I'm a virtual lawyer

With a virtual degree. I'll take them to vcourt. But I'll want real money though. Then when I'm done with that, I'll get all the vpeople that use your vsex aids and file a vclass action that they don't work.

Surely the whole idea of this second life thing is that you can have experiences unrelated to the real world. You can screw a hooker, rob a bank, rip off someone's IP, sue them, do whatever and it doesn't really matter because this is Second Life and just a fantasy.

Munchy Flower: Welcome to the fantasy of being ripped off!

well F@ck me

Unless somebody owns the patent obviously.

I get it.

I read this article once, and thought I was dreaming. Then I read it again and I wasn't. Now I get it though. You made it all up didn't you?

This couldn't really happen. Not even in Merica. Could it ?

Second Life

Don't know about Second Life but these people need to get a life.

(untitled)

I admit to getting bored with the article about a quarter of the way in, but did I understand correctly ?

In this virtual world, a designer/company is getting ripped off by others, and so chooses to sue the God/Government authority (and in the real world no less) rather than taking out a civil action against the ones doing the ripping off? Just seems a bit misplaced to me.

Surely they should be taking the alleged perpetrator to virtual court and suing the virtual pants off them for all the virtual money they can get ?

South Park?

Have South Park done anything on Sadville? I know they did an episode on WoW but I'm sure Sadville would be rich pickings for South Park.

Stories like this help reinforce my (low) opinions of Sadville and its patrons.

Surely

The 'crime' is being commented in SL, so that's where the court case should be?

prior art

... isn't there a clear case of prior art here dating back about as long as man (and woman) has existed, so this guy ripped off evolution / your god creator person.

The reason they are suing Linden:

They are suing "Linden Labs" because the T&Cs of Second Life state that anything you produce "in world" is your own and that you own the copyright -- they also state that they comply with the DMCA in this regard.

This is akin to paying a web hosting company to host you digital photography, protect your copyright, and allow you to sell access to it -- then finding that another customer managed to copy your photographs and is hosting them with the same company but giving them away. Since you are paying for copyright protection and hosting you ask the company to take down the infringing site, and they don't.

You may not like Second Life, or even see its appeal, but this has very little to do with the actual "game" and is about contracts, the DMCA, and copyright.

I'm always interested to know what the people who supposedly have "Real Lives" actually do that makes them so much more special than those who like to use Second Life -- do you all go straight from work to the gym, then do some charity work, then teach your kids quantum theory, make love to your beautiful partners then make some more notes in the margin of King Leah as you drift off to sleep?

I think you just watch TV with your other half, go on the odd bike ride, have a few drinks with mates in the pub and feel smug because you're not having conversations about politics, philosophy or art with people from across the world while playing around in a virtual environment.

Personally, I find people in Second Life more open minded and less judgemental than in real life -- meaning conversation is much more wide ranging and stimulating than most in real life. It also gives one the opportunity to communicate people with diverse social and political backgrounds from all over the world.

virtual vs real : it's all about the money

The problem is obviously that whilst everything else is virtual, the money is real. That's the key downfall of all the SL type environments and all those colossal MMO wastes of time.

Real money=real life issues.

I've yet to see SL as anything more than a waste of time. Most of the people I've spoken to have been more concentrated on SL rather than meeting in real life - which is the point, in my opinion.

There may be people it's worth chatting to, but I've not really found it possible without faffing around.

@Adrianww

Then you're lucky -- most people I talk to in Real Life seem more interested in talking about their money problems and Big Brother (C4 TV show).

As for going to other places -- of course I do that, the two are not mutually exclusive -- but what's wrong with doing both?

Of course, Second Life isn't for everyone -- but to dismiss it as a "place for sad people to hang out" pretty much proves that you're closed minded and intollerant.

Awesome

Hope this is treated with the contempt it deserves.. I can imagine other online gaming businesses looking at something like this with extreme humour though. Most simply make it a violation of the player's terms and conditions if they purchase services or virtual equipment. They make sure that anything created for the game violates their terms and conditions if it's sold for profit and anything created within the game still remains the ip of the game's creator.

I know Second Life is different and actually encourages people to make money from their software, but if they allow 3rd parties to own the ip of content created for the game they were bound to get into this sort of trouble eventually. Anyone who purchases the game can create anything for it and there is no financially viable way of policing users in the way these companies want.

Here it goes again...

Anytime there's an article about Second life, I can be sure that the actual subject of the article will be completely ignored in the comments, which will instead be packed with posts by people slagging off Second Life.

Personally, I happen to be disabled, and I find logging in in the evening to hang out and chat with friends to be a superior way to spend the evening compared to passively soaking up whatever crap happens to be on TV.

@ Cameron

Ah, a rare beast indeed - a Sadville shill. Cameron, dear boy, you really *do* need to get out more.

Interesting, too, that the story is about sex toys... aren't sex toys mostly used for masturbation?