World of StarCraft modders clash with Activision Blizzard originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 19 Jan 2011 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

The other day we covered a lawsuit by Corey Fahy (AKA Belial Foulsbane in Second Life) vs Linden Lab, various third-party viewer developers, content creators and others.

While there doesn't seem to be any case to really answer (because you can't copyright a name, method, process or algorithm, and Fahy seems ineligible for legal costs and statutory damages in any case) things definitely took a turn for the weird last week.

Continue reading Fahy vs Linden Lab: This just gets weirder

Fahy vs Linden Lab: This just gets weirder originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 20 Apr 2010 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Last week, on Thursday 8 April, Corey Fahy in Philadelphia filed a lawsuit against Linden Lab and more than 25 others, in the Pennsylvania East District Court (case number 2:2010cv01561, assigned to judge Joel Harvey Slomsky). Fahy alleges that an algorithm in one of his Second Life products has been subjected to copyright infringement, accompanied by the usual requests for damages, statutory damages, ten times damages, attorney's fees and all that.

Where do we even begin? We'll spare you most of the cruft and go straight to the heart of the problems that we can see with this particular lawsuit.

Continue reading Fahy vs Linden Lab: No case to answer?

Fahy vs Linden Lab: No case to answer? originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 14 Apr 2010 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

This week, in The Virtual Whirl, we're taking a look at the vigilante side of intellectual property rights.

For many, it seems like a good idea to mass-report or name-and-shame intellectual property rights violators whenever and wherever you see them ... but is it really?

Continue reading The Virtual Whirl: Of villains and crusaders

The Virtual Whirl: Of villains and crusaders originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 13 Feb 2010 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

When we're logged into Second Life and discussing various products, items, goods and clothing, we'll often refer to owning something that we've purchased. It's a very natural sort of metaphor. We're not, however, under any actual illusion that we own the items in question.

We read the Second Life Terms of Service when we signed up, and we're well-aware that we haven't been given ownership of the virtual goods we paid for, nor has any purchase taken place in the legal sense.

Continue reading Property, Second Life, backups and you

Property, Second Life, backups and you originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 15 Dec 2009 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

While Linden Lab allows you to submit a DMCA notice via post or fax, there is a third option that's valid while you're waiting for the promised new DMCA process to come along.

While many service- and platform-providers insist that they do not accept emailed DMCA notices, if you submit them correctly, the provider is lawfully obligated to accept them. Interestingly, a proper DMCA notice by email can actually give the recipient more surety about the identity of the submitter than faxed or posted notices.

Continue reading How to email a Second Life DMCA notice

How to email a Second Life DMCA notice originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 31 Oct 2009 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Remember Kevin Alderman (known in Second Life as Stroker Serpentine), CEO of Eros LLC who is one of the plaintiffs who have filed a lawsuit against Linden Lab for negligence with respect to security and failing to act in accordance with their obligations under the DMCA? Well, it can't be a good week for either him or for the Lab.

During Linden Lab's Burning Life event in Second Life this year (a sort of living pop-art showcase and party that draws many spectators) persons only presently known to the server logs left a cache of copied content, including at least one of Alderman's latest products, and a whole swag of other content belonging to other designers - free for the taking.

It isn't really Burning Life's fault, but if you had to place the stuff somewhere where many people would take it, none-the-wiser that it was unlawful content, that would be the best place at this time of the year.

Continue reading Second Life designers burned at Burning Life

Second Life designers burned at Burning Life originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 27 Oct 2009 10:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

With the lawsuit pending against Linden Lab, you'd think now would be a pretty poor time for them to mess up on handling IP rights infringement. You'd think that, wouldn't you?

Second Life user and content-creator, RobbyRacoon Olmstead, recently discovered one of his items had apparently been duplicated in infringement of his creator-rights. He obtained one of the copies, verified the matter to his satisfaction, and reported the matter to Linden Lab who suspended Olmstead's account the following day. Seriously, how much worse could the Lab have mucked that one up?

Continue reading Second Life content creator reports infringement, gets suspended [updated]

Second Life content creator reports infringement, gets suspended [updated] originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 23 Sep 2009 09:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Eros LLC, and graphic designer Shannon Grei (Munchflower Zaius) have filed a class-action lawsuit against Linden Research Inc, more commonly known as Linden Lab, developers and operators of popular virtual environment Second Life, on behalf of themselves and of copyright/trademark holders and Second Life content creators.

Filed in the Court of the Northern District of California yesterday, the complaint defines four groups of class action and alleges: four counts of trademark infringement (two direct, one contributory, and one vicarious), four counts of copyright infringement (two direct, one contributory, and one vicarious), a breach of California Business Professional Codes §§ 17200 and 17500, one of Intentional Interference with Economic Relations, and one of Negligent Interference with Economic Relations.

Continue reading Eros LLC, Shannon Grei form class action against Linden Lab for infringement

Eros LLC, Shannon Grei form class action against Linden Lab for infringement originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 16 Sep 2009 09:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Linden Lab yesterday published a "Content Management Roadmap" for Second Life, which outlines directions that they'll be taking towards Intellectual Property in future. Why then, you might wonder, is it not called an "Intellectual Property Roadmap"? We think that's because - to the Lab - Intellectual property issues all resolve down to content-management, at the platform level.

The roadmap covers five main sections, three of which basically comprise methods of helping honest folks stay honest, one which recognizes and rewards top-sellers, and one which allows more expeditious property violation notices. We're not really sure how much of a roadmap this really is, as it purports to cover less than six months, and describes projects already near completion. Nevertheless, it's interesting reading.

Continue reading A Second Life roadmap: Content-management/Intellectual-property

A Second Life roadmap: Content-management/Intellectual-property originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 05 Aug 2009 09:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Taser International Inc have filed a lawsuit against Linden Lab (and others, including some present and some departed) staff. We got a hold of the April 17 complaint yesterday, and have been going through it since then. We've got a summary of the complaint and issues for you, but we won't be linking to the complaint due to the presence of what may be considered to be pornographic images in Exhibit 2. The "crack den" reference in the headline is a recurring phrase in the legal complaint. You'll see why.

If you want the one-sentence summary, Taser seem to have failed to do their homework and basic research, but their case doesn't seem to be entirely without merit either.

Continue reading Taser International vs Linden Lab: Crack Den crackdown

Taser International vs Linden Lab: Crack Den crackdown originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 21 Apr 2009 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Earlier this year, we made a number of attempts to determine how Linden Lab handled DMCA notices on content in their virtual environment, Second Life. Linden Lab declined to answer at the time, however, the owners of a clothing and accessories store ~*Fresh Baked Goods*~ (whom we will call FBG for brevity) were recently the recipient of one such DMCA action, and have documented the whole process from their end of things.

It all started on Tuesday, 19 August 2008, when an email arrived from the Removals Department at Linden Research Inc (the proper name for Linden Lab). Citing three sets of necklaces as the offending articles, the owners of FBG were asked to disable or remove access to the content and were given two days to fax a formal DMCA counter-notice to Linden Lab, including their physical identities and contact information, which Linden Lab would then pass on to the person or organization who filed the original DMCA notice.

	Are you a part of the most widely-known collaborative virtual environment or keeping a close eye on it? Massively's Second Life coverage keeps you in the loop.

Continue reading DMCA notices in Second Life: A practical example

DMCA notices in Second Life: A practical example originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 11 Sep 2008 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

On 14 November, 2003 Linden Lab caused quite a stir by announcing that users who created or published content via the Second Life service would "retain full intellectual property protection for the digital content they create, including characters, clothing, scripts, textures, objects and designs."

Essentially, the same rights that they'd have anywhere else (barring assorted terms of use/service to the contrary). It seems obvious, in many ways, but ultimately it's actually very rare. Terms of use/service which express a contradictory position are in the majority. In fact, go to the filing cabinet and pull out the contract for your current RL job. Odds are, there are a whole slew of creator rights that you've already signed away that have little or nothing to do with your job.

That, unfortunately, is the normal condition. When it comes to the new, novel, or creative -- almost everyone wants a piece of your pie, and few want to leave a slice for you, if they can avoid it. Even taking Sturgeon's (second) Law into account, competition for the remaining portion of human content and pop-culture is quite stiff.

Continue reading Peering Inside: The rights of creators

Peering Inside: The rights of creators originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 30 Jun 2008 10:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

After taking a working day to mull over and polish a response, Linden Lab has posted it to their official blog.

The net result of the post unfortunately, judging by responses and discussion elsewhere appears to inflame and annoy involved consumers and creators, as users claim that the response is tangential and evasive.

Continue reading Linden Lab responds to DMCA concerns

Linden Lab responds to DMCA concerns originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 17 Jun 2008 23:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

There are widespread reports today that Linden Lab has removed all content from Second Life (from in-world, and from user inventories and object contents) that were the work of a small number of users, apparently over DMCA issues.

Hitherto, Linden Lab has a reputation for only taking down specific, identified items in-world -- stuff that you could point to. Indeed, it attracted criticism for not also removing other copies of such items from in-world and from user-inventories.

Now, it seems the Lab is going large, and doing just that.

Continue reading Linden Lab's big content takedown

Linden Lab's big content takedown originally appeared on Massively on Sun, 15 Jun 2008 01:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Linden Lab reports that it is putting more 'resources' on to DMCA duty to deal with improper duplication of content in Second Life.

This would be a significant improvement over reports of one person, not even performing the DMCA processing full-time. We don't think the new people will be full-time either, but more person-hours either way. Well, that's all assuming that 'resources' means people. Maybe it means the rumored part-time DMCA processor is now full-time.

Continue reading Peering Inside: Linden Lab, the DMCA, and content

Peering Inside: Linden Lab, the DMCA, and content originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 14 Apr 2008 10:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Cel Edman (aka Elout de Kok outside of Second Life) has withdrawn his popular, and free displacement map creation tool Sculptypaint for several days citing piracy of the packs of textures that he sells as the root cause, as well as slow and half-hearted response to DMCA notices by Linden Lab.

While Edman doesn't name specific names of those stealing the texture packs that he sells to fund development and distribution of the popular tool, he does finger one specific group for distributing his commercial products, a group called the Mental Mentors.

Continue reading Second Life tool suspended, author blames Linden Lab's DMCA procedures, mentor piracy

Second Life tool suspended, author blames Linden Lab's DMCA procedures, mentor piracy originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 06 Mar 2008 17:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.