Why So Much Fear?

Debating??? hahah well let me put it in another way for you way................ Bakerys or wahtever company that is using Disney related images have promission to use the char`s image on them from Disney. "bakeries put their characters on cakes without an agreement" This is statement is not true...... In japan everything that shows images of "Disney" likeness on them CarrY`s a lable on them. Reguardless "median" its drawn with Frosting, cake shaped pans etc..........

Thank you, Usagi. Have a nice day.

Love I always have a nice day..........
If your going to point out sample don`t make a generalization about it. Its worse then assumptions. Have bright cheerfulday

I cant believe someone compared virtual content creation and grinding in a MMORPG...

Ricardo perhaps it will help you understand peoples "paranoia" a bit more if you go over the concept of intellectual property again.

As for Usagi im not quite sure why you are calling people who dont create their own content stupid, dumb and generally not belonging to SL. Who exactly would there be left to buy things if everyone was a master designer themselves? Im quite confused by your statements.

I'm sorry, Usagi, I really don't understand what it is that you are trying to say.

If you are saying that in Japan that bakeries that use Disney characters are required to have an agreement with Disney then that is what I am saying. That is the same way that it is here in the states and is exactly what I said in my post.

If you are saying that in Japan that bakeries are allowed to use Disney characters without permission from Disney then that is a surprise to me. That is not the way it is done here in the U.S.

I never use these words when i post on the forums. But frankly speaking taking my thought out of context seems to be a what ou have done. Lets me repost it for you.........

Here the quote


REFERING to the people that steal nobody else do i aim this remark too. Does this clear up what you read wrong?

In all forms does Disney require the "TAG" of their images ( when a third party company is allowed to use said disney images ). Bakery`s is just one example. I not sure how Disney protects their images in your part of the word. But Here in japan reguardless of the object the image is placed on or drawn etc. It requires a special little stamp or lable before its allowed to be sold. Now in cases where drawing and or pasting iced flosting images. The bakery thats is using say Mickey Mouse image has paid for the useage of "Not Unlimited" but a limited number allowed but the written agreement. That said i have i know have gotten off track with the topic and i sorry. But too many times people believe anyone can use trade mark related images for theior own gain.

let the silly boy keep his toys


Particles create enormous lag

Better off without them -the best clubs make you turn them off by default

Usagi, please don't think that I'm looking at this as a "laughing matter" because I'm not. I don't believe that 'stealing' someone elses work and selling it as your own is either an honourable or decent thing to do at all. I spend half my time in SL going to classes and learning how to make things for myself...... The other half, making things that other people may or may not want to purchase, if they do then I'm honoured and if they don't, well at least I've made something that I can be proud of. I call my stuff 'rubbish' because well, I have a habit of self-deprecating my own work...in relation to clothing and furniture etc.

But just wait till I get my SL music career....you won't find any self-deprecating humour there at all. And I think that if someone tried to 'steal' my voice then there's nothing that I wouldn't do do make my feelings to that person known.

Historically, laughing at oneself has been an Irish tradition.... please notice that I said 'one's self' and NOT others..

Thats what is occuring these days. People are not creating anything anymore as they did early days. Because be fear those objects will be stolen........
Well there are many that do, but compare the number to before people just don`t build.
Goood luck to you and your music career a field on SL that is surely needed these days...

Usagi

/me waves at Pocket

As a recipient of one of Pocket's outfits I can safely say her "stuff" is not "rubbish"

/me waits for the music career

.

Hello,

Maybe i'm missing some detail in this topic but ok let see:

You spend 10 hours for create an item, and do you want to sell it at some fair price, 100 L for example.

Then come another guy, copy your item and resell it at 50.

Then come another and resell it at 25

Then another resell it at 10

The logic says that all the people will buy to the guy that is offering your product at 10 L, BUT my question is:
How this guy can cover their costs?

Because as far as i know, the land that you need to put a store is not free. If you need to sell 3 of your items to cover your rent, the last guy needs to sell 30 items. Ok, then this guy get some store with a cheaper rent in some crowded mall, but he still needs to promote his store so much as you (or maybe more) to sell the stolen items and stole your public. You can cover the advertisement selling just 2 items, but he needs to sell 20 items.

So, this guy must be really stupid to sell stolen cheap items, because the cost of the land is the same everywhere in SL. Thats why i dont understand those huge malls of freebies, where is the gain? ok, they appear in the popular list of SL, but again, where is the gain?

Then i think that the problem of the resell is not that they are broken the business of the good creators, it's more about pride. I'm sure that is not funny when some ass**** copy your work that cost you a lot of time and effort.

If we compare this situation with the RL market we will see that in RL, the business that fight with prices always lose money, so if you want survive you must use the tools of management and marketing that RL companies use. That's why i like SL, you can create social simulations of RL for a very very lower cost.

I'm not an expert in SL business but i think that we can take in consideration what define a sucessful business in RL:

1. Good products
2. Good price
3. Good service
4. Awareness
5. Innovation

lol....thanks for that Sally

I think that there are possibly some re-sellers out there who sell BIAB's that are not trying to rip anyone off that are may new residents. I know that when I first entered SL, I saw these various packages and thought to myself.." now that might be fun".. If someone is unaware of the ins & outs of the selling and creating aspect of SL, then that's fair enough.. SL is a huge learning curve not only for learning to create your own items, but also for the 'best practice' side of business.

We all live and learn not only in SL but also in RL...

I fail to see what business it is of anyones what creators charge for their product, what permissions they chose to set or not set on them.
If you dont want to buy something then dont buy it.
Or am I missing something here?

Not true.

Economic theory translates quite well across all platforms.

Take World of Warcraft.

There, you have to grind, quest, or group up to plan, to acquire worthwhile amour sets and especially weapons to suit different races. In short they are hard to come by and require a lot of time and effort

In game there is an active type of stock market where such goods are brought and sold.

Rare and legendary weapons go for what amounts to serious gold, even in real life money via a tolerated black economy gold currency/real life currency exchange.

Over there, I have both a legendary sword blade and ranged gun. The cost to acquire them was nearly 1000 gold, which at unofficial exchange rates is about $38 US.

Methods may alter my friend but principles don’t change, therefore I well understand how a talented content creator or legal resale business may feel within SL when they are ripped off. For example, I paid a visit to Julia Hathor’s island group recently, the sheer skill and ability she must have input into that is stunning. Why should she and others of her ilk not make a fair living rather than seeing her goods ripped off by being copied, resold en-mass, and devalued to nothing in terms of fungible value?

Or for that matter the people or persons in WoW who sold on those goods.

Same priciple.....nothing changes

Not true.

Economic theory translates quite well across all platforms.

Take World of Warcraft.

There, you have to grind, quest, or group up to plan, to acquire worthwhile amour sets and especially weapons to suit different races. In short they are hard to come by and require a lot of time and effort

In game there is an active type of stock market where such goods are brought and sold.

Rare and legendary weapons go for what amounts to serious gold, even in real life money via a tolerated black economy gold currency/real life currency exchange.

Over there, I have both a legendary sword blade and ranged gun. The cost to acquire them was nearly 1000 gold, which at unofficial exchange rates is about $38 US.

Methods may alter my friend but principles don’t change, therefore I well understand how a talented content creator or legal resale business may feel within SL when they are ripped off. For example, I paid a visit to Julia Hathor’s island group recently, the sheer skill and ability she must have input into that is stunning. Why should she and others of her ilk not make a fair living rather than seeing her goods ripped off by being copied, resold en-mass, and devalued to nothing in terms of fungible value?

Or for that matter the people or persons in WoW who sold on those goods.

Same priciple.....nothing changes

As for my that is absolutely true. My flying pig uses a wing texture that's not mine. I'll be making it a freebie.

S

Some does; some doesn't. The passage quoted (originally Ordinal's, by the way: 2k is grinding posts) was in response to a claim that copying in SL was no big deal because--in a different economy that only supports manual copying--people manually copy stuff. My point (and I think Ordinal's) was: "Duh!"

It's specious to compare the threat posed by copying in SL to that threat in an economy where everything must be manually created.

No it doesn't.

Most gaming platforms have an economy based on scarcity of resources. The basic materials are limited in supply. The price of an item is mostly based on scarcity or expense of the required materials. Which again is mostly based on (completely fictional) scarcity of those specific resources.


Only the SL land business is based on (real) scarcity of resources.

SL's content sales economy has no scarcity of resources.
The content business has unlimited materials and unlimited supply and no production costs.. It's a completely different economic model. Comparable to the service industry, software sales, music business etc.. It's an economy based on (initial) time/money investment vs. product demand over time. Price is mostly based on this initial investment and the expected number of sales.

By blatantly copying and reselling item, you basically ruin this model. As the original seller, now having to compete with his/her own product for a much lower price, will lose sales and is no longer as able to recuperate the initial investment.

Yes it does, sorry you are missing the point.

Question quote: Most gaming platforms have an economy based on scarcity of resources. The basic materials are limited in supply. The price of an item is mostly based on scarcity or expense of the required materials. Which again is mostly based on (completely fictional) scarcity of those specific resources.

Answer: In WoW’s case that resource is the time and ability to acquire that resource

Question quote: Only the SL land business is based mostly based on (real) scarcity of resources.

Answer: In real life so is the property and land business. With the exception of Dubai (artificial islands) you cannot make land from nothing, and as far as property is concerned in most developed countries you have various rules and regulations that require planning consent before you build new ones. That is mirrored in SL…..go to many private island estates and they have covenants about what you can and what you cannot build. Finally, on this point SL can produce new land from nothing. In real life that is (mostly) not true

Question quote: SL's content sales economy has no scarcity of resources.
The content business has unlimited materials and unlimited supply. It's a completely different economic model. Comparable to the service industry, software sales, music business etc.. It's an economy based on (initial) time/money investment vs. product demand over time

Answer: It does have a scarcity of resource and that is ability/skill to use the so called free resources

Conclusions. All real and virtual worlds that mirror a capitalist economy require ability/skill/time, a degree of determination and in most cases seed capital to grow skills and prosper.

The more of these common attributes you possess the more successful you will be regardless of if it is a virtual or real world


Question quote: By blatantly copying and reselling item, you basically ruin this model. As the original seller, now having to compete with his/her own product for a much lower price, will lose sales and is no longer as able to recuperate the initial investment.

Answer. Yes I agree in total with that.....in real as well as virtual life

Sure it does. The resource most required and of surprising rarity would be TALENT.

It's what all these people devaluing your creations lack.

Well..there's already plenty of explanations here but I need something to light the mind fuels while I have my coffee so....I'll respond too...

It's true, on the one hand...that in the real world...once we purchase something it is out right to sell it or give it away as we see fit (except insurance).... But in the real world there are also patent & copy right laws in place to protect us. So...while I may indeed re-sell my gucci hand bag (which i do not own because I am not about lebals) it is still a gucci hand bag and everyone knows that and the real designer will continue to be revered. There are also gucci knock-offs...but everyone is pretty aware of those as well.....and knock-offs have tell tale differences that the clever shopper is aware of. So.. we buzz along happily in our consumer based society, marketing and purchasing and ebaying to our hearts content.

In SL there is no such protection for ones creativity and hard work. And, as someone else stated.....there are limits to what we can produce. So.....ya kind of have to be a bit wary of the copy cats and thiefs because the buyer in SL is not going to be biased if they find your beautiful creation for a few 100 less L's.....they're gonna go for the deal...regardless of how it came to be sold that way. Chances are, they're not going to even realize it was stolen or copied. This puts a huge wrench in the consumer machine because there is no guarantee for the original creator. The only way anyone can assure that their original stuff is sold by them, as theirs, is to saturate the market and guard with the appropriate permissions. If I own a gucci handbag.....and I want to sell it.....I have no choice but to sell the original....and I certainly can't modify it and make a billion copies without first spending a LOT of cash to produce my new product. So....there again, IRL permissions are set by default really. SL is no different except that we have to make an actual selection of those re-sell permissions and then hope like hell noone finds their way around them. It just the way it is..... and if you work your ass off...spending hours perfecting a build or in photoshop perfecting clothing or skin.... then you deserve the credit. But SL can make no promises, unfortunately...so it's up to the creators to guard their work.

You're comparing apples to oranges. In Starwars Galaxies you were not building or creating anything. You were simply "grinding" for pre-made in-game items to be able to acquire an already pre-designed final item. This requires no creative talent or skill. All that is required here is time, patience and the ability to "connect the dots."

In SL you are actually "tapping" into your creative talents and skills to build or create something from scratch. The items you are creating are not pre-designed within SL. The only thing all creators in SL have in common are the in-world building tools or any of the myriad of off-world creation programs. All creations are started from scratch by using these tools to create a final and unique product. Unlike SWG in as much as so long as you "connect the dots" your final product will be the exact pre-designed product for everyone that the game developers pre-programmed it to be.

Make a long story short, what you think you created in SWG is not your creation at all. It is the SWG game designers creation. All you did was gring and "connect the dots" to access that final pre-designed creation.

Big difference.



Again, you did not "build" anything. You simply "grinded" to access already pre-made items. Once acquiring all of the items necessary you could then access the final pre-made product.




It is only a shortcut for the thieves who copy others creation and then sell it as their own even though they didn't invest any time or creative effort into the design process.



You might be on to something if you catergorized it as more time consuming, but even that is debatable. Calling grinding...er....harvesting for pre-made in-game components harder than the entire process of creating something from scratch, then seeing it through to its final product to the point that others will appreciate it enough to consider spending their RL hard earned money to acquire is ...um ... ludicrous, to put it nicely.

Disclaimer: I am just pointing out the obvious fallacy in this argument. It is not meant to minimize the potential and inherent creative talent of anyone who may have done this in SWG.

you are seriously demented.

I do agree with your economic perspective. (I guess, actually reading a post, before replying is kind of helpful

The fact if the amount of effort grinding in WoW, and the endless hours to reach the level to craft, or the amount of time spent in PS and the endless hours of learning the skills is comparable, is not the issue here though. (That's a completely different discussion).

The point I was trying to make was that, the act of copying and reselling, as performed in SL is only possible in the SL economy. There is no counterpart in WoW, SWG etc., due to the completely different model.