Updated LL TOS Claims FULL RIGHTS to ALL CONTENT

[Toysoldier Thor]

I recently been made aware of the draconian arbitrary new full rights claims that LL Legal has taken on all content that comes into SecondLife.  Basically the new clauses in LL's TOS states with zero confusion that LL has claim their full non-exclusive rights in any way you can dream up to the content that any creator of SL has brought into the SL grid or content that someone has brought in from from other external sources under their licensed terms with these external sources.

And since LL's TOS also states it is the document / agreement that is the final say between LL and its customers / users / residents, nothing any LL staffer tells you, or forum/blog posting LL makes, or written statement of interpretation made by LL to promise us that they would never use their powers for evil hold any weight since LL has not made these comforting statements of clarification in the TOS.

This new utterly disrespectful draconian arrogant and even legally questionable new TOS claim by LL of our IP content as well as the IP content of other external IP owners is quite obviously stirring up a quickly growing hornets nest among content creators as well as even external content sources.  I understand there has already been an external texture library source that has responded by banning any users from bringing its content into the SecondLife grid.

What really shocks me is that in this Merchant Forum where the vast majority of participants in this forum are CONTENT CREATING MERCHANTS.... that there is no discussion or expressed concerns that LL has just claimed equal full rights to your content if you have brought it into SL.

Did I miss something here in this forum?

[Toysoldier Thor]

I recently been made aware of the draconian arbitrary new full rights claims that LL Legal has taken on all content that comes into SecondLife.  Basically the new clauses in LL's TOS states with zero confusion that LL has claim their full non-exclusive rights in any way you can dream up to the content that any creator of SL has brought into the SL grid or content that someone has brought in from from other external sources under their licensed terms with these external sources.

And since LL's TOS also states it is the document / agreement that is the final say between LL and its customers / users / residents, nothing any LL staffer tells you, or forum/blog posting LL makes, or written statement of interpretation made by LL to promise us that they would never use their powers for evil hold any weight since LL has not made these comforting statements of clarification in the TOS.

This new utterly disrespectful draconian arrogant and even legally questionable new TOS claim by LL of our IP content as well as the IP content of other external IP owners is quite obviously stirring up a quickly growing hornets nest among content creators as well as even external content sources.  I understand there has already been an external texture library source that has responded by banning any users from bringing its content into the SecondLife grid.

What really shocks me is that in this Merchant Forum where the vast majority of participants in this forum are CONTENT CREATING MERCHANTS.... that there is no discussion or expressed concerns that LL has just claimed equal full rights to your content if you have brought it into SL.

Did I miss something here in this forum?

[Toysoldier Thor]

If any of you creators of SL content have not heard of LL's hijacking unrestricted rights to your content in the TOS you agreed to in August, there are a lot of good discussions and blogs of it.  But I would suggest you read a blog posting from Nalates where she does an excellent full talk about how serious this is, what the possible impacts this will have on both the creators and the future of the SL grid, what you could do as options to protect or not protect your controlling IP rights to your content in SL, and options to make Rodvik and LL possible reconsider there draconian move.

http://blog.nalates.net/2013/09/12/second-life-tos-change/

There are other excellent posts to help you understand what LL has done to claim unrestricted full rights to your content like the blog from Inara Pey

http://modemworld.wordpress.com/2013/09/11/tos-change-and-content-rights-lab-provides-statement/

You all would be wise to know what LL has potentially taken from you in the future... so at least you wont be surprised if LL business conditions change and they decide to fully leverage their full rights to your content.

[Pamela Galli]

---

Toysoldier Thor wrote:

I recently been made aware of the draconian arbitrary new full rights claims that LL Legal has taken on all content that comes into SecondLife.  Basically the new clauses in LL's TOS states with zero confusion that LL has claim their full non-exclusive rights in any way you can dream up to the content that any creator of SL has brought into the SL grid or content that someone has brought in from from other external sources under their licensed terms with these external sources.

And since LL's TOS also states it is the document / agreement that is the final say between LL and its customers / users / residents, nothing any LL staffer tells you, or forum/blog posting LL makes, or written statement of interpretation made by LL to promise us that they would never use their powers for evil hold any weight since LL has not made these comforting statements of clarification in the TOS.

This new utterly disrespectful draconian arrogant and even legally questionable new TOS claim by LL of our IP content as well as the IP content of other external IP owners is quite obviously stirring up a quickly growing hornets nest among content creators as well as even external content sources.  I understand there has already been an external texture library source that has responded by banning any users from bringing its content into the SecondLife grid.

What really shocks me is that in this Merchant Forum where the vast majority of participants in this forum are CONTENT CREATING MERCHANTS.... that there is no discussion or expressed concerns that LL has just claimed equal full rights to your content if you have brought it into SL.

Did I miss something here in this forum?

---

There are other discussions about it, in teh SLF and other forums. On Hamlet Au's blog today, as well as on Inara's, there is a statement from LL saying, no, they do not intend to steal our content.

[Chic Aeon]

Here is what has been on the boards that I have seen, mostly on the texturing issue but crossing over to the rights issue.

http://community.secondlife.com/t5/Building-and-Texturing-Forum/CG-Textures-Announcement-FYI/td-p/2187679

http://community.secondlife.com/t5/Building-and-Texturing-Forum/Linden-Lab-just-killed-50-of-all-content-creation/td-p/2191213

And my (first) blog post from Sunday on the subject which is gaining on the "most popular ever post" courtesy of Google it seems:  http://chicatphilsplace.blogspot.com/2013/09/that-supposed-day-off-thing.html

 

Happily (from my point of view) some content creators are on hiatus with me while we see if The Labs will fix their tremendous error. Very few folks (those that are talking anyway) seem convinced that just saying it's really OK is enough. DUH! .

[Toysoldier Thor]

There are other discussions about it, in teh SLF and other forums. On Hamlet Au's blog today, as well as on Inara's, there is a statement from LL saying, no, they do not intend to steal our content.

 

Yeah but as has been said all over... LL's non-TOS promises and assurances have ZERO WEIGHT.  If they truly mean what they have posted informally... then why dont they put this in the one document that overrides all other official communications from LL... the TOS

This is becoming LL's BONEHEAD MOVE OF 2013. 

[Medhue Simoni]

As far as I'm concerned, LL can make any claims it wants over whatever imaginery rights they think they might have, or legal authority they think they might have. This doesn't actually mean they have this said authority or right. If anything, they might have some claim over items created with prims, and that is only because prim objects are created using the platform. 99% of everything I make is created outside of SL. If LL were to make any kind of claim on something any merchant made, without giving due payment and credit, you can bet there would be an uproar, irreguardless of some TOS. Likely there would be lawsuits to challenge the whole premise. Even more likely, would be many of us donating to pay for that merchant's lawsuit, if not directly involved.

That said, I don't disagree that people should be talking about it more. Possilby, there is more to this than meets the eye.

[Monti Messmer]

I cannot fully agree.

If by a contract you accepted you give away your rights - with or without payment doesn´t matter - then it´s gone.

Accepting the TOS is accepting a contract and the IP rights on all stuff brought into SL is transferred to LL.

Maybe today they won´t use/abuse this part but companies get sold and new owner might just want  to milk the cow to death.

It is the same with FB, most people knowingly ignore, all pictures uploaded there all stories written belong to the owners.

If LL wanted to make sure no stolen content is uploaded they could phrase the terms a bit different, this is pure to claim all rights on the world and everything created and brought into, while they cannot claim rights on something stolen but thats another law hoax.

Monti

[Rex Cronon]

there is also a thread here: http://www.sluniverse.com/php/vb/general-sl-discussion/87012-second-life-license-change-implies.html imo this change to the tos feels like a punch bellow the belt:(

[Magnet Homewood]

If we had to agree to this new TOS before we logged in (which we did) then goodbye rights, they are gone, and I think I am safe in saying that nothing can be done to legally reclain these rights. You agreed, deal with it.

Hoewever, the interesting question for me is, this new TOS cannot possibly apply before it was implemented, which means, you do not lose your rights to content uploaded before the new TOS in August. I just wonder if LL have good records of when things were uploaded so they can cover their backs.

[Pamela Galli]

When it comes to having to decide whether LL has done something boneheaded or something malicious, I know which I always pick.

[Rex Cronon]

sadlly, one does not exclude the other:(

[Flea Yatsenko]

So, does this mean LL is claiming copyright to the stolen intellectual property that gets uploaded to SL? I was reading the CGTextures thread and I realized that this has basically turned people stealing mesh content and uploading it into, "some random guy is making a few bucks off of my work" to "LL says they own this and they're free to use it how they want, but LL is assuming it's created by the uploader and it's actually my work which I don't want in SL or to give LL free permission to use my goods however they like"

What effect do you think this is going to have on all that content that comes from other games?

[Chic Aeon]

I actually read the TOS that way (that it only applies to uploads AFTER the TOS changed  -- and possibly 30 days after that date -- questions on that part).

Hence, I like a lot of other builders, have put uploading on hiatus.

There have been many comments from lawyer types (we can never know who is and who is not a lawyer by their login names) that the TOS would actually NOT hold up in court. And I do agree that if they  edit: Linden Lab actually started selling things then even more folks would leave and yes, sue. Good for them as this is very obviously wrong.

We DID agree when we OKed the TOS. We had little choice as you say. But we DO have a choice if we continue to build or not. Some of us aren't willing to enable this farce.

That's the way it is. Plenty of things to do in SL besides build. Unfortunately for The Labs --  if enough folks stop building, upload revenues go down, Marketplace sales go down, people continue to leave. All not good for the big picture as far as I can see.

We will see if they back up their PR spin by fixing the grievous error that they made and return the TOS to something sane.

[Czari Zenovka]

I'm pretty much taking the not building route atm.  The TOS change isn't the main reason (continued issues with mixed listings despite CTL saying everything is fixed is a huge issue, along with some other things) but this adds to it.  I'm just a tiny fish/merchant in a big sea but, yeah, other things to do in SL.

[Pamela Galli]

SL is fast becoming one of the largest illegal marketplaces for mesh already. It is famous for it -- hence Turbosquid having an explicit warning not to upload anything sold there onto SL. So with this bonehead move LL has already further sullied its reputation, as shown by the CGTextures warning. And that does not mean I think LL wants to actually sell my content -- pathetically, tho, that is exactly what they have announced to the world.

 

[Toysoldier Thor]

It has been proven many times that within LL, several department can and do make criticial customer impacting and corporate impacting decisions that were poorly thoughtout and myopic.  The LL Legal team is one of those departments that has ZERO understand of nor concern of LL's reputation, business health, and certainly LL's customers.  They stick their heads in the sand and blissfully perform the purist corporate legal things they know.

But what is so amazing is that that these myopic departments appear to be able to execute such draconian bonehead move without any internal review and approvals by the other departments in SL who's job it is to protect the reputation of the company, maintain and attract new customers, grow the corp products / service.  It has been proven once again that a department like Legal can autonomously make such wide ranging and seriously impacting decisions.  Clearly it seems like Rodvik had no voice in this becaue you would think he would have had enough common sense to say "What are you Lawyers smoking down there when you thought this up?". 

So now, since LL internal had not notice or voice in the legal team's decision, they learn of all the impacts to the Legal team's bonehead move.  They realize how ticked off LL's content creators are of the change.  They realize that their TOS change is causing retaliatory IP protecting actions against this draconian TOS change.  They are already being forced to explain and promise to their customer that we all misinterpreted the change and we should not fear these TOS changes.  And I suspect in the coming weeks, LL will be forced once again to clean up and back track on the stupid decision they initially made when they realize that this issue is not calming down and it continues to make LL and SL look bad.

But as is also commonly known about LL's management, instead of realizing quickly have bonehead a decision they publicly made and reversing their decision, they wait and wait and wait in hopes that it will just go away and things will calm down.  During this waiting period, they tick off their customers and partners and others in the industry that further hurts their product.

This LL will never change.

[Toysoldier Thor]

So let me ask a couple technical question regarding this bonehead move by LL Legal....

Question #1

Lets say a creator decides his content is too valuable to him (or her) that they cannot toerate the risk that this new LL TOS applies to his content, or that this TOS change now makes his license agreements he has made with external IP owners invalid / revoked for use in SecondLife.  As a protective response, he decides that he need to remove his IP / licensed IP content off the SL grid.  How would he request for LL to remove ALL instances of his IP that is distributed on the grid?  Would LL even honor a request by the IP owner to remove all content?  Remember that since LL's new TOS says they have full shared rights of all content on the grid, the IP owner would have to request that even content he has sold to others on the grid would be removed.  Would a DMCA against LL even make sense?

Question #2

Is LL now Co-Liable to all IP content that is brought into the SL grid illegally?  i.e. if a resident brings in a disney mesh model, texture, etc. and Disney comes on to sue.... is LL also liable now or do they just get to enjoy the full benefits of the ill gotten content with no legal liability?

 

[Pamela Galli]

Well I don't know but if LL is going to announce ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US then yes they might be taking on more liability than they had planned.

[Chic Aeon]

As I mentioned before (I think in this thread last night)  Nope another one here http://modemworld.wordpress.com/2013/09/11/tos-change-and-content-rights-lab-provides-statement/    ----  the TOS states that even if a content creator removes his content from inventory and empties his trash and delete things from the Marketplace (I don't think that is mentioned but it would make sense to do so obviously), the items are still "out there" and LL isn't going to do anything about it. And realistically they have backups of the database if they wanted to get to that content (THAT being content uploaded after the content creator OKed LL's rights by agreeing to the August 15th TOS).   If I have read that wrong, please someone let me know. I have read the TOS too many times now and I am not going back there.

Again, as far as I and many others can see the only content that is in danger is that uploaded after August 15th  with the new TOS or perhaps 30 days after. OLDER stuff should be safe. So if you aren't comfortable with the way things are, just don't upload anything. Simple as that.

Since the new TOS puts the onus of legality fully on the the person uploading I can't see how LL could be held liable for any illegal content even if they resold it (in fact that seems to be the whole point of the two changes in one TOS revision).

It would be very good if folks actually took the time to READ THE TOS a time a two. Then they would have a better idea what is actually going on. They could make their own decisions about what it "seems" to say and how it might be used. Just saying.

[Miss Choovio]

Hiyah chic and others. @Chic  You are right  thats for sure of course they do have database backups. BUT I haven't seen anything in the TOS were they mentioned that the content parts only counts after  the August 15h? I understood it's retroactive as well...

I am wondering about the guys who are flooding the complete SL forum with their escort crap and it seems nobody cares for , but it's like with the TOS most haven't read them and don't care. In case LL is reselling their stuff for much more as the content creator got in SL; the whining and frustration will grow. Only jerks would pay a company which claims all rights for YOUR work, it's called fraud! Another point is most residents haven't noticed yet that LL has more projects than SL. LL prepared perfectly the illegal robbery in changing their TOS to legalize their greed. 

All the TOS of content creators and their label semi exclusive are for the trash, because if you agree to the LL TOS you are expropriated. I think it's just a question of time when LL will resell their 3D models.

[Phoebe Avro]

And that will be the death of SL and LL, no one will touch them with a barge pole!

 

Edit to add, funny i can keep the spam bots out of my own forum no trouble, but LL dont seem to know how to do it!

[Toysoldier Thor]

I would agree that this latest LL TOS change whereby LL Legal has decided its in the best interest of the company to force all SL customers/creators give full non-exclusive rights to LL for any current/future purpose is getting a lot of negative press out to the industry that is often the sources for SL's content.  And by LL biting the hand that feeds SL's lifeblood, they are just putting another nail in the SL coffin. 

Unless LL Corp. wakes up and quickly rescinds this bonehead legal move upon its sources of content, it will become established legal / TOS practice at these sources to add a clause saying "NO CONTENT FROM THIS SOURCE CAN EVER BE BROUGHT INTO THE VIRTUAL WORLD OF SECONDLIFE FOR ANY PURPOSES".  This is very similar to how because of the USA Homelands Act, many corporations in Canada have common established rules that many American online business whereby a company's corporate or client information would be store is not allowed as a service due to violation of client confidential / privacy concerns.  Its just now established common practice.  The same will start entrenching for LL's SecondLife and any content that in the past was allowed to enter SL for its own benefit.

ANOTHER THOUGHT...

Regarding the topic of how all us Content Creators of SecondLife were basically forced with little feasible option but to accept LL's new TOS changes... I would think it could be easily argued in courts that our agreement to LL"s TOS changes would be akin to "Agreement Under Duress" to LL's new Content Rights grab of our IP. 

Many of us Merchants have invested countless hours/months/years into creating and uploading content into the SL grid and spent a lot of money to create this content - often for the sole purpose of uploading it into SL.  We did this under the long standing TOS understanding that LL's only access rights to our content was purely for the ability to operate the SL Grid.  This has been a long strong established understanding.  Now LL makes a draconian change to the TOS rules whereby they DICTATE that "YOU WILL AGREE THAT WE HAVE FULL RIGHT TO USE YOUR CONTENT FOR WHAT EVER PURPOSES WE NOW AND IN THE FUTURE WISH TO USE IT FOR". 

If you do not agree to this new TOS - which LL forces you to agree to prior to the next time you log into the SecondLife grid, you are no longer allowed to gain access to all your investment, and content that is in the grid or on the SL Marketplace.  So its basically, agree to us having full access to your content or you will never have access to it ever again.  Are you OK with these new TOS changes Mr. Ms. SecondLife Content creator?

Basically, I can't see how this latest TOS change can hold any form of legitimacy in any court.  As far as I see it, this was an agreement to LL's service agreement that we were forced to agree under duress.  As such, in my opinion, the entire TOS is pretty much invalided and LL would likely face an onslaught of this form of challenge the first time LL ever tried to use our content for ANY purpose other than what they use it for now.

Thoughts?

 

[Toysoldier Thor]

Another thing about this LL High-Jacking of our IP Content TOS change....

I have to ask..... WHY NOW?

The rules in the SecondLife TOS pertaining to the level of access and usage rights LL has to our IP have been in place and stable for a very long time.  It was well understood and accepted and all was good.

So what triggered LL Legal to decide now... after all these years... that they need a TOS agreement that would increase LL's legal rights of use of our IP beyond what it has been all these years?

This is more so what scares me about this TOS change.  Its the timing of this change that LL Legal all of a sudden needs to have more access to our IP content.

To me, unless LL Legal was bored and needed to "keep us looking busy to justify our salaries at LL",  I fear that there is an up-coming need for LL to access our content beyond what they have needed in the past.  Since LL is known to be bringing out new products, games, services....  it would be a valid assumption to think LL has something coming out outside of the SecondLife grid whereby the SL content is compatible to this new product/service.  As such, they needed to set the stage and ensure they have the agreement from the SL content creators (even though in my opinion the agreement is under duress) to allow them to populate / use our content freely for this new product / service.

There had to be a reason for this change in TOS....  to me, this would be the only reason LL Legal would be wanting to create such a storm / anger with its SL customer base and the industry.  I guess they feel this new product / service getting fast and large ingestion of amazing content is worth the risks of the TOS policy on the SL grid.

 

[Chic Aeon]

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Miss Choovio wrote:

Hiyah chic and others. @Chic  You are right  thats for sure of course they do have database backups. BUT I haven't seen anything in the TOS were they mentioned that the content parts only counts after  the August 15h? I understood it's retroactive as well...

I am wondering about the guys who are flooding the complete SL forum with their escort crap and it seems nobody cares for

, but it's like with the TOS most haven't read them and don't care. In case LL is reselling their stuff for much more as the content creator got in SL; the whining and frustration will grow. Only jerks would pay a company which claims all rights for YOUR work, it's called fraud! Another point is most residents haven't noticed yet that LL has more projects than SL. LL prepared perfectly the illegal robbery in changing their TOS to legalize their greed. 

All the TOS of content creators and their label semi exclusive are for the trash, because if you agree to the LL TOS you are expropriated. I think it's just a question of time when LL will resell their 3D models.

---

1. Well legally (not a lawyer) the PREVIOUS terms of service which was in effect when we uploaded items prior to August 15th stated that the rights you were giving them were for distribution of the service and did not include that giant giving away all rights that is now in section 2.3  -- so I can't see how The Lab could claim that they NOW have rights to that work from long ago and that seems to be the general consensus even among those that "might" be lawyers .   I have read that clause many times and see no claim to retroactive anywhere.   If you find anything that says that, please add to this thread.  The TOS is long and complex and it is easy to get bleary.

2. I notified the moderators and maybe someone will take all that down soon. It is here often but not in THIS mass.

3. And I am going to give you a special award for your last paragraph because that is an idea that I haven't read on other forums and one that I didn't even think about  -- very true that "exclusive and semi-exclusive" either base mesh or completed items are questionable terms now as there are no guarantees.