Stroker Serpentine goes nude… protesting content theft
February 29, 2008 12:36 pm
‘Content theft steals the clothes of our backs‘ is the main message of this ‘content theft awareness ad campaign together with an occasional ‘Be proud of the skin you’re in… unless it’s stolen.‘ As mentioned in the post where I wonder if content virtual, yet real, thievery is in the lift, or Second Life Residents are just more conscious of it, this ‘awareness campaign’ was organised by Chez Nabob:
It is by no means and end solution, but simply (in my mind anyway) the easiest first step in what I believe should be a multi-pronged offensive strategy for securing more safeguards for IP within SL.
Nearly everyone in the fashion/builder/scripter community is aware of what’s going on in SL regarding theft. The question is how much does the average SL resident know about IP rights in SL? Are they aware theft is occurring? Do they understand the ramifications?
So the goal of this is to try to educate the larger public in SL as to what’s going on, provide information on what the consequences are for everyone and (most importantly) rally them to stand with content creators in lobbying LL for greater protection for IP rights.
What is interesting is how each ad has a rather personal approach: Mr. Serpentine - SexGen bed trial against Catteneo - stresses the fact that being a virtual thief, you do can get cought and can’t hide behind just an IP. He also warns that if things continue this way, we might in end up with having no content creators left: ‘Customers pay when content creators can’t devote time to making new products because they’re out chasing thieves or simply stop producing altogether because of theft.‘ Caliah Lyon - Muse Fine Jewelry - on the other hand asks us to not patronize the stores of thieves who rip textures, copy prims and steal intellectial property. She adds: ‘Stand with us and lobby Linden Labs for security measures that protect the I.P. rights of your favourtie builders, fashion designers and jewelry makers‘ and ends with a nice ‘please?’.
This is the first time such an campaign takes place in Second Life. Did you spot any of the other ads already? And where? Do you think this will help?
7 Responses to “Stroker Serpentine goes nude… protesting content theft”
[…] addition, Chez Nabob is setting up an intellectual property rights awareness campaign which will launch towards the end of this week with a series of about seven ads featuring several […]
Thanks so much for the coverage of this very important issue. It’s a difficult problem to deal with for a variety of reasons, and one that will take the effort of a collective to solve…if that’s even possible.
Very well executed! While I feel that sometimes people tend to over-sensationalize this issue, these posters bring it down to earth a bit and share their personal stories.
As a builder and virtual retailer, I am also concerned about this issue (but a bit less than the clothing makers; I make scripts that are more difficult to dup). However, I wonder how the poor consumer can tell whether they are buying counterfeit goods? It’s not like the perp is gonna mark them “stolen”, and many shoppers would have no idea theft has taken place.
I agree. I paid 6000 Lindens for a skin recently and felt like I was totally robbed blind. Like they were taking the shirt of my back, so to speak. Imagine my outrage when I saw the same skin on sale for 25 Lindens. I have a good mind to go back to the store and demand my 6000 Lindens back. Honestly, the bare-faced cheek of these thieves knows no bounds :(
I’m a small content creator myself and haven’t been hit by a theft problem yet, but I know it could happen. So I’m always worried when I buy something from a small content creator… Until LL do something similar, what about a public website tracking thieves? Like what Spamhaus is to fight against e-mail spam…
I think it is way more easy to get a community to together decide on - take for instance - what is spam and what is not - and what is stolen and what is not? Look at the ‘battling’ ‘this was stolen’ vs. ‘I was first, not you’ on the fashion blogs sometimes. What if the subject of dispute is LSL (CCS vs WARP), … . Anything containing meds, Britney Spears or Shakira is spam, but for some in-world items it is way more hard to judge what is or isn’t ’stolen’ / IP-infringement? The Lindens have on average have more tools to judge on that than the community has at the moment?
Care to comment?