GamePolitics.com is reporting two separate news about the New York State anti-video game bills are getting some heat from people concerned about them.
The CEO of Vicarious Visions, a video game developer from Albany, NY, writes a rather excellent editorial in Times Union, a newspaper in Albany. The editorial mentions the failed attempts of legislating video games in other states, and how the court battles there have cost tax payers almost $2M USD. He’s warning the New York State legislators from going the same path given the sorry state of New York State finances. He’s recommending the legislators concentrate their legislative efforts in encouraging the use of the ESRB ratings and educating parents of the ratings and parental controls already used by the video gaming industry and retailers.
More importantly, it seems the legislators themselves are waking up to the realities of the two bills. Senator Ruth Hassell-Thompson recently challenged Andrew “Virginia Tech in every sentence” Lanza in the New York State Senate about the constitutional concerns of his bill. Lanza remained clueless, as always. I’m very encouraged by the fact that he’s, in fact, finally getting challenged by someone over this issue. If the bills don’t get struck down before Eliot Spitzer signs them, the legal fees will come down on us New York State tax payers.
-TPP
