On my post Friday I was called out for not listing solutions and for not “helping out”. I did however have a paragraph explaining what I would like to see done. However, it may have been missed. So below I am going to list some things I would like to see happen in order to help curb content theft.
Some of these ideas are not mine. However I think they have a great deal of merit and would like to see them implemented in some form or fashion.
1: Communication: We need to become more verbal with the folks in Linden Lab. We need to find out when and were office hours are, and we need to become more vocal at these meetings so that we can give feedback to our hosts. Huffing and Puffing “Lindens this” and “Lindens that” will not do it. We need to act professionally and politely and maybe we can start moving forward on being better able to protect our content.
2: Education: We need to start educating new residents and perhaps some of the less enlightened older residents on the impact content theft has on our Second Life. Perhaps something can be worked out with NCI and other resident education facilities and organizations to hold classes and seminars on why content theft is so incredibly bad for the consumer and creators alike. Kiosks could be placed in stores and other locations giving notecards relaying the same information.New residents need to be taught how to fill out complete abuse reports when they find stolen goods, and they need to be taught the consequences of purchasing the illegal wares.
3: Technology: For lack of a better term this is just building a better lock after somebody picks the one you have. Currently there are people out there working hard on making vendors that may prove difficult to steal from for example Reacher Rau has been working on a vendor system which may help slow down the theft.
4: Bloggers: As much as I am usually loathe to say this. Bloggers can indeed play an important role in the effort to stop or slow down content theft. When we see stolen goods and have proof their stolen, we need to get the word out. We need to teach those who are reading the same thing we want to teach the new residents.
5: Ban Brazilians: Actually I am just kidding. But seriously why is it most of the content thieves come from this country?
Have suggestions? Ideas on how to help? Post them in the comments below.
9 Comments(+Add)
I’ll just repost what I posted on the SLU forums.
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Has anyone actually considered the idea of having an advocacy PLATFORM for this sort of thing?
I’m with everyone else who is of the mind that this idea just will not work, mostly because LL simply will not notice or care that a few hundred people out of 200,000 active players are shutting down their stores for 48 hours. Ultimately, tier still needs to be paid, lindens will still be cashed out later, shopping will still happen once this is done, and anything you don’t upload in those 48 hours will still be uploaded at a later time. Basically – I fail to see how you’re accomplishing anything by waiting 48 hours to do something you’re inevitably going to do anyway.
As someone who’s spent most of her adult life working for advocacy nonprofits, my thought is this: why not form an actual advocacy group? Release a kiosk in-world for people to set in their stores to educate customers. Develop a kiosk where people can send emails from within SL to Linden Lab in support of content theft policy reform. HAVE content-theft awareness sales/merchandise – raise awareness not only of theft but of the TRUE content creators in SL. Rally at Linden office hours and press the issue. Send “letters to the editor”, or in this case, blogs, in-world magazines, ad space, in-world TV shows, and social networking platforms (i.e. forums, SL Profiles, the many, many SL NING sites, SLU, etc). There could even be in-world fund-raising events to raise money to perform some sort of real-world advocacy movement to hit LL at their offices, like a fax campaign, petition delivery, or making phone calls.
Ultimately, trying to drain LL of any sort of substantial amount of money (especially over the span of 48 hours) is a folly idea, simply because unless you manage to get every major store owner and every land baron on your side, you won’t even be a penny in the collection plate. And let’s not forget the LL/SL sedition ‘laws’, which raise a whole other set of problems on their own.
Being an advocate for change is great, but it only works if you’re realistic in your goals and know how to go about attempting to achieve them. Coming hard and fast out of the gate rarely, if ever, works. No one starts at the top, Rome wasn’t built in a day, even Picasso had to start with doodles on paper, and all that. And while I don’t believe that this particular method (no shopping/uploading/buying/selling for 48 hours) will work, it’s not to say that there aren’t other things that could be done to garner LL’s attention elsewhere through different means.
I like all these ideas a lot. Very nice. I also want to suggest when we are reporting content theft cases and such via blogs, groups, etc. that we not allow comments and such that actually FREAKING TELL PEOPLE HOW TO DO IT. I have seen this all over the place lately. Someone writes a blog post about how their stuff got stolen or how their friends stuff got botted or whatever and some tool in the comments is all “oh yeah they can be done by taking prim a and doing blah blah and then taking prim b and doing blah blah. easy as pie!.” And all i want to do is find them and cut them.
#4:
I do this myself. I read very few other blogs, but when I see an item that I like, I’ll TP over to the store to check it out. I’ve found stolen content more than once, and have had the unpleasant task of asking that blogger to pull their post on the item (or at least remove the item name, store name, and slurl.) It sucks, but it has to be done. Unfortunately some places that are brimming with stolen content continue to get blogged because they give out freebies pretty regularly. The ripped designers have not and will not file DMCAs, so the content lives on, and some just look the other way.
As far as #2 goes, I don’t think it will help much. I’m not discouraging anyone from doing it, but I honestly thing a lot of people won’t give a shit. I recently taught a month-old account how to unpack boxes and adjust prims. I noticed her hair was stolen, and her skin was suspect. I didn’t call her out on them specifically; I simply said to watch out for freebie areas, because they may have ripped content. She abruptly left. This leads me to believe that she knew she was wearing stolen content and didn’t care.
I know some want to educate the world on the content theft issue. I think that could potentially be disastrous. I watched a video with screen shots of hair stolen from the Teen Grid, and YouTube linked it to a copybot demonstration video. Number of hits on the TG hair theft video at the time? 15. Number of hits on the copybot demonstration video? 31,000 and then some. Plus, the comments were chock full of, “okay, I’m sold. How do I get it?”
I really believe telling the public about SL’s content theft issue (and in the process telling them that you can look ‘fabulous’ for free) would open up a whole other can of worms.
Ryker, as to advocacy, Roslin Petion and Chez Nabob have been talking about this for a while, I think. I’ve recently been talking with Roslin, also, and we are in the very beginning stages of creating a forum for open dialogue with the intent to develop a proactive plan of action. We would love to have input and participation from as many people as possible and are looking at the most effective ways to facilitate collaboration and sharing of ideas.
Also, I think anyone who rents a space in a mall should be aware of who is around them. Before you rent, do you look around at your neighbors? Do you see BIAB stuff, or a ripped skin for sale? Do you still rent there?
I’ve been in some pretty shitty malls and have seen some great creators there, which makes me wonder, “What are you doing here?” If ANY content creator looks the other way when surrounded by ripped content, this problem will never be solved.
Don’t know for sure that it’s stolen? Take a pic and ask around. Better to know for sure than to let it slide.
These are good suggestions and, of course, no rational person is *for* content theft.
This comment is not directed at your post specifically, Dancien, it is more of a general inquiry. How am I going to recognize ripped skins? I have been in SL for over 2 years and I cannot tell who makes what skin or hair at a glance – so how will a new resident? I am really asking this – what are we, the consumers, supposed to be looking for? I cannot get a demo and then compare it to every skin on the grid. I cannot memorize every nuance of every hair maker so that I can spot a certain creator’s design instantly. As a consumer I feel powerless.
Do you want another idea for the list though? Here is one – limit or stop allowing free accounts. When it gets inconvenient to be a thief, there will be fewer thieves, IMHO. Yup – it is drastic. But then again so is content theft.
@Tym – I had this same convo about ripped skins and clothes (i.e. no prims) with a friend of mine who makes clothes, skin and hair and he says it would be very difficult to spot this because its one with the avatar so to speak – maybe degradation of the textures?
@Dancien – wonderful suggestions and how to hate to beat a dead horse but Artist’s Voice has the same ideas as well. I just think too many are focusing on the protest instead of looking to see what else the group is hoping to accomplish. Why not start another group? There doesn’t have to be one group devoted to this – the more the better I think. Anyway enough said and thanks for following up on your previous post with these ideas.
I heard the allegation that the majority of content thefts come from Brazil a lot. Can it actually be proved?
@Tymmerie
I don’t recognize all skins or hair on the grid. Not hardly. I recognize the designers I wear most often. I have the genuine Naughty Designs Alina skin that was ripped and can be found all over the grid. I walked into a place that had great sneakers and saw “my face” on the wall (slightly degraded) as part of a skin/shape package and knew they were selling the rip. Sometimes it’s the little things on a skin that make it instantly recognizable: a certain collarbone, the lips, eye makeup, like “hey, aren’t those RockBerry lips?”
As far as hair is concerned, I practically lived at ETD in my first year. Her designs are recognizable to me. Others, not so much.
This is why, when someone finds stolen content, they often reach out to their friends. When lots of people get together, more things are identified and reported, and more creators are notified.
The only time I, as a consumer, feel powerless is when a designer refuses to DMCA the ripper. We found a bunch of stolen skins, and the designer was “too busy IRL” to prosecute the thief. That makes our abuse reports invalid, and the ripped content stays. If some designers won’t stand up for themselves, then I feel this… movement… may never really be as effective as it needs to be.