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posted by takyon on Saturday June 10 2017, @07:55PM   Printer-friendly
from the full-life-consequences dept.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

In August, Milwaukee's Lake Park saw swarms of Pokémon Go players, some of whom trampled and trashed the area, making a general nuisance of themselves. Not everyone behaved badly, as John Dargle, Jr, director of the Milwaukee County Department of Parks, Recreation & Culture, acknowledged in a letter [PDF] at the time. But a subset of thoughtless gamers created enough of a burden that Milwaukee County Supervisor Sheldon Wasserman proposed an ordinance [PDF] to require augmented reality game makers to obtain a permit to use county parks in their apps.

The ordinance was approved and took effect in January. It has become a solution waiting for a problem – according to a spokesperson for Milwaukee County, no game maker has bothered to apply for a permit since then.

[...] Nonetheless, in April, Candy Lab, a maker of augmented reality games based in Nevada, filed a lawsuit "out of genuine fear and apprehension that this ordinance, conceptually and as written, poses a mortal threat not only to Candy Lab AR's new location-based augmented reality game, but also to its entire business model, and, indeed, to the emerging medium of augmented reality as a whole."

-- submitted from IRC


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  • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 10 2017, @08:31PM (9 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 10 2017, @08:31PM (#523577)

    But there is no commercial use of the parks in these circumstances. The difference between a person walking through the park sending texts on their phone and looking for Pokémon on their phone is which app is currently the active/front-most app on their phone.

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  • (Score: 4, Informative) by AthanasiusKircher on Saturday June 10 2017, @08:43PM (8 children)

    by AthanasiusKircher (5291) on Saturday June 10 2017, @08:43PM (#523579) Journal

    But there is no commercial use of the parks in these circumstances.

    Pokemon Go crossed the billion-dollar revenue threshold earlier this year [techcrunch.com]. An essential feature relies on people exploring locations to generate that revenue.

    The difference between a person walking through the park sending texts on their phone and looking for Pokémon on their phone is which app is currently the active/front-most app on their phone.

    Are you rewarded for sending texts from specific locations in a public park? Does the company earn revenue from your actions happening in a specific location?

    Pokemon Go, as I understand it (I've never been even vaguely interested in playing), made a lot of choices about where to locate various things in real life based on how popular such locations might be with users, etc. I assume that's why it chose to "locate" game features in public parks. When texting companies start encouraging people to congregate and send texts in parks for some reason -- to generate PROFIT -- we can have a discussion about what they're doing with their apps too.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 10 2017, @09:08PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 10 2017, @09:08PM (#523588)

      Some texts still result in a charge per text. If someone sends text from a park bench does the city get a piece of that charge? What about someone sitting under a tree in a park who donates money to a charity because the concert they are watching on their phone prompted them with a short code?

      Since you don't understand how Pokémon works (I have never played it but I have nieces who have) you don't buy anything at a location. You only discover the Pokémon characters running around and you "capture" them (actually capture a token for that particular type of discovery, similar to an electronic version of geocaching).

    • (Score: 2) by frojack on Saturday June 10 2017, @09:11PM (5 children)

      by frojack (1554) on Saturday June 10 2017, @09:11PM (#523589) Journal

      Does the company earn revenue from your actions happening in a specific location?

      The Short answer is NO.
      The almost as short answer is NO. https://techboomers.com/t/pokemon-go-prices [techboomers.com]

      It has nothing to do with WHERE you are when (or if) you decide to spend ANY money in the game. Most players are kids, and most players don't ever spend a single DIME on the game.

      --
      No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
      • (Score: 2) by AthanasiusKircher on Saturday June 10 2017, @09:26PM (4 children)

        by AthanasiusKircher (5291) on Saturday June 10 2017, @09:26PM (#523596) Journal

        Let me rephrase: did the company make choices about where to require key events to take place in order to make its product perform better? Did such design choices cause the product to perform better? I think so. If product performance was improved, did revenues increase? Yes.

        Anyhow, let's take a step back here, because I actually view the taxation aspect of the permit regulations to be the most controversial. Even IF we conclude that there is no commercial interest here, a company encouraging people to go certain places without adequate planning could definitely create a public nuisance or something. Even non-profit organizations are frequently required to obtain permits if they want to use public parks for their activities.

        • (Score: 3, Interesting) by frojack on Saturday June 10 2017, @09:37PM (3 children)

          by frojack (1554) on Saturday June 10 2017, @09:37PM (#523602) Journal

          a company encouraging people to go certain places without adequate planning could definitely create a public nuisance

          You mean like establishing the park in the first place? Then building parking lots and sidewalks near it? Then licensing vendors and pay toilets to make park use more pleasant? All to build an Attractive Nuisance!!

          So we should prosecute the cities themselves, or the citizens who demanded (and paid for) those parks? Where was their planning? Where was their fences and gates and posted hours and police? How irresponsible!

          --
          No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
          • (Score: 5, Interesting) by AthanasiusKircher on Saturday June 10 2017, @10:42PM (2 children)

            by AthanasiusKircher (5291) on Saturday June 10 2017, @10:42PM (#523616) Journal

            You seem to be unfamiliar with the notion of the tragedy of the commons [wikipedia.org].

            As it was once explained by a philosophy professor, let's say you REALLY love to walk around on grass in your bare feet. So you do down to the public park every night, and take off your shoes, and walk around on the grass -- and you enjoy yourself. Fantastic.

            Now imagine if every single person in the city went to the park and did the same thing every day. After a couple months, there is no grass left, and thus no resource for ANYONE to enjoy.

            Public parks ARE a public resource. But they are designed with specific use cases in mind, including specific volumes of people, specific kinds of events, perhaps specific design issues to either encourage or discourage crowds in certain locations. If you violate those use cases, you may make the park less valuable as a resource for everyone. People DID complain about the crowds created by Pokemon Go. Are all of their complaints about the use of public resources invalid?

            So, what does the city have to do if the grass starts to die in the above scenario? It passes regulations over the use of the grass in the parks. That's its right to protect the appropriate use of the park as determined by voters for all citizens of the city. That's what it's doing here. If citizens of the city disagree with the necessity for such permits, let them take that up with their elected representatives.

            • (Score: 2) by frojack on Sunday June 11 2017, @12:37AM (1 child)

              by frojack (1554) on Sunday June 11 2017, @12:37AM (#523629) Journal

              You seem to be unfamiliar with the notion of the tragedy of the commons

              On the contrary, you are clearly unfamiliar with it. This has NOTHING to do with that.

              There exists no commons in modern cities. Certainly not American cities. BLM lands are the closest example in the US, but even those lands have usage regulations.

              The parks are already maintained by city government, with regulations and a budget and a maintenance staff, and hours of operation, and police patrols. NOTHING at all like the tragedy of the commons.

              Stay in school!

              --
              No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
    • (Score: 2) by edIII on Saturday June 10 2017, @09:26PM

      by edIII (791) on Saturday June 10 2017, @09:26PM (#523595)

      You've nailed the distinction. Profit.

      There will be some sort of "Fair Use" augmentation to prevent 1st Amendment issues from arising, but any commercial augmentation provider would need to cover the usage fees that their customers cause. No different than parks hosting county fairs and whatnot, or even a private road. If one person starts running a business with 50 people showing up to work each day, they cause 50 more cars to be on the road with the associated wear and tear. Their share of road costs is no longer equal with everyone else.

      Causing hundreds of people to enter the park, running around hysterically like idiots, is in fact a usage and resource issue. Organizers need to play by the rules, and when augmented reality is explicitly designed to interact with reality, there is functionally no difference between a real event hosted on public grounds. If the augmented reality is not designed to host events, play games, or as a matter of design entice and reward people for accessing an area, then it should be free to do whatever it wants.

      I dunno about some of the points. The bathrooms and parking fees seem to be a bit extreme, but again, that should just conform with what any other organizer would experience in an event like a fair where roads and businesses are impacted. Of course, it would be determined on a local basis.

      There is a degree of nuance that is missing here, but the law can evolve to address it. It would be interesting to study it first and determine the impact on public resources before deciding that a law is required. As for the vandalism and other undesirable behavior, enforce existing laws.

      --
      Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.