“Curiosity killed the cat, but for a while I was a suspect.” ~ Stephen Wright

Okay so I’m not usually a cat person, but I wants me some boxed ninja cat.

“In the last days of Vaudeville Theatre, they sued Marconi because radio was killing Vaudeville, where you had to pay to go into a relatively small room to listen to music and voice. But it didn’t kill music, the outcome was a thousand times more music, making a thousand times more money, reaching a thousand times more people. But in the short term, there was panic.” ~ Cory Doctorow

More than any other topic about SL, I am exhausted with content theft. It is always there, somewhere, in my twitter feed, friends’ blog links, or sneaking up on me in the form of an insanely rambling notecard dropped on me by a designer I’ve never heard of (or worse, one I’ve heard of but can’t stand).

When the issue began, I was outraged at Linden Lab’s indifference and short-sightedness. Over time, my feelings have shifted to less disgust with LL (there are so many things they get wrong, how can you be outraged at all anymore) and more disgust with those individuals in the SL creative community (and blogging community) who behave in a ridiculously stupid manner about content theft.

No matter the repulsive antics, however, I come up against the reality that content theft is still a serious issue that threatens the SL economy in may ways. Putting aside the crybaby tactics, the melodrama and the police-state protection measure attempts (that never work, it’s worth mentioning) there does need to be dialog on the topic, and it should include someone from Linden Lab who has a commitment to getting this handled in a way that provides help to the creative community without limiting too much user freedom. Assuming anyone like that still exists at Linden Lab and holds the authority to do more than order refills for the soda machine.

Years ago, I had a three-day debate with Grace about content theft; we kept hitting walls while we volleyed solutions.

First, you come against the fact that anything which can be manufactured indefinitely/at no cost has a difficult time establishing and maintaining a market value. This corrupts the conceptual value of virtual goods with consumers (social morality does not place as much stigma on stealing a stick of gum as it does a diamond ring, and the stick of gum can boast a larger physical value than anything sold in Second Life). Now, to be certain, the time, effort, and skill that goes into creating most objects in Second Life has costs and value, just as every software-based product does. But how many people have not-so-legal copies of one program or another on their computer as they’re now reading this?

Second, you realize that DRM never works and that most companies have been spending billions and raking their middle-men minds out trying to find a method that does work. You also look at history and must concede that every time content creators have tried to stifle invention and technology in the name of protection, they’ve been wrong. TV did not kill the movie industry. The VCR did not kill movies and television. Despite what the music industry claims, MP3s have not stopped most people from dreaming of being the next American Idol. Markets shift; technology opens more doors than it closes; those who try to police progress are always wrong.

Third, you hit the problems with trying to police stolen content without infringing on the innocent and the rights of non-abusers. I am not of the opinion that everyone should be treated as a potential criminal for the “greater good” of something. No-mod items which should be mod (like clothes or hair) piss me off. We shouldn’t have to contact a creator for a “fitting.” The SL consumer is already at a huge disadvantage on most items. We can’t try on most clothes before buying them. We can’t trade-in most objects. There is no longer anything that passes for a second-hand market. We can’t back-up our inventories for data loss. Trying to force the SL consumer to accept that we shouldn’t even be allowed to tailor our purchases to our avatars really fries my yams — especially when making something no-mod is not a protection against anything (excluding scripts, obviously). You don’t stop someone from stealing your textures, sculpts, or shape settings by making something no-mod, you just slow them down, make them use better tools, and piss off a lot of ordinary consumers in the process. There are now content creators who embed scripts in their items to NOTIFY them when you rez an object that’s intended to be worn. Not long ago, a friend of mine rezzed a shoe to leave it out as a prim decoration in her virtual dressing room and the content creator IMed her in a tizzy to accuse her of rezzing it to copybot. Nothing sells a brand like a rabid content creator acting like an idiot and accusing an innocent consumer of criminal activity. Morons.

Fourth, there’s the statistical issue. We don’t know how much stolen content is actually happening, so it’s hard to sell the need strenuously. It’s largely anecdotal guesswork based on a lot of crying from melodramatic hens who, unfortunately, can rarely be trusted to offer sound testimony.

Fifth, you have all the joys of documenting and filing DMCA paperwork and the international issue, coupled with the fact that so few content creators use the system that’s in place to protect them.

Sixth, Linden Lab should not be in the position to judge content disputes. It’s a bad, bad, bad, bad, bad idea. For them, legally, as well as for the community in general.

The list goes on, but for every problem, the main question still stands: how to solve it?

At the time of my debate with Grace, I was firmly in the camp that a third-party organization needed to be established to act as arbitrator. This was the way eBay disputes used to be handled, once upon a time, and it worked fairly well. The idea, loosely would be to have an established Linden-Lab approved protocol which would be included in a revised SL TOS making it so that anyone offering items (free or for sale) agreed to arbitration in cases of potential content theft. This arbitration process would be focused solely on the removal of the content from LL’s databases and would not stop any wronged party from seeking civil recourse. The system would be self-funding, as the accuser would have to pay an arbitration fee, and the defending party would have to also pay one to dispute the accusation. After an established process of review, the party who was found not at fault would be refunded, and offending items would be removed from the grid into a “holding” database (rather than just being deleted) not only to provide for an appeals process, but also to maintain records for any civil legal issues. Obviously, this means the third party organization would need to have a liaison with Linden Lab to execute matters of authority.

I still believe this third company, provided it be headed by responsible individuals with fair and established reputations in the business community, could perform their services with acceptable levels of transparency at a modest fee. They could easily work in tandem with SL. Yes, there would still be sour grapes and crybaby antics, but there would be a system to weed out most of the trouble.

However, I no longer believe this alone is the best solution. This kind of review process would only work for textures that are somehow watermarked by their creators or can be identified as unique to a particular individual, and many concerns extend beyond this point. Specifically, the ability to import non-borked meshes will bring with it a whole new dawn in the need to protect content. As such, the entire way that LL handles offered content needs to be addressed.

So why not simply make it so that free accounts are unable to create transfer items, place items for sale, or mark items as free to the community? Why not make it so that anyone trying to distribute virtual goods must have a confirmed payment to distribute anything? (Please note, I am not talking about the useless age-verification, I mean an actual credit card / paypal account / other payment method transaction on file).

This accomplishes a few things.

1. It cracks down on anonymous theft in a big way. It forces someone who wants to circumvent the system and steal content anonymously to commit credit card or payment fraud, making their actions a matter for authorities.
2. It makes it so that anyone filing a DMCA or looking to take legal action will not have to shell out ridiculous amounts of money chasing a phantom just to file a C&D or other notice.
3. It invests those people who want to create and distribute in the community.
4. It gets rid of a bunch of badly made crap from the grid.
5. It provides a real (and fair) line between paid and free accounts. Everyone on the SL grid is supposed to be an adult, and adults (crazy cat people aside) understand that with privilege comes responsibility — it’s rule of society 101.

There will be casualties and unexpected consequences. For every protection, there is a compromise. I’m well aware that creators with multiple accounts will encounter issues (although I do think simple ways to link accounts can be established for concerns like this). When you look at the horrible ways many content creators are trying to address content theft on their own, or you consider how Linden Lab might handle this otherwise, or even when you realize the implications of “in the shadows” projects like Modular Systems’ Onyx, you start to see the benefits of making a transparent compromise with minimal impact.

This system would preserve the ability of free accounts to make things for themselves, to experiment and build, to offer art for exhibition, etc. These would all be good things to encourage new residents who need time to “skill up” before entering the marketplace, etc. It also provides for artists or educators who don’t have any interest in the money game. Performances, lectures, etc will not be affected. Most residents, being straight consumers, likely will not be hindered at all. I personally do not know a reputable content creator who doesn’t have a paid account.

IRL, if you want to go into professional business, you need a business license, articles of incorporation, financial records, etc. There is some record of transparency with the proper authorities so that anyone in the public with a grievance can know who to address. This process, if nothing else, will verify who the parties are in legal matters and protect Linden Lab from having to fight lawsuits with consumers (gestures of good faith also go a long way in most courts).

Making it so that in order to distribute content, you need to have a paid, verified account, is hardly a draconian gesture. I think having this simple protection in tandem with an open protocol for handling disputes (and possibly collaborating with a third party arbitration organization) should be on Linden Labs not-so-distant to-do list. And I hope something like this is on the table for discussion before importing meshes becomes a reality.