Online virtual community Second Life has banned gambling activities among its virtual residents and warns them from participating in the many online gambling sites that have developed in “The World.”

San Francisco-based Linden Labs’ new policy, revised as of July 25th, now states: “It is a violation of this policy to wager in games in the Second Life (R) environment operated on Linden Labs servers if such games: 1) (a) rely on chance or random number generation to determine a winner, OR (b) rely on the outcome of real-life organized sporting events, AND (2) provide a payout in (a) Linden Dollars, OR b) any real-world currency or thing of value.”

Second Life is a 3-D virtual world, which started in 2003, it has grown explosively and is today is inhabited by over eight million members where real estate speculation, escort services, a virtual World Stock Exchange, and online gaming were allowed to thrive.

The new ruling comes less than two months after the company made new rules saying it would no longer tolerate “broadly offensive” sexual content in the once free-wheeling world.

Linden Lab has specified that the new gambling rules refer to games such as baccarat, blackjack, poker roulette, slot machines and other popular casino games, and extends further to sports betting.

The community has threatened to suspend or terminate the accounts of any members who violate the new regulations, which come into effect immediately.

Reactions from members has been mixed. “I don’t like gambling, but everyone has the freedom to choose whether or not to waste their money,” says one member. While others laud the action: “I’m going to say well done.”

Tags: Second Life, Online Gambling Ban

This entry was posted on Friday, July 27th, 2007 at 11:04 am and is filed under Casino News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.