Linden Lab's big content takedown
Filed under: Economy, News items, Second Life, Legal, Virtual worlds
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.
Two of the names mentioned so far are Eva Capalini, and Loni Arado -- neither of whom appear in the Second Life user database anymore (banned or canceled accounts).
The content in question appear to be scripts and textures which have been either distributed as free, full-permissions items, or sold for incorporation in other products -- and therein lies the problem.
Hincapie Schmertzin (posting on the Second Life forums) said, "We are running a shoe business and based many of our shoes on patterns bought from Loni Arado. Every pattern was obviously purchased in good faith - just as our buyers bought shoes in good faith. Today, we and they woke up to every single pair of shoes being non-rezzable. As such, the problem has ended up in the hands of ordinary secondlifers running businesses."
Second Life user Joshua Nightshade has created a JIRA issue, requesting clarification from Linden Lab for their apparently unannounced change in DMCA policy.
The affected content appears to be scripts and textures, many of which are widely used. It seems that any content with Eva Capalini or Loni Arado listed as the creator is simply no longer available, including sculpt-textures and widely used animation/pose scripts.
Reports are a little confused as to whether objects containing the blacklisted components were removed entirely, or whether only the components themselves are no longer available within the system, but in the cases we've verified so far, it seems to be the latter. This seems to particularly affect many versions of the very popular 'MLP scripts' (originally created by Miffy Fluffy) and widely used in a large variety of products over a number of years.
To be clear, Miffy Fluffy's content is still good, but certain copies of it by some other creators may not be. Various textures from other creators are similarly affected.
If you purchased such a product, the content is now broken, and you've wound up the loser. The creators who have had their content blacklisted have more than likely profited from the venture. The store where you bought your lost products may have acquired the components in good faith.
Certainly, the move could well shake the faith in the Second Life economy, as many quite reputable creators and sellers are affected by this, and the loss of confidence may injure the businesses of many more. Additionally, we have what appears to be a change in action policy without prior notice.
Wholesale content removal (based on a correct or incorrect claim) is the norm in many DMCA actions online. The remover of the content (in this case) Linden Lab, is indemnified by the DMCA for any liability or loss to third parties as a result of such a content takedown, so long as the procedure is followed rigorously.
It's conceivable that some creators will start to put up signs to reassure customers, about refund policies or claiming 100% original content -- but people who are stealing content are able to do the same, so that's hardly a good guide.
It is rumored that Linden Lab will be making some sort of official statement on the matter in the coming days.
We have contacted Linden Lab for official comment.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
6-15-2008 @ 3:10AM
skribe said...
More ridiculous knee-jerk reactions that completely undermine business confidence. How hard was it for LL to deliver a press release explaining the problem now rather than waiting days (or maybe weeks)? The CEO really needs to pull his finger out on this inability to get his communications people up to speed and on message.
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6-15-2008 @ 3:42AM
Jay said...
Ha, this is exactly what Anne O'Toole and her ilk were calling for (Along with banning all of Brazil from SL) so that's who people's anger should be directed to.
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6-15-2008 @ 9:54AM
Tony Drummond said...
So is this why my house has suddenly disappeared. That is crazy, as far as I know it had no scripts and no sculpties.
Maybe the textures...but I bought it from what I thought was a reputable trader.
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6-15-2008 @ 11:46AM
marxdudek@gmail.com said...
Loni Arado's shop was located next to my property when I lived in Lyralo. Flying over there now out of curiosity to see what's become of the property.
Yep, shop's gone (Lyralo 191,63) and his group (OMG! SCULPTORS INC) is empty. So how does this work, anyway? If the land is group owned, and the group is emptied of members, what becomes of the land? If Lyralo weren't currently lagged to hell by a sex skybox rentals, I suppose I'd might actually be interested in finding out.
Also looks like ALOHA FREE PARADISE (home to Loni's other shops is showing "unavailable or no longer exists").
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6-15-2008 @ 4:44PM
Vryl Valkyrie said...
Would be nice to see all of the thousands of textures that Lilybeth Filth illegally sold in TRU textures. Content theft needs to stop and LL needs to take it more seriously so this is a step in right direction, hopefully.
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6-15-2008 @ 4:49PM
Ann Otoole said...
Sorry but this is not what the honest creators of Secondlife have been calling for. Seems LL may be "indemified" or think they are but it seems they missed something called Good Faith. But then again this may be the only way to accomplish a takedown under the existiong DMCA.
For those that don't know what Good Faith is:
"The term good faith is used in many areas of the law but has special significance in Commercial Law. A good faith purchaser for value is protected by the Uniform Commercial Code, which every state has adopted. Under sections 1-201(9) and 2-403 of the code, a merchant may keep possession of goods that were bought from a seller who did not have title to the goods, if the merchant can show he or she was a good faith purchaser for value. To meet this test, the person must be a merchant, must have demonstrated honesty in the conduct of the transaction concerned, and must have observed reasonable commercial standards of fair dealing in the trade. A buyer would likely meet these requirements if the purchase proceeded in the ordinary course of business. If, on the other hand, the purchase took place under unusual or suspicious circumstances, a court might conclude that the buyer lacked good faith.
Where a nonmerchant purchases property that the seller lacks legal title to convey, the issue of good faith is known both as the innocent purchaser doctrine and as the bona fide purchaser doctrine. If the purchaser acquires the property by an honest contract or agreement and without knowledge of any defect in the title of the seller, or means of knowledge sufficient to charge the buyer with such knowledge, the purchaser is deemed innocent."
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6-15-2008 @ 6:09PM
Tie said...
actually Ann that is only US law and differs in the UK. And as only 45% of the user base are US that's one of the challenges.
I am a content creator and a legal owner of my work. It's design rights registered. Therefore I want all copies removed from all databases.
I do feel sorry for those who brought stolen versions, but buyer beware. It's why we have asked over and over and over for the content creator level accounts with enhanced RL validation. That way somebody commits theft/fraud/borrows a nice picture - there can be legal accountability.
Also as most are long gone, perhaps you questions should be directed as those who exit USD from a virtual platform where the company performs ZERO money laundering checks. PayPal 1700 EUR in Europe and you need bank account validation level, address and phone validation level. Linden Lab perform none.
I actually want full removal for every DMCA case. Because Linden Lab hold zero legal right to have it on their asset servers. If they continue with it for the good faith users, they are breaching my IP and therefore will fail the test for Safe Harbor.
They are now reacting correctly.
6-15-2008 @ 11:38PM
Tateru Nino said...
Good Faith can be argued, but the argument would have to take place between the person who purchased in good faith, and the copyright holder. Probably in front of a judge in many cases, if there's no easy agreement.
A copyright holder gets to decide who does and who doesn't get content and under what circumstances or conditions (within the framework provided by law).
For Linden Lab's part, they either comply with the takedown and derive some basic immunity, or challenge it (the latter being a potentially costly process) and risk some liability. Granted, that's a bit of a simplification, but it's a workable guide.
Some have argued that this is one of the principle flaws of the DMCA; for example, the EFF co-founded by Mitch Kapor (ex-chairman of and currently board-member of Linden Lab) has argued this point on a number of occasions.
6-15-2008 @ 8:05PM
Chez Nabob said...
Actually Tie, I believe you would be subject to U.S. law in this case as LL's servers reside on U.S. soil and I believe the Agreement you "signed" binds you to U.S. law and specifically the state of California should any legal entanglements arise.
Of course, I could be wrong.
But the real reason I wanted to jump in here is that I think this is a HUGE step in the right direction. I do agree that LL should have issued a statement regarding the policy change (assuming there actually is a change and not just some glitch due to an asset server snafu), but I think they'll need to make tough calls like this for a while in order to crack down on the rampant theft that's been allowed to continue for years.
In many ways this is a situation that LL has turned a blind eye to with only occasional lip service paid to the issue of IP rights infringement. I feel sorry for the customers and legitimate businesses who have been victimized by the steps LL appears to now be taking. However, I think ultimately this is what needs to be done.
If a clearer, more effective IP rights/DMCA policy would have been established right off the bat, we wouldn't have needed to launch the I.P. rights campaign, Stoker, Rebel, Nephilaine, et al wouldn't have had to go to court, hundreds of thousands and more likely millions of dollars would not have been lost by legitimate content creators and finally this drastic measure they've taken this weekend would have been entirely unnecessary.
But I do commend them for FINALLY taking a step in the right direction.
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6-15-2008 @ 9:04PM
Digit Darkes said...
I totally Agree with Tie, It Should all be removed....Maybe this way there wouldnt be any of those SHI^^Y A$$ Business in a box stores that look like TRASH, and only sell things THE SELLER DId NOT create.....BEsides isnt second life's Slogan....your world...YOUR imagination? Whats imaginative about selling other peoples Creations? AND this WAY if anyone Wants to buy use my hair Textures for Example, they can come to me directly, Pay me for them, and SIGN a RELEASE form and LOOK me in the EYE!!! HAHAHA
Because, IT is the WORST feeling in the WORLD when your Textures were RIPPED and it is on SL Exchange WEBSITE BEST SELLERS List for half the Price your selling it for, and you cant do anything about it.
THE absolute WORST.
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6-16-2008 @ 6:26AM
Vryl Valkyrie said...
In my case with TRU Textures and also a few other smaller merchants, had they removed all of the textures from the database .. there would be plenty of naked prims in SL today since most of SL is textured with Marlin Studios and Half Life 2 textures..
I do think this is the appropriate thing to do. An example was needed to be made. Unfortunately it wasn't done sooner. I only hope that LL keeps it up... naked prims or not.. missing in action or not.. this will also not only make the seller more *cough* honest but shall also make the buyer more aware.
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6-16-2008 @ 7:10AM
Jeanine Berkmans said...
This stupid action of SL affects my bed selling business and my customers extremely. It appeared that the .positions and .notecards that I used in most of my beds and tubs were originally created by Eva Capalini (I really have no idea why), and now there are gone from all the beds that I had rezzed in my shop. I have sold hundreds of beds and tubs in the last half year, all my customers will be harmed by this. Strangely enough the beds in my inventory, and the contents of it that I copied to my inventory were not affected. But why delete notecards? Surely they don't infringe any copyrights... This may harm my reputation as a seller :((((
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6-16-2008 @ 10:40AM
Marx Dudek said...
Who knows how many individual pieces of content they were dealing with? (Think "I have to organize my inventory".) It is extremely odd that your configuration notecards (but nothing else?) were "authored" by EC. Did the configurations vary from a standard set? If not (or if you had a copy of the configuration saved as a textfile off-world), and you have a shop in-world, it shouldn't be hard to create a distribution point for new notecards and installation instructions.
Oh, and signs. Big, big signs. "O hai, LL borked your bed? I kan haz a fix!"
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6-16-2008 @ 12:42PM
River Ely said...
If TRU take a dive, I am gonna be well upset, i hate to think of the thousands I have t paid to them.
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6-16-2008 @ 2:10PM
Zoey Pinkdot said...
I think its absolutely fabulous that this has begun and I hope it continues. Take it all down!! We were affected by the MLB scripts just as you were Jeanine. We have many beds now that customers cannot even use. BUT we had no idea the scripts were stolen and are more than happy to hire a custom scripter or purchase a reputable system. I in no way even want to use this script anymore. Do you really want your products linked to something stolen Jeanine? I know I don't. So if this means it will take me a while to sift through customer complaints and fix my system then so be it. Its a gamble you take when useing something that is free and full permissions.
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6-16-2008 @ 4:41PM
Ordinal Malaprop said...
Ms Pinkdot, you seem to have entirely misunderstood the situation. The MLP scripts were not stolen. That is the point here.
6-16-2008 @ 2:26PM
sirhc DeSantis said...
So now I will go inworld and find my inventory full of broken/unusable items. Thats just great, really ends off a crap weekend beautifully. Way to go Lab
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6-16-2008 @ 3:21PM
Elaina said...
If you purchased these items from reputable designers then I am willing to bet they will be more than happy to help you. I know we are. We have gone above and beyond to fix every bed of every customer that has contacted us and are in the process of redoing all of the beds on our sim. Its a great thing that Linden Labs is finally taking a stance on this and I hope they continue to do so. Maybe now we'll finally get rid of the tons of 'riff raff' that flood the grid...or at least cut down on it.
6-16-2008 @ 6:21PM
Vryl Valkyrie said...
Don't reconfigure the old beds with new cards or you will be in the same position as Eva. Those animations were stolen. Pirated. Non authorized.
My bf and his partner had a thriving animation business until this female dog came along and sold illegal animations full perm. She destroyed his animation business.
He has legitimate animations and a sex box for beds. So yay.. he and his partner are back in business again since more than half of SL cannot have virtual sex.. so love it.
I hope that woman for lack of a better word fries.
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6-16-2008 @ 6:40PM
Stroker Serpentine said...
FREE SEXGEN
I have spoken to my staff and we are willing to replace these broken beds with a 50 anim SexGen. I feel for the end user here who bought in good faith, but I also know that LL is limited as to how they can approach such a pervasive issue. Not everyone is going to be happy.
That being said, if you will point your affected friends to this thread and its specifics we will do what we can to get our fellow enthusiasts back in the saddle :)
1. Contact Andrea Faulkner or Stroker Serpentine and mention this post.
2. Provide evidence (rez or transfer) of your broken Eva Capalini or Loni Arado creation to one of us.
3. Choose your style of bed from our shop here:
http://slurl.com/secondlife/Eros/184/193/23
4. We will provide you with a FREE 50 anim SexGen bed.
This is a limited time offer because we do not want to be doing this forever. But we feel it is the least we can do to support the irradication of these agregious con artists. (and its good promotion !) Stroker Serpentine
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