Content Theft just getting easier?

Let's not get into the open-source battle again. It's already been pretty much proven that open-source has absolutely nothing to do with the issue.

And, for what it's worth, SLFreedom is a script-kiddie tool for people who have absolutely no clue what they're doing. Getting around IP bans is a terribly trivial thing to do, even without such tools. Getting around machine bans is only slightly less trivial.

The bottom line is, there is *no* technological way to prevent content theft or to prevent the thieves from repeatedly coming back for more. That is a fact of life we all must face. There are, however, things that LL can do to substantially curb the problems. Though they will never go away completely, it *is* possible to push it down below the noise floor by simply doing away with free, anonymous accounts; requiring all new accounts to have a valid e-mail address that is verified before account activation, and require the account to have an active, valid credit card associated with the account with valid billing address information, which would also be verified by pinging the account with a one-time activation fee. These two things, coupled with more consistent enforcement of standards, would do far more than any flimsy permissions system or IP ban.

Yep. I'd buy that for a dollar.

The trouble is that free accounts bolster SL's spurious population figures. It's a bit like the crap avatar mesh they don't seem to want to change because so much texturing and animation content is already based around it. Take away the free accounts and the log-in figures will look awful thin.

I doubt very much they would shoot up to eight million again. Heaven knows what that would do to the share prices.

I can understand that it may not be reasonably possible to stop content theft.

What I do not like is the fact that Linden Lab does not admit to what it can and cannot do. Its advertising materials sell the fact that it protects residents' intellectual property rights. It keeps making promises to implement new technology/polices that protect intellectual property rights. And it woefully falls short of fulfilling its own promises.

The honest thing to do is just admit to what it can and cannot do, and let individual creators make informed choices about how much time and money they want to sink into creation content in that environment.

Again, I think you people are missing the point. Read beyond the content theft to what I've been saying about how EASY it is. How simple it is that people can come in and just stand there and walk off with your content. If it was harder to do and you had to work to steal something, then I would just be upset at the person but because open source viewers have hit the market, it's become as simple as pressing a few buttons and anything you want is yours.

THAT is my issue. I hate how my work, be it a texture, build, or animation, can be taken by anyone who uses one of these rogue viewers, and taken so quickly and quietly that I've become somewhat paranoid of anyone that comes in to watch a show. If the viewer wasn't open source and they forced the standard viewer, it would remove alot of the ease in content theft, so don't give me this shit about how open source viewers have nothing to do with it.

I understand there is little to no way to prevent content theft. What I don't get is why it's so fucking easy? I've been around for a long time and I even went through another store of mine getting hit by copybotting because it didn't seem to be too simple for alot of people. Right now it's to a point that anyone with a curiosity and a few minutes on google could find one of these clients and begin the five finger discounting.

So, do I expect it to be fully prevented? No. But I sure as hell don't expect it to be so easy. It's readily available through a client that is open source. It takes little effort to do. I understand it can't be stopped fully but for fucks sake, can we atleast eliminate the easy ways? I guarantee content theft would drop like a rock if you got rid of the simplicity of it and it came down to actually having to work to steal stuff. It would still exist, but not as much and surely not as easily.

It was that way before OS viewers and it will be that way after OS viewers are disallowed.

But, what Eric is pointing out is that it's easier now than it was before. Instead of downloading a completely separate program, you just get a viewer that has that program petty much built in and it's one button click, got it all.

In this case, it's an arms race and one that LL can't win, when it comes to coding. Not now. They screwed that pooch long ago, when they implemented some of their most clueless policies.

For most content, it ALWAYS has been that easy. Even the original copybot client was basically controlled with a few simple commands you IMed it via chat. For the cachewalker programs, they were always pretty much point and click. Hell, I could MANUALLY pull textures, sounds, etc out of my cache. The names weren't very easy to figure out, but so what? Put them in a thumbnail viewer / play the sounds, and you'd have the exact same ability to copy them.



News flash: it is the SAME for every other kind of content on the planet. Music/Movies? Rip/copy the CD/DVD or record to tape. Literature/art? Digital cameras and photocopiers. Even sculptures can be copied, though the technology is still a bit pricey. Not for too long, though. There's NOTHING MAGICAL about SL. It is subject to the SAME problems that ALL content creators face everywhere in the world.



Open source viewers have nothing to ADD to it. If the viewer was never open-sourced, not only would the reverse-engineered tools have both continued evolving and filled the space, they would have exploited the MANY holes that have been found and patched SINCE the viewer was open-sourced, and we wouldn't be in any different situation now, but probably even worse.



It ALWAYS has been "really easy" for anyone willing to put the most meager amount of time and effort into it. Someone will ALWAYS do the "hard work" to crack ANY copy protection system and release the resultant "tool" to the masses for anyone to use.

The main reason it has become so prevalent today is the spread of knowledge about the tools, and a lack of timely action on the part of LL to do what they can and should do to address the issue.

One of the nasty side effects of all this content theft going on is that it is starting to turn residents against each other, ramping up paranoia to fever pitch.

I just became the latest victim of this wave of content theft. No, I didn't get anything stolen from me (that I'm aware of). Rather, I just got accused of content theft myself! One minute I'm browsing a large multi-sim furniture store that specializes in Japanese-style furnishings; the next minute, I find myself frozen, accused by the store's owner of copying animations, stating that I had triggered their copy protection system ("When you copy something, it restarts and sends an alert" was the explanation I got), kicked, and banned - and warned that if I rez any of her things, they will "phone home"!

The irony of the matter? Well, there's several, actually. First, I'm a builder, and very sensitive to the subject of content theft. To be accused of such a thing makes me feel violated in the worst possible way. Second, I was in the process of picking out one of her L$1500 animated beds when this unpleasant exchange occurred. Now, it looks like I'll have to buy one somewhere else.

Content thieves can die and freaking rot in hell for putting the community into such a state where kneejerk paranoia takes hold!

That is precisely why I tell all content creators (and everyone else) to stop with the stupid paranoia, and GET THE HELL OVER THE SITUATION.

Copyright infringement is NOTHING NEW. It WILL happen to EVERY content creator at some point. The BEST defense against it is knowledge. Every content creator is the SOLE PERSON ultimately responsible for policing infringement of their content.

I won't even lay this at the feet of the infringers. Yes, what they are doing is wrong, but they WILL and DO exist. That a content creator chooses to respond to that fact with more wrong is solely his/her choice.

The same thing happened before with the Copybot fiasco in 2006. It will happen again and again and again until content creators learn the lessons that every other content creator on the planet have had to learn in order to properly deal with it. The only people they are hurting when they react this way are themselves and their legitimate customers.

Please elaborate, I'm finding it really hard to swallow that a content creator looking out for their interests is equal to or worse than a content thief. As for GET OVER IT, how about you get over it? And while you're at it, quit playing down content theft with a *shit happens* attitude, it just numbs everyone into thinking it's acceptable, it's not.

Well if someone can see LSL source code from no mod scripts, SL is a complete waste of time.

Talarus:
It's lot different now than it was with copybot. Now it's built into the viewer. This thread isn't about theft happening - it's about it being buiult into the viewer. If you think that nothing has changed, you ought to have viewed those demo videos.

I'm sorry, but after the experience I had last night, I am with Talarus now more than ever. Yes, content theft is wrong. Yes, it is damaging to Second Life, every bit as much as in real life. But now, here I am, an honest, fairly active member of the community, now labeled as a thief because of God-only-knows-what, by a fellow content creator and store owner who has adopted the policy of treating all of her customers like potential criminals, shooting first and asking questions never. THAT sort of mindset among our content creators and store owners is going to end up being far more damaging than the theft itself!

When nobody trusts anybody, and everybody thinks everybody else is a criminal, then it's over.

This would explain why the first question - the *ONLY* question - she asked me, after she froze me, was what viewer I was running. As soon as I said "Emerald", I got kicked to the curb.

And right now, I'm of half a mind to go over to SLU, where I know she's active, and raise serious hell, though right now, the cooler head in me is telling me it's not worth it.

It's new.... from what I understood they can see source code of no mod lsl scripts.
How can you copyright a source code if the thief make few changes? Coders need months to develop an lsl script and the thief need half a day to make a different copy of it changing some minor parts of the code.

Indeed, nothing new happened. Frustrating, yes, but nothing new. And as far as the animations go, they are unusable anyway, you still cannot download an animation. Replay yes, download no. And scripts: Is the ripping of nomod script confirmed, or a rumour? Because I do not think it is possible.

Of course I understand the frustration of the OP. And in his frustration, he probably made more out of this then there actually is. People like the ones behind Emerald and Coolviewer helped the development and patching holes in the regular SL client, so the Open Source path was a smart one.

I am indeed with the camp that says: Don't make too much out of it. Of course, LL should do more. And my bet is that they eventually will, the registry of viewers is part of that. Of course verifying all accounts would help a lot more, but that is not the way they seem to go. But they know what happens and I am convinced they do have their plans. They just take too much time to act, that is for sure.

In the meantime: create! Do not let yourself be scared by this all. They would laugh their ass off if you did.

Alienating your customers and worrying yourself into a frazzle trying to find ways to PREVENT it from happening is as (or even more) damaging than the effects of infringement itself.



I AM over it. That's why I am posting in response to YET ANOTHER DAMN HYSTERICS thread.

What does hysteria gain anyone? It pisses off your muse, your desire to create, which is YOUR SOLE REASON TO BOTHER BEING A CREATOR IN THE FIRST PLACE.

I am not "playing down" infringement. I am calling it what it is, and am putting it into its proper perspective. One which I, AS A FRICKIN' CONTENT CREATOR, have had to learn to deal with FOR THIRTY FRICKIN' YEARS, WELL before Second Life was a gleam in Philip's eye.

Infringement isn't acceptable at all from an absolutist perspective, which is why people literally DESTROY themselves over it. When you put it into its PROPER perspective, as a RISK that must be MANAGED, just like EVERY OTHER RISK that has to be MANAGED, the problem ceases to be an obstacle to your creativity, and you can get on with your life and the business of capitalizing on your talent.

Dude, I SAW those videos before ANYONE, including Jesse, knew about them.

No, nothing has changed. Overall, content still is just as easy to infringe as it has always been. Just because it is now more "visible" doesn't mean it has gotten "massively easier". Tech-illiterate people were figuring out how to setup and use Copybot JUST FINE, years ago.
Before that, it was Jeffrey Gomez' prim mirror. Before that, it was GLintercept and cache viewers.

Nothing has changed, nor was there anything new in those videos.

Copybot predates the open sourcing of the viewer which seems to be a fact people always conveniently forget.

"Second Inventory" predates the "malicious third party viewer" era we're in right now as well and pushed the copybot concept into "more user friendly" terrority. The fact that it's a legitimate tool that respects permissions really doesn't make a difference here because it takes extra effort to respect permissions so if you can do that you can certainly copy-at-will as well.

Even if there had never been any open sourcing of the viewer things wouldn't be any different: the "tools" would have continued to "improve" and content theft wouldn't be any more difficult than it is now; it would just involve pushing a button in a different place.

That's not an effective means for animation theft, if it's intended to distribute the animations.

However, it's always been relatively simple to add code to save any witnessed animation as a bvh file.

How does one detect an open proxy server?

Mail servers use a web of trusted connections, which is open to a lot of flaws, but at least raises the bar. But I don't believe they do it by detecting open proxies.

EXACTLY!

The SAME THING happened when the Copybot fiasco of 2006 hit. Content creators dwelt on their hysteria, closed their shops in protest, bought tons and tons of those scam "Copyright Protection System MK IV" pieces of utter crap, and drove away their own customers.

..and then they had the gall to come back a few months later and whine how the SL economy was in the crapper, since their sales were down. WELL, NO KIDDING! Drive away your paying customer base, and GUESS WHAT HAPPENS?

The message is simple: STOP BUYING INTO THE HYSTERIA AND DEAL WITH IT BY LOBBYING LINDEN LAB TO 1) BE PROACTIVE ABOUT MEDIATING INFRINGEMENT, AND 2) PROVIDE US WITH THE TOOLS NECESSARY TO IDENTIFY IT WHEN AND WHERE IT OCCURS. Put infringement in the PROPER PERSPECTIVE, and MANAGE it as one of the many RISKS of being a digital content creator in today's world.

NO OTHER SOLUTION is going to even put a dent in the problem, period, so all this hand-wringing over technological solutions, open source, and everything else is COUNTER-PRODUCTIVE.

I assume you mean the client can "play in world" using UUID. This means it's relatively useless for content theft.

But that doesn't mean that stealing animations isn't easy. I haven't heard of a viewer that does it yet, but I'm sure it's just a matter of time.

Unfortunately, their intent isn't backed up by any technically feasible and useful mechanisms that would prevent connecting and masquerading as a legit viewer.

Wow.. First time I've heard that one. Does the cow next door get sick if there's a witch in the neighborhood, too?

Send 'em to the forums to ask about this. Really.. It's total BS and I think there are probably several people around who'd be willing to say so.