Rude seller of full perm mesh, threatening to DMCA?

[Jade Nova]

I apologize in advance for the long read. My actual question is at the bottom in bold. The long read is the background information regarding the problem.

 

So I bought a full perm mesh shirt from a seller on the marketplace. I made a few shirts with it and have them for sale in my store on the marketplace, abiding by every one of their terms and conditions for the mesh (repainting the texture entirely, not selling full perm or freebies, etc). 

Anyway, when I opened up the UV map texture for the shirt, I noticed it was really screwy. Not buggy screwy but just didn't make sense why it was unwrapped this way.

I have plenty of experience in Maya, I just don't have the patience to make my own mesh clothing here on SL. I hate rigging and I hate unwrapping UVs, but I do know how it is done. I also know that when you unwrap the UV you can rearrange the part of the image that goes where on the mesh on the wiremap. As in, you can drag drop and scale each part and arrange it to fit on the map however you want. Now I know that may not be possible in all modeling programs and I have no idea which one this person used but I don't see any reason for having all of this extra space in the texture map. It forced me to have to use 1024x1024 textures instead of 512x512 because the 512 was simply too small for any text to be legible (since the actual wireframe at that point was closer to 256x128). I could still just barely get the resolution I would have had with a normal 512 map, but with the rez time of a 1024. It wasn't a HUGE deal, but I felt it was worth a mention in my review.

Anyway, I left a four out of five star review on the sellers page for the shirt I bought. They contacted me a few days later saying its a bug and offering to email me another copy of the wiremap, but I politely explained that I don't think it's any sort of bug, just the way the map was unwrapped (If I scaled up the wireframe but not the image resolution, only that top left corner would be showing on my shirt) They asked me if I could update my review just to say that it's workable since I did get my shirts to look okay, so that no one thinks it's unusable and doesn't buy it. I agreed seeing no problem with that and updated my review. I still left it at 4/5 stars and I still mentioned the problem of the UV. I updated my review to this:

 

Nice mesh but wtf@the UV maps

Posted December 19, 2012 by Jade Glazner 4 stars

I like the mesh but the texture maps have way too much unnecessary whitespace. The part of the texture map that it actually uses for the shirt is confined to the top left quadrant of the map. The entire thing is still 1024x1024 but the size of the area of texture that's actually shown on the shirt is only about 30% the size of the entire image. I unfortunately had to leave it at that size in order for any text to be legible and not blurry at a short distance, which means longer rezzing times for customers. I managed to make it work okay and I love how my shirts look but I would much rather be able to use a regular 512x512 map, which is not possible with this.

 

I honestly don't see anything in my review that could be perceived as offensive. But apparently they got really bent out of shape at the fact that I said "wtf" in the title. I'm not a professional critic, and I don't feel the need to be formal with my reviews. I didn't use the actual word and the expression wasn't even used angrily, it was just the only thing that I felt accurately described my reaction to seeing the UV map. Anyway, they started cursing at me and calling me names and all sorts of things because of it. I maintained my composure and proceeded to re-explain the problem I had with the UV and asked if they were to do an updated version please let me know, etc. I was still being polite. 

But my problem (and question) is, during this fairly unpleasant conversation, they returned my lindens and threatened to DMCA anything I have up for sale using their meshes and not to buy from them anymore. My question is, could they DMCA my shirts? I did buy the full perm items from them on the marketplace and I abided by all of the rules in their TOS notecard that came with it. 

And if they do DMCA it, does LL actually review them before things are deleted? Can they check the transaction records to show that I purchased the full perm items from them, and that I am following all of their rules regarding resale? It would be quite **bleep**ty if they were to DMCA something I paid for the rights to use, regardless of them giving me an unsolicited refund. I also have the chat log of the entire conversation saved on my computer. Would that suffice for LL if there was a problem?

[Innula Zenovka]

As I understand it, LL don't have any discretion to exercise in the DMCA process; they're just responding to documents issued by third parties. 

So, again as I understand it,  if the seller follows the procedure outlined under "To File a Notification" at LL's DMCA page, and you then follow the procedure outlined at "To file a counter-notification," the content under dispute remains in-world until a court tells LL what to do about it (assuming that the complainant actually takes the matter to court).

I have no idea what an American court would make of this.   Seems to me, not that I know anything about American law, that   your initial purchase of the full perms mesh created a contract between you and the creator, whereby the creator granted you a license to use the mesh, under certain conditions, in return for your payment.    So the question is, to my mind, can the creator lawfully withdraw the license simply by saying "I've changed my mind" and giving you your money back?   

Seems to me you'd need to take professional advice on that.     

In the meantime, as I understand it, LL will simply respond to documents issued by the creator and by you.   You might consider asking over at SLU, where there are a lot of content creators who are very experienced with the DMCA process. It seems a rum business to me, if the creator can simply change his or her mind about the license because you're made some very mild criticisms in a review, but it's not up to me.   Nor, I think, is it up to LL or the creator -- seems to me a matter of US law.

 

[Mitsuko Kytori]

Hello,

 

Please let me send you an advise : when you buy a full perm product try to know before if the seller have licensed software, and if software they used authorize to resell the 3D object. Keep in mind many and many mesh objects in sell in second life are just take from another 3D Marketplace and resell as this ...

For information, to build with licenses software a mesh outfit and with the minimum software license that need more than 800 $ (70000 ¥ almost) I will be very surprise to know the number of "creator" spend this ... and so have the legal right to resell 3D object.

 

(And in all case, I am sure they have better luck with subscription marketplace system compare to licensed software users as me, sorry for this out thread remark)

Mitsuko

 

[Ferd Frederix]

Yes, they can DMCA you ( anyone can), but  if they do, you get  to respond.   I doubt very much it will apply.  As a result, you can actually go after them for damages (but it's not worth it) for filing a DMCA under false pretenses.

When they sent youa refund, regardless of the reason,  that was  a gift, no matter what the chat logs say.  There was no contract between two agreeable parties, unlike Marketplace transactions, and no legal obligaton to return it.  

[Mauve Binder]

I wont touch your issue with the seller or the DMCA, what I can tell you is that the reason for the 'dead" space on your template is to match up with the way textures wrap on the SL avatar. I recommend you google "the mermaid diaries" and learn about this through her incredible tutorials.