Demuzio Law Review

Just one final word(s) on this before I try to ignore it forever (until it effects me directly).

Of all the things which are somewhat disturbing about the Illinois Law, and there are several, the one I find the most is that it's still almost completely unknown to the general gaming public. Blogs have picked up on it far more the mainstream media ... and the gaming media is just completely void on the issue from what I can see. The problem with that is this was a law made for political reasons and unless we remind these people that gamers are parents AND voters in more and more numbers every day then this issue will continue to just steamroll on until the industry starts to actually assume self-censorship.

Much of what the law is about is ill-informed and some parts are just plain wrong. It passed not based on it's merits - but based on it's feel-good nature (think of the kids!) and almost complete lack of opposition from the public.

Will it destroy mods and indies? OK, probably not. I agree with the consensus that some relatively basic consent agreements can probably shield those not already protected. Course, there's a couple logistical problems there. One - people need to be aware that they should be doing that, and the same failure to communicate which allowed this bill probably won't be there to pass that message along. Then, of course, there will be those who won't believe they need to do it.

Heck, many modders are minors ... so how complicated would that get?

Hopefully the ESA will be able to slap this down. It's vague, it's relatively hard to enforce and it's pretty ineffective. I don't think ESA will be able to fight this on First Amendment grounds but I think the public safety stuff won't stick together the way it's framed this time around.

What's disturbing about the general lack of hurrumph on this issue is that there will be another time around and I don't know if anyone will be watching or caring. If most attitudes are "those kinds of law will never be upheld" or even "the industry deserves it" and big press game media don't even want to touch it, this will always be a fluff issue politicians and lawyers will use to make their case, career or election year.

And if we aren't careful, they'll eventually slip it right past us. And when some small studio gets served for taking part in some youth crime in a state they've never set foot in ... we'll probably have to blame ourselves.