Transcript of Cory permission town hall?

Havok is the physics engine that SL uses. Right now we're using Havok 1; the port to Havok 2 is something that has been requested since SL was in beta. Havok 2 is supposed to improve the handling of collisions between physical objects. For example, right now certain physical collision computations can cause the server to go into a "deep think," bringing the sim to its knees; supposedly Havok 2 will avoid these. Also, right now physical objects may collide when they're as far as 0.1 meters apart. Supposedly Havok 2 will increase the resolution to 0.01 meters.

Some people anticipate that Havok 2 will provide increased performance, allow vehicles with more than 32 prims, etc, etc. That remains to be seen.

Haney is working on getting the transcript posted, so look for that sometime today. I'll cross post to http://secondlife.blogs.com/prompt

(Here's the transcript taken from the Rodeo Repeater Event, local chat was removed.)

PART 1

Cory Linden: ok, I suspect that we have a lot of ground to cover, so why don't we get going?

Torley Torgeson:

Cory Linden: I have some general comments from the various blog discussions

Cory Linden: that we'll hit first and then we can talk about issues

Cory Linden: the idea being that we'll do the usual Q&A but stay on specific issues longer than usual

Cory Linden: First off, a bit of background as to why we're talking about changing permissions

Cory Linden: and it isn't because we want more stuff to work on

Cory Linden: the first concern is the legal one . . . right now you all have real world copyrights in your creations

Cory Linden: but the current permissions aren't actually forcing buyers/recipients to agree to licenses that match the abilities granted within the license
Cory Linden: as we grow and you all are creating items of greater and greater value, more and more issues could appear

Cory Linden: such as - you want to make a graphic novel of your avatar, sell a chair design to Design Within Reach, etc

Cory Linden: so we need to make changes to clean up the legal issues

Cory Linden: Second, the current persmissions are strongly biased to the creators (this will be a topic of discussion I suspect)

Cory Linden: but economic growth and innovation, two absolutely critical pieces of SL's long term success

Cory Linden: have historically tied to the cost of information

Cory Linden: this is an important concept, ok?

Cory Linden: cost of information determines how quickly innovations occur and the more limits that are placed on information transfer

Cory Linden: the more innovation is slowed

Cory Linden: slower innovation is bad for Second Life.

Cory Linden: If you look at the historical roots of intelletual property law in the US (and around the world)

Cory Linden: they are always a balance between limited monopolies for creators (which means that creators can sell there stuff for more)

Cory Linden: and the societal good of shared information.

Cory Linden: All of these stresses apply to SL as well.

Cory Linden: So, we wanted to look at how to find a better balance between creators and consumers than we currently have.

Cory Linden: In looking at this, we focused on fair use and the right to tinker.

Cory Linden: We saw an opportunity to allow the buyer to make choices about whether they wanted the rights that

Cory Linden: are usually keyed to first sale doctrine -- such as the right to resell or give away something -- and fair use rights

Cory Linden: like modification, tinkering, &c.

Cory Linden: So, that's the general background. I assume that you've all been on the blog, so let me run

Cory Linden: through some of the questions quickly

Cory Linden: <takes breath>

Cory Linden: everyone brought up the critical nature of a smooth transition and converting content from the old to the new system

Cory Linden: Part of the reason that we're talking about this so early is to ensure that we can do that

Cory Linden: I don't have a full proposal for conversion yet (mainly because I suspect that your feedback will cause changes to the proposal)

Cory Linden: But a quick first pass looks something this

Cory Linden: nomod/nocopy/trans => (c)

Cory Linden: nomod/copy/trans => cc

Cory Linden: mod/nocopy/trans => cc

Cory Linden: mod/copy/trans => cc

Cory Linden: note that several of these become more restrictive, but that is balanced by the wrapper concept and its ability to tweak stuff you own

Cory Linden: the tricky cases are the "no transfer" cases of mod/copy/notrans and nomod/copy/notrans

Cory Linden: the new plan doesn't actually have a "no transfer" permission (which I think that we'll talk about)

Cory Linden: so the situation would likely be that those would become (c) + no transfer, a special case for old content

Cory Linden: this is a good moment to talk about no transfer.

Cory Linden: Several of you brought this up and it is an interesting question. Right now, the plan is to not have that permission anymore.

Cory Linden: In thinking about it, we were thinking about real world rights and it seemed like a far more natural fit that if you owned something you could pass it along.

Cory Linden: Will propogation into sub parts (the creator changing permissions) be supported?

Cory Linden: Yes

Cory Linden: Right now the plan means that you can't make unique objects anymore. Several of you raised good points about that.

Cory Linden: The tension is that unqiue objects break some of the fundamental properties that make digital items, well, digital.

Cory Linden: However, I understand that games, collectables, &c are important, so there are some options

Cory Linden: such as the scripting language being able to detect broken wrappers, hashes, &c.

Cory Linden: Should creators be able to create anonymous content in SL? I don't think so, but it is an interesting question. Basic Chair: Right click me and choose 'Sit Here' to sit down

Cory Linden: One final bit, then we;ll open things up.

Cory Linden: Not all licenses play nicely with each other.

Cory Linden: The most obvious example is the GPL which, by its nature, tends to "infect" other content that it touches. We had originally planned to offer GPL rather than BSD, but

Cory Linden: since it doesn't integrate cleanly with Creative Commons, that was a non-starter.

Cory Linden: There is also a possiblity that CC as written can't be used within SL (long legal discussion that is somewhat beyong this meeting) but a modified version of CC would work.

Rathe Underthorn: it is for the betterment of us all

Rathe Underthorn: if we stand together

Cory Linden: Rather, could you wait until I'm done, please? ALso, could you sit down?

Cory Linden: Rathe, that is

Cory Linden: Thanks!

Cory Linden: moral rights are another issue

Cory Linden: in some nations, the creator has the right to determine how her creations are used

Cory Linden: ok, that's the overview and list . . . before we get started and the fur and pixels start flying, I'd like to thank you all for caring about this.

Cory Linden: These are complicate issues that don't have obvious or simple answers. Your participation speaks to your thoughtfulness and intelligence.

Cory Linden: So, Haney do you want to hand off questions?

Haney Linden: so that everyone doesnt talk at once, please IM me and we'll go in turn

Haney Linden: Tiger Crossing: Point on scripts detecting broken wrappers and disabling objects that would allow cheating at games (etc)... This may need to be incorportaed into the breaking ritual: "Breaking the wrapper may disable or damage this obejct. Do you want t

Haney Linden: Do you want to continue?"

Cory Linden: THat's an excellent point. Clearly the "Wrapper Breaking" event is important and needs to be made clear to the owner.

Skunken Gascoigne: Unfortunately, I'd like to discuss, but I have to go. A pity that this town
hall had to happen just minutes before my Weight Watcher's meeting. x_x G'bye.

Cory Linden: James Grimmelmann of LawMeme had a good point as well

Cory Linden: He suggested thinking about the "wrappers" as mattress tags that you can tear off.

Cory Linden: Although in this case the mattress police won't come and invade your home.

Max DeGroot: *snicker*

Haney Linden: Oz Spade: A question is raised about having all items transferable, if someone makes a vehicle and sells it, coudln't someone turn around and resell or give away for free that vehicle?

Cory Linden: So, in the real world, if I buy a car from you, I can resell it or give it away. In SL (perhaps) you also have the ability to modify it or copy it.

Cory Linden: So the idea is that the buyer can either preserve the ability to give it away *or* they can copy it/modify it. (For full (c) permissions)

Haney Linden: Tiger Crossing: Can permissions remain seperate on linked objects, to be later pulled apart, or willlinking "fuse" them together, with a lingering taint after separation?

Cory Linden: I like the "tainted permission" concept . . . that's a great question and I don't know the correct answer yet.

Cory Linden: The intial feeling was that fusing them was simpler but several folks on the blog have shown examples of why keeping them distinct would be useful.

Cory Linden: I suspect that we'll end up more on the hierarchical side.

Haney Linden: Jennyfur Peregrine: Will there be a new function in the permissions settings that allows the texture to be locked so a clothing item can be modified but the texture will not show so that no one can take a screen shot and rip the work off?

Cory Linden: That's a great question. Obviously, any texture that gets displayed can have a screen shot taken.

Cory Linden: This is the "analog hole" in the real world of DRM and copy protection.

Cory Linden: I think that we can take steps to discourage people. You: Have a seat and get comfortable...

Cory Linden: However, you can't completely stop this . . . you can just do things that make the screen shot lower quality.

Haney Linden: CrowCatcher Valen: any plans on a URL blocking tool so people cant take the stream from your land?

Cory Linden: oh, so you want to stream to yourself but not to others?

Haney Linden: CrowCatcher Valen: no CrowCatcher Valen: people can take streams we pay for

Haney Linden: CrowCatcher Valen: we dont want them too CrowCatcher Valen: now anyone can

Cory Linden: oh, wait, I see you want to make it so that only people on your land get it

Cory Linden: the problem, of course, is that if you are streaming at them, they can sniff the packets to see where it's coming from

Haney Linden: CrowCatcher Valen: so that it's not visable, sorry

Cory Linden: but I agree that hiding the url makes that harder

Cory Linden: sort of a similar problem to the texture question.

Haney Linden: By the way, if you are here you can chat out followups to your own questions

Cory Linden: these are both examples of the core issues, right? Digital data is easy to move around, copy, &c.

Cory Linden: The internet is good for moving it and computers are good at rendering it.

Cory Linden: But, free markets are built on the tension between property rights and information cost, so we're trying to find the best balance.

Haney Linden: Kathy Dayton: With this change,, will it still be possible to buy gifts for people and transfer them (for example offlline)?

Cory Linden: Sure, first sale is preserved unless you want to copy a (c) item or modify it, then you lose the ability to transfer it.

Haney Linden: Bakuzelas Khan: if you take away no transfer, if people can transfer, people will buy stuff cheap and sell it again for high prices - so everyone will have to charge crazy prices for stuff to prevent that and make sure they get a fair deal.

Haney Linden: Bakuzelas Khan: If people can see a low quality texture of the work, then they will just make a low quality knock off of it and try to get a refund from you, or sell it to someone else claiming it's made by you.

Cory Linden: To the first question, I'm not sure that I agree. If I can buy a shirt for $10 or $100 (and it's the same shirt) then I'll pick the $10 shirt, right?

Cory Linden: I agree that more features to find and sell items are an important piece in making that decision.

Haney Linden: Bakuzelas Khan: If people can see a low quality texture of the work, then they will just make a low quality knock off of it and try to get a refund from you, or sell it to someone else claiming it's made by you.

Haney Linden: sorry

Haney Linden: Bakuzelas Khan: but how will they know? lol

Cory Linden: this goes to the question of finding things in world. I don't want to get too far afield, but that is clearly important. Again, information flow is a good thing.

Cory Linden: To your second question, clearly "copying by inspection" is a problem (just like the real world).

Cory Linden: However, if there is good information flow, I know that better quality items sell for more than cheap knockoffs (again, like the real world)

Haney Linden: Leran Charlton: Haney, Im concerned as a merchant that furniture I make such as chairs can simply be copied for more. How does this affect my ablilty to sell my product? If I make a dining set containing 4 chairs, the buyer need only buy one and make

Cory Linden: This is a good question and I don't have an immediate answer . . .

Cory Linden: I wish I could just say "ok, creators can control how many copies are made" but I am concerned

Cory Linden: that everyone will just make that choice and ultimately decrease learning and innovation inside SL

pancake Stryker: whats up here

Cory Linden: But I agree that we need to debate that question very carefully because I understand the issue

Cory Linden: I guess the question back to you is: "Can you just sell the set of 4?"

Haney Linden: Cid Jacobs: what happens to items that r previously sold with copy permission, will they be given transfer as well? if so that will put me out of biz

Cory Linden: wait, can I get an aswer from Leran?

Basic Chair: Right click me and choose 'Sit Here' to sit down

Cory Linden: who's not even here I guess

Cory Linden: ok, cid . . .

Cory Linden: no

Cory Linden: one option is that they become cc or (c) and lose copy, but the owner can break the wrapper to regain the copy permissions (and lose transfer in the process)

Cory Linden: The other option for stuff already out there is to respect current permissions and to allow migration to appropriate new permissions

Cory Linden: this would allow creation with old stuff and slowly phase out the old permissions

Haney Linden: Leran Charlton: Haney, selling it as a set of 4 is fine and can certainly be done, but, not everyone wants 4 chairs. especially if they have a small place

Cory Linden: OK, so we're not going to decide on the unique item question this instant. The thing for the creators to think carefully about . . .

Cory Linden: is whether uniqueness is really a good thing or not . .. I know that many of you already allow copying because it's what your customers want

Cory Linden: after all, your customers want more freedoms not less

Haney Linden: Gwyneth Llewelyn: ask Cory about "co-creation" ie. having a prim/texture/script authored by different people and/or groups. What I read on the blog was not clear to me on how "co-creation" will be implemented or propagated.

Cory Linden: right, that isn't clear yet, although its related to the linked question

Cory Linden: short term, there will probably need to be a single "creator" even if that person allows multiple people (in a group for example) to edit the item

Cory Linden: it it different pieces combined, then this goes back to one wrapper or many, which I agree we all need to consider (especially the tradeoffs between simplicity and completeness)

Haney Linden: Fargon Millhouse: Reverse engineering is a problem in the Real World...how can you assure owners of intellectual property that this will not be dont in SL....since you can choose to "break" the wrapper, copy and redistribute?

Haney Linden: Fargon Millhouse: also.........I often PAY (IN RL & SL) a programmer to develop scripts which I then own and intend to copyright...can you explain how this will work..since I am a bit fuzzy on this right now...

Cory Linden: First question . . . Cory Linden: I can't assure you of that. The current permissions system doesn't and the real world doesn't. What I can assure you is

Cory Linden: you have legal recourse (just like in the real world)

Cory Linden: oh, wait, just noticed a misunderstanding . . .

Cory Linden: if you break the wrapper, you lose the ability to redistribute . . . that's one of the core ideas

Cory Linden: trading off freedom to tinker with first sale concepts

Cory Linden: however, laws and societal norms are ultimately way better at dealing with infringement

Cory Linden: on the second question, if you make a contract with the programmer in the real world then you're set

Cory Linden: they give you the text and you make the (c) script

Haney Linden: Kim Anubis: Q: So you're essentially going to force us to put a "site license" on our creations?

Cory Linden: I'm not sure what you mean by that . . .

Cory Linden: we currently allow you to keep a full (c) on everything that you make in world

Haney Linden: Kim Anubis: You can't use multiple copies of a program you buy at once, irl

Haney Linden: Kim Anubis: You can't use multiple copies of a program you buy at once, irl

Cory Linden: well, right now if you by something with no copy set that's what's being enforced

Cory Linden: the new system allows your customer to choose if they want the freedome to tinker with or copy the item.

Haney Linden: Kim Anubis: but here, you're talking about making everying copyable Kim Anubis: so one chair seats 12 or 20 Kim Anubis: one scripted item could be used by the owner on 10 parcels Kim Anubis: etc. Kim Anubis: at the same time.

Cory Linden: That's the current proposal, yes

Cory Linden: However, once they decide to use that option, they are losing the ability to resell the chairs, give away the script, &c

Cory Linden: Much like IP in the real world, we need to make decisions about what the best path is for our world.

Cory Linden: The real world has opted for "strong copyight"

Cory Linden: unfortunately, history has shown that strong copyright hurts innovation, hurts markets, hurts technology growth and hurts customers.

Cory Linden: We have an opportunity to do better.

Haney Linden: Jillian Callahan: Q: On a script with a "broken wrapper", is there anything that would prevent copy-paste outright duplication?

Cory Linden: The (c) scripts never show their text for exactly that reason.

Cory Linden: Again, a tradeoff

Cory Linden: buyers can choose to buy scripts that they can see because learning the scripting language is important to them.

Haney Linden: Oz Spade: What about vehicles? These objects are frequently lost on border crossings, the permissions system would run counter to any vehicle business that uses copy as a way to recover.- Pertaining to the nomore no-transfer rule - Most vehicles would th

Haney Linden: Most vehicles would then be set to nomody/nocopy

Cory Linden: Right, but the buyer can break the wrapper and keep a copy in their garage/inventory/whatever.

Cory Linden: Plus, we are working on tools to help recover lost items as that is important.

Cory Linden: For those who haven't seen it, there is a discussion of current feature work on my blog.

Cory Linden: Anyway, the wrapper actually helps the vehicle problem by always allowing the owner to make a copy (if they're willing to give up being to resell it)

Haney Linden: FlipperPA Peregrine: Just a quick question: Most residents believe that a simple solution involving two features would suffice. These two are the ability to lock textures on modify enabled clothing/objects, and transfer to owner. Why wouldn't this simple

Haney Linden: suffice?

Cory Linden: As I stated at the beginning, there are legal implications to having permissions without appropriate licenses. Second, that we want to find a better balanced set of permissions.

Haney Linden: Bakuzelas Khan: What's the difference if I give my employee 10 "wrapped" skins to sell, and a guy buys 10 skins to sell, and they go to different sims to sell my product, the scammer selling them for twice my price. How would a consumer know that guy doe

Haney Linden: doesn't work for me Bakuzelas Khan: Anyone could still buy my product and resell it anywhere, wrapping does nothing.

Cory Linden: Yes, they can resell your product, increasing the number of people who know about you. This is just like the real world, where you can resell a car or a CD.

Cory Linden: As we talked about earlier, this is a good reason for better search tools to make it easier to find duplicate items at different prices.

Haney Linden: Bakuzelas Khan: so.. you're encouraging scamming?

Cory Linden: no, I'm encouraging a balance between the rights of creators and the rights of owners.

Haney Linden: Lumiere Noir: Hi Haney, I understand LL has been working on a Linux verison of SecondLife. Are any of these proposed changes an effort to align SecondLife more closely with the beliefs of the GNU/FSF/Linux/*BSD communities?

Cory Linden: Yes.

Cory Linden: Well, let me expand on that a bit . . .

Cory Linden: Long term economic growth is tied to innovation. This is tied to several factors, the most important of which is information cost and property rights.

Cory Linden: The success of SL is strongly tied to your ability to be innovative. What FSF, OSF, &c point out is that free information leads to more innovation.

Cory Linden: What they miss is that not all creative endeavors have proven effective within the open source model, and

Cory Linden: that temporary monopolies (ie, intellectual property rights) have been a key component in markets as well.

Cory Linden: So, while I think that software in particular has much to learn and gain from open source methodologies (hence the BSD license choice) for the complex creativity within SL

Cory Linden: more options than just "strong copyright" or "full commons" are required. Hence a plan that allows choice for both the creators and the consumers.

Haney Linden: Kenzington Fairlight: this new system seems to assume that everyone in SL is good natured and wouldn't use mod abilities to simply copy an object/script into their own name. But the truth is there are alot of sneaky shady people who will now have an eas

Haney Linden: an easier time doing what they do

Cory Linden: Remember, that if you break the wrapper, you can't transfer that new object.

Cory Linden: Also, to folks who are coming in late or who haven't hit the blog, we're talking about this now so that you can provide feedback and make the plan better.

Cory Linden: The soonest these changes would actually be implemented is two releases away, so quite a ways into 2005.

Cory Linden: this isn't something that we're going to do quickly.

Cory Linden: In return, I hope that you will all think carefully about what kind of world you want to live in. While it is sometimes easy to just assume that creators should have all the rights over their creations . . .

Cory Linden: history has repeatedly shown us that this reduces innovation and progress, as well as limiting entrepreneurial opportunities.

Cory Linden: Even thought that hit 5pm on the dot (flashing red light and all) how about a couple more questions?

Haney Linden: ok Haney Linden: Gwyneth Llewelyn: suggestion to Cory: when the wrapper gets broken, IM the creator So you can track it (there could be alternatives to IM, like tracking it from the user profile page, for example)

Cory Linden: Gwyneth, that's actually something that we thought about doing. It was a great suggestion of James Grimmelmann's actually. It would be easy to do, do if people liked that idea we could certainly implement it.

Tiger Crossing: (If objects can be scripted to detect wrapper breakage, they can do the IMing for you, or whatever else.)

Cory Linden: That is true as well.

Haney Linden: Kim Anubis: Q: How do you think this weakened copyright will be viewed by companies considering offering virtual copies of their RL products in SL?

Cory Linden: this is an important question, Kim. Again, we aren't weakening (c) so much as protecting critical pieces of it. I use the idea of "strong copyright" to contrast the crazy direction that certain senators are going with the historical balance that (c)

Cory Linden: used to strive for.

Cory Linden: I think that companies that get SL will also get the IP regime that we have chose and, frankly, those are companies that we want.

Haney Linden: Oz Spade: What about a situation where someone breaks the wrapper, copies down all the key points of an object, position, size, texture keys, etc. then applies it to their own object? Doesn't breaking the wrapper make making a duplicate knockoff easier?

Cory Linden: Oz, that's a good point, although if the viewer has enough data to render the object than someone who is sufficiently sneaky could do that anyway. So . . .

Cory Linden: the question becomes, do you want the benefits that come from the right to tinker with the risk of kockoffs (although in the real world, creators are able to stay ahead of knockoffs) or

Cory Linden: a world where only people who really want to hack around can learn from each other? Also, better search and other approaches can help - plus the idea of messaging on wrapper breakage.

Cory Linden: OK, last question

Haney Linden: Neehai Zapata: Under this same system, would we also be given the source to Second Life itself to modify if we so choose?

Briana Dawson: lol

Cory Linden: not until SL goes open source and that's another discussion

Jeri Zuma: Q. just like the day sets here every 4 hours, how about having the strong copyrights expire after, say 12 months -- that's plenty of revenue for the inventor...?

Cory Linden: Jeri, that's a great question. Again, it comes down to what more protections are actually doing for the creators.

Cory Linden: Many of you already sell stuff modifable so that your customers get a better experience and the new plan isn't changing that

Cory Linden: OK, I want to thank Haney for passing along the messages and all of you for spending the time to seriously think about this.

Cory Linden: As many law students can tell you, IP isn't always the most exciting of subjects, but it is incredibly relevent to the world we're building.

Cory Linden: So, think about it. Learn about it. Some places to go are Cory Doctorow's writings, Larry Lessig's Free Culture, the LawMeme blog, Jack Balkin's writings at Yales and others.

Haney Linden: Please read and post to Cory's blog at http://secondlife.blogs.com/prompt/ and thank you all for particpating.

Tiger Crossing: Cory, some people think it's possible to separate Gifts from Sales, I know that any attempt to block one or the other is trivial to circumvent, but an MSRP that remains on an object (in the wrapper?) beyond breakage would help the issue, dontcha think?

Cory Linden: And thanks for all the negative ratings during the talk !

Haney Linden: hey now

Beryl Greenacre: yikes

Phil Murdock: /me giggles

Briana Dawson: ok it wasnt me

Cory Linden: I think MSRP is a really good idea, actually

Oz Spade: Negative ratings? Bah!

Tiger Crossing: What? We still have ratings? Who knew??

Jillian Callahan: You're not serious... tell me you aren't serious.

Cory Linden: lol Tiger

Torley Torgeson: Thank you graciously for having us,

Cory. ^_^

Oz Spade: Ratings... another issue... lets start about that... Question 1)

Cory Linden: I hope that you all debate this passionately on the blog

Jacqueline Bancroft: lol

Beryl Greenacre: good point, Oz

Oz Spade: Yes thank you Cory

Torley Torgeson: Oz: eh... enough on the forums about that... it's starting to get redundant.... he he he.

Meiyo Sojourner: Thx for your time Cory

Cory Linden: Ratings are for another day, *but* I can tell you that a lot of design work has already gone in to making those better

Cory Linden: and that we'll likely do a similar thing . . .posting early and often so that we can talk about ideas

Oz Spade: Great!

Torley Torgeson: yay

Cory Linden: I am incredibly focused on being more transparent and making sure that you all are involved as you want to be in building this world.

Oz Spade: Thank you for that Cory.

Oz Spade: Its fun for us too to be able to help decide what goes into SL

Beryl Greenacre: that's encouraging, but must be very hard to accomplish, Cory.

Torley Torgeson: Sharing is caring, and if we can turn such complicated matters into blossoming cornucopias of interest that appeal to the SL community at large, it will truely benefit us all. Ideas, engines of creation! w00t.

Cory Linden: One final comment . . . people make the mistake of thinking that they need strong copyright to create economic growth and innovation . . .

Briana Dawson: only Freedom!

Cory Linden: I strongly encourage all of you to go out and learn about this topic because the truth may come as a surprise.

Cory Linden: Lessig's book in particular is very approachable and well documented.

Torley Torgeson: I am with you there, Cory... sometimes, if you let a bird fly free, she'll be happier and come back to you if it's really meant to be. Kind of like "pay it forward".

Oz Spade: I'm always up for learning new stuff

Phil Murdock: Do you think this will discourage some talent from releasing products they feel will jsut be ripped off?

Cory Linden: Yes, but oddly enought the economic arguments are just cold, hard numbers . . . economies grow, people get smarter and richer, when information is cheaper. Economist named David North won the Nobel for this exact topic.

Jeri Zuma: (even Bill Gates said that the world is now a combination of commercial and open source)

Haney Linden: Check the announcements in secondlife.com/forums for a text copy of this meeting

Torley Torgeson: Phil: oh, my simple own thoughtline is that there will always be scammers. But don't focus on them -- focus on providers of most excellent products, and reward the individuals who help the system to flourish. It's important to take a multitiered approach

Briana Dawson: very idealistic

Phil Murdock: trust no one

Oz Spade: Awsome, thanks haney

Beryl Greenacre: Everything changes when real money is involved, unfortunately.

Cory Linden: again, I'm trying to approach this not from an idealistic position but from a practical one

Cory Linden: the more information flows between SL's residents, the better they are able to make SL their own

Oz Spade: Thats true

Briana Dawson: The reality is that in SL we have seen people new ideas and market it better, shutting out the originator. Thats like RL i suppose.... and it also rewards the scammer.

Oz Spade: And the more and greater things can come from like minds openly working on something.

Briana Dawson: yea what Beryl said.

Torley Torgeson: I am a pragmatist but one mustn't throw away a whole barrel if only a few apples are rotten. I'd like to be more jaded but I have met people in SL who have taught me otherwise.

Cory Linden: damn those nice SL users for ruining a perfectly good cynic

Beryl Greenacre: heh, Torley, your optimism is infectious.

Torley Torgeson:

Meiyo Sojourner: lol

Torley Torgeson: Thank you graciously!

Oz Spade: I think it'll be interisting to see the good and even some of the bad effects this may have. Hopefully more good than bad.

Beryl Greenacre: I was wondering why this talk wasn't cross-posted on Announcements as usual, I usually look there for Town Hall meeting announcements.

Oz Spade: It'll be a learning experience.

Oz Spade: Yes it was hard to find out about this town hall.

Oz Spade: Even your blog url was well hidden.

Cory Linden: lol . . . we'll try to publicize the blog more

Cory Linden: Beryl, I'm sorry . . . Haney will be beaten

Meiyo Sojourner: make him walk the plank

Haney Linden: we hate crowds!

Jeri Zuma: is there a listing of all Linden blogs?

Beryl Greenacre: lol

Oz Spade: I don't blame yah on that one Haney, crowds cause lag and lag is bad like fire!

Oz Spade: Hmm, I thought there was a page somewhere...

Briana Dawson: Haney is doing a grave injustice to the female avatar at the moment.

Haney Linden: no one page for blogs yet that I know of

Haney Linden: but coming soon

Cory Linden: there's nothing wrong with a monobrow

Beryl Greenacre: heh, it's arguable that "Ruth" is hard to recognize as "female."

Oz Spade: guess I was imagining things.

Oz Spade: Who is Ruth anyway?

Briana Dawson: hah funny

Phil Murdock: lol

Briana Dawson: toss on 600 prims Haney, then have a fun trip around SL

Oz Spade: Hehe.

Beryl Greenacre: Ruth was one of the standard female avs that used to come with new accounts, Oz

Cory Linden: for the record, we're testing a fix for some of the prim + teleport issues right now

Oz Spade: Yes, I know that much beryl was wondering if ruth was based on someone official.

Cory Linden: details on the blog, actually

Oz Spade: Yeah I saw that, good to know what you guys are working on.

Basic Chair: Right click me and choose 'Sit Here' to sit down

Beryl Greenacre: lol, sorry, Oz

Oz Spade: S'okies! Shoulda phrased that better.

Jeri Zuma: (...and i hope lag is being worked on!...)

Oz Spade: Heya ben

Briana Dawson: nice landing Ben

Cory Linden: Yes, we are adding lag as quickly as possible

Briana Dawson: nice new look too

Phil Murdock: lol

Cory Linden: Or was that not what you wanted?

Jeri Zuma: lol !

Oz Spade: Radioactive, do you glow in the dark ben? You: That is my experience too. Taking a long time to get into scripting.

Oz Spade: Hah, nice shirt too

Beryl Greenacre: wow, Ben's a mer-man!

Ben Linden: only if I'm very very angry

Oz Spade: Hehe.

Oz Spade: /me Demands lag!

Oz Spade: Hmm, Suddenly more ideas for lag based t-shirts come zooming in.

Haney Linden: ok bye yall, thanks again

Ben Linden: do you mean t-shirts that create lag?

Oz Spade: See yah Haney, thank you!

Meiyo Sojourner: bye haney - thx

Oz Spade: Those too ben, I think a metal linked shirt made out of torii would do it.

Meiyo Sojourner: hahahahaha

Oz Spade: With shiny of course

Ben Linden: wow, each of those mics represent a repeater - so however many folks were here, there were 40 other places they were listening from

Oz Spade: Wow.

Oz Spade: Ben are you in charge of mic layout for events?

Cory Linden: rohkey dohkey . . . I'm off, please discuss and pontificate on the blog. Remember, we're talking about the design early so that we can make it better.

Ben Linden: well, for the last 2

Meiyo Sojourner: hehehe... I know where this is going

Cory Linden: Thanks everyone.

Beryl Greenacre: thanks Cory

Oz Spade: May I suggest a Smiley Face for the next one?

Oz Spade: Thank you again Cory

Ben Linden: I was thinking a hexagonal close packing

Meiyo Sojourner: bye cory

Phil Murdock: Nite Cory

Ben Linden: but a smiley face might be good

Phil Murdock: don't make me give you that neg back

Meiyo Sojourner: I still like my treasure hunt idea too

Oz Spade: Hehe, could do a giant SL hand symbol also with the ammount these are getting too.

Oz Spade: Yes Meiyo had a lovely idea for mic layout also

Briana Dawson: whoa whoa

Oz Spade: Iee floor from under our feet

Oz Spade: /me watches as ben flicks the lights off and on

Ben Linden: thanks for tuning into the LBC, join us for the next townhall

Um, that's a bit too harsh, I think...

Thanks for posting this, Salazar!

A smidge offtopic, but...

Havok (apparently) does everything from script movement to avatar movement to bounding boxes for avatars to even benign stuff like camera movement and building.

If they botch it up... kaboom goes SL

LF