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Barfield, Woodrow; Williams, Alexander --- "The law of virtual reality and increasingly smart virtual avatars" [2018] ELECD 1373; in Barfield, Woodrow; Blitz, J. Marc (eds), "Research Handbook on the Law of Virtual and Augmented Reality" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2018) 2

Book Title: Research Handbook on the Law of Virtual and Augmented Reality

Editor(s): Barfield, Woodrow; Blitz, J. Marc

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN: 9781786438584

Section: Chapter 1

Section Title: The law of virtual reality and increasingly smart virtual avatars

Author(s): Barfield, Woodrow; Williams, Alexander

Number of pages: 42

Abstract/Description:

Advances in virtual and augmented reality technology and in the software to produce virtual worlds have allowed virtual avatars to be used with increasing frequency for a range of activities. But with improvements in the technology to create virtual and augmented reality worlds have come corresponding issues of law and policy which apply to the avatars that represent the human presence in virtual worlds. This chapter discusses several issues of law which relate to the design and use of virtual avatars, with a specific focus on avatars that are gaining in intelligence and operating with more and more autonomy from humans. Virtual avatars are increasingly not simply entities under the control of real-world users, as with avatars found in many online virtual reality games, but rather are becoming more autonomous actors, generating their own decisions and solutions to problems which may not always be intelligible or transparent to the real-world users they represent. Additionally, it is the case that increasingly smart avatars operating with greater autonomy raise significant legal issues beyond those of “human-controlled” avatars, not the least of which is whether the avatars themselves deserve legal rights.