Linden Labs and Second Life have long held that all content created in the world is the sole property of the creator (or owner, once sold) and much of the early press material backed this up. As such, thousands (millions?) of people have set up business operating in world selling clothes, buildings, and real-estate to new Second-Lifers. However, Linden recently instituted a new licensing agreement that jeopardizes this long-held claim, and is now the subject of a Class-Action lawsuit against Linden.
But “at an unknown date ” the suit says Linden began removing references to ownership from its website and began characterizing Second Life users as having “a license to computing resources ” not actual ownership of virtual terrain. A new Second Life user contract took effect Friday. It specifies that “virtual land is available for purchase or distribution at Linden Lab s discretion” and that “Linden Lab may revoke the virtual land license at any time without notice refund or compensation.”
The plaintiffs hope this will be the landmark case in virtual rights, and proof of how the internet is pervading every aspect of our lifes. I personally think their claims may be a bit overblown, as the actual text in the new EULA reads:
Linden Lab may revoke the Virtual Land License at any time without notice, refund or compensation in the event that: (i) Linden Lab determines that fraud, illegal conduct or any other violations of these Terms of Service or other Second Life policies is associated with the holder’s Account or Virtual Land; or (ii) the holder becomes delinquent on any of that user’s Account’s payment requirements, ceases to maintain an active Account or terminates this Agreement.
The real problem seems to be that Linden has the ability to change these terms at any time. It’s a bit of a “slippery slope” argument, but held up through this statement only 2 paragraphs down:
You agree that Linden Lab has the right to manage, regulate, control, modify and/or eliminate such Virtual Land as it sees fit and that Linden Lab shall have no liability to you based on its exercise of such right.
What are your thoughts?
via A real-world battle over virtual-property rights — latimes.com (print version).
This sounds like it has to do with a recent lawsuit someone tried to bring against LL for repossesing his land. A lawyer had figured out a way to buy a whole sim for very little (like $300) through blatantly illicit means, and then had it taken back by LL when they found out about it. So he sued them. *FAIL*
This is simply LL making sure that it doesn’t happen again – if you break the rules, particulary in purchasing land, you don’t get any recompense at all, and you can’t sue them for your own idiocy.
@spyvsspyaeon: The rules and licensing around snapshots or film (machinima) in SL are spelled out in the SL Terms of Service, Section 7.4 and the SL wiki page about the “Snapshot and Machinima Policy.” Read those things first. Also read the SL Terms of Service, Section 7.5 because it talks about what happens to your license to a photo of something if that something is subsequently removed from SL. (You retain the license.)
Rules about taking photos in the physical world don’t apply to screenshots taken of SL. That’s an often-invoked analogy but not a useful one. A better analogy would be taking a photo of a movie set.
If you “buy” Windows 7 (operating system software) from Microsoft, you’re really buying a license. The idea of buying a license isn’t new. You don’t need some new dictionary to understand this. SL isn’t a real place like Times Square; it’s a collection of intellectual property that seems like a real place.
Consumer confidence and producer confidence affect all markets, not just SL.
Troy McConaghy that is the best answer I got. Now things made me get this issue a bit clear, but just a bit. But I still have a question, how come to take a snapshot or film an avatar (virtual ID) I have to ask permission, and how come have that permission officially (I just supposing that someone grant permission and 1 month latter, for any reason, take that permission, do I have to destroy my work because of spoken words?). If I am planing of making my business with media content, how can I claim my permissions in a court? TOS and machinima policy don’t say how! LL neither. Too complicated, what could be easier. Virtual exposure happens like on real life,if u are walking on street (street read public land, that grant free access to anyone) and you take a shot do you have to ask permission (sorry difficult to disengage to the real life while in some point u do the comparison). I still have the opinion that Second Life Property it is like web hosting if u rent, so how come call it rent and not buy and sell. Or do I need a new dictionary to understand what it is pretty clear on Real life. I know that virtual matter it is annoying to discuss, not physic and so volatile and fragile that can make the market fall by the lack of confidence in the market content creators and investors?
Okay, so suppose you have some land (a license to use some simulated land) in Second Life and you build a house there. To get Linden Lab to repossess the land, you’d have to break a rule. Suppose it was a minor rule and all Linden Lab did was repossess the land (unlikely, but let’s see where this goes). Then the stuff on your land will either go to your “Lost and Found” folder or your “Trash” folder. Moreover, you should have taken a copy into your inventory as a backup. Your house isn’t gone forever. You still have it in inventory.
The more likely situation is that you broke a rule and Linden Lab suspended your SL account. You can appeal the suspension and maybe they’ll reinstate your account. If LL leaves your account suspended, or deletes it, then you can’t get into SL at all. This is the situation that worries some people. Is it within Linden Lab’s rights to cut you off like that? I guess that’s one of the questions the legaloozas will have to debate.
One response is, “Don’t break the rules.”
Another response is: create all your content outside Second Life (using other tools for 3D model creation, image editing, etc.) and upload it into SL. That way, you’ll have all the originals and SL is just a distribution mechanism. You could upload your content into other virtual worlds as well (e.g. Blue Mars, Opensim regions, etc.). Basically, don’t put all your eggs into one basket. I should take my own advice!
@Troy McConaghy True, but (I think) it gets a bit ‘sticky’ when you have a House on that repossessed land, or any other items attached to it.
If someone uses SL to create intellectual property (e.g. they build a house using the inworld building tools), then they retain ownership of that intellectual property. Reference: SL Terms of Service, Section 7.1. It’s been that way for years and hasn’t changed recently.
If you buy something from someone in Second Life, then the default is for the creator to retain ownership of the intellectual property and for you to get a (limited) license to use that IP in SL. Reference: SL Terms of Service, Section 7.3. (To buy their intellectual property, you have to negotiate a separate deal and LL doesn’t provide systems to help with that.)
“Land” in Second Life (i.e. simulated land) is a service/system that’s licensed to residents of Second Life. It’s not real real estate. I think this is where a lot of confusion arises. When you “buy” a mainland parcel in SL, you’re listed as the “owner” but all you really own is a license, not actual property. Contract law, not real estate law, is what applies. Reference: SL Terms of Service, Section 6.
I’ll agree that the part of the SL Terms of Service that lets Linden Lab change the TOS in the future is a bit coy, but to be fair, whenever LL does change the Terms of Service, you have to agree to the new terms the next time you log in to SL. (Facebook doesn’t even do that courtesy; they just slowly make your data more public while you think it’s remained private, quietly updating their terms in the background.)
I wrote about this issue back in Nov. 2008 (http://botgirl.blogspot.com/2008/11/lie-of-sland.html) but unfortunately didn’t have the sense to initiate a class action suit. I’m really pleased that this issue is now in the courts and more publicized in the public domain.
It may be unfortunate that Linden opened up second life as a virtual real estate speculation experiment. I think it could have actually had more regular traffic had it not have done so.