... and can land you with a criminal record (in the Netherlands at least)

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/video-games/9053870/Online-game-theft-earns-real-world-conviction.html

- although I suspect the violence employed in the virtual theft was the reason for the conviction. I think this decision was correct - do you?

I can agree.................The effort put out is the same as stealing, if it was important to you and had value to you...............then I feel if you take it you have stolen it.

Yes, I think it was a correct decision.

Sure, and on the beating and threatening at knifepoint would be reason enough.

And to put this in perspective, there are people who pay very good money for kids to play for hours and hours on games so that the rich gamers can play at the level they want in their down time, instead of wasting their more valuable hours getting though the easier levels. It's a source of income for a lot of kids.

Really? I didn't know that. I'd do it if someone would pay me ;)

The whole world of gaming is totally foreign to me, as there's no 'payoff' for me, but I know many people feel very passionately about it to the extent it rules their lives.

They'd no doubt feel the same about my obsession with watching horses race round a track! - although here in the UK at least the tracks are all different!! - and we have a lot of jump racing which is the real deal for me: it's more dramatic, and the horses often return each season for many years. The current champ over a distance is 12

Yes, it's the very time-consuming ones with loads of levels. Or they are new games that need testing by very good players.

Passion and obsession in a field can be a wonderful thing, especially if one devotes their life or free time to it for years. :)

Do you watch equestrian events as well, BP?

Not very often starkttn, racing's pretty wall to wall here!

But I do try to watch cross-country equestrian events, and I'll watch the Olympic horse events (while grinding my teeth about the damage to historic Greenwich Park).

I'm not so keen on show-jumping these days, it's too demanding of horses imo without being much fun for them (training inc) and permits drugs to mask injury in too many jurisdictions. Similarly, I dislike a lot of the training and gear for top dressage (the Germans and Austrians for example, tend to the extreme in both disciples...)

Crap I was a thief when I played video games. I love stealing things in fantasy. Did it with D&D too.. "you knock the guy out now what do you do?".. "I check through his pockets of course before he wakes up".

That reminds me of the book I just read, Neal Stephenson Reamde