild of Calamitous Intent – Freedom of Expression

By brendan dzioba on October 14, 2015

This url does not meet the site security guidelines.

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Class 4 – 10/7/15: “Right to the CreaTE or Rights to the Creation” & Brian Dartnell

By Jon Festinger on October 12, 2015

Slides and Video (of Jon’s talk). First 1:28 of audio missing for some reason.

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jon

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