FC: Should video games be required to come with warning labels?

From: Declan McCullagh (declanat_private)
Date: Tue Apr 09 2002 - 06:52:42 PDT

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    [The threat of legislation by the U.S. Congress prompted the videogame 
    industry to form the Recreational Software Advisory Council circa 1994 
    (http://www.rsac.org/, though it is now trying to reinvent itself for web 
    ratings and you won't see much videogame stuff there anymore). I believe 
    there is no current law requiring video game creators to label for violent 
    or other content. See also: http://www.politechbot.com/p-01353.html and 
    http://reagle.org/joseph/commerce/singles/rsac7.html and Sen. Lieberman's 
    "report card" at 
    http://abcnews.go.com/sections/tech/DailyNews/internetgames981201.html --Declan
    
    ---
    
    Date: Mon, 8 Apr 2002 14:59:12 -0500
    From: Clayton Carter <crcarterat_private>
    To: Declan McCullagh <declanat_private>
    Subject: [POLITECH] Warning Labels for Video Games?
    User-Agent: Mutt/1.2.5.1i
    
    Hi Declan,
    
    	Long time lister, etc.  I haven't played computer games in
    years, but I still found this story[2] rather interesting (and
    ridiculous) and thought that might be of interest to the rest of the
    list.
    
    	The summary is that some poor guy (with a documented history
    of mental illness) in Wisconsin was supposedly addicted to
    EverQuest[1] and, having commited suicide, his mom (he was 21) has
    decided that Sony (which publishes EQ, I guess) needs to put warning
    labels on the game because
    
    	``...they are all the same. It's like cigarettes. They need to
    	  come with a warning label. `Warning, extensive playing could
    	  be hazardous to your health.' ''
    
    	The simplest (and, perhaps, most cynical) of the multitude of
    questions that this brings immedediatly to mind is: I presume she
    thinks that warning labels on video games will be more effective than
    those found on cigarettes?
    
    	Thanks for running the great list.  Take care.
    
    Clayton
    
    PS - It appears that K5 already ran something on this[3] (back on the
    first).
    
    [1] http://www.everquest.com/		(redirects to:)
         http://everquest.station.sony.com/
    [2] http://www.jsonline.com/news/state/mar02/31536.asp	(same text as:)
         http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/news/editorial/3022603.htm
    [3] http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2002/4/1/16133/05371
    
    -- 
    Clayton Carter   crcarter at cs dot indiana dot edu
    "My mom says I'm the handsomest guy at school.""
    
    
    
    
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