Content Theft, Still…?
“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.
I agree! It is a relatively simple solution that will even help reduce griefing and make it harder for kids to access the grid. Send this post to LL and make them read it!!!
Commented by Tymmerie Thorne on July 2, 2010 at 10:38 AMWell, I’m a content creator, and I don’t have a paid account, payment info on file, or an age-verification stamp. A requirement that residents have a paid account or payment info on file to be able to sell goods or create transfer-enabled items would pretty much eliminate my SL income and end my Second Life experience.
I have no interest in taking money out of Second Life—everything I earn goes to charities, performers, or rent—nor do I wish to visit the Continent of Dildos and Bazooms. I create stuff and work on other people’s projects to pay my own way in SL. Creating artificial barriers to participate in the Second Life economy as anything but a consumer would pretty much remove me from Second Life. I’d like to think SL would be slightly poorer for that.
But you don’t know me so I’m disreputable. Neat! Now I have street cred!
Commented by Lou Netizen on July 2, 2010 at 2:13 PMThank you, Lou, for illustrating the type of reaction that content creators all too often employ to undermine their own credibility. Nothing in my post said that people without paid accounts are disreputable. I don’t know a reputable content creator without a paid account. I stated this to demonstrate that the vast majority of content creators (in my experience) already have paid accounts and, as such, the impact of my suggestion would be less than other measures that are often under discussion.
I don’t know anything about your experience, what you contribute, the content you create, the validity of your statements or how your issues measure up against the majority. And, based on the nature of your comment, I’m not sure if you’re trying to express that you feel your experience is more common, or that you feel your personal experience is more important than addressing the issue of content theft. Conveniently, you get to imply your victimhood and make my post all about your personal story without actually addressing the larger issue.
As I expressed, my plan is not a Utopian solution. In a perfect world people would not try to sell stolen content and there wouldn’t be any need for this brouhaha. I fully stated there would be casualties and consequences of implementing any measure, including my own. There always are. Right now, allowing free accounts to run rampant without any accountability is also a consequence. These conflicting concerns are exactly why I outline my suggestion as a compromise that is, as far as I can see, the least of all possible evils and as transparent and fair as I can envision.
Linden Lab is, sooner or later, going to have to do something that addresses content theft. But everyone’s position seems to be blame to LL for inaction and then cry victim about any possible compromises.
I, personally, have a lot of difficulty mustering sympathy for those who would leave SL over $70UDS/year. If the platform, the community they’re a part of, and their activity here doesn’t generate or isn’t worth spending six bucks a month, then it seems to me that what they generate and/or what they offer the community doesn’t mean that much to them or the people they contribute toward.
Providing different levels of privilege for different types of accounts is hardly creating artificial barriers and, entitlement mindsets aside, paying for privilege is the norm in human society. Second Life is already a luxury format. It’s only available to people who have access to computers good enough to run it and the internet access to log in. Under my plan, free accounts would still be able to explore, create, and exhibit at no cost. $70 a year should not be that big a deal to anyone looking to distribute or create on top of these other privileges.
This platform did not start out with free accounts; they were introduced as part of the ongoing social and economic experiment that is Second Life. Re-evaluating the effects and consequences of free accounts and restructuring the privileges associated with being allowed to distribute with zero accountability is, in my opinion, the least Linden Lab should be doing.
Personal anecdotes are not a suggestion or a solution and the only thing they contribute to the debate is distraction.
Commented by Salome on July 2, 2010 at 3:30 PMI’m not trying to pick a fight, and apologize if my attempt at levity fell flat. I appreciate your reply and essay in the spirit in which they’ve been offered: food for thought and a policy proposal.
In my view, limiting the ability to sell and transfer items only to paid accounts might reduce some “casual” content theft—I’m thinking some of the folks who rip content as essentially a form of griefing. However, most people who have decided they want make money by stealing content from Second Life creators—or by making the tools to do it—are not going to have a moral issue with taking another ten minutes to buy or set up fraudulent “paid” accounts. There is a thriving online black market for compromised credit cards, PayPal accounts, and (to a much smaller degree) Second Life accounts. Aggrieved content creators who want to peer into that world will find a distinct lack of transparency.
Your piece and response note the policy proposal would have casualties. I don’t run a platform; I don’t claim to have The Big Picture of content creation in SL. All I can do is raise my hand, place my pixelly cartoon face with any lumpenavatars who would be swept aside, and say “I would be one of those casualties.”
Commented by Lou Netizen on July 2, 2010 at 5:16 PMThank you for your second response. I can work with this sort of a comment.
That said, I think you’re missing the whole point of requiring payment when you dismiss the potential for this method to dissuade content theft. Requiring payments means that in order to sell stolen content, a “thief” has to do one of two things:
1. Put their own name, ID, and payment information on file with the account they plan to steal with;
2. Commit payment fraud by setting up fraudulent accounts under false IDs.
You characterize payment fraud as “taking another ten minutes” but in reality, it’s a step the average person won’t have immediate access to and a step that will give most pause. True, career criminals who have unlimited access to fraudulent accounts would be able to continue to set them up time after time, but I don’t believe that makes up a large percentage of SL content theft. Obviously that’s my supposition.
Moreover, by forcing such people to commit payment fraud over and over, it makes their actions criminal and not merely civil offenses. A lot of people who would take a risk for a little profit over the threat of possible civil action wouldn’t be as willing to commit an act that faces criminal prosecution. This gives Linden Lab the ability to turn over repeat abusers to authorities instead of muttering DMCA jibberish.
Another deterrent would be the costs of setting up multiple accounts. Sure, there is a black market for fraudulent payment methods, but black markets are expensive and at some point, if the system can identify the theft fast enough, having to purchase the accounts, rip the content, get it up for resale, etc will become less profitable and the people running the scam will have to try another plot elsewhere.
I appreciate that you would be one of the casualties, and I can respect your view if you truly believe the system wouldn’t be a significant deterrent. But, basically, what you’re saying is that (1) you don’t earn enough in SL to pay for a premium account, (2) you don’t value the platform, or your actions within it enough to switch to paying for your account, (3) you think that your experience is more common / more valid than trying to discourage content theft. If that’s your opinion, I can actually respect it, but it helps people like me if you just express it that way and don’t go for the heartstrings with anecdotal stuff.
For what it’s worth, I would be in favor of “grandfathering in” accounts from before the proposed new policy took effect so that people who have established themselves in the community and haven’t raised concerns can continue on their merry way.
Commented by Salome on July 2, 2010 at 7:14 PMTo be perfectly honest, this post comes off a bit elitist….strike that… very elitist I don’t think you understand all the uses of sl and all the reasons people come to free accounts. It may not at all have anything to do with “affording” 70 USD a year. And the fact that you automatically assumed that was the reason was majorly presumptuous and rude.
Your list of the “3 reasons” in the reply above is exceptionally limited and just says *ignorance* to me. If you think you’re logical, and it appears that you think you do, then you don’t attack your only commenter just because she is able to knock your flawed reasoning. She didn’t try to pull “your heartstrings” she politely voiced that your premises are false. Don’t get angry. Think it through! If your hypothesis fails… come up with a new hypothesis… not defend it like a rabid fundie.
I also don’t see that “most content creators are paid accounts anyway”… I’d like to see the statistics on that. There are plenty of small timer content creators that are there just to make enough lindens to pay for their fun in sl. If they have to pay in 70USD a year then that’s 70USD they have to recoup in sales. Then it makes sl really into a business that they have to stress about. SL is supposed to be fun…. last time I checked…
SL is not really a luxury experience either. It doesn’t take a fantastic computer to connect. The minimum requirements cover just about anything that manages to limp along. I got SL to work on my EEE pc… not well… but it did run. So that assertion is patently false.
Also, your commenter makes a very valid point about fraudulent accounts/stolen credit cards. Forcing paid accounts will only change the crimes… but not prevent them.
I understand that content theft is frustrating but this suggestion just doesn’t cut it.
Commented by H3thr Swashbuckler on July 3, 2010 at 1:29 AMGoing to have to disagree with you a bit. Personally, I don’ think limiting sales to Premium accounts is a good idea. I know content creators, even an oldbie or two who don’t use a Premium account. I even know of one who did, and then dropped it. Hell, I don’ t have a Premium account and I set boxes for sale ( to myself) to refresh my L$ after a Lindex buy, but I don’t make content so it’a moot to me.
Limiting sales to those with “Payment info on file” on the other hand, I can get behind.
There’s another way of dealing with stolen content. It’s often cheaper than regular content yes? It’s often bought by newbies who aren’t all that familiar with the SL economy and who don’t have a lot of L$ to spend ( or who don’t want to spend a lot of L$) Lets put it this way, if there’s more folks unwilling to pay L$900 for a gown than L$200 perhaps said L$900 gown should cost L$200 in the first place. We know that the number of people who are willing to shell out more than L$200 in a transaction is small, and the thieves cater to those who aren’t. So starve the thieves by selling non-stolen content to those who might tend to purchase it.
Commented by CronoCloud Creeggan on July 3, 2010 at 10:53 AMH3thr –
1. I agree I probably sound elitist and presumptuous. Putting forward suggestions in a blog for the consumption of readers is a pretty ego-healthy act. As for “rude” and “rabid fundie,” there I can’t help you; I don’t understand how defending a position and demanding reasoned responses over personal anecdotes is rude or fundamentalist. Logical, I maintain; angry never happened. You don’t have to use tea leaves to read my emotions, just ask and I’ll tell you. No-mod hair pisses me off, comments don’t.
2. I’d also like to see statistics on how many reputable content creators have paid accounts. Statistics would obviously matter before anything like this was implemented.
3. To pile onto the elitist accusation, I’m not sure I care about the small beans content creator that doesn’t recoup $70 USD per year. I mean, sure, I care about them as people in the general sense, but I don’t care that they be allowed to distribute to the grid. Most of the small time people in SL who don’t make any money, make crap. *** Please note, I say most and not all, before anyone starts foaming at the mouth*** Being a person whose inventory was once flooded on a daily basis with it, I know what I’m talking about. If creating low-skill items make people happy or keeps them entertained, and they have a driving need to distribute and/or offer it to the community, they can pay $70/year for their happiness. Also, don’t quote me without key words. I said “most reputable content creators” not “most content creators.”
4. If you think that owning any computer (even an ASUS), having regular access to high-speed internet, and having spare time to spend in a virtual world isn’t luxury, then I think you need to re-evaluate the state of most people who live in the world and perhaps go a little lighter on the elitist accusations. An SL premium account is less than half a WOW subscription, less than most people with computers spend on their daily coffee, and less than any number of activities. Free accounts would still exist; they simply wouldn’t be able to distribute to the grid.
5. I addressed Lou’s point about fraudulent accounts / stolen credit cards — why act like I ignored it? It was a good one. And you’re right, as I pointed out, it changes the crime from civil to criminal — which does contribute to prevention and provide a lot more options for dealing with the offenders.
6. You obviously feel my suggestion “just doesn’t cut it,” but other than personal attacks, general disapproval of my language use and attitude, and some vague “not-uh” statements, you’re not really adding to this debate. If you think I’m being ignorant about free accounts, then expand on what you feel my “ignorance” is overlooking. Give examples. If affording the $70 isn’t the issue, then what is? You don’t think it matters changing the act of theft from civil to criminal — tell me why. If you’re going to comment, use the space for something other than name calling and disagreement without purpose. Otherwise you’re just here to “rabble, rabble, rabble” and I have South Park episodes to entertain me if I want that.
CC-
Commented by Salome on July 3, 2010 at 12:36 PM1. I thought about the “Payment info on file” as another option. The problem is that verifying a payment method is different from actually using that payment method to commit fraud. Any kid can use his parents credit card to verify something without getting caught — but a parent is likely to notice a charge on their credit card and look into it. I would support this option if the “payment info on file” was actually verified in such a way that (1) it was a meaningful act of verification, and (2) it also ups the crime from civil to criminal. I’ll do a little research, but this might be a viable option. Don’t kid yourself, though, there will be just as much personal whimpering about verifying a payment method as there will be about paid accounts.
2. Without statistics the issue about how many reputable content creators who are still distributing meaningfully to the grid have paid accounts, I suppose we can go back and forth on it. I don’t know any. But then, I’m probably a lot more particular in my definition of reputable content creators than most, and I don’t personally care about content creators who produce low-skill items or oldbies who don’t skill up being allowed to make their once-a-month sales. (I’m not saying these are the people you know, I’m just saying, if they are, those aren’t people I’m concerned losing their rights to distribute freely to the grid).
3. I’m right there with you on the overpricing of most SL content creators, and, as you’re aware, have been for a long time. I don’t have a lot of sympathy for the high-end content creators these days (who seem to be the biggest crybabies, by and large). Skin creators, specifically, deserve the black market they’ve created in my book. Shoe creators are next. When most high-profile theft occurred against the spoiled, overpriced skin creators, I honestly didn’t care. But theft, in general, has escalated to the point where anything that looks good is ripped and distributed without regard to price. Thieves, more often than not, work the borked keyword search systems in-world and pay for high-profile positioning on XStreet so their items (which can even be higher priced than what content creators sell for) come to the attention of consumers first. That’s a problem which effects every level of the SL-economy, if for no other reason than it discourages anyone from trying to innovate. I have personally been of the opinion that the best way to combat content theft was to outpace and underprice the thieves, but it doesn’t look like that is an option anymore.
Excellent article Salome, definitely a good read. I think requiring a paid premium account to distribute content is a wonderful idea. Hell, I remember when you had to pay a fee to create BASIC accounts. $9.95, if memory serves. Lot of griefers took delight in the removal of that fee.
Commented by Burnman Bedlam on July 3, 2010 at 3:31 PMInteresting article and comments. You and I have discussed the whole “free accounts” thing before. I believe the idea of of requiring people to “pay” for accounts on SL just scares too many people. Content theft will never be stopped completely but at this time there just isnt anything that deters it. I came into sl in 05/06 and the next month was the great flood. All the unverifieds were accused by lots of people for many things. It was great that the numbers shot up but so did the griefing, theft and stability issues. I know many people want to keep their sl private, anonymous and giving LL rl information leaves most feeling gunshy. But at some point to get what people ultimately want there has to be some changes. Some that may not be convenient to all. I like the grandfathering in idea. With some tweaking to the level of users such as {“open(guest), basic, premium}
You pay for what you get and if you expect LL to solve your theft issues you have to bring ideas that are reasonably workable to the table. Simply saying LL should investigate every instance or reported content theft is unreasonable.
Commented by Veritable Magic on July 3, 2010 at 5:18 PMVeritable – it’s worth reiterating that the system I’m proposing doesn’t end free accounts, or forbid free accounts from receiving/transferring items created by others. It would simply forbid anyone with a free account from setting items to sale for general distribution, listing on xStreet, etc and/or from marking objects they create themselves as transfer.
I firmly believe that free accounts should remain, as they have multiple purposes, and provide input.
I know you know. I just wanted to say it, as that point seems to be getting lost a little.
Commented by Salome on July 3, 2010 at 6:13 PMThere are kind of two issues intertwined here: stealing content, and selling stolen content. (Caveat: I am neither a lawyer nor American, so sprinkle grains of salt on my understanding of U.S. law.)
I’m sure folks reading this piece understand that restricting sales and creation-transfer to paid accounts would have no effect on the technical ability to steal content. Right now, with let’s-say-US$20 for a copybot client or the equivalent of first-year programming background can steal content in Second Life. Anyone who wants to copybot an entire sim or four and set the results out at Burning Life would still be able to do so. The motive for these acts is not financial, so content theft as griefing and as a way for 4chan kids and others to get their lulz would continue.
U.S. law already provides for criminal prosecution for copyright infringement, even if the perpetrators do not make money from it. (It’s the LaMacchia thing—the “NET Act” I believe.) If “the authorities” wanted to get involved—or content creators or Linden Lab could persuade them to get involved—a mechanism for prosecution already exists, at least in the United States.
If content thieves are operating to make money, then presumably they move that money out of Second Life. Doing so requires account(s) with associated payment information. If the outside accounts receiving the funds are being used fraudulently, the content thieves are already committing criminal acts in most countries, including the U.S. federal offense of wire fraud along with any violations of applicable state civil and criminal laws. If the accounts used to receive funds from sales of stolen content are *not* fraudulent, the Lindens should be in possession of the object ownership information, transaction records, and financial information necessary to identify the accounts. So, folks getting real money from content theft in Second Life are either already on the record or already committing criminal acts.
I would posit that if people are making money from stealing content in Second Life, they’re either not worried about supplying valid account information or they’re not deterred by the criminal nature of their actions.
Commented by Lou Netizen on July 4, 2010 at 5:07 PMLou,
Thank you for this response.
I should have been clearer — I am not proposing that this plan will stop personal theft (what you refer to as “grief” theft). Truthfully, I don’t care about the casual person/group that rips something for their own use or for the purpose of putting theft on display to make a statement or cause a stir. Those types will always exist and the nature of digital media will never be able to quiet them. Certainly, acts like those are still a violation of copyright, but they’re not a grave threat to the SL economy and they likely will never happen in enough bulk action to dissuade creativity and ingenuity. While that aspect of the problem is worth mentioning, it’s not my focus, nor my interest.
The second part of your post is, however, very important — addressing the fact that many of these people may or may not be violating criminal law already. I am also not a lawyer, however, it is my understanding from things that have been expressed to me from people who are lawyers that because current theft takes place using the Linden Dollar and not “real” currency, that the likelihood of criminal conviction of these crimes is murky at best. The theft is happening in a non-currency format, so while there is wrongdoing, the extent of the crime is unclear. Criminal law, especially for criminal acts that are on the fringe of technology like these, depend a lot on public perception and corporate pressure. Linden Lab is never going to be able to exert the type of pressure the RIAA or big-time entertainment studios can heap onto the Napsters / Pirate Bays of the world. LLab lacks both the resources and the will. Moreover, the general public is going to have a hard time feeling any desire to convict people for stealing make-believe clothes in our current environment. Please understand, I’m speaking only from what I’ve gathered from people who deal in US law; I do not know how this atmosphere translates to other countries. I do believe this will be easier as virtual good laws become more established, but that is a way off yet.
Cornering these people into commiting credit card fraud, however, puts the crime into a format the courts are already prepared to deal with, and forces the criminals to act against parties that have systems in place to deal with them. SL content creators and Linden Lab are out of their depth trying to deal with this kind of theft. I assure you, banks and credit card companies are not, and if these people are forced to open up account after account to continue stealing, committing credit card fraud over and over, there will be action taken against them by people who know how.
Your next good point is that most of these people may or may not be operating with fraudulent accounts. The truth is, we don’t know. We don’t have statistics. What we do know are the things that have been revealed by the few public cases we have to go by — the most important being that of Volkov Catteneo. In Catteneo’s case, the thief did not have a paid account and Stroker Serpentine had to employ a lot of costly legal tactics just to find out who the John Doe was (subpoenas went out to Linden Lab, Paypal, AT&T, to name a few) and which account he was filtering the money to. When it was revealed that Catteneo had a free account with no information on file, and that he was filtering money to another account, Catteneo maintained that he was not associated with the paid account. The fact that he was selling the stolen property on one account and filtering it to a paid account opened up a temporary, but costly, legal problem. Without expensive digital forensics tying the actions of the free account to the account that was able to withdraw to PayPal, for all anyone knew, the account receiving funds was innocent of any wrongdoing. If Catteneo had been unable to sell under his free account, the process of identifying him and holding him accountable would have been much easier and wouldn’t have cost Serpentine a small fortune to pin down some kid from Texas who could never, in a million years, reimburse the costs Stroker had to shell out.
Allowing these people to operate under free accounts and then funnel the money to paid accounts gives them cover. A lot more than I think most people realize. It gives them time to continue to act. It gives them plausible deniability. It places an unreasonable burden upon those trying to bring them to light.
If I have a paid account and I receive money from others, some of that money might be legitimate and some of it might be ill-gotten. Proving that I had a hand in the theft that took place on another account is difficult without logs and data and the kind of forensic examination that is very costly for the average person. Hiring lawyers and data experts and going through the legal requirements of companies like Linden Lab, PayPal, AT&T, etc. makes it nearly impossible for the average SL content creator to try and untangle the mess. If, however, the theft takes place on the same account that withdraws the money then one subpoena to Linden Lab takes care of everything. It eliminates the cover and puts the criminal under a lot more exposure than they may be comfortable with. It also makes catching them and shutting them down faster, staunching their ability to inflict damage on the economy.
This is not as simple as “criminals don’t care if they’re breaking the law.” Of course they don’t. However, criminals, in their own way, operate like businesses. They evaluate exposure, liability, and risk against profit. If the odds of getting caught and held accountable are higher than the gains, they generally move on to an easier scam. Obviously, you will not stop every criminal, or have a fool-proof way to deter everyone, but you can employ reasonable safeguards that make it difficult. No one likes putting down a rat trap, but if you have rats, you bait them, set them out, and place them were you won’t accidentally step on them.
My plan is not aimed at trying to do the impossible, nor am I only person to suggest something along these lines. I merely present this concept back into the dialog because, for me, the problem has reached a level where it must be addressed and this type of solution presents a lot of possible good and doesn’t inflict a great deal of burden on the general community.
Commented by Salome on July 4, 2010 at 7:38 PM@Lou
Regarding the selling/distributing stolen content aspect (the only one of the two intertwined issues worth talking about), I agree with you on the point in the final paragraph that career criminals are not going to be dissuaded from crime on the basis of consequences. However, it seemed to me that the impetus of the original post was not so much to set up deterrents as it is to suggest a viable recourse against thieves. I believe your statement that the “folks getting real money from content theft [...are...] already on the record” is a misconception. Consider the following hypothetical scenario:
New, free accounts can be generated quickly without any payment info, and a spoofed MAC address and some war driving takes care of bans. These free dummy accounts would be used to sell stolen goods. The $L would then be then transferred to third party paid accounts who cash out. It would be difficult, if not impossible, to legally prove that these final recipients are the same people who actually stole the content (“it was a gift”), and therefore hard to prosecute for content theft. And you probably wouldn’t be able to sue for money back because what transferred hands wasn’t money, but tokens.
What she seems to be proposing is an attempt to more effectively tie down the thief with a real life identity. Regarding career criminals, if the thief is sophisticated enough to use identity theft to make a few dollars in Second Life (and that would be lame if they were sophisticated), then it would be a federal crime anyway and something they would be required to pass along to authorities.
Commented by Chance Abattoir on July 4, 2010 at 8:01 PMFor the record, I again invoke my sterling not-a-lawyer/not-American credentials. I am also unfamiliar with the Robert Leatherwood/Volkov Catteno case—it predates my involvement with SL—and am informed only by what I’ve read here and some quick research.
I guess I see a disconnect between asserting let’s-call-them-non-griefer thieves don’t “make up a large percentage of SL content theft” while lets-call-them griefer thieves are “not a grave threat to the SL economy.” If griefers aren’t a threat and criminals aren’t a threat, who is?
Salome wrote: “If [..] the theft takes place on the same account that withdraws the money then one subpoena to Linden Lab takes care of everything. It eliminates the cover and puts the criminal under a lot more exposure than they may be comfortable with.”
I think that’s a big “if.” As I understand the proposal, thieves would seem to have almost exactly the same cover under an “only paid accounts may transfer or sell items” policy that they have now. It’s safe to assume anyone interested making money from stolen content would continue to obscure their actions by transferring funds between a collection of accounts, so following the money would still require detailed data forensics across innumerable accounts. Phishes are on the open market for US$1–$25 each; carding them requires mere seconds. As Chance notes, anyone with the technical capability to rip content is probably capable of obscuring MAC addresses and IPs, making it considerably more difficult for Linden Lab to connect the dots. Add international identities and accounts to the mix to make things even more fun. Bottom line, creating fraudulent Second Life paid accounts does not require a “career criminal”—we’re much nearer the level of people who rip off vending machines.
It only takes one transaction to make a paid SL account, and that account need never withdraw money from Second Life, merely offer content for sale in-world, so we’re still in the realm of “token” fraud rather than currency fraud. For a small amount of money, a scammer could easily set up a significant number of paid SL accounts. Only one of those accounts needs to actually put money in a thief’s hands: heck, with a little social engineering, that number can be zero.
Salome asserts banks and credit card companies are (paraphrasing) within their depth to deal with this sort of theft. At least in the United States, they seem disinclined to do so until the cost of investigating the fraud rises above the cost of writing it off. In this scenario, the costs incurred by the card issuers are quite low; in the U.S., my understanding is that those costs are borne by the merchants, not the credit card issuers.
If there’s one thing we all agree on, it’s lack of hard data about the impact of content theft on the Second Life economy. Salome suggests it is a grave threat; I’m not sure the Second Life content market is large enough to attract the attention of let’s-call-them-non-griefer thieves. I have no idea if either stance is accurate.
According to data offered by Linden Lab (http://secondlife.com/statistics/economy-data.php) user-to-user transactions seem to account for about US$100K in June, but in-world businesses (annoyingly undefined) pulled in (back-of-envelope) around US$6 million, with about a third of that going to businesses pulling in under $10 a month. Acknowledging not all those transactions are legit, the former is not enough to attract tremendous sophisticated criminal attention; however, the latter is enough to attract folks somewhat above the level of ripping off vending machines.
Sincere question: can these LL numbers be used to describe anything about the size of the Second Life content market? Also a sincere question: if a third of in-world businesses (still annoyingly undefined) don’t earn enough to pay for a premium account, is it fair to characterize a policy requiring paid accounts to sell or transfer items as “hardly a draconian gesture?” Decimation kills only one in ten.
Anyway—lots of topics here. Sorry to be so longwinded. If nothing else, you’ve spurred me to look into these issues more deeply.
Commented by Lou Netizen on July 5, 2010 at 3:26 AMI don’t see lots of topics here, unless you are referring to your post.
Commented by Chance Abattoir on July 5, 2010 at 4:28 AMLou – I’m not following some of what you say here and I’m not sure where you’re coming from, unless you’ve misinterpreted me, but I’ll clarify as best I can.
1. Let’s look at the types of people who steal content that we’ve mentioned.
*** The thief who does not distribute — what you call the “griefer.” They might steal something for display and/or personal use, but they’re not really undercutting significant business profits, or discouraging art/ingenuity in a meaningful way. This is the type of “theft” that is unlikely to be caught or discouraged. I don’t consider this worth targeting, however, they would be completely shut off from sharing or distributing their work (whereas now, they could do so on a whim).
*** “Hardcore” career criminals / hackers-for-profit (the types that would have endless immediate access to fraudulent payment methods and the other things you mention). Hard to see this type as a significant part of the SL theft picture. There simply isn’t enough reward in the market to warrant exposure — as you yourself point out. These types can generally be discouraged by negating the risk-to-reward ratio. Something my plan will do.
*** “Casual” criminals — the half-way hacker who is looking for an easy way to make a few hundred bucks or settle a score by putting someone’s entire inventory into the freebie market. The vending machine criminal, as you deem them. It’s worth noting that a vending machine criminal would be discouraged if they knew there was a video camera trained on the vending machine. That’s what paid accounts would be – a visible deterrent.
From what we’ve seen, the average SL copyright thief tends to fall into this last category, and can be anything from an annoying teen in Texas to some disgruntled loser in Queens, to anyone’s guess in X. These are the types of people who have regular lives to protect, who would think twice about putting their RL name / financial information on the line and who are unlikely to have unlimited access to fraudulent IDs and financial accounts. These are the types who (based on the few cases we have to pull information from) think they can do anything they want on a free account and funnel it to a paid account and be protected. This casual thief is the type I see as the biggest threat because they can impact a creator’s entire library in a handful of minutes and this discourages serious invention and creation. Giving this type of individual pause, limiting their cover, making the process more difficult for them is the focus of my suggestions. These are petty criminals who would likely decide not to do something in the light of day, if it were too much trouble, or if real-life consequences were staring them in the face.
2. The technology and mentality to rip “make believe” content is much more accessible than the access and willingness to commit credit card fraud. You must understand, for most of these people, the idea of stealing a make-believe shoe isn’t a big deal. It’s all make-believe. However, the idea of using a fake credit card, funneling money, committing a RL crime everyone is familiar with — that is not a step the average person takes lightly, even if it is easier. With one product, cheap and easy, I can rip content and place it up for sale — all without leaving the anonymity of SL, secure in the knowledge that I’m — at most — setting myself up for civil liability if the creator can spend the money to find me. But to get a fake account I’d have to go onto someplace on the internet and buy it — providing my financial information to the criminals supplying me with a fake credit card account, and I’d know I was messing with financial fraud — a criminal act that comes with criminal liability. Is that going to deter me? I’d bet yes.
The availability of false information might be there, but petty thieves aren’t going to want to get into that kind of thing. The average thief I’m trying to discourage isn’t going to be sophisticated enough to cover their tracks in a manner you suggest, and even if they did, my suggestion closes the window of time it takes to shut them down. They’re not going to have the resources (equipment, knowledge, etc) to get in and get out quick. These are small-time criminals of convenience. They’re not going to have top of the line computers, spoof equipment and limitless databases of fake credit cards. If they had all that, they’d be running more profitable scams in better formats. Again, the handful we’re aware of all used their RL info on their paid accounts and did their stealing on free accounts because the confusion gave them cover. The amount these individuals take isn’t even really significant, it’s the fact that so many of them can operate at one time without any real deterrent that has created our current problem.
3. My method still limits the time it takes to shut down any kind of abuser. The minute their account is unable to be verified — the minute a complaining party notifies Linden Lab that the subpoena came back invalid — that account gets shut down, the items get removed, their sales go off the market. Requiring paid accounts takes this timetable to shut theft down from months to weeks (possibly days, depending). This makes the scam less profitable and ups the risk, discouraging both types.
4. True, even with this system someone could try and provide themselves cover by setting up multiple paid accounts. Again, the more they commit fraud, the more they rack up their criminal acts, the less likely someone is to push to this level.
5. While the thieves I’m aware of all used their own information to set up their paid accounts, let’s assume your side — that people will use fraudulent financial information. Let’s say they only use it once for the one month $9 change and then use ill-gotten gains to pay their accounts from then on. I find this highly unlikely, but we’ll go with it. First of all, that person isn’t going to be the only one using that stolen information. If they’re using false accounts, they will likely set off bells for similar transactions on the compromised account, and I assure you both credit card issuers and authorities will be happy to include them in their proceedings. And once one account is under investigation, it will trigger Linden Lab to take a hard look at those accounts which feed it / feed from it. I had my account turned off once for a perfectly innocent transaction, I’ve no doubt how quick they can shut something off that looks dodgy. Credit card companies might not investigate one $9 charge if it were isolated, but the odds of people using fraudulent information for only one transaction is highly unlikely.
6. If Linden Lab does incur charge-backs from fraudulent accounts this will force them to step up their own position against fraud. I call that a win for everyone.
7. You may not think that theft is a grave threat, or that the impact of content theft is significant. I can assure it, it is. It has already cost SL consumers a number of talented individuals who no longer participate in the marketplace and has kept several more from bothering to try because they feel anything they create will simply be stolen and repackaged before they recover profits equal to their time. The quality of items on the SL market are no longer just a matter of twisting a few prims and slapping on a hasty texture. The creators fueling it today are highly skilled in Maya, Photoshop, Poser, and any number of programs and programming languages. Their time is not cheap. For them to invest in creating for SL, they need some confidence their hard work will be rewarded. If those types of individuals — the type I call “professional creative” types fail to invest in the SL marketplace, we’re simply going to be left with hacks and amateurs. Been there. Done that. No, thank you.
8. You ask: “…if a third of in-world businesses (still annoyingly undefined) don’t earn enough to pay for a premium account, is it fair to characterize a policy requiring paid accounts to sell or transfer items as “hardly a draconian gesture?”
My answer is going to seem harsh. If an in-world business isn’t making enough to cover a premium account, then what they’re contributing to the grid isn’t being deemed valuable by the market and they should fail like any number of RL businesses. The owners of such businesses can close their doors and focus on whatever it is they’re already doing with their time (it’s certainly not running a business). If, on the other hand, they want to keep what is obviously a vanity project, they can pay for their vanity like the rest of us. As I said in my original post, it doesn’t bother me that a side-effect of this type of thing would remove a lot of badly made crap from the grid. Obviously, exceptions and policies could be made for organizations like charities. I don’t think that’s draconian, I think that’s simply common sense. I’d guess a lot of those businesses that aren’t making the cut anymore are abandoned projects and business-in-a-box wastes at any rate.
9. Long-winded never bothers me. Don’t apologize for it. I simply find that some of your arguments backtrack upon themselves.
Commented by Salome on July 5, 2010 at 7:31 AMSorry if I’m late for the discussion-fest, but I just would like to add something that’s been missing. Obviously, nobody here is aware of the current state of copybot viewers and their capabilities. Actually, disabling the ability of free accounts to create transferable items is useless. Current copybot viewers not only can override any permissions, but also spoof the creators, so a ‘copied’ item is, technically, not even created by the copybotter.
Also, with fear of sounding picky, but could we use a different expression for “content creator”? That’s a term originally used by the music industry which shows, as Courtney Love already pointed out 10 years ago, what their artists are to them: “Being a “content provider” is prostitution work that devalues our art and doesn’t satisfy our spirits.”
Commented by V on July 10, 2010 at 8:00 AMV,
I’m well aware of the current state of copybot-viewers and their capabilities. That’s why I’ve repeatedly said there’s nothing that can be done to prevent people from being able to copy and use/display at the personal level. You’re misunderstanding the purpose of my suggestion.
The purpose of requiring paid accounts isn’t to prevent the act of copybotting (you can’t); it’s to establish accountability for people who profit form the distribution of stolen material, increase their liability, and reduce their profit margins until the distribution becomes a poor risk and lower reward expectation. Most importantly it shifts the crime from a civil offence to a civil and criminal offence, which significantly reduces the burdens of victims seeking resolution and increases the action they can take to protect themselves and their work.
You can’t stop people from stealing on a personal-use level; with our current technology it’s impossible and to crimialize a user base is (as the music industry is discovering) a losing battle. But it’s equally unreasonable to place an unfair burden onto victims that is not shared by the offenders. Theives know how costly and unlikely it is for victims to seek resolution, that’s a big factor in the rampant theft we’re seeing now. Creating a system where content creators are more likely to act to protect their work will be another discouraging factor. It’s market-defeating to have a system where it’s so expensive to protect the integrity of products that it outpaces the profits of the average (and even the high-end) creators.
Spoofing the creators and/or overriding permissions doesn’t have any affect on my suggestion. If a free account doesn’t have the ability to distribute, then they are forced to distribute on a paid accounts and that establishes a “paper trail.” It’s about legitimizing the sales process, limiting the profit a thief can except, increasing the odds a thief will get caught, upping the consequences across the board — all of which contribute significantly to deterring offenders at very little negative consequence to the community.
As far as the “content creator” issue goes, you may use whatever term you prefer, but I don’t see a problem with it, nor do I take any offence to being addressed as a content creator. I also wouldn’t call the majority of what’s out there for sale on the grid “art” and I’m not particularly concerned with the “spirits” of those who base their self-esteem on basic vocabulary. Not that it matters, but I also don’t find anything morally wrong with prostitution or commerce taken on its own level. There’s nothing intended or demonstrably derogatory in the term “content creator” and trying to assign negative implication to it feels like offence for offence’s sake more than anything. It’s also worth noting that “artists” who vilify the marketplace that pays their rent are generally drama-hungry hypocrites — which is why your quote comes from Courtney Love.
Cheers, and thanks for reading and contributing to the debate.
Commented by Salome on July 10, 2010 at 11:13 AMOkay, point taken. However… in order to commit a ‘real’ crime the copybotter already needs to have some payment info on file in order to shill out his sale revenue. Maybe I’m missing something, but making them have payment info on file before copybotting is not much of a difference to needing to have payment info on file after selling copybotted stuff and cashing out.
Commented by V on July 10, 2010 at 12:00 PM@V — you seem to be confusing different facets we’ve discussed. Let me see if I can break it down easier.
There are three basic actions involved in what we’re discussing.
1. Performing the theft.
2. Distributing/Selling the content of others for vindictive purposes or profit.
3. Cashing out
I don’t think there’s anything we can do about #1, really. Policing the grid and trying to stop things at the theft level is chasing our own tails.
Distribution:
Based on what we’ve seen involving the few cases we have to go by, the most popular habit for thieves is to sell/distribute anonymously and then funnel the funds to a real account to cash-out. They do this because it’s easy and because they know the victim will have to go through great expense and effort to tie them to any wrongdoing.
Under the current system there is no accountability for distributing. Distributing someone else’s content for free (rendering their products value-less) or for token profit under a false name has only civil implications, and those can only come to pass if the victim can identify the offender and prove the issue. Since you’re not being charged under a free account, you’re not committing payment fraud if you provide a false name and there is no criminal deterrent; the civil offense can take place anonymously without incurring a criminal act. This system places an unfair burden upon the victim just to seek redress; they must expend time and money on digital forensic procedures to attempt to tie the offender to the crime and even just to identify the offender. There is no crime committed when someone attempts to seek cover by funneling funds between anonymous sell accounts and authorized cash-out accounts. Thus, individuals can sell anonymously (civil offense) and cash out without committing a criminal act.
Under the proposed change, the privilege of selling/distributing is tied to accountability and consequences. Payment information would be required and providing false names / false account information becomes a criminal act of fraud. This ties the civil offense to a criminal act if it happens anonymously. If it doesn’t happen anonymously, the victim incurs much less expense in seeking redress. Individuals cannot anonymously commit the civil offense without also committing a criminal act which negates the funneling loophole.
Cashing out:
Commented by Salome on July 10, 2010 at 2:41 PMUnder both systems, providing false information to cash out is a criminal act (fraud). I believe this criminal deterrant is why we haven’t seen cases (to my knowledge) of people providing false information to cash out. However with the proposed system we’ve moved accountability up one level, so cashing out fraudulently means there are multiple acts of fraud being committed (distribution and cashing out, etc). Those individuals who thought they could sell anonymously and cash out without committing a criminal act are completely deterred.