divorce
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Divorce dispute leads to accusation of crime in space
This is one spaceflight milestone that NASA isn't about to celebrate. Former Air Force intelligence officer Summer Worden and her family have filed complaints accusing Worden's estranged spouse, astronaut Anne McClain (above), of committing a crime while in space. When McClain appeared to know of Worden's spending habits despite an ongoing separation battle, Worden found that McClain had accessed their still-linked bank account while aboard the International Space Station -- supposedly committing the crimes of identity theft and improper access to private financial records.
Cyanogen and OnePlus are never ever getting back together
It's always sad when a couple that looked so good together decides to part company, but that's what's happening with OnePlus and Cyanogen. The cracks in their relationship started to show back in November, when Cyanogen backed one of OnePlus' rivals when it launched in India. After a few testy exchanges while out at parties, Cyanogen's Steve Kondik has told PC World that the partnership is now over, but no-one's holding a grudge. OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei agreed, telling the same publication that the team-up had been "mutually beneficial," but that the two companies would take different paths in the future. For its part, OnePlus is now working on its own proprietary Android skin, OxygenOS, while Cyanogen is working with Microsoft and other manufacturers to get its operating system in more places. [Image Credit: Getty]
Judge says you can serve divorce papers through Facebook
How do you end a marriage to someone who's purposefully avoiding your divorce papers? Try Facebook. A Manhattan Supreme Court judge has ruled that a New York woman can serve her divorce summons by messaging her soon to be ex-husband on Facebook. He'll get the notifications once a week on the social network for three weeks, and it's splitsville if he either acknowledges a message or refuses to respond.
Arrivederci: WhatsApp cited in 40 percent of adulterous Italian divorces
Technology can bring people together... and tear them apart, apparently. The Italian Association of Matrimonial Lawyers claims that WhatsApp chats are cited as evidence in 40 percent of Italian divorce cases where cheating is involved. Reportedly, a lot of these less-than-faithful spouses can't help but message their lovers, whether it's to whisper sweet nothings or send sexy photos. In some cases, lawyers say they've seen people juggle "three or four" partners through WhatsApp at one time -- probably not how the developers pictured people using their service.
You got served ... on Facebook :(
It's made you distrustful and toyed with your emotions and now a Staten Island Support Magistrate has deemed Facebook an acceptable vehicle for your legal woes. According to the New York Post, Gregory Gliedman ruled that Noel Biscocho could use the social network to serve his ex, Anna Maria Antigua, with a legal notice that he no longer wishes to pay child support for their 21-year-old son. The ruling reportedly came after Biscocho attempted to reach Antigua multiple times in the real world. And here we thought breaking up via text message was bad. [Image credit: Peter Dazeley / Getty]
Officers' Quarters: Gdivorce
Every Monday, Scott Andrews contributes Officers' Quarters, a column about the ins and outs of guild leadership. He is the author of The Guild Leader's Handbook. To lead a guild effectively, its leaders have to be on the same page. In this week's email, a guild's founding officers have a fundamental disagreement about the direction of the guild. One of them wants out, and she wants to take her half of the guild with her. Hi Scott, here's a little question: A few years ago, my boyfriend and I started our own guild, mainly for the extra storage space and to share profession materials between our characters (we both have plenty of alts). A few months ago, we decided to turn it into a raiding guild, invited a few friends who then in turn invited a few more friends and so on. Then our first disagreement happened.
E3 2012: Dragon Eternity's cross-platform warfare and weddings
Harken back, o reader, to ye olden days of E3 2012, if thou canst recall, as a great and powerful force of dragons has arrived among us. OK, so E3 wasn't that long ago (although it often feels like it), but something dragon-like has certainly surfaced: During the expo, I saw an impressive demo of Dragon Eternity, a cross-platform fantasy MMO from Game Insight, and as of this morning, the embargo on all the details of that demo has finally lifted. Hit the break and I'll tell you all about it!
The Game Archaeologist moves into Lucasfilm's Habitat: Part 2
Last week on the exciting cosmic adventures of the Game Archaeologist, we uncovered the ancient civilization of Lucasfilm's Habitat, one of the early predecessors to graphical MMOs. While we talked about how it came to be and pondered just how much money we'd waste if game companies were still charging by the minute, we didn't have the time or space to cover the community and events that formed around this experimental project. That day has come. Prepare your bladder for imminent release! Giving a bunch of players tools to do every which thing in the game and turning them loose without strict regulation might seem like a recipe for an instant sewage pit of a game today, but our cultured, classy behaviors weren't quite trained into us in 1986. When players first set eyes on Habitat, they weren't thinking of min-maxing, kill-stealing, or raid progression; they were trying to make sense of a virtual world using the only frame of reference they had to date: their own lives. Out of a melting pot of ideas and objects came fascinating stories from one of the earliest MMO proto-ancestors of the modern era. Get your '80s on as we head back... to the future!
75% of MapleStory's marriages suffer the heartbreak of divorce
Monogamy isn't in the cards for most MapleStory players, and neither are faithfulness, silver anniversaries or alimony-free lifestyles. You see, MapleStory boasts an incredibly high rate of divorces with its marriage system, as a whopping 75% of players who get married in-game end up getting those unions annulled. MapleStory's marriage system is fairly popular, with 26,982 such events occurring last year in North America alone. Each marriage costs $25 for the couple, but it seems that the initial investment wasn't enough to keep a majority of the players together for long. Within a year, over 20,000 of those marriages broke up. Due to the high divorce rate -- much higher than the real-world version by far -- Nexon investigated individual stories of in-game divorce trying to figure out why these virtual marriages aren't sticking. One player named Seth realized that his "Maple spouse" was merely using their relationship to bum free items off of him, which led to their break-up. Marriage in MapleStory is a detailed process involving an official engagement, two rings, real-world cash, and a spiffy in-game item that gives the happy pair a big boost to stats. However, if a marriage is annulled, each partner has a 10-day cooling off period before he or she can remarry. [Source: Nexon press release]
Dear Aunt TUAW: Help me join my life, my heart, my iTunes account
Dear Auntie TUAW, Can you believe my wedding is in a few weeks?! That's got me thinking all of our digital goods that we now will both share. While I would like to know if it is possible to combine 2 iTunes libraries and still keep metadata (like play counts and composers), I am more concerned with the number of Apple ID's that will be under 1 roof. I've got an old Apple ID that I've made a LOT of purchases with, both hardware and digital goods. In January, I purchased MobileMe, mostly to keep our calendars in sync on 3 macs and 2 iPhones, but I would also like for that me.com address to be my new Apple ID for purchases in both the iTunes store and the Mac App Store (especially for syncing apps on all the machines). Can I just use that ID on all machines? What happens to my purchase history, like all my apps, movies, and anything with DRM? And of course, my future wife has her own Apple ID as well. Is it possible to bring all this together? And don't worry, the band will play a polka the first set, just for you. Thanks! Love and happiness, Dave
Divorce Online highlights cases caused by "gaming addiction"
Divorce Online, a do-it-yourself website that facilitates the filing of separation proceedings sans lawyers, says that a significant percentage of its "unreasonable behavior" petitions stem from cases of gaming addiction. The website highlights the fact that out of the 200 women who filed petitions between January and April of 2011, 15 percent featured complaints relating to spousal neglect in favor of titles like World of Warcraft and the Call of Duty series. Despite the fact that gaming addiction is not currently considered an actual addiction by the medical community, Game Politics notes Divorce Online's use of author Ryan Van Cleave in its press release. "A lot of the problem spouses encounter with video game addiction is that the non-gamer doesn't appreciate that it's an addiction. This means it's not a choice to spend so much time in a virtual environment versus time with the spouse and family. It's a compulsion," he says.
Drama Mamas: Breakup drama
Drama Mamas Lisa Poisso and Robin Torres are experienced gamers and real-life mamas -- and just as we don't want our precious babies to be the ones kicking and wailing on the floor of the checkout lane next to the candy, neither do we want you to become known as That Guy on your realm. We received some great responses so far from our last call-out for results from letters written to Drama Mamas, but we want more. If you have had your letter answered by us, please send us an email at DramaMamas@wow.com with what happened afterward, if you would like it included in our special results post. Hi there, Drama Mamas, I'm writing today because I really don't know the best way to handle this situation. My ex has recently started playing WoW again, and returned to the server and faction we were playing together. Now, he had quit for a fairly good time, so I returned to the server where I had friends -- IRL and in game. I had assumed that because the break up was fairly nasty (with me finding out he had cheated on me and spread lies about me), that he would follow the deal we had made and not return to the server. The deal was: wherever we knew one of us would be, the other would not be. Obviously I would return to the server, and I fully expected him to start playing another server so we would stay out of each other's hair. When confronted, he told me that he would transfer if I payed for it and then ignored me.
Drama Mamas: Divorce drama
Dodge the drama and become that player everyone wants in their group with the Drama Mamas. Lisa Poisso and Robin Torres are real-life mamas and experienced WoW players -- and just as we don't want our precious babies to be the ones kicking and wailing on the floor of checkout lane next to the candy, neither do we want you to become known as That Guy on your server. We're taking your questions at DramaMamas (at) WoW (dot) com. I think it's pretty much impossible to avoid drama when it comes to divorce. Even if it's an amicable breakup, there are still the issues that caused the breakup as well as situations that must be dealt with as a result of the split. This week, Divorced asks who gets custody of the guild?
Second Life affair grounds for real-life divorce
Amy Taylor and David Pollard, a British couple who, until recently, had spent three years together in marital bliss, are both avid Second Life players. So avid, in fact, that their nuptials were delivered in the game's virtual world in addition to, you know, the real one. Unfortunately, digi-Amy caught digi-David in a compromising position with a digi-prostitute shortly after the wedding, leading these two fully grown adults to file for an untimely digi-divorce. However, they remained married in real life, which likely led to a few awkward conversations over brunch.Digi-David seemed to prove his fidelity by passing a "honeytrap" test later ordered by digi-Amy, in which a buxom digi-Private Eye attempted, and ultimately failed, to seduce his avatar. Unfortunately, digi-Amy recently walked in on digi-David and another avatar, who were conversing with "genuine affection". In response, real-life-Amy filed for real-life-divorce from real-life-David.This report has been fairly sensationalied by the mainstream media over the past few days -- some outlets state that Taylor's divorce lawyer had already seen a Second Life-related seperation earlier that week, while some mention that Taylor has found love once again, this time in World of Warcraft. Regardless of the veracity of these questionable accounts, the news of couple's split due to online infidelity seems to be as true as it is infinitely depressing.
Fiesta: to have and to hold, 'til death do you part
Ten Ton Hamster recently spoke with GM Dakkon from Outspark, about the new marriage system coming to their super-cute MMO Fiesta. They say the perfect spouse is someone who can be your best friend as well as your lover. Well as of June 30th, friends in Fiesta will be able to tie the knot in-game, by purchasing rings (that "allow the couple to warp to each other from anywhere within the game") and a marriage license. That special day is celebrated with a wedding dress and a tux, fireworks, and cute mini-pets. While Outspark is saying "I do" to virtual weddings, thus far there isn't a system for digital divorce in Fiesta. Is it unreasonable to assume that roughly half of these marriages will end up there? One envisions this playing out with much drama... and so many possible scenarios. Custody battles over the mini-pets, and of course who gets to keep the house? Green card hunters looking to marry their way onto another server. And who knows... maybe even a black widow, marrying her way to greater and greater wealth. All jokes aside, Outspark is onto something interesting here. It seems to be a bit of a social experiment, but definitely one to watch, at least until the devs implement prenups. But one real question remains: will Outspark ban same-sex marriages in Fiesta? Perhaps controversy will ensue after all.
Game aims to help kids cope with divorce
When parents are going through a divorce, children usually want to focus on something else -- anything else -- rather than watching the painful process of a marriage breaking apart. They might even want to focus on Earthquake in Zipland, a simple adventure game designed by a team of psychologists to help nine to 12 year olds deal with the complex emotions surrounding a crumbling marriage.We can appreciate the desire to help children through interactive entertainment, but the ham-handed allegory the game presents sounds like it could use some work. As the game's web site puts it, Zipland is "a small paradise island comprised of two parts held together by a zipper, which represents the marriage of the parents (the King and Queen). Suddenly an earthquake rips the island into two, leaving the king and the queen on separate islands. Moose, the hero, sets out on a quest to build a new zipper and try to re-combine the two islands so that life can go on as before (which of course he can't)." Talk about depressing.We doubt that most children want or need to be reminded of the harsh reality of divorce through a game. These children would probably be served just as well by any engaging game that provides a distracting escape from the real world. It takes time to come to terms with the painful circumstances surrounding a parental divorce, and forcing them to confront these circumstances through a game might do as much harm as good.
Divorce, 360 style
What do you do when your scumbag ex-husband runs off with the nice computer, the big screen TV and, consequently, your children's love? You buy an Xbox 360 for bait and start the emotional manipulation. Your kids might be psychologically scarred by divorce, but they'll be entertained. Might help snag a new guy too.[Via GamerScoreBlog]
