Continue reading The SOPAbox: Defeating online piracy by destroying the internet

The SOPAbox: Defeating online piracy by destroying the internet originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 10 Jan 2012 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Gamigo buys Black Prophecy, buys into Reakktor Media originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 27 Jan 2011 21:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

The last time we saw any statistical data on overall awareness of intellectual property issues, it seemed that awareness of copyright and trademarks was quite appallingly low - and actual accurate knowledge about them was a very rare thing indeed.

Surprisingly few people seem to know their way around the don't-do basics, and with record numbers of trademarks being registered in recent years, it is actually nice to see that some online operators have got a firm grip on things this year.

Honestly, if you tossed a press release on our collective desk touting your virtual environment or MMOG having items or outfits available in support of the 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa[TM] ... well, it'd probably cause an avalanche of pizza boxes ... but after we got the mess cleared, we'd probably assume that your promotional stuff was littered with unlicensed FIFA trademarks. It's happened before.

Continue reading Online operators avoid balls-up with football trademarks

Online operators avoid balls-up with football trademarks originally appeared on Massively on Tue, 29 Jun 2010 21:00:00 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.

Seems that most of what you hear in and about Second Life recently revolves around creator rights, copyrights, trademarks, intellectual property rights, infringement and so forth. It's not that intellectual property infringement is new - you can certainly replicate content with the official viewer if you know how - but it is in the limelight and a major feature of Second Life discussions by virtue of assorted high-profile infringements, and legal actions.

Copyright infringement can't be made to go away. Since the Statute of Anne in 1710 originally codified copyrights in law, infringement has only been somewhat quelled by various means, never practically eliminated. In these predominantly digital times, there are many new tradeoffs could be made that could reduce the incidence of infringement, but at the cost of also reducing functionality.

Continue reading What compromises would you make to reduce Second Life copyright infringement?

What compromises would you make to reduce Second Life copyright infringement? originally appeared on Massively on Sun, 01 Nov 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.

Last week, as you might recall, we covered a tale that really caught people's interests, and warmed the hearts of many a Second Life content-creator; That Linden Lab had run a bit of a sting, which neatly suckered a bunch of copyright infringers, resulting in their banning.

In the wake of that, a number of readers (indeed quite a lot of you) wrote in to tell us that you had heard that the bans of most or all of the those involved had been reversed within a day or so. While people do indeed circulate all manner of rumors, that would certainly be quite an interesting turn of events, so we got some legwork done to see if we could get to the bottom of it.

Continue reading Copyright infringement bans upheld, or repealed?

Copyright infringement bans upheld, or repealed? originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 16 Oct 2009 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Numerous Second Life content creators are warning their clientele that the Web-site virtualget.net (which has been apparently been operating for a couple of months now) is a credit-card harvesting scam. Whether that's correct or not, the site appears to be using the product images and product descriptions and trademarks of numerous Second Life content creators without their permission. The original images and text appear on Linden Lab's Xstreet SL virtual goods shopping Web-site.

Numerous DMCA notices are reportedly being filed by content creators at present. We attempted to contact virtualget.net (anonymously registered in Singapore) for comment, but none of their email addresses appeared to be functional -- One email address was restored to function when the majority of the site was taken down a short time ago, but we received no response. Linden Lab, who has an intellectual property stake in the matter, was not available for comment either.

Users of Kaspersky protection software found the Web-site marked as a phishing site several hours ago, presumably based on user reports.

Update: The operation seems to have disabled access to much of the site in the wake of numerous DMCA notices filed by content-creators.

	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.

Second Life content creators warn about scam site originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 07 Oct 2009 11:00:00 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.

This week, Linden Lab announced a move to quash casual infringement of marks, rights and copyrights on their Web-based Second Life goods service, Xstreet SL, among a general tightening of the listing rules.

It doesn't come as much of a surprise, really. Linden Lab has, it can be argued, a high level of contributory liability for material on Xstreet SL, compared to any user-based infringement in Second Life itself. Also, goods on Xstreet SL are readily visible to search-engines and lawyers, whereas in-world materials do not generally have that kind of visibility.

Continue reading Linden Lab tightens Xstreet SL rules

Linden Lab tightens Xstreet SL rules originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 14 Aug 2009 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Games and fan art go together like mashed potatoes and gravy -- you just don't have one with out the other. But how would you feel if you found a legal disclaimer in your favorite game's website terms of service that claimed that any fan art you produce, regardless of your intentions, is owned by the game company just because you depicted the IP?

That's what Woody Hearn from GU Comics found inside of the Bioware Tems of Service on the Star Wars: The Old Republic website. The paragraph in question (found in section 7 of the terms) essentially states that all fan art derived from any intellectual property of LucasArts and/or Bioware is explicitly the property of LucasArts and/or Bioware. So that stormtrooper picture that you drew? Yeah, it belongs to LucasArts.

Hearn has already explicitly stated that GU Comics won't be featuring any more Star Wars: The Old Republic or other LucasArts / Bioware titles until the policy changes. While he is covered under the fair use law for satire, any other pieces drawn by other artists may not be.

Bioware owns you... or at least your fan art originally appeared on Massively on Sun, 31 May 2009 17:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Over the last few months, there's been an increasing amount of talk about the modified Second Life viewer being used with Open Life Grid (a third-party virtual environment based on reverse-engineered and open-source systems and protocols). Most of the talk centers around copyright infringement -- or license violations, if you prefer.

It's claimed that the operators of Open Life Grid are failing to comply with the source-code licenses (the GPL with FLOSS exceptions) under which the Second Life source code has been made available. Now, while the issue has been reported to Linden Lab's license-infringement hotline, the issue is actually a bit trickier for the Lab than it would first appear.

You see, the viewer code contains contributions from a number of third-party contributors, each of which retains their copyright, intellectual property and rights to their contributions under the terms of the contribution agreement. All of whom have the right to commence their own actions.

Continue reading Linden Lab's collective copyright conundrum

Linden Lab's collective copyright conundrum originally appeared on Massively on Sun, 22 Mar 2009 16:00:00 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.

The suspicion of [Name Removed] originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 24 Apr 2008 10:31:00 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.

Blue Mars developer too good at replicating reality originally appeared on Massively on Mon, 24 Mar 2008 09:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

V-Day to come to Second Life: sadly not entirely smooth sailing originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 26 Jan 2008 12:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

After Aimee's post on the actions of Guide Hawk (or guidehawk_ltd) with respect to using resident's imagery to promote his guide book, I asked Linden Lab about Guide Hawk's claim that he paid and has authorization from Linden Lab for use of the material and their name for promotion of his auctions.

Linden Lab's response was - well, they declined to answer the question.

Continue reading Guide Hawk, and intellectual property - Linden Lab responds, sort of

Guide Hawk, and intellectual property - Linden Lab responds, sort of originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 15 Nov 2007 05:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Continue reading Intellectual property: If it's not nailed down ...

Intellectual property: If it's not nailed down ... originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 10 Nov 2007 18:23:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Continue reading Second Lifers sue over item theft

Second Lifers sue over item theft originally appeared on Massively on Fri, 02 Nov 2007 14:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.