Merchants

[Ry0ta Exonar Advisor]

I'm not sure if they are the same person or a pack of thieves, but all of them are selling complete avatar sets on the marketplace that are compilations of stolen skin, hair, eyes, clothes, tattoo, accessories, AO and what not. From what I gathered there are 3 stores of them on the marketplace. Please IM me in-world if you need to know their name.

[Dais Viertz]

Yeah, I saw their stuff and talked briefly about it in the commerce group inworld. They've got items featured and that's how I saw.

Not sure how this can be allowed to take place in broad daylight, despite so many of us knowing about it. Just goes to prove SL is a safe haven for thieves.

abc, it's easy to get away with copybotting as 123 in Second Life giiiiirrrrrrllll~ 

[Josh Susanto]

LOL... no, seriously... LOL

[WolfBaginski Bearsfoot]

One of the problems is that the copyright holder has to deal with this through a DMCA notice to Linden Labs.

We may spot the copied item, but we can't do anything. We don't have the necessary legal status. And Linden Lab have to follow the statutory procedure: it protects them from lawsuits over all those Star Trek unforms in the game.

So if you see this sort of stuff, let the original creator know. I've done this a couple of times. Once, I was told the Lab was being very slow, but there was some evidence of a change of staff at the time, affecting who dealt with this stuff.

And I know a couple of times when people without the necessary authority acted, and got legitimate stuff removed. That wasn't in SL. but there are people here who would do that out of spite.

[Jennifer Boyle Member]

Just curious.  Does LL require people to certify that they have the necessary rights when they put things on Marketplace?

[Josh Susanto]

They've never asked me for anything, and I offer A LOT of stuff that would very seriously infringe upon Selena Wells if she had not indicated on Facebook that she is OK with it. 

[Ry0ta Exonar Advisor]

That's stated both on TOS and SL Marketplace Listing Guidelines .

[Ry0ta Exonar Advisor]

So I've been awaiting the outcome. On Sept. 30 I got an acknowledgement of receipt of my DMCA notification from Intellectual Property Team and 3 days later I got an e-mail saying that they removed the item in question from the thief's inventory, so I went to check the marketplace page of the item just to find it's still there. Uncomfortable with that I sent back the e-mail asking why it is still available on marketplace and what I should do to get it removed from marketplace, but I've not received a responce to it yet.

One week's ago I saw 2 other listings of the thief which contains 2 other skin creators' skin having disappeared from his/her marketplace store. I knew also those creators filed a DMCA, so I thought maybe I had to wait a little more but anyway I sent another DMCA on the same listing, still no responce from LL. This time I've not even received an acknowledgement of receipt...so I wonder if it wasn't received for some reason.

Some hours ago I got IMs from one of the other skin creators and he told me that he got a message from linden lab too that they removed that complete avatar, but it still there, like it was the case with me. Yeah, that it one of the listings that wasn't there when I saw a week's ago. So I guess LL actually removed them, but the infrindger just relisted again?

I thought this kind of thing was usually sorted out in a few days. Does anyone have a similar experience?

[Pamela Galli Member]

Oh yes I have had a similar experience, after filing a 20 page meticulously documented DMCA on the person who copied half my store and then put stuff made with my content up for sale inworld and on the MP. Those were taken down only to be replaced by more. A second DMCA produced the same result -- stuff taken down, but reappeared.

The person who put my most popular kitchen for sale full perm still has an account. No consequences whatsoever.

LL IS ON THE SIDE OF THE COPIERS, NOT THE MERCHANTS. Those accounts do not get banned. The stuff is not removed from their inventories. The IP team does not respond to emails of inquiry.

[Ry0ta Exonar Advisor]

Wow, sorry to hear such an outrageous experience you had, Pamela.

The ripper should have received multiple notifications and ARed by us but he/she is up and running and even added a new listing.