Stolen items question

$$$ sigh

I once made a little personal assistant robot, back in the day (about when Grey and Blue and all the other big theme sims came out). Somehow, a copy got out, full copy/mod (I think it went public, because I never gave out ANY copies). It spread like wildfire :\

I feel ya, Cris.

> This seems to have been a one time thing that happened a while back, however,
> many people didn't realize it happened and haven't checked all their items (we're
> still finding one or two we missed ourselves).

Is this the case now? Can anyone here affirm that the problem still exists for
items they've already created before the fix? Or is the current issue more for
the reasons that Aimee suggests-- fear that another version of this bug/whatever
may crop up again, and a desire to be compensated for the impact it's already had,
before it was fixed?

My beef isn't just that it happened, my problem is also the policy of doing nothing about it.

I can understand bugs, but people who choose to exploit those bugs and go unpunished, that's where I, and I believe Aimee as well, are getting frustrated.

Aimee,

Sorry you're so frustrated. I don't blame you for being upset if someone made a joke of an unhappy situation. Without having witnessed the conversation, it's hard to gage, but if whatever was said was uncalled for then I guess there's no excuse for that.

As for your other points, I agree that something needs to be done, but I can understand that there is trememdous difficulty in deciding what action should be taken and how situations should be judged. I don't blame LL for having a policy of simply staying out of it (if indeed that is their policy). In their place I might do the same thing.

What you call an "OBVIOUS rip-off" may be just that to you, perfectly obvious, since you are operating from the point of view of someone immediately involved in the situation. However, from a mediator's point of view it may not be that simple. How is a mediator to know what the real truth is? Is the rip-off artist really a crook or is the accuser trying to cause trouble for an innocent person? Was the whole thing a misunderstanding or was there malicious intent?

In the real world we have trials and law suits to decide these things, processes which take months, sometimes years in order to insure fairness to the highest possible degree. How to handle these situations within SL is a huge question with no immediately obvious answer. Should we hold trials in SL? Should the Lindens have ultimate say in determining guilt or innocence, and if so, by what criteria should they judge? What should be the punishment for someone "found guilty"? With the world continuing to grow at a rapid pace, how much of LL's limited resources should be invested into "criminal precedings"?

As for compensation for losses suffered due to bugs, that would be wonderful, but again it raises questions that are nearly impossible to answer. What constitutes a legitimate loss? How do you tell a real victim from a con artist trying to milk the system? How do you isolate someone who has legitimately suffered due to a bug versus someone who suffered for some other reason, either by their own stupidity or by attack from another individual? Should LL really be held responsible if a malicious person exploits a bug or should the person be held responsible? Does LL now need to employ investigators to examine every claim of loss? Would a good solution be the implimentation of private "insurace companies" by SL residents so that LL does not have to be involved?

The point here is that there is a much larger picture to consider than just "I lost money and I want LL to fix it". There are fundamental consequnces to the community and the culture as a whole every time any such decisions are made. As I said earlier, I was deprived of untold earnings from all the sales I missed out on when I got smacked with 3 permissions resets in a row, but I never once considered asking LL to compensate me. This was because first of all, I blamed not LL for my woes but the actual individuals who chose to exploit the bugs (If an earthquake were to knock down the door to a bank vault and someone looted the vault, you wouldn't blame the earthquake; you'd blame the thief), second, there was no way to PROVE anyone had stolen anything, and third I knew that all the fundamental questions I just mentioned would have to be answered before LL would ever be able to decide if and how to act in response to the situation. So, I simply filed a bug report and asked them to fix the bug. I already told you of their response, which was more than I had hoped for.

Someday perhaps there will be good answers to all these questions, but until there are, painful as it may be, I have no choice but to support LL if they choose to stay out of these things. The day they do decide to take action is a day that will have immeasurable ramifications for all of us. I sicerely hope they consider wisely before that day comes.

"OBVIOUS rip-off"s are when someone is selling or giving away one of YOUR sale items, with your name still attached as the creator, and you ask them to stop, and they do not. I am not sure where there is room for fuzzyness when your name is on it. They could claim you gave your sale item out with full privs and then changed your mind. But even in that case, you have NOW made it clear that the person should not be selling the item.

Yes, I understand that there is a cost involved to get justice. I just think it will be a healthy discussion to determine what costs the Lindens can afford to pay to keep producers producing. If the answer is "none...the way we are doing it is the only way it can be done", then the loss of productive players like myself and others will simply be the lesser of two evils.

But honestly, I think the Lindens can do better. In a previous post I made mention to SL harassment issues and how they are, by necessity, handled on a case by case basis by the Lindens. The proceedings do not take months or years. It's done this way because leaving the issue of harassment untouched by the Lindens would be worse, not better for the SL community. I think there are ways this same model can be used for theft and I think the results would pay for the cost.

Regarding: "I lost money and I want LL to fix it". Clearly that is not what I am saying. Better to say: "I lost money, and if LL cannot promise this bug will never ever happen again (which is fine), what CAN they do to make me want to continue producing things in the future?" Reparations was just an idea I threw out there. But I would take anything above and beyond joking about my situation.

I understand your point, Designers and other producers are just one voice in the population, and decisions that aide them could hurt others. But we can only be advocates for ourselves. I would be doing SL a disservice if I faded off to other creative endeavors without giving the Lindens a chance to know how their current polices are discouraging us from producing and in some cases playing. The rest is up to them.

-aimee

Just to play devil's advocate for a moment, here's an example of how there could be "room for fuziness" in a situation like this. Let's say I make an item I don't really like enough to keep, but you do really like it so I give it to you. You like it so much you decide to show it to your friends, who also like it, so you sell them each a copy. Before you know it, you've got a booming business selling copies of that item I was going to throw away because I didn't appreciate the value of what I had. Now I come along and say "Wait a minute. I made that and now you're selling it. I should have been selling it. You ripped me off!"

Who's in the right here? That's not an easy question to answer. I gave you the item with full permissions on it, which means I geve you the right to resell it. What's to stop me though from crying that I never wanted it to become an item sold enmass. Do I as the creator still have rights even though I effectively gave those rights away? Do I have any right to demand that you stop selling even though you were granted the right to do so when you were given the item? Do you as the recipient have the right to do with as you please with an item I made? What if I go to the Lindens and say that I had made the item no-transfer, but due to what must have been a bug you were able to sell it anyway? How do they determine the truth?

That's just one example I made up off the top of my head. Here's another one, a more realistic one. Think about my avatars that were distributed when I got hit with the perms bugs. If I come across someone who received a copy of one of them from a friend, and the friend got it from some other friend who got it god knows where, do I have the right to demand that that person give it up? The creator in me says absolutely. I made it. I never intended for it to be distributed free, and this guy got it free so he should either pay up or lose it. However, the consumer in me says no. He had no idea the original source copy was bugged. All he knows is that is he was given something free, which for all he can see is still free to copy, and now some jerk has come along making demands of him, treating him like a criminal when he really hasn't done anything wrong. Once again, who is in the right? Does the creator maintain rights indefinitely or does there reach a point when it's time to say the consumer has just as much right? I really don't know how to answer to that.

I can think of plenty more examples. I think it's important to keep in mind that it's easy for any of us to approach these situations solely from the point of view of a creator, since that's what we are, but rarely is any issue as simple as anyone on just one side of it thinks it is. Once again, I totally agree that something needs to be done to give us better protection, but it's really hard to say exactly what would be fair. I have no doubt that this is likely a topic of frquent discussion around Linden conference tables. It would be impossible to imagine that it wouldn't be. As I said earlier, I just hope they consider very carefully before they decide how to handle these things.

That is indeed a fuzzy area, and can be resolved with a simple rule, that the creator has veto power over their creations. If someone wants to make a booming business selling an item they didn't create they can do so at their own risk provided everybody knows the rules from the very start. My plan would obvisouly be a boon to the creators, but who would it hurt? Well...people that take other people's items and stick them in a box for sale. I won't dismiss these people as useless but if you need to choose a party to favor when coming up with regulations, I think SL would have more to gain by siding with the creators.

Your second example -- the reason this is a dilema is because we are currently living in an SL environment where everybody knows there will be NO reprocussions for purchasing stolen goods. The person that bought the stolen item was blisfully unaware of any wrongdoing and would be just as much a victim if you took their avatar away. The answer? The Lindens make it known from the start "Purhcase items from anybody but the creator at your own risk!" Put this in the TOS, stick it in the new user guides, add it to the SL instructions. If a salesperson other than the creator tries to sell you something, you should send an IM to the creator and get the scoop first. Once this becomes well known and second nature, there will be no more dilema, it will just be common practice. And I don't think it will hurt good retailers as certain people will start to establish a good reputation in the game, nearly eliminating the need to check up on them if creator and seller names do not match.

Remember I am not just a creator. I am also a consumer. I buy stuff. I would like the credit of seeing this from both sides. I am just saying answers to these issues are not as confusing as they are made out to be.

-aimee

Whatever happened to the proposed integration of Creative Commons licenses into SL? That was a good idea, but it needs to go one step further, and add the extention that for closed-source works, the owner can retain the veto Aimee describes.

Further, there needs to be a better policy for policing content and taking action. I realize that the logistics of investigating every single "they stole my stuff!" complaint likely necessitates the current "yup, they stole your stuff all right! so?" policy, but I seriously think you need to run the numbers again here. You're losing your most valuble customers over this.

LL customer service (particularly when it comes to dispute resolution) has always been inconsistent at best. This is what I've always said was the biggest problem with Linden Lab. It's not that anyone's doing a bad job, it's that there evidently isn't enough communication or centralized logs of disputes or help requests with users. It's not like this is a small deal, either. The feeling that the Lindens really don't care will ultimately be worse for business and worse for SL than high prices or a buggy client could ever be.

Aimee,

Thanks for the lively discussion. I'm enjoying this and I hope you are too.

Anyway, I personally think your latest sugestions are good, especially the one about putting something in the literature instructing people to contact the creator before purchasing items from someone else. A pop-up window with a reminder window restating the policy with an "are you sure" button before the transaction is finalized might be even better.

I see two problems though (if you haven't figured it out yet, I'm trying to argue both sides of the case at once here). First, what if I grant you the right to sell my items, and then I get mad at you for some reason or I just go crazy or something, and then I change my mind. All of a sudden your profits are gone, your customers' items poof, and your reputation goes to hell, all because I'm a bastard and I wanted you to suffer. How is that fair? Second, as the previous example shows, your solution is incredibly one-sided. How do the seller and the consumer have any recourse against a creator who has all the power? There has to be a way to balance the concerns of all stakeholders or any policy is fundamentally flawed.

As a creator I'd certainly love to be as advantaged as you propose I should be, but it's just not fair.

It's a tuff situation.

Yes this is an outstanding discussion and I respect your opinions. I also think as far as creators go, you're fantastic. Remember when we first met you had your CHIANA AV... one that I had been trying to hard to make but couldn't

Remember that my issue is more abstract. I am not necessarily comitted to my own solutions to the specific problems you pose. I only offer up ideas to show that the problems are not insurmountable. More important to me is solving the general problem of "how do we keep producers producing for SL?" Hypnosis may be the answer for all I know

That said...the first issue, the "vindictive creator". Remember that a creator allowing someone else to do all the selling is an atypical situation, so disputes should be few. In those rare cases, all parties knowing the potential risk, why not draw up a contract? It doesn't have to be fancy, just a quick paragraph describing what all parties agree to. Both parties can then e-mail the agreement to a special linden address where it will be largely ignored until a dispute occurs. Then a Linden judges the case (and i don't think it would have to take months).

As for the second issue, I agree with you. Playing devils advocate for myself...I could as a creator sell all kinds of wonderful preen stuff and simply yank it all on a whim. That would suck. My reputation would be pretty much gone forever after that, but it still doesn't help the people already ripped off. I really do sympathize with the people that UNKNOWINGLY purchase or distribute stolen goods and I wouldn't want to see justice roll over them in a new plan.

-aimee

Chosen I have a simple Solution to your "The other person wants to sell it and make profit off of it."

Its very simple and is already being done. Player A wants to be a reseller of Player B's Items so Player B agrees and sets up a Vendor. Player A then subsequently "Rents" Locations to put the Vendor at. Then has Player B place the Vendor. The Vendor Gives both parties a cut and viola Player B maintains thier Rights and Player A works hard to get people to buy as it benifits both Players.

However, back to the current point here. Many things were given to people in the past were given with the correct permissions set.

Meaning initially it was like No Mod No Copy and transferable and then all of the sudden it becomes full mod rights via a bug.

Meanwhile the individual that recieved the orginal finds out and has since had a dispute with the creator.

Should the Creator pay a penalty of being ripped off because of a bug?
I mean this Item in question may very well be the life blood of that creator in world.
To have it stolen and reproduced in such a fashion dilutes there customer base and inspires lack of confidence in the creator when they will not support the item due to it has in essence invalidated the "warrenty".

So please explain to me where the lack of concern or attitude of "Oh Well" benifits either the customer or the creator.

I dare cite other instances of this as I have mentioned them before and the same arrogance of "Oh Well" has applied. In essence a lot of creators are feeling LIED to when it says you can maintain property rights. When in all essence its more like oh well if a bug comes up and you get screwed your screwed sorry. That leaves a very nasty taste in a persons mouth when told that.

Only other question I have right now is why all of the sudden is anyone taking notice hmmm?

This has been stated time and again on the forums especially by myself for one but this thread seems to have taken off in its enlightnment of the situation.

Why when other creators have spoken up in the past is this just now getting noticed?

I find it Ironic and condescending that attention is being focused on it now.
Where was the focus when it happend to others?
Where was the concern when it happend in the past?

People were to busy worrying about land barrons and trivial gom trading prices going up and down.
People were screaming foul on land scanners and club owner dwell.
People were screaming no comercialism and not on my door step and now all of the sudden concern is being placed on this.

I find it not only incidious but extremely nieve that people continue to focus on the problem of the moment. Funny how after 11 months of varied reports and sad comments of breech of contract or breech of permissions that this is finally comming to the forefront of peoples minds.

Am I being condescending in my statments of course I am. Am I bitter that I have been ripped off of course I am. Have I stopped making content for SL. NO. Some will call me hypocritical for saying what I have and still producing content.

But, I will say this I produce because I am enjoying it whether the politics are screwed all to hell or not I create for friends.

But at the same time I will speak out Foul and Injustice when I have seen it happen to other players.

This is why I question the focus now as it in a way eludes to a topic that has been discussed many times.
If the focus is derived from penchant for certain figures in SL then we have an even deeper rooted problem than just permissions.

With that being said I bid all a good day.

Sincerely, Shadow

hi All,

I caught up last night with Cristiano and Mistress, who gave me new ideas for stuff to look for in chasing possible bugs... I will look for any possible ways in the code (or a history in things we log) for objects that are inside other objects (for sale or in a vendor) to change their permissions.

Also, let me offer a L$10,000 reward to anyone who can bring me a working reproduction case of any bug in this category - inotherwards if you can show me an object and any set of actions you can take that causes the permissions on that object to change in a way that is not what the original creator set. Please IM me in-world if you can show me such a bug. In the case that a bug that changes permissions is found, we will patch it instantly (typically meaning the next day).

Regarding the customer support on these reports, I apologize for the LL team. It isn't our intent to seen unconcerned - sometimes we are just stressed and frustrated too - we have a very strong internal culture around content loss or damage - we NEVER want it to happen. So we probably get overly keyed up around investigating this stuff and then frustrated when we realize there is nothing we can do or that there is no way to trace the history of an event.

We are additionally looking into logging options that can help with tracking permissions changes on specific objects. We do not currently log every change to an object (imagine if you will the volume of that data across the grid), but will look at whether we can fractionally store enough history to help up trace any possible bugs or just help reconstruct the history of an object.

Again, I am sorry and we take these problems very seriously, and will do whatever it takes to resolve them as we can track them down.

I know of some permission strangeness in the 'object heirarchy' where its possible to *think* you set a permission to something over an entire object, when in reality this isn't the case, and instead you set permissions over jus a small part of an object. This can further lead to problems where setting permissions can 'fail' aka you set no transfer and it appears to take the nt set, but then after a few seconds it gets an update an goes back to transfer.

Another one i've seen is where obviously script permissions 'appear' to percolate up, even though they really don't.. aka putting a no copy script in an object make it look in your inventory like its a no mod object, but rez it in world and you can mod to your hearts desire (since its only the script thats set no md, not the object itself

Also there some situations where you can set a scripted object no mod no copy, and think you have 'protected it' when someone can jus take the script inside it (which had full permissions at the start) and put it in another object that looks the same, and presto instant 'full mod' version of your scripted object that you had thought you protected

It's a great sign that you are taking interest in this. A 10k bounty on priv bugs is nice too. It's also good that you are taking steps from a development point of view to address future priv issues.

Any word on current losses incurred from past bugs and policy changes on the matter? Perhaps diciplinary action for users that knowingly steal? A lot of us have been screwed, and to be honest, we all expected the Lindens to say something to the effect of:

"we are gonna try hard to make this bug not happen in the future".

But the answer we WANT is:

"Keep producing things in SL, cause if our bugs ruin your business...here is what we will do...."

SL's economy is built on a foundation of trust more so than any other economic environment because it's entirely virtual. We put hours into creating content because we believe in our hearts that SL will still be around tomorrow. As you can read in these posts, this is not just a technical issue. it's a matter of maintaining the public trust.

-aimee

Very well put Aimee, I sincerely concure with your conclusion of our plight.

Shadow

I'm happy that there is an interest too, this is so frustrating. Ideally this wouldnt happen, but I can't expect that. I can expect that if it does and people exploit it, there will be reprecussions.
Is it possible to enforce something.. that if you do not "own" the item, you cannot give it out/sell it period? This way, if it does get bugged and says "nobody" is the creator, you can just remake the item... (since you will have the textures) and in cases of selling it to someone so that they can sell it, you would give them the textures and they would be the creator?
Now, I'm the first to admit I know nothing about programming limitations, what is and isn't possible.. but I feel like this *may* be a solution.

Very nice to see an interest being taken in this, more so than just "we feel your pain". I know recently there has been a large group of creators burnt out in Second Life. I needed to step back and remember why I enjoyed Second Life in the first place. When you put hours and hours of your time into creating content for others to enjoy, it's a major strike to the knees for it to be stolen. As Aimee has stated many times through this thread it causes you to question putting anymore effort into creating again.

I hope that the 10k L$ reward will help in bringing more bugs to light. I agree that something needs to be stated in TOS about purchasing content from anyone outside of the creator. If people are warned up front that they are taking a risk then perhaps it will cause this type of behavior to slow to a crawl. If someone is selling an item with permission from the creator then perhaps more steps will be taken to prove this. I for one have come to the conclusion that in any buisness "deal" taking a screen shot of the agreement with UI on isn't a bad idea. There isn't much else you can do that can't be edited. I know my sister, Gwinivere, has had problems with people she has done buisness with coming back upset because they don't remember agreeing to something. She has also had problems with people she's done animations for selling items with her animations and never giving her credit or compensation. For that reason she stopped doing alot of custom work in that area.

I would also like to take this time to say that all Lindens should listen to Catherine Omega!! lol.

Anyways, thanks Philip for letting us know we aren't being swept under the virtual rug. It's dark under there..and I don't trust Aimee in the dark.

I just came up with an idea that I think might solve a lot of problems. Before I get to it, let me thank Phillip for taking a personal interest. I never doubted you guys were on the case, but it' does my heart good to hear it from the top.

Okay, so here's my idea. What if there were another checkbox in the item properties that only the creator could check or uncheck, indicating the authenticity of the item for future resale? In other words, if the box is checked the consumer knows he or she is dealing with an officially licensed reseller. If it's unchecked, then it's buyer beware; this may be stolen goods. Perhaps also the creator could have some control over how many times an item can change hands before the license is no longer valid.

So for example, I create an item and my friend wants to sell it for me. I give him a licensed copy that is allowed to change hands one time. The copy is licensed for resale as long as my frined has it, but all copies purchased from him by a customer would not bear the license. Now if the customer tries to resell, then everyone would know they are not getting an official version of the product.

This obviously wouldn't be bug-proof any more than any of the other permissions are, but assuming the bugs get squashed, I believe this would solve a lot of the other problems we've discussed here.

EDIT: Oh, and by the way thanks, Aimee, for the compliment. I really appreciate it.

How many times have I told you not to play with big fonts! ~ takes away the big font box from Torley ~

Wahhh *bawls, does one of Ano's dances -- NOT a stolen one*

Seriously though, I am happy to see this being addressed actively. And if we spot itemstealers, we'll have to get our prim-pitchforks and torches and do something symbolic and quite possibly virtuous, yet humorous at the same time.

There is a bounty. And this will help put more awareness "out there".

Philip,

Thank you for taking the time to spend with me and others at my store last night to discuss and help address this problem. Thankfully you left before Liquid Zidane's hair took down Mavericks. Your efforts are greatly appreciated, as is your statement here. I have always been impressed by how willing you are to work with us individually and collectively, and it is one of the reasons I remain so committed to SL. Again, thank you to you and to the everyone at Linden Lab.

you really DID use that quote

LOL I told you I would - it was too good to pass up