Is 'THIS' the future of Second Life ?

Try this: Turn all your stores and vendors to require payment information on file and possibly age verification.

Now watch your income stream.

LL uses an international billing company last time I checked, since they handle payments not only for the US but the rest of the world for LL

Governance, you can't get it online. All you can get is verified data, you can verify the person using the data is the same one as in the data.

There's no law against breaching the membrane between the online and the material. Would it be too much to "verify" transfer-enabled accounts by sending a secret by physical mail?

It would take some amount of time to get from SFO to Timbuktu, and it would cost somebody some amount of postage, but it establishes that the recipient at some point had access to wherever that mail was sent.

(One objection that I can think of is that this reveals to anyone else with access to that mail the fact that some mail was received. That's kind of unfortunate, but I don't know if it would be a real problem or not.)

Qie: that just shows the mail arrived at that location and was sent from it.

It does not prove the person that got and replied was the actual person verified.

Nothing short of in-person verification every time that person logs in, or through a biometric scanner will actually verify who is at the computer and logged in vs the data sent in.

and with a biometric scanner it's always possible to dig up a dead body and slide them over the scanner.

there's just no hope..

A couple of interesting quotes from the current LL blog which relate to the current thread

https://blogs.secondlife.com/community/grid/blog/2009/04/01/second-life-lives-behind-a-firewall






Interesting to see that LL can provide a safer place for content creators IP. As Amanda Linden says : 'content creator IP rights must be protected '

Come on then Mort we have all pitched in ideas which you have discounted (some I heavily disagree with based on your prepay over use in the example).

The underlying issue I think we got to was not how to stop content theft (near impossible), but how to have accountability when it occured so the creator has recourse.

If that is not the model you would use in a economic environment such as Second Life, what is your model?

Interested to know.

Nice quote on Amanda - M Linden quotes from SL5B you should find interesting too, I am hopeful he will post a follow up in the near future on that.

Sure, but I don't think we have to be that ambitious; we just need something worth a subpoena when a copyright violation is charged.

I mean, I can imagine somebody in Botswana falsely "verifying" an inventory of SL accounts and selling them on the black market, but both that seller and anybody who buys the bogus accounts would have a pretty tenuous future.

Maybe there are other scenarios I'm just overlooking.

It is indeed incredibly offensive. And is the 2nd time in just a few days it's been referred to in these forums. The more things change the more they stay the same.

Here's some rope in the shape of a giraffe:




happy happy joy joy

all the data needed for a real credit card, is the same used for the pre paid

The difference is the prepaid actually costs them money.

heh, I can disagree all day long but to go further would mean certain disclosures I would not put into a forum around financial institutions.

Appreciate your standpoint, respectfully disagree as you have not given any potential solutions/ideas to the debate to take it forward.

There is no solution short of dedicated hardware purchased from LL with physical identification of the user/purchaser. UUID tied to that hardware, for every account created from it.

But with an online system like SL that is international... the best you can do is file the DCMA and have LL do it's required by law duties.

Because you can't go after the thief operating out of the Bahamas, nor can you go after them if they provide false data.

There is no magical technology that can do what you want.

And you need to check, I had to give my SSN, DOB and all that to Walmart to activate my card. Everything I had to do to set up a bank account and get a real credit card (which I got rid of when I got my debit card)

That is about the reason I decided to stop the debate as well.

1: scrap the entire current grid and OS initiatives.
2: Rewrite SL from the ground up with a proprietary rendering and physics engine with built in encryption modules.
3: Contact the graphics chips makers to integrate safeguards into the drivers and tools for their products to prevent man in the middle collection of data as it goes to the graphics processor
4: Require the LL client, and forced updates as they fix exploits and loopholes
5: Require corporate okay on all content uploaded or created (by paid/tradesman accounts), necessitating higher upload costs due to governance team size increases
6: Have to make a lot of basic/library content to keep people interested in SL till they become a paid account. (again staff size increase for content creation developers)
7: Alter free accounts to limited to one area with mall/showroom areas with features to entice them to sign up after 14 days for a paid account. But free accounts cans till login to the core areas.
8: Set paid accounts to allow for item creations using library content textures and scripts, non-sale transfers okay. No vendor or paid transfers, except through tips.
9: Set tradesman accounts to full creation perms using library content, and LL verified content of their own uploaded.
10: All paid/trade accounts must be verified by sending data packets through the mail (preferably certified or registered): containing government notarized proof of identification and age (Birth certificate, Passport/Driver's License, etc... as well as a signed statement that protects LL in case of disclosure or issues with the user's government laws) [also a rise in employees due to compliance and processing needed, all employees that deal with the data packets will have to be screened and monitored]


that should protect both IP rights, verification of users, and allow LL better control of content to make SL more kid friendly for a merger the grids or bringing in the family market.

Mort, I am impressed. As unwieldly and byzantine as it sounds it is by far a more clear and concise business plan than LL could ever hope to have.

That's just it.

anything that does what is wanted in here is going to be that way.

You also have to realize due to sudden wipe of data, meaning all current content is hosed down the drain. The backlog for say Bare Rose would take weeks to get their current content reintroduced into the new grid.

Add in less users due to the verification requirements, and hoops needed to use the service... land prices would be higher... due to LL not having enough subscribers to fund massive land areas without increased tier.

Edit: and it's basically There with added layers of hoops and BS

there might be 5 players left after all this is done.
really now, theres no point at all to using SL if one has to jump through hoops like these.

nice idea - .1 thru 4 would be nice but it will never happen. The rest is garbage. Its the free to make anything thats the draw of SL.

If I thinkup a new design of shirt or fabric in RL I dont have to get a OK from big daddy goverment first. I make it and I sell it. End of story.

NEXT.........

Well it's got the protections that people scream they want.

Never mind it would kill SL, they would have the ip protection and verification they want to implement.

Personally, I factor the DMCA admin costs in to my overall business plan. I employ someone to detect and combat content theft on my behalf and as result all I have to do is submit pre-prepared DMCA reports and do a bit of follow up. Been doing this since 2006 and takes away allot of the frustration and annoyance of doing business in SL. I've had hundreds of people suspended and banned in my time and with an effective system in place it is possible to stay ahead of the thieves and to protect your business. Admitedly this is only an option for the more successful content creators, but I would include the OP in that group and would advise you invest some of your profits in proactively combating content theft.

It would be much easier, cheaper and more reliable if Linden Lab automated it. They could add a program on the backend that looks for copies. If it finds two similar objects with a different creator name then it would alert the creator of the object with earliest creation date. The creator would then verify and send a report to Linden Lab.

I am impressed, but most people who wander into SL do not have a business plan, do not know how to make a business plan, do not have the $ to pay someone to "detect and combat content theft," do not have any idea what a DMCA is and, let me repeat this for emphasis, have no idea what a DMCA is. For most of us, your solution is as unwieldy and unlikely as MorVent's satirical 10-point plan for fixing this mess.

However, I do see a business opp: A "Preparing DMCA Reports for Dummies" book. I'd buy one. Seems like that would also be a great item in a Beginners Kit for SL content creators that LL should offer. (Or if they do, pardon my ignorance.)

Until this game gets back to the (supposed/original) focus on creating our own imaginative world instead of creating immense wealth, these problems--copyright theft, land/traffic/copybots, etc.--will continue. And frustrated creative and contributing players, will give up along with the other 70-90% who try SL and don't stay.

It would be nice to build just for fun. But I doubt we would see a lot of cool stuff from folks that create just for fun.

The good stuff takes a lot of hard work. There's very little fun to be had.

You realize you're making his point for him, right?

That's the reason he posted it, because to get what people want (the ability to be lazy and let the government do the work for them so they feel "safe", all essential freedoms will be either abolished, curtailed, taxed, regulated, and/or heavily monitored. "Fair use" is abolished. DRM will be everywhere, and you won't be able to access your OWN content without licensing yourself.

Won't that be a fun world?

Most people don't know what a business license is or if they need to have one. Most people don't know what incorporation is or what it takes to go about it. Most people don't know how to do business accounting and keep their personal and business finances separate, or do separate business taxes. Most people don't know how to hire someone or do payroll properly.

Point is, going into business requires educating oneself in all these areas, and/or paying someone else who is more knowledgeable to do them right. You can play "hobby business" for a while, but if you neglect doing things the proper way long enough, you WILL get bit on the ass. Be it the state, the IRS, a customer who is harmed and sues, et cetera. It will be a painful lesson.

There are no end of "Business for Dummies" books, tapes, classes, etc out there, but all the info in the world is meaningless unless a person takes the time and makes the effort to obtain and grok said info.

As such, anyone who is interested in creating things outside of just the pure joy of creating (ie, selling them for money instead of giving them away), should take the time to learn about copyright law, at a minimum. Failing to do so is not necessarily a problem, but it hearkens back to the issue described above; it will eventually bite them on the ass.