In a defamation lawsuit arising from a feud between players in an online role-playing game, the Kaohsiung District Court on May 20 acquitted the defendant on the grounds that the insults and name calling were targeting a fictional character, not a real person.
On May 22 last year, the defendant, surnamed Lai (賴), was playing Lineage M — a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) with a medieval storyline — on his cellphone with other gamers.
Lai, using the gamer tag “Minion Fish Butcher,” got into an argument with “KGB Pretty Girl,” who turned out to be a man surnamed Pan (潘), the ruling said.
Lai typed messages to Pan in Chinese — such as “Are you an idiot?” and “Are you a fucking dog?” — in the game’s chat window, it said.
Taking the insults personally, Pan took screenshots of the messages and filed a judicial complaint against Lai.
Pan said that Lai had publicly slandered him before a live audience, as figures showed that about 70,000 gamers were playing the MMORPG at the time.
At the trial, Lai said he had typed the messages, but that he had directed them at the fantasy character “KGB Pretty Girl.”
Lai said he did not know Pan personally and had not meant to insult him, the real person.
The insults were directed at a fictional character in an online game, the court said, adding that as Lai did not know Pan’s age or name, he had not insulted a specific person, so it was not public defamation.
The court dismissed the case, saying that as “KGB Pretty Girl” was not publicly known to be associated with Pan, it was not the same as a person insulting someone on a public street.
Wang Chieh-tuo (王捷拓), a lawyer and former prosecutor, said that the justice system is gradually coming to regard online fantasy games and other online platforms as public spaces.
If the case had been filed by Holger Chen (陳之漢), a YouTuber well-known for his online name “Gym Boss” (館長), the ruling would likely have been different, Wang said.
“If people posted comments under a news report about Chen that insulted the ‘Gym Boss,’ most readers would believe that the posts insulted Chen,” he said.
Taiwan is to commence mass production of the Tien Kung (天弓, “Sky Bow”) III, IV and V missiles by the second quarter of this year if the legislature approves the government’s NT$1.25 trillion (US$39.78 billion) special defense budget, an official said yesterday. Commenting on condition of anonymity, a defense official with knowledge of the matter said that the advanced systems are expected to provide crucial capabilities against ballistic and cruise missiles for the proposed “T-Dome,” an advanced, multi-layered air defense network. The Tien Kung III is an air defense missile with a maximum interception altitude of 35km. The Tien Kung IV and V
The disruption of 941 flights in and out of Taiwan due to China’s large-scale military exercises was no accident, but rather the result of a “quasi-blockade” used to simulate creating the air and sea routes needed for an amphibious landing, a military expert said. The disruptions occurred on Tuesday and lasted about 10 hours as China conducted live-fire drills in the Taiwan Strait. The Civil Aviation Administration (CAA) said the exercises affected 857 international flights and 84 domestic flights, affecting more than 100,000 travelers. Su Tzu-yun (蘇紫雲), a research fellow at the government-sponsored Institute for National Defense and Security Research, said the air
Taiwan lacks effective and cost-efficient armaments to intercept rockets, making the planned “T-Dome” interception system necessary, two experts said on Tuesday. The concerns were raised after China’s military fired two waves of rockets during live-fire drills around Taiwan on Tuesday, part of two-day exercises code-named “Justice Mission 2025.” The first wave involved 17 rockets launched at 9am from Pingtan in China’s Fujian Province, according to Lieutenant General Hsieh Jih-sheng (謝日升) of the Office of the Deputy Chief of the General Staff for Intelligence at the Ministry of National Defense. Those rockets landed 70 nautical miles (129.6km) northeast of Keelung without flying over Taiwan,
A strong continental cold air mass is to bring pollutants to Taiwan from tomorrow, the Ministry of Environment said today, as it issued an “orange” air quality alert for most of the country. All of Taiwan except for Hualien and Taitung counties is to be under an “orange” air quality alert tomorrow, indicating air quality that is unhealthy for sensitive groups. In China, areas from Shandong to Shanghai have been enveloped in haze since Saturday, the ministry said in a news release. Yesterday, hourly concentrations of PM2.5 in these areas ranged from 65 to 160 micrograms per cubic meter (mg/m³), and pollutants were
RSS