Evony legal fighting fund

OK.
You guys can help. Please.
This libel lark is very expensive.
I have very good Australian solicitors and barristers, who I obviously can't afford.
They are acting pro bono because of the importance of the case.
But still there are lots and lots of expenses to be met. So we need funds.

I have set up a PayPal donate button on Bruceongames.
Every penny counts.

Remember that as the law stands now a company from say, America, can zap you in Australia for writing the truth. And there is nothing you can do about it. My case is trying to set a precedent to prevent this.
Then there is the overall Evony thing of putting gold farming within a game. You get the first week of play protected to build your emotional involvement in the game. After that you are pushed pretty hard to dig in your wallet a lot in order to be competitive in the game. They have subverted the whole gaming mechanic.

 

I hope your case isn't predicated on this. Because although Evony is clearly tacky and opportunistic, I'm pretty sure that subverting gaming mechanics (and using micropayments for that matter) is well within the bounds of acceptable behaviour.

 

No offense (although I sort of don't give a sod), but haven't you just brought this on yourself by ranting and moaning about something that probably doesn't even affect you? Not that I really care if you have some kind of argument as to how gravely significant it all is... But, you do tend to come across as a petty naysayer and spamlaunching-grumblebot. Why should we care or help bail you out?

Okay, I said I don't care, but I guess i'm intrigued to see if you have anything convincing up your sleeve/bum. Bum, because that's what you appear to talk from. Mostly. You might win me round!

Best of luck!

 

This started with them comment spamming my blog lots.
Basically black hat, gold farming marketing applied to the game industry.

Then there is the client. Would you let a Chinese company with no western offices put software on your computer that can do anything they want it to? About ten million people have! Many on their work computer. And I know things about the Evony client that I am saving for the trial.

And now they are trying to suppress fair criticism of what they do. An American front company for a Chinese game sueing a British blogger in an Australian court. Libel tourism at its very worst. They are trying to bully their way to censoring the internet in a way that I can't defend.

If they get away with doing this to me then it opens the door to everyone with money to misuse the Australian courts to manage their online reputation. No blogger or forum poster is safe.

 

None of those things you mention are illegal. In fact it sounds very similar to Zynga's business model, aside from them using tacky boob-based advertising and being run by the Sinister Chinese.

Sooo... just out of curiosity, what is it that they are suing you for claiming? It would help to know if you actually were being libelous or not.

That whole territory-shuffling business does sound odd though.

 

It is all explained here: http://www.bruceongames.com/2009/10/19/evony-and-bruceongames/

 

Um, yes? I mean, Evony in particular, no, because I have no intention of being ripped off by a crappy MMO, but then I don't play World of Warcraft either. I certainly don't see anything wrong with Chinese software, and you're verging on racist territory again quite honestly. Who the hell cares where the software was written? Any time I install anything it's a balance between risk and likelihood of that risk and I consider Chinese-written software no more or less likely to do my PC harm than something written in America or Britain or Japan or France or anywhere else in the world.

I mean, if what you said was factually correct in every particular, and if this is an entirely gratuitous case designed purely to... well, I dunno, what do you think they're getting out of this? But anyway... if all that is the case, good luck to you, the last thing the world needs is spurious court cases - honestly, genuinely, good luck. But I don't know whether what you wrote is true, I only have your word for it; and let's just say I have a healthy amount of skepticism given your obsession with the Evil Chinese (seriously, Bruce, if it's not supposed to be racist, you have to understand you're just embarrassing yourself); so no, I won't be donating.

Also - presuming you're not a registered charity - you are letting the taxman know about this source of income, aren't you?

 

Your fucking computer (or at least, a large number of its parts) was almost certainly made in China.

 

In all my articles there are links to supporting information.
And the Guardian says most of the same things.

The Chinese thing is important.
Up till July they made a lot about being Chinese.
Then they formed a Delaware front company and suddenly claimed to be 100% American. They then systematically removed every mention of the Chinese connection from all their websites. One, UMGE.com, they deleted completely!

 

I don't think the Chinese thing is important. I think the Evony legal letter was actually pretty accurate in saying "the imputations arising from the Articles are all the more offensive by reason of the sprinkling of racial slurs throughout the Articles".

Your claim that they are "subverting the gaming mechanic" also seems quite bafflingly irrelevant. There is nothing illegal, or even immoral, about using a micropayment model. The only thing you can sting them for there is if, as the Guardian article claims, it can be shown that "the confusing way the game prices its add-ons means that many users may not realise that a simple action, such as sending a message to another player, can cost 15p a time". You could then perhaps argue that they breached trading standards, but you'd want to be careful about making such claims...

Similarly, it's one thing to say that somebody's game is awfully damn similar to Civilization. It's quite another thing to say that it's an infringement of intellectual property. That's for the courts to decide (if Sid Meyer & co decided to take them to court).

All in all I'd say you probably *have* gone beyond regular criticism, into potentially libelous territory. I am surprised that they are contesting your claim that they resort to spam-advertising, though.

The fact that they've decided to sue you in Australia, simply because people in Australia have viewed the pages (and presumably, because they think NSW law is more favourable to their case) does definitely set a worrying precedent.

 

The way I see it, everyone has already tried to help you. You didn't accept it. Why should we help you now?

You were poking a rottweiler with a stick. Everyone told you not to do it. Now you're asking for money for the plastic surgery to hide the horrific scars you got from it.

I do agree with you that it's unfair that The Guardian isn't being picked on ...but then they have journalistic skills to word things in a less black-and-white manner, heavy financial and legal backing to defend themselves, and don't go about spreading their word in a way that annoys most people.

 

Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't the Guardian get most of their information from you?

 

You could always try this at the crossroads in Leam:

 

My prediction is, if it came to a ruling, that some of the complaints will be thrown out but a few of them will stick.

But the best argument is probably that the viewing of a web page shouldn't be sufficient cause to involve the Australian courts in settling a dispute between two foreign parties.

 

LOL!!! What did I miss? Brucey, what did you get yourself into?

I find the Evony ads to be annoying. I also find dog shit in the street to be annoying. I don't stand next to the dog shit and yell at it that it's annoying.

Once you bring down the Evony guys go after those gambling on-line people. They give you free credit to hook you and then you HAVE TO PAY!!!!!!!!!!1111111111111111111111111111

And you can almost NEVER win. It's a SCAM!!!!!!!!!1111111

After that you should take on an entire country or something.

Edit: Just read the other threads. EPIC!!!

Good luck, Erin Brockovich!

 

So your answer in life is to back down to bullies. You want me to let Evony win this so that your freedom of speech is taken away. You are not anonymous on the web, anyone can get a court order in Sydney forcing TCE to divulge your identity and with the reciprocal arrangements TCE would be forced to comply. Anyone could close down any thread on here any time they felt like it. Because everyone would back down in the face of incredibly expensive legal action. We are lucky this time because some top Sydney lawyers are prepared to act pro bono, they realise the importance of the case. These lawyers would not be doing this if I had a case to answer. Everything I said was the truth or fair comment based on truth.

 

Their journalist has been following Eric Lam, UMGE, WoWMine etc for ages. She is the expert on the whole matter.

 

The online gambling people aren't trying to take away your rights of free speech. Evony are. And Evony contains on line gambling.

 

You want "the cabal" to give you money now? Sheez.

 

Again, just for clarification... "forced"? IANAL and all that, but I don't understand how anyone can force anything. If someone said to me, "if you don't delete what you wrote in a forum thread we'll take you to court in Australia!" I wouldn't even bother expending energy laughing at them. And if as a result they went to court in Australia, and assuming the judge didn't throw the case out for being spurious (seriously, closing a forum thread? Sheesh) and there was this crazy reciprocal arrangement you talk about and the British authorities tried to... well, what? Send me to prison? That's about the only thing I can think of that would matter, there's got to be something after "do this or..." because I don't see how "...we'll take you to court in Australia" is, in itself, at all threatening. I mean, fine, go to court in Australia, I won't be there, but you knock yourself out. But anyway, assuming there was some kind of threat of imprisonment at the end of it, one short phone call to the Daily Mail and you've got "Convict Nation Sends Our Brits To Jail" or something, bit of pressure on the Home Office and the whole thing gets annulled. Surely?