Legal Hurdles Foil Mass Effect 3 "Space Edition" Lottery - UPDATED

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Mike Droz:
-snip snip-

Hey, no worries, I'm pretty sure that everyone knows that you pretty much had nothing but good intentions with this. Plus you refunded the money, so I doubt any charges will be pressed.

Qitz:
That'll teach those greedy bastards to try and do something nice like donate some money to a charity!

Also, stuff is illegal in Nevada? Bwaaah?

Keep in mind they were only going to give 33%, or one third, of it to charity. The rest was going right into their pockets to start their own private games company.

Either way you would have thought they have put at least a little research into it first.

Rainboq:

Mike Droz:
-snip snip-

Hey, no worries, I'm pretty sure that everyone knows that you pretty much had nothing but good intentions with this. Plus you refunded the money, so I doubt any charges will be pressed.

You're basing that on... ?

Maybe they had good intentions donating part of the money raised to a charity, but they were still attempting to cash in on the ME3 hype machine.

Had their intentions been as noble as everyone thinks, they would have given all profits to charity and hoped that the good word of mouth and their selfless actions would result in a great starting point for raising capital.

Instead, to over-excited guys thought they could make a quick buck and pulled a bonehead move.

Zom-B:

Rainboq:

Mike Droz:
-snip snip-

Hey, no worries, I'm pretty sure that everyone knows that you pretty much had nothing but good intentions with this. Plus you refunded the money, so I doubt any charges will be pressed.

You're basing that on... ?

Maybe they had good intentions donating part of the money raised to a charity, but they were still attempting to cash in on the ME3 hype machine.

Had their intentions been as noble as everyone thinks, they would have given all profits to charity and hoped that the good word of mouth and their selfless actions would result in a great starting point for raising capital.

Instead, to over-excited guys thought they could make a quick buck and pulled a bonehead move.

Its baseless, but I doubt that charges would be pressed if they didn't actually go through with it. As well, donating ANY of the portions is a fairly noble gesture.

Really?... So, it's perfectly fine if they went onto ebay and sold the damn thing and kept all the profit for themselves. BUT it is illegal to run an event promising to give money to GODDAMN CHARITY, and to help fund a new project which can potentially create new jobs? Excuse me for a second, I'm off to go bash my head against a wall.

spectrenihlus:
FOR THE LOVE OF CHRIST THESE LAWS ARE STUPID!! Why should the state tell me how I wish to spend my money, if I want to put my money into a raffle for the chance of winning a product I should have the right. Why the government has to be involved is beyond me.

Because people can fall under false pretenses when a charity event doesn't disclose how they spend the funds. The government has to step in to prevent dumbasses from giving away their money for a game (that wasn't even in "Space" in the first place) and get pissed off about it when you find out they used most of the funds to create a start-up company (it's called investors, business loans, and profitable product). Hiding behind the word "charity" and "children" is terrible while people out there donate their time and money that goes straightly to the cause.

And everybody who says, "The law be damned here." can practice what they preach by donating money to Child's Play. They have a donation button, on the top right corner. They're still accepting money but this time, ALL of your money goes to the charity.

The term Mass Effect 3 "Space" edition is completely false because the balloon pops in the stratosphere. Nowhere NEAR outer space. That balloon needs to go another 37 miles to be considered "spaced".

Interesting. Running a 50-50 raffle in Michigan is perfectly legal, and never requires a license, as far as I know. "50-50" meaning half of the proceeds go towards the people running the raffle, and half towards the winner. Perfectly legal, widely done, no license ever needed.

Maybe Nevada is just retarded in their gambling laws (whoulda thought?).

shado_temple:

The trick with this story is that they attempted to host a raffle where a majority of the proceeds went to the creators of the raffle, without consent from the state in a form of a license (which are considerably difficult to obtain).

You have to have consent from the state to run a raffle over there?

Flames66:

shado_temple:

The trick with this story is that they attempted to host a raffle where a majority of the proceeds went to the creators of the raffle, without consent from the state in a form of a license (which are considerably difficult to obtain).

You have to have consent from the state to run a raffle over there?

Specifically in the state of Nevada. Most of the tax revenue there comes from gambling (Las Vegas and all that), so they try to make sure things like this are legit (and pay taxes from the collection).

Sewer Rat:
Really?... So, it's perfectly fine if they went onto ebay and sold the damn thing and kept all the profit for themselves. BUT it is illegal to run an event promising to give money to GODDAMN CHARITY, and to help fund a new project which can potentially create new jobs? Excuse me for a second, I'm off to go bash my head against a wall.

The big difference between eBay and a raffle is the amount of money that people would've been "scammed" out of. An auction on eBay would've resulted in a single person (of questionable sanity) paying a large sum of money for this copy of the game, with the other participants none the poorer. A raffle, on the other hand, has the potential to have unlimited persons giving unlimited money for a struck-by-lightning chance at getting this game, with an unofficial promise of money eventually going to a charity, or to fund their company.

Again, had they just given all the proceeds to charity, none of this would've been a problem; the fact that they tried to keep a chunk of it was what caused problems.

CharitableMyAss:

spectrenihlus:
FOR THE LOVE OF CHRIST THESE LAWS ARE STUPID!! Why should the state tell me how I wish to spend my money, if I want to put my money into a raffle for the chance of winning a product I should have the right. Why the government has to be involved is beyond me.

Because people can fall under false pretenses when a charity event doesn't disclose how they spend the funds. The government has to step in to prevent dumbasses from giving away their money for a game (that wasn't even in "Space" in the first place) and get pissed off about it when you find out they used most of the funds to create a start-up company (it's called investors, business loans, and profitable product). Hiding behind the word "charity" and "children" is terrible while people out there donate their time and money that goes straightly to the cause.

And everybody who says, "The law be damned here." can practice what they preach by donating money to Child's Play. They have a donation button, on the top right corner. They're still accepting money but this time, ALL of your money goes to the charity.

The term Mass Effect 3 "Space" edition is completely false because the balloon pops in the stratosphere. Nowhere NEAR outer space. That balloon needs to go another 37 miles to be considered "spaced".

They gave their money for the chance to win Mass Effect 3 early ( whether the game went up into space is irrelevant) what the people who receive that money want to do with that money is up to them. The problem I have with this is that you absolutely have to donate all the money to charity, why? Why can I simply sell raffle tickets to this and say all the money will be going to me, but according to the state that is illegal.

They did nothing wrong the LAW was and is Stupid and the person who thought it was a good idea needs a full on beat down...or a stern evil stare.

The law makers are fools. You should eat them.

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