Interesting article on Second Life Rights, and Content Theft

No, it doesn't. It says that in the case of a work for hire, it says that the employer or similar person is considered the author, but it doesn't say anything about what makes something a work for hire. It's answering the question "Who is the author in the case of a work for hire". It's not answering the question "What is a work for hire".



It is part of the context. You quoted Title 17, Chapter 2, section 201. I quoted Title 17, Chapter 1, section 101. Title 17 is the US Copyright law. You can't interpret anything in Title 17 without reference to the definitions in section 101. The very first sentence of section 101 says "Except as otherwise provided in this title, as used in this title, the following terms and their variant forms mean the following:".

Alright, I went back and re-read the materials, and you both are correct. There must be a contract must specifically state that the work is made as a "work for hire", otherwise the default is that the rights stay with the creator.

The problem is that the language in 201.b. is ambiguous, and on reading by itself makes it appear as if the reverse is true; ie, the actuality is that it represents an exception to the exception, rather than a simple exception itself.

Apologies for the confusion, it was my own. In all my contracts, on both sides of the table, I ALWAYS spell out whether something is a "work for hire" or not, and what specific rights are reserved. I don't rely on defaults. The problem is that most people don't know to bother, and get burned not realizing what the defaults actually are.

Regardless, the point stands that we don't know whether the contract in this case stated it was a work for hire, or whether the conferred rights were transferred back to the creator if it was. The creator says he "protected his rights"; we haven't heard from the hiring party. Even still, the forums aren't a court. Without actual evidence, no one can know whether the sim owner actually had the rights to dispose of the creation as he/she did.

Kidd, you're mixing the original topic with a subthread.

In the case of the note, ignoring the note, the texture has SL permissions that indicate the appropriate use. However, sometimes we have to sell things with full perms and a restricted license. For example, the general rule for textures is to sell them full-perms (otherwise they're useless in builds for products, which is the main market), and ALSO allow downloading to modify and re-upload, as long as you distribute wihtout full perms.

In the case of the note, the note said this download and modify cycle was not permitted, rendering the textures less valuable. Unless this was clearly stated before the sale, the note is not binding.

None of this has much to do with Voom's case.

Read the TOS. If you make anything in SL that is covered by a patent you own, you are allowing use of that patent in SL, pretty much without restriction. Of course, you're quite right that RL patents can't be infringed in SL. So, my point would have been more clearly stated as "You can't patent something you create in SL and enforce that patent within SL."

BTW, you can patent nearly anything as a "process patent", without rendering it in hardware. You can patent the behavior of computer programs. However, you cannot patent an algorith, which is considered a "mathematical fact" rather than "an invention".

IMHO, there is a very fuzzy line between "an invention" and "a mathematical fact". I'm not up on the latest in the law in this regard, and I'm not a patent attorney (but my father is, and we discuss this stuff a lot).

Personally, I am in favor of patents of truly novel concepts, but feel that the patent system is terribly abused by big business to create barriers for entry by small companies, and that they most often do not serve the intended purpose. But that's another issue altogether! My father disagrees with me, but he does have my understanding of how patents are used by telecom communications equipment vendors.

This paragraph does not make any claim on what a work for hire is. It states who is considered the "author" and "owns all of the rights", in the case of a work made for hire.

It does not say what a work made for hire is.

I realized this was a subthread, but what I said stands. The point I was making is that as far as the courtroom is concerned, the buyer will have the burden of proof about the "general rule". I agree that they'll easily prove that the unwritten, implied contract will allow them to use the textures in other objects and sell them. All I'm saying is that it will take more effort for them to prove that they have the right to download, modify, and upload.

I understand the point you're making, but that's the wrong way to phrase it.

You can patent something you create in SL (assuming it's patentable at all). You're just contractually obligated to give LL a license to use that patent, including allowing their users to use that patent, as described in the ToS (to whatever extent the ToS are enforceable).

In fact, if you have an existing patent outside of SL, and apply it within SL, the ToS require you to give them a license. But if you own a patent outside of SL, you never bring it into SL, and someone else does, then you can enforce it. (That's obvious, since a patent owner may not even be a user of SL, and hence not bound by the ToS.)

I pretty much agree with the rest of your commentary on patents, but I'm not prepared to say that it's impossible for someone to either create something patentable within SL or apply an existing patent to content creation in SL.

if you think ip means 'ideas', you are wrong... the ipod would have never been invented (it wasn't the first mp3 player on the market; it came later but managed to be such a better one via its software/hardware combination, it took the market. considering apple computers have and pretty much 'always been' in the modern era to have such a small sliver of the market, this speaks to how one can 'do the same idea better' and grab a toehold in one or more markets).

maybe it's already been hammered in, but i felt i should just say it again - the idea that -ideas- are ownable is completely and utterly false. i feel it's a false idea that continues to perpetuate thru rumor and misinformation that disservices both creators and consumers alike.

:\ as far as work-for-hire, i could not definitely say - but i would assume rights to the contractor. however if a presigned contract/agreement stipulates that the artist retained such rights to their work (and in sense only offering their client a copy of their work), then yah, the artist retains the rights. easy-squeezy.

i know, i know, 'take it in front of a judge'... well if it that ever happens, we'll see. but if such a situation erred on the side of the contractor, imho it would only stack up to one court's opinion and be up for an appeal up the chain.

p.s. patents are not up for 'time of creation' allowance as copyrights and trademarks are - and as is, patents (nor trademarks) do not apply to this situation (and neither party could claim such). only copyright, and again, unless pre-agreed by both parties, copyright would belong to the contractor.

copyright (an artistic or technical creation) underwrites patent (which recognizes a creation as a new invention). if the creation then goes on to become a 'household brand' per se, then that brand is trademarkable.

It hasn't been necessary to hammer it in, because no one has claimed that ideas are or should be protected.


In this context, "contractor" and "artist" would be the same person. Isn't English wonderful?


Brands don't have to be household brands to be eligible for trademark. A brand just has to be used in commerce.

;0 yes it has, though not by you probably (i don't remember you specifically claiming that; just others.) it seems to be a misconception some are eager to push. i do not know why - though i have asked for them to explain why! ;0



;0 yes, english is wonderful... but not intrinsically any better or worse than any other language. ;0 and from the woeful confines of my synapses, 'contractor' means 'the one with the money hiring', and 'contractee' would mean 'the one who is hired to perform the work'. that may not be definitionally correct; thank you for correcting if it helps others understand better - but i think around the parts where i'm at, what i said would be properly understood. (so please don't bury the message underneath nitpicking... ;0)



:0 absolutely and understood - i didn't mean to misrepresent anything by expressing such; just meant to get across 'the idea' (lol that word again ;0). no, one does not need to have 'an established brand' to take claim of a trademark for their potential branding, as long as it is not already taken (an easy googlesearch away).

Don't chop off the last clause in that sentence in the TOS:"... to use your Content for all purposes within the Service." Every word means something.

In other words, if you put some content into SL, you are licensing people to use that content. Please note that this does not allow them to create their own content that infringes on your patents. It just means that if you sell them a mousetrap object, they get to use that mousetrap object without paying you a patent license. They still can't make their own mousetrap that infringes on your patent -- that would be beyond the scope ("use your Content" of your promise. And most importantly, you can't sue LL for patent infringement from the mere fact that some object you created in SL is based upon your own patent but is stored on their server and accessible (for use or for sale to other players, under your terms).

This is simply to prevent you from creating objects in SL, making them available to people, and then coming back and saying, "Ha Ha! You sat in my funny mousetrap chair that I put in my public garden -- now you must pay me royalties! Ha ha! LL stored this object on their servers, so they must pay me too!"
That's all.

People are not allowed to infringe your patents.
Also, you could license your content in some other way
which might include collecting patent royalties; this would
be slightly complicated, but you could do it (because of the
way that TOS is worded and how it would be interpreted by a court).
The TOS does not necessarily have to override other contracts that
you may have with other users of SL. You just have to write such
contracts very carefully.

"Then he noticed his original work was returned to his Lost and Found folder -- all in pieces".

1. Doesn't that mean he was not only registered as the creator of the objects in SL -- he was actually registered as the owner of each one?

2. So, the new owner had not bought the right to be registered as the owner from him?

3. If the new owners wanted to port to a another grid, wouldn't it be easier to just ask the owner to port it, rather than have some bot copy it?

4. Or simply buy it, including full ownership, not just rendering rights on a particular sim in SL? Assuming that everything is for sale at the right price.



Gospel Voom has recreated New Orleans on SL:

http://slurl.com/secondlife/Fat%20Tuesday/129/161/23

(I registered on Openlife to compare the two versions, but cannot log in.)

5. Do you expect to see the owners of nawlins sue Gospel Voom?

1. Which programs can do that? How do they work?
2. Do you have to be the land owner?
3. But the script owner can hide scripts from others, hence from the bot, right?
4. What can you do to prevent the bot from working?

Maybe this deserves another thread.

Yes, Copybot deserves a seperate thread; this is not a Copybot discussion. Since at least 2006 there has been at least one Copybot thread running; if you browse the forums I am sure you can find the most recent or ongoing one. This discussion is more about the legal and moral issues of intellectual property in SL, especially the Gospel Voom story.

Briefly, the answers to your questions are: (1.) Many programs, some called "Copybot". It's easy to obtain this program or develop a new one. (2.) No, it does not respect permissions. (3.) Scripts are not copied by Copybot. because they are never transmitted to the Viewer. Prims, texures, clothes, and so on -- but not scripts -- are transmitted to the Viewer. That's how Second Life works. (4.) Nothing can thwart Copybot, unless you own the entire sim, it's not next to any other sims, and you ban the public from going there. Because Copybot works by logging in an avatar (a "robot" and visiting the sim. (5.) No, there is nothing that Linden Lab can do to prevent this, either.

At the risk of stirring up an old off-topic debate here, there's something germane to the thread: It's absolutely true that LL can't prevent some variant of CopyBot from working, but there's much they can do to make it too painful for anyone to consider infringing with CopyBot or otherwise.

LL cannot use the DMCA to pursue violators on behalf of the Copyright owners. However, the ToS explicitly grants LL a license to use the protected content within their service, which I believe gives them legal standing for a civil suit against the violators. And the thing is, LL can claim much greater damages from infringement than the mere loss of sales revenue that the copyright holders themselves suffer. The value of LL's entire service is compromised by such infringement: it reduces the appeal of the service to content creators, and by thus reducing the quality and quantity of content, the appeal of the service is reduced to content consumers--on both counts eating away at LL's user base and bottom line.

IANAL, but it seems to me that if LL were sufficiently motivated to launch and aggressively pursue just a handful of such suits, violators would soon enough learn that their defense costs alone would dwarf the value of anything they could steal. And there's a non-zero chance they could end up owing LL every dime they could ever hope to earn from real-world sources for the rest of their lives. And it would serve the bastards right.

Or he'd deeded it to a group.

As Argent said, either owner or deeded it to a group.

That doesn't follow. The new owner may have bought the right but not exercised it. Or maybe some objects were changed and some weren't. The line you quoted shouldn't be assumed to mean "all of his original work was ....".

Another possibility is that the question wasn't addressed in the contract. The creator cares more about the SL creator field than the SL owner field. The buyer would only need ownership for some limited purposes. So they may not have gone to this level of detail, or not even thought about it.

I don't think so. For one, even if the creator didn't care about the use, he might want to charge for his time and effort in doing the port. And even if he wouldn't have charged at all, the bot would have been faster and more reliable as far as making an exact reproduction.

The way this reads, I think you mean to buy with full perms within SL. That alone never, ever implies permission to render in some other grid.

The other way to read it would be to buy all the copyrights as well. This would have to have been written into the contract, and it's not at all clear that the creator would have agreed to this at any likely price.

The best up-front solution would have been to state in the contract that the buyer has the right to at most one rezzed copy of the build at any time, regardless of the grid. The creator may or may not have charged extra for it, but the incremental cost should have been reasonable.

Of course with hindsight, creators of custom builds in the future would do well to make sure their contracts explicitly deal with the issue of multiple grids. I bet many already did this, before this article was published.

It depends upon their contract. If they bought the exclusive right to use it in SL, then they might have a case - but they would probably only raise it if Voom sued first. If not, then what grounds would they have?

FYI, copyright ownership cannot be implicitly or orally transferred. Like real estate, it must be explicit and in writing.