It’s your classic chicken/egg question with digital hooves, digital mares and digital peanut butter between the gums

While SG has covered Second Life before, we don’t tend to cover it a lot simply because it’s just too goddamn weird for this planet. I mean, it may not even be an actual video game, so much as a place to give up your money and then find someone to sue.

The latest one concerns two makers of virtual animals, specifically ponies and bunnies. They’re locked in a lawsuit over who copied whose digital meaningless crap first. One litigant’s demands were particularly cruel, or hilarious, depending on your point of view. They asked that Linden Labs shut down the store of the alleged infringer, which would have shut down the feed supply for the virtual horses, which would starve them to death. Linden said no thanks.

But lo, there is a human victim, a woman who lives in upstate New York who cares for one of the animals in jeopardy. While Linden hasn’t shut down the feed store, that’s still the aim of Ozimals, Inc. which is a virtual bunny ranch (no, not that kind) that claims Amaretto Ranch Breedables, the horse farm, copied its intellectual property. A judge recently ruled that the suit could go forward but did not grant Ozimals’ wish to starve the ponies.

I don’t understand anything anymore. That sound you heard was my brain exploding.