Man Subpoenaes Celebrities For WoW Lawsuit

Erik Estavillo, a gamer in San Jose, California is suing Blizzard because he believes that World of Warcraft ruined his social life. He argues that Blizzard's World of Warcraft is a "harmful virtual environment," and that much of its design is "sneaky and deceitful." In particular, this oddball plaintiff believes that World of Warcraft has the highest subscription fee of any MMORPG ($14.99 USD monthly), and that portions of the game, like having to walk to one's corpse and a lack of mounts at lower levels, are all designed to waste his monthly fee.

Hilariously enough, the gamer is also subpoenaing Depeche Mode musician Martine Gore and actor Winona Ryder because they both understand what it's like to be lonely and anti-social. Gore was chosen because "he himself has been known to be sad, lonely, and alienated, as can be seen in the songs he writes," and Ryder was named because of her acting role in J.D. Salinger's Catcher in the Rye. Previous to this lawsuit, Estavillo also sued Sony for banning him from their Playstation Network while he was playing Resistance: Fall of Man. The case was dismissed in September, but Estavillo has now appealed it, and is also suing Microsoft and Nintendo because a broken Xbox 360 caused him "undue stress," and a Wii update that blocked access to a third-party program interfered with his inalienable right to pursue happiness.

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Burden of Proof
# Nov 28 2009 at 3:35 PM Rating: Excellent
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Even if you ignore all the other aspects of this that are ridiculous, will he be able to show that he had a an active social life to ruin? Consider how many other gaming related lawsuits he has filed, gaming is pretty much all he does, it would seem.
Burden of Proof
# Nov 28 2009 at 5:26 PM Rating: Excellent
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That's a hilarious insight. If only they could use this kind of stuff in court: "we will now prove that this man had no life before he played games and he totally had no friends." Now lawsuits come with the added danger of being publically shamed by the law.
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