Does LL plan to update the permissions system?

I was wondering if LL is planning, in the medium term, to overhaul the permissions system, by adding new types of permissions, such as :
* for objects : next owner can change 'next owner' permissions. (if no, functions as a sort of GPL in that it prevents the next owner reselling it under a more restrictive licence)
* for notecards : seperation of "modify" into : "can read", "can save changes to", and "can copy text from". (prevent copying of copyright work from notecards, enabling people to make their living from writing or selling information)
* for notecards : allow notecards to be printed for offline viewing, or saved to local files on the SL resident's computer. (only if they have the 'can copy text from' permission, of course)

There are also proposals for :
* a fine-grained role-based permissions system to replace the 'friends' list
* a fine-grained permissions system for push (up for voting).
which both seem like overhauls of the permissions system in SL in a different way.

Is LL investigating the shortcomings in the permissions systems in SL? If so, do they plan to implement anything like the above things to address our concerns, and make new ways of using SL possible?

Asking about this...

Most of our efforts to revamp the permissions are falling into 2 categories:

* The new groups based roles which is expected to ship with SL 1.12. This allows the mapping of roles in groups to particular sets of permissions on group owned objects.
* Adding support for creative commons licenses while leaving the original permissions system as an option. This will open up many new options with a net global benefit to content creation and velocity of innovation in SL. This will allow 'GPL-like' licenses through the share-alike license. Visit Creative Commons for a more thorough discussion of the mechanics of their copyright licenses.

If someone can read a notecard they can copy it by hand, sniff network packets, or extract it from the disk, so we will probably never attempt to separate read from copy. People have been managing to make money with books through social and legal controls even though books have been trivially copyable for a long time now. There are even examples of authors that make a living while simultaneously encouraging people to copy and distribute their works, for example, Cory Doctorow.

Fine grained controls of friends access has been discussed, but never fully designed and not currently scheduled other than an upcoming update for better control of online status.

Fine grained controls of push is also not scheduled, but we will allow push-free parcels to address concerns about griefers.