Having yesterday reported on law students exploring property law in SL, today more news on the legal front. Second Life contains its own bar association. They have, of course, their own website and are building up to have an important meeting next Wednesday (18th April) where it is likely they will be changing the rules to charge for membership. I'm not a lawyer and have only a passing acquaintance with lawyers and the law, but it strikes me that as the SL community grows so will the drive to have lawyers and to thrash out laws. In fact a little poking into the background of Benjamin Noble reveals he has already been invvolved in this process, as he applied to be a judge within the Confederation of Democratic Simulators (Neufreistadt and Colonia Nova), one of the few places to have a legal system that we might recognise from RL.
NOTE: I mistakenly believed Benjamin had been one of the architects of the CDS legal system, and my original piece stated that. His comment below has led to this edit for the sake of accuracy.
1. Hi there, and thanks for the link to Virtually Blind. You've got an interesting site and an interesting take on the presence of lawyers in virtual worlds (something you can tell I think is both inevitable and at least potentially good).
Anyway, one quick clarification - I'm not really one of the architects of the governmental or legal system at the CDS, though I did apply to be a judge there (before the fledgling judicial system was basically killed off) and I am still a "citizen" by virtue of belonging to a group that owns land in the CDS. I'd like to see the CDS to more with the momentum it has, and I know others would too.
Posted at 3:50PM on Apr 12th 2007 by Benjamin Duranske (aka 'Benjamin Noble' in SL)