An interesting judgment has been issued in the Netherlands concerning virtual items associated with the online world Runescape. According to the article on the Radio Netherlands Worldwide site:

“In a precedent-setting trial, a court in the Dutch city of Leeuwarden has ruled that stealing virtual items is theft and sentenced two teenage boys to community service.”

Setting aside the fact that the two teenage boys beat the 13 year old victim and threatened him with a knife to force him to transfer the items from his account to theirs, this is a drastic departure from how other jurisdictions have handled of cases involving virtual property.

What is also interesting is that based on this article the court determined that there was theft (citing a previous case involving the theft of electricity), but the article doesn’t specify from whom the objects were stolen. According to the Runescape Terms of Service under the heading Intellectual Property Rights:

“You agree that all intellectual property or other rights in any game character, account and items are and will remain our property.”

According to the TOS, Jagex the company that owns Runescape owns the intellectual property rights to this material, not the players, so there may have been theft, but from whom? Furthermore, what effect will this have on the real world trade of virtual items? If anyone has a copy of the judgment translated into English, I would be interested to see it.