possible copyright violation

How do you feel about the portrayal of women in Gorean works and culture?

Yes yes yes, those who don't agree with my ideals, are all loons or have some sort of mental illness.

Don't get me started. I don't have the energy today.

~Ulrika~

Ok I will remind you some other time.

I am not a Gorean, I think I would be sick if forced to read a book by Al Gore, but then again I respect his right to publish his fantasies, however insane they may be. (duh, I know what Goreans are, don't get all excited)

But isn't SL all about Fantasy?

There are vampire communities, furrie communities and I actually ran into a community that loves to preach of the joys of Marxism and even built a city to recapture the flavor of Stalinist East Germany, walls around their city and all. Talk about living in a fantasy world!

Wars are started by 'geniuses' who think their lunatic fantasy is better than someone else's.

Here we are, a brave new world, but yet nothing has changed.

Ok Lets get it started....Please...LOL

Well thanks for making me feel bad, but I am an artist and while I agree with the general point you are making, I think this particular use is okay (or I would not have done it).

In this particular case, the majority of the works are anonymous velevet paintings of the realy crappy variety that one often sees in flea markets or on eBay going for $2.00 US or less. The majority of the works were produced in "factory" art settings where the "artist" is hired to paint esentially the same picture 10 to 20 times a day from a model provided to them. To me the preservation of the images in a nice form and their availbilty in SL is a good thing, and in fact my entire purpose. I think it is an honor to all those poor unknown artists myself.

Some of the images are no doubt copyrighted images by artists who are still alive, and some might even be selling their wares still. In this sense I may be breaking copyright law by producing them for money If in fact I ever got any money out of the deal. As I said in a another post, I never have sold one and my intention with even putting a price on them was more along the lines of "it would be nice to get a fraction of the money I spent back" than it was an attempt to start a velvet painting business. Also I have never sold a single one and I have changed all the prices to zero now because of this thread.

My reasoning on those paintings is that they will never be available in SL as paintings unless those particular artists join SL, learn how to do computer graphics and upload their work. By taking the best scan I can of their paintings and putting them in a virtual frame and making them available in SL I am doing nothing different from the thousands of residents who scan a picture out of an art magazine and put it on a prim in their living room and I initially did it for my own personal use in the same fashion.

This is just not the same as those folks selling Giger "textures" etc. It would be closer to those folks that have set up virtual "art galleries" displaying famous paintings like Rembrandt and van Gogh, except that I dont get dwell and dont charge anything and they are not really on display. (they are in the attic of a store on a remote private island that gets almost no dwell at all and not marked for sale)

The third category, is that I have a full set of Edgar Leeteg's orginal black velvet paintings. He is the "grandfather" or whatever of black velvet paintings. These are clearly his works just as the Rembrandts and Da Vinci's for sale all over SL are those artists works also. Again, my point here is to include something in SL (at pretty much my own expense) that realistically will:

a) either never show up here or

b) if it does show up it will show up crappily done and probably expensive

I thought it better to make nice good famed versions of the available works and distribute them for free as opposed to some crappy ripoff scan showing up later at some texture shop is all.

Maybe we should concentrate on the massive amounts of real awful, blatent copyright violations in SL before we spend all afternoon discussing the finer poins of this marginal and technical illegality.

There are folks that are selling access to streaming servers with illegal content advertising in SL all the time, and there are the uses of SL as a file trading service like the books I pointed out in the original post. Those are blatent RL copyright violations of the works of existing artists that are still for sale in many venues, perpetrated by users who are in the RL business of ripping off artists with a vengance. How about we spend some time going after them?

A virtual black velvet painting represents (virtually) no sales loss to a RL black velvet painting business, whereas an SL "book" is still a book and can be printed out to read on the bus. In fact it more of less has to be. The idea that folks are going to sit in SL and "read" those virtual books from cover to cover is a bit of a joke. Same with the "SL DVD's." This is just file sharing by another name.

Nice, long rationalization, short response:

1. your feeling bad by someone's commentary is irrelevant
   
2. you don't have rights to the works
   
3. you don't have license to the works
   
4. you have no ability to ability to surmise what the rightholder would want
   
5. your feelings about the use of your works are also irrelevant
   
6. other's copyright infringement doesn't justify yours
   
7. even though you didn't invoke it, there is no way this infringement could be considered "fair use" as defined in Title 17 U.S.C.
   

Spill more words if you want. Better still, do the right thing regardless of your feelings on the subject. Copyright infringment makes Jesus cry.

This gave me the the biggest belly laugh.

I'll agree with Dianne's comments from the beginning of this thread, stealing copyrighted stuff isn't nice. The fact she does it too doesn't make her point any less valid. I think I might be guilty too, shhh, don't tell..... Jesus has enough on His mind...

alright, someone is needed to defend the right of Goreans in SL...First off, supposedly the books were asked to be removed from SL and were in several of the Gorean Sims. (Supposedly from someone who tried to get permissions legally) No Clue whether these 10L books have content or not...as i have not seen them personally. Now...as far as Goreans in SL, they have just as much right to base a life style on science fiction as those that base them on Fur and other such things. Diversity is what makes SL great! And Urlika...Gor isn't about sex...it is about the natural division among the sexes and what is expected of each gender. (No different than role playing King Arthur and Camelot) Just fun for those that do it. Cheer up and enjoy the diversity...get to know Goreans, we are people to!

I am not "stealing" anything and bravo for making the issue into a personal attack.

How is making something available for free stealing?

As I have said (endlessly it seems) my original purpose was personal use only. Secondary to that I later wanted to make them available to others (for free), but I wanted to *avoid* the possible theft of the works enabled by our little capitalist empire here and it's faulty permissions system.

I see this situation as me going the fifteen or so "extra miles" necessary to ensure that these works are *not* stolen by every money-grubbing texture artist in SL. Not the other way around.

I give up. I am making long reasoned responses here and you guys are just throwing hyperbole and glib remarks back. Talk to yourselves.

As soon as I make the boxes and box them up, they will be available as freebies in the junkyard if Yadni agrees to take them. If he/she doesn't, then they will be available in my attic (if youcan find it). As I have also said they have notecards in them explaining all this crap and my motivations, (in case the artists ever show up), and info on the artists etc., which is a hell of a lot more than anyone else has ever done in this regard to my knowledge.

Five years from now when you see one of these paintings on someones wall in SL, reflect on whether I was an evil bitch for "stealing" someones work, or whether it is in fact amazing that a little thing like a velvet painting persisted for so long, because it's distribution was handled so effectively and fairly (by me).

It isn't provided you have an ideosyncratic definition of "stealing", but it is certainly copyright infringement. Wasn't it your concern about such that caused you to start this thread?

Very well said Teri.

I wasn't attacking you, I was defending your original point.

The fact you made no money has no bearing at all as to your guilt regarding copyright enfringement. If I rip a song from Emule and never sell it, is it stealing?

Regardless of whether you are guilty or not doesn't make your original point less valid. That's my point.

All the Gor novels (complete content included) are indeed available at Perilous Pleasures, on the Isle of Bliss. The L$10 price is for the lovely covers and hard work involved by the person that did them. It's not that easy to get full transcriptions and inbed each chapter seperately, with a table of contents. As far as I know, the contents, on a notecard, can be had for free just by clicking on the book, but if you want to have the book for your virtual library, with the nice cover, it would cost you L$10 for a copy. I will check to make sure that's still the case. We also have "The Story of O", which is a great classic D/s novel, and hope to have others soon, as well as original works by SL residents, and short stories found on the web.

It is copyright infringement, no doubt, but on such a small scale, and in a tiny virtual world, that I really doubt John Norman would care. In fact, he would probably be tickled to see how the Gorean community is doing within SL. But if he did dissaprove directly, I would certainly see that they were removed. There are copyrighted items, paintings and pictures and text all over SL, and hardly worth anyone's time to chase down, nor the lawyers fees to see that they are removed. SL just isn't that big of an impact or deal.

I'm not Gorean myself, but I fully support their right to roleplaying and their particular flavor of D/s. They are consenting adults and find enjoyment in the practice, which is
good enough for me.

And Dianne, it's always a good idea to practice what you preach, lest the crowd starts to throw overripe vegetables at you when you mount the pulpit.

What does that mean, I'm not allowed to talk about it then?
I dont know if I implied or you inferred any of this but I have no disagreement with these statements.
Well you are right that I haven't invoked it but I actually think it might cover this use. It's certainly 100% fair use for me to do everything I have done for my *own* SL purposes. It's personal use/research in the exact sense meant by "fair use" with no money changing hands. If I am "facilitating" others to use them in a similar way, that seems like a sufficiently grey area to at least make it at least questionable.

In any case, I dont think your characterisation of it as a black and white kind of thing is really accurate. You have also ignored my comments to the effect that I have actually tried to find the copyright holders of these works.

And your comments hurt me! (wah!)

So after all that I was right and you are selling copyrighted literature in SL. Thank you for somone finally coming forward to admit it.
I do.

The situations are entirely different.

You are engaging in illegal file sharing through SL. I would argue that the products you are providing are not SL products at all, but for off-line reading or printing. The books are currently for sale in RL and you are clearly taking money out of the pockets of the author and publisher by doing so.

I am doing nothing of the sort.

Edit: only just noticed your 'contents for free" statement. If true that mitigates the remarks I made, but doesn't change your legal position as far as I understand the law.

Pointing to other's crime as being more sever doesn't make your crime ok.

Why not admit you are breaking the same law for which you condemned others? Self justification doesn't make it ok.

This is my opinion, and is in no way meant as a personal attack.

I'm not selling them at all. I didn't do the work to get them there.



Ahh..by different, you mean the same? You uploaded graphics files by artists, without their permission, and sold them within SL? Ahh..yes..very different.



You can argue that they are not for use within SL all you want, but of course you have no evidence for your argument. In fact, I would venture to say that from what I've seen and from the folks I've talked to, they are indeed for use within SL, as many folks read them in the library, or in quiet times within SL. These are OLD books, ( I read them about 25 years ago), and can be gotten for very cheap at used book stores in real life. A far better alternative than cutting and pasting to a word processor and then printing out a crapload of loose pages, just so you can read them outside of SL. They are probably long-since out of print, and the full text of them can be found on many Gorean websites.



Sure..if you say so.



Indeed. Nor does it change yours. They are at Perilous Pleasures as reference material for those within SL that are interested in practicing the Gorean lifestyle. As Perilous Pleasures is a very non-profit D/s club devoted to educating and supporting the D/s lifestyle, they fit in to the library nicely, and are part of a much larger collection of reference material, including educational material, web-links, transcripts and essays.

Just to make an over obvious point here.

Paintings on Black Velvet are to Fine Art exactly what The Gor Novels are to Literature.

Well, they both required some effort. Norman had to make up alot of strange words and customs, while the black velvet painters had to get those dogs to hold cards in their paws and sit still.

hahah!
Now that is something I can agree with.

I have never done this.
You haven't been reading very closely.

Well I am in error then.

Obviously I was unaware that anyone had found them, but I suppose I should have expected it. So I guess I have made 10 lindens off the sale versus the 100 or so to upload and the hours of photoshop to create them.

Everyone is having a good time (especially two or three of my "enemies" ), raking me through the mud with funny remarks, so I am not sure it I will even bother to answer on that thread.

I find this whole thread to be just too personal as well. It's fairly clear to me that the ringleaders in this debate are more concerned with finding something that I did wrong than they are with copyright.

I have laid out all the information I could in the clearest possible way about the difference between this situaiton and the GOR books. The GOR books are copyrighted works and being for sale in SL is a definite violation. The velvet paintings are a different situation for all of the reasons I outlined in the thread. They are also not intended for sale. (despite one actually being bought) Whether most of them are even copyrighted or copyrightable is in question.

I spent a great deal of time and effort trying to do something good for SL.
A selfless act IMO.

Now I can't do it.
So the net result is:

- I lose some money and time
- everyone in SL loses the art
- if someone wants a velvet painting they will still upload it
- these paintings will become part of the great yard sale crap category
- they wil be sold over and over again at much more than 10 indens
- no one will ever know about the artists was and so they will never get credit
- *everyone* loses out IMO including the orginal velvet artists.

Are you saying you never sold any, or are you saying you never uploaded any? Because an earlier post suggested you did sell at least one. And in another post you discuss uploading these images.