…coming as soon as September.
From New World Notes:
In a long-expected announcement on the official blog yesterday, a Linden staffer laid out stringent policies on the sale of unauthorized virtual copies of real world products and brands. That includes avatars based on real world celebrities such as Angelina Jolie and Barack Obama — those two are explicitly cited by example, in the new xStreetSL listing guidelines– along with unauthorized clothing, trademarks, furniture and car designs, avatars based on copyrighted characters and more.
This move comes several months after a trademark infringement suit was filed against Linden Lab by Taser, targeting virtual shock devices sold in Second Life which were originally called “Tasers”. It’s almost certainly a necessary move for the company to protect itself legally, though at the same time, it will be difficult to enforce as worded now. To prohibit, for instance, the sale of Second Life furniture which merely has “the distinctive appearance of a brand of furniture available in the real world (like the Eames® lounge chair and ottoman)”, seems to set the bar far too high. There are probably a large number of SL products that qualify as contraband under that criterion.
I’m having a good chuckle right now – this is awesome. However, it would seem the Lindens’ reaches only go so far… this seems to only reach as far as XStreet. (If that’s the case, people could just stop using XStreet.) I’m sure they don’t have the time to troll the grid 24/7 looking for violating copies.
LOL So they can’t do anything about digital copyright inworld, or absolute proof of theft from one SL designer by another with a DCMA filed… but they can ban likenesses on a broad scale with no filings? Great job, LL. Really stellar work.
“avatars based on copyrighted characters”
I guess cosplay is dead… on xstreet at least
When the Herman Miller company (Eames Lounge Chair copyright holder in the USA) set up a virtual store in SL, they threatend all other furniture designers who sold this chair with law-suits (which is their good right). They made a “only use the original” (or something) campain where you could drop in your ‘fake’ eames chair and other chairs with Herman Miller copyright from other designers and get a free ‘Herman Miller’. Somehow the script didn’t work (or was never intended to work) and one could get free designer furnitures there by just clicking the vendor (maybe it still works, haven’t been there in a long time) next to the same chair for 500L$. And yet every good furniture store in SL has the Eames Lounge Chair for sale. And i predict this will never change.
The problem with this new rule is that trademarks only reach as far as you registered them and protect them for. For instance Herman Miller had to set up shop in SL to extend their trademark to include 3D digital furniture in order to protect their TM and for it to stick. If a company has not extended their trademark to include 3D virtual items then the only leg they have to stand on is for copyright infringement with use of photography.
So here we have advertising for XStreet that features a set of Pioneer CDJ decks with the brand name very poorly blotted off. If you remember back when this ad first appeared it said Pioneer right on the item in the ad. Blotting out the brand still doesn’t solve the fact that its making use of a copywriten photo of the actual item and even if that was okay they are still breaking their own rules by showing an item that looks exactly (minus the logo) like an item you can get IRL.
Odd the “celeberty” likeness of real life people, don’t cartoonists already “lampoon” people by making charactitures of them? So in sense as SL is basically a “toon” can’t you still make charactitures of real life people, just not “copywritten” or “fictional” characters. I’m sure I can still buy a richard nixon mask at halloween with out the company that manufactures it having to pay old tricky dicky or his estate royalities.
I can’t believe someone just said “Tricky Dicky” on SCD. We’re so progressive. lol
Uh uh redgrave. all their clothes will be takne down.
ohh alll those converse look-a-like shoes … and I guess anything photo sourced …. wow the trolls that like to repost people because they have nolife are going to be in heaven
I’m just glad I havent seen any obama “avatards” in-world. being griefed in RL from him is enough.
But yeah…I see this nothing more than a public response to generic C&D letters from attorneys.
Not a darned thing will change.
When it gets to the point of SL losing half its new-$Linden sales from lack of anything to buy (assuming it works, which it wont) standards will be relaxed until it isnt a direct violation (which is determined by their EULA/ToS, and not a court of law where every infraction should be, to form a definition and legal precedent…for most big-name brands such law rulings already exist).
I miss law school. Wish there was more money in being a non-slip&fall lawyer. I’d go back.