After a counter notification....

[Fergie Finesmith]

Hi, I'm waiting for a response after a counter notification. According to LL Laqroki have 10 business days to sue me in the court.

I would like to know what will happen after 10 days and Laqroki didn't sued me in the court. Will LL restore all my stuff on the original place where they were at (in-world and SL Marketplace) ? I've been reading a lot of stories about LL restoring stuff without permissions, or in fact they don't restored all the stuff... I'm scared.

I don't know, but this process is really weird, according to this I'm able to fil a DMCA notification against whomever only because is my competition and I want them out of the market...

[Ry0ta Exonar]

---

Fergie Finesmith wrote:

I don't know, but this process is really weird, according to this I'm able to fil a DMCA notification against whomever only because is my competition and I want them out of the market...

---

If you had not used their brand name as one of the keywords for SEO, they wouldn't have paid attention to your store. When I saw your listing on the marketplace, I also thought they are very similar to their skins, especially the use of  highlight and shadow.

 

[Fergie Finesmith]

Are you trying to say that I'm copying Laqroki? hmmm my skins were made with Evely lane, Eloh Elliot templates. And about the hightlights, do you think Mallory Cowen is the only woman in the world that knows how to do that kind of highlights on a simple plain texture of 512X512 pixels using photoshop??? I don't think so.

You should look at the details, try to wear a demo of one my skins and then a Laqroki demo and you'll se the big differences.

Mallory Cowen and her husband Winter Diprima always visited my store since I opened, and bought demo after demo, maybe they always wanted to find little details on my skins to take legal process.... I'm no more a poor newbie Mallory, I'm here to stay and I'm gonna fight for my skins hun, wait and see.

[Randall Ahren]

If they do sue, make sure you demand proof of ownership of the asserted copyrights. The burden is on them to prove their case and one of the elements is proof of ownership of the allegedly infringed copyrights. Demand certified copies of the copyright registrations.

[Ry0ta Exonar]

---

Fergie Finesmith wrote:

Are you trying to say that I'm copying Laqroki? hmmm my skins were made with Evely lane, Eloh Elliot templates.

---

 

No, I'm not. I don't even want to judge cuz that's none of my business. I just meant your skins are similar enough to cause them to wonder if their skins might have been copied under the situation where your skins were marketed with their name in the keywords.

 

[Randall Ahren]

Marketing skins with someone else's name in the keywords is not copyright infringement. 

[Josh Susanto]

But it is an invitation to waste a huge amount of time clarifying that there was no violation.

[Jennifer Boyle]

---

Randall Ahren wrote:

Marketing skins with someone else's name in the keywords is not copyright infringement. 

---

That's absolutely correct.  The only case about which I know details in which LL took down content based on a DMCA notification was actually a case of alleged trademark infringement, which is not subject to DMCA.  My conclusion is that LL is not very careful about assuring itself that the allegation in a DMCA notification would constitute copyright infringement if true.  

[Ry0ta Exonar]

Yep, you are right. It's keyword spam that violates marketplace listing guideline like I said in the previous thread.

http://community.secondlife.com/t5/Merchants/A-Little-scared/m-p/1236567#M12095

 

[Catwise Yoshikawa]

There is other way to report what he did then. They should flag his items as keyword spam, not file a dmca..

Maybe the problem is that Marketplace didn't remove those listings, or didn't advise the merchant to remove those spam keywords and they finally go to file the DMCA just because nothing was done.

[Ry0ta Exonar]

---

Catwise Yoshikawa wrote:

There is other way to report what he did then. They should flag his items as keyword spam, not file a dmca..

Maybe the problem is that Marketplace didn't remove those listings, or didn't advise the merchant to remove those spam keywords and they finally go to file the DMCA just because nothing was done.

---

I'm not saying they filed a DMCA because of keyword spam. lol

---

Fergie Finesmith wrote:

I don't know, but this process is really weird, according to this I'm able to fil a DMCA notification against whomever only because is my competition and I want them out of the market...

---

When I read above comment, I thought  they had a good reason to file a DMCA because

---

your skins are similar enough to cause them to wonder if their skins might have been copied

under the situation where your skins were marketed with their name in the keywords

---

What if someone you don't know is selling a reindeer similar to yours at cheaper price with "catwise" in their keywords on the marketplace and your customer let you know about that? Do you not wonder if your reindeer might have been copied?

So (in her case) it's not like what she said, ie she can file a DMCA notification against whomever only because they are her competition and she wants them out of the market.

That was my point. I don't know why they actually went so far as to file a DMCA.:matte-motes-big-grin-squint:

 

[sunshine Juneberry]

---

Randall Ahren wrote:

If they do sue, make sure you demand proof of ownership of the asserted copyrights. The burden is on them to prove their case and one of the elements is proof of ownership of the allegedly infringed copyrights. Demand certified copies of the copyright registrations.

---

 

Actually you are not required to register anything in order to claim  copyrights.

I'll quote the U.S. copyright office

 

"The way in which copyright protection is secured is frequently

misunderstood. No publication or registration or other action

in the Copyright Office is required to secure copyright."

"Copyright is secured automatically when the work is created,

and a work is “created” when it is fixed in a copy or

phonorecord for the first time."

 

"Copyright protection subsists from the time the work is created

in fixed form. The copyright in the work of authorship

immediately becomes the property of the author who created

the work. Only the author or those deriving their rights

through the author can rightfully claim copyright"

 

United States Copyright office puplication U.S Library of Congress. http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ1.pdf

 

[Josh Susanto]

In other words, if someone hacks into your computer and takes it and uses it, they're guilty of both hacking and of violating your copyright.

What's less clear, although I've discussed it a lot elsewhere, is what happens to copyright when the work becomes distributed, especially without any kind of copyright notice.

For example, imagine that you make a child porn image and then make it available to Google. The image would seem not to be defensible as "undistributed" if made available to Google by the copyright holder. It seems to me that any other image also made available to Google would also be "distributed"; it's not the nature of the image which determines whether an act performed with it constitutes distribution.

At least some of you reading this probably have images of which Google has produced a thumbnail version without any explicit consent on your part. Google further makes commercial use of these thumbnails. Billions of them. These thumbnails, by their very nature, are more recognizable than whatever I would derive from such an image in order to produce a sculpted prim. It's my understanding that if an image is already the same size as a Google thumbnail, the thumbnail effectively duplicates the image. And yet, I have been criticized for using derivative images which are produced from images with no copyright notice, while no one says anything about Google's continued commercial use of millions, if not billions of thumbnails produced from images containing copyright notices and from websites with explicit efforts built in to thwart use of the images by Google users.

Moreover, I could easily extract any image if it is the same size as a Google thumbnail, and I can actually use Google, itself, to get around use restrictions on Flickr if I so choose. But I don't do these things. And if there's any kind of copyright notice inside an image I might want to use, I at least respect that. Google doesn't.

And yet, I'm the bad guy and Google is the good guy.

Right?

[Phil Deakins]

---

Josh Susanto wrote:

[...]

And yet, I'm the bad guy and Google is the good guy.

Right?

---

Nope. Google is a bad guy - I've no idea about you

Since Google started their images search, I've always said that it's nothing less than theft on their part. They don't ask. They just take - and use on their own site.

They do the same with books. Apart from books that are old enough for the copyright to have lapsed, that's nothing short of theft too. A group of authors tried to stop them from stealing their work and showing it on their (Google's) site, but I think they failed.

Google is a scum company because of their practises, such as their image search.

[Josh Susanto]

I support Google's very thorough use of books to which IP rights have expired, provided that, in addition to whatever else they may do, they also provide accurate representation of the original content and appearance. 

And I don't necessarily think that Google is evil.

My main point is that what I've been accused of "getting away with", as compared to what Google is "getting away with", is on the same comparative order of scale as someone tearing a tag off of a mattress.

But I'll probably get sued (rightly or wrongly) long before Google does, for 2 reasons.

1) Because people blindly accept that Google must not be breaking the law with what they do, simply on the basis that it's too big and profitable a business to be substantially rooted in ignoring copyright questions.*

2) Because people would rather try ot get blood from a stone than try to get anything out of multi-billion-dollar company and its world-class team of lawyers.

*"The bigger the con or the older the con, the easier it is to pull."

- from the movie Revolver

 

[Catwise Yoshikawa]

---

Ry0ta Exonar wrote:

---

Catwise Yoshikawa wrote:

There is other way to report what he did then. They should flag his items as keyword spam, not file a dmca..

Maybe the problem is that Marketplace didn't remove those listings, or didn't advise the merchant to remove those spam keywords and they finally go to file the DMCA just because nothing was done.

---

I'm not saying they filed a DMCA because of keyword spam. lol

---

Fergie Finesmith wrote:

I don't know, but this process is really weird, according to this I'm able to fil a DMCA notification against whomever only because is my competition and I want them out of the market...

---

When I read above comment, I thought  they had a good reason to file a DMCA because

---

your skins are similar enough to cause them to wonder if their skins might have been copied

under the situation where your skins were marketed with their name in the keywords

---

What if someone you don't know is selling a reindeer similar to yours at cheaper price with "catwise" in their keywords on the marketplace and your customer let you know about that? Do you not wonder if your reindeer might have been copied?

So (in her case) it's not like what she said, ie she can file a DMCA notification against whomever only because they are her competition and she wants them out of the market.

That was my point. I don't know why they actually went so far as to file a DMCA.:matte-motes-big-grin-squint:

 

---

oh! Now I understand what you said. Guess I was a little lost here ^^'

 

 

[Randall Ahren]

---

sunshine Juneberry wrote:

Actually you are not required to register anything in order to claim  copyrights.

---

True, but you have no standing to sue over a copyright that you do not own. Ownership of the underlying copyright is a still a required element of a claim for copyright infringement. 

Moreover, for a federal claim of copyright infringement, you should review 17 USC 411, which in pertinent part provides no action for infringement of the copyright in any United States work shall be instituted until preregistration or registration of the copyright claim has been made in accordance with this title. 

 

[sunshine Juneberry]

---

Josh Susanto wrote:

At least some of you reading this probably have images of which Google has produced a thumbnail version without any explicit consent on your part. Google further makes commercial use of these thumbnails. Billions of them. These thumbnails, by their very nature, are more recognizable than whatever I would derive from such an image in order to produce a sculpted prim. It's my understanding that if an image is already the same size as a Google thumbnail, the thumbnail effectively duplicates the image. And yet, I have been criticized for using derivative images which are produced from images with no copyright notice, while no one says anything about Google's continued commercial use of millions, if not billions of thumbnails produced from images containing copyright notices and from websites with explicit efforts built in to thwart use of the images by Google users.

Google is a search engine. Google shows images to help people searching for particular images that have been published in a public area.

Google shows some of my images that i have posted on Markeplace. I posted those pictures so that they can be seen on a public website. I don't think they're violating anything because they make no claim the image is theirs and all they're doing is allowing people to link to the original image. This is bad for what reason?

Imagine if Google or any search engine wasnt allowed to show, use, or post any copyrighted text or image in the searches, would search even work?.Would the internet work as an information superhighway?

Google is just as guilty of violating copyright as LL when people make AVs or reproduce images inworld that are copyrighted.

If you have a problem with google using a thumbnail of one your images and you feel its in violation of your copyright, then you file a DMCA request and google has to stop or face fines.Its upto the copyright holder to file this is they feel violated.

I think most people don't mind, or even prefer their copyrighted images and text to be shown in google searches because it ultimately benefits them or their websites with sales, revenue, exposure, traffic ect...... Of course if they don't want it...then back the DMCA request...

---

 

[sunshine Juneberry]

---

Randall Ahren wrote:

---

sunshine Juneberry wrote:

Actually you are not required to register anything in order to claim  copyrights.

---

True, but you have no standing to sue over a copyright that you do not own. Ownership of the underlying copyright is a still a required element of a claim for copyright infringement. 

 

 

---

You OWN copyright as soon as you create something,  and you can claim copyright infringement without ANY registration....and even sue without any registration.

from your own source...

"Copyright registration is the process by which a formal claim of copyright is filed on a work with the U.S. Copyright Office.  Registration is not a condition of copyright protection, although it is a prerequisite for filing a copyright lawsuit on U.S. origin works.  However, it is possible to file a lawsuit on a previously unregistered work merely by filing an application for registration immediately prior to initiating the lawsuit."

 

 

[Randall Ahren]

---

sunshine Juneberry wrote:

You OWN copyright as soon as you create something,  and you can claim copyright infringement without ANY registration....and even sue without any registration.

from your own source...

"Copyright registration is the process by which a formal claim of copyright is filed on a work with the U.S. Copyright Office.  Registration is not a condition of copyright protection, although it is a prerequisite for filing a copyright lawsuit on U.S. origin works.  However, it is possible to file a lawsuit on a previously unregistered work merely by filing an application for registration immediately prior to initiating the lawsuit."

---

Yes, but you have to prove that you own the copyright. If someone sues me for infringement of a copyright that they claim to own, I am not going to take their word for it that they own it. Someone else may be the creator of the allegedly infringed work. Furthermore, I am not going to take their word for it they that they registered the work. I am going to demand proof of the registration, certified by the Registrar of Copyrights and bearing the original seal.

Moreover, the date upon which they registered the work is very important because if registration was not timely, they are not entitled to statutory damages or attorneys fees.  See 17 USC 412. 

Concerning google images, see Perfect 10 v. Google. The use of small copied images as shown by search engines is considered to fall under fair use.

[sunshine Juneberry]

---

Randall Ahren wrote:

---

sunshine Juneberry wrote:

You OWN copyright as soon as you create something,  and you can claim copyright infringement without ANY registration....and even sue without any registration.

from your own source...

"Copyright registration is the process by which a formal claim of copyright is filed on a work with the U.S. Copyright Office.  Registration is not a condition of copyright protection, although it is a prerequisite for filing a copyright lawsuit on U.S. origin works.  However, it is possible to file a lawsuit on a previously unregistered work merely by filing an application for registration immediately prior to initiating the lawsuit."

---

Yes, but you have to prove that you own the copyright. If someone sues me for infringement of a copyright that they claim to own, I am not going to take their word for it that they own it. Someone else may be the creator of the allegedly infringed work. Furthermore, I am not going to take their word for it they that they registered the work. I am going to demand proof of the registration, certified by the Registrar of Copyrights and bearing the original seal.

Moreover, the date upon which they registered the work is very important because if registration was not timely, they are not entitled to statutory damages or attorneys fees.  See

17 USC 412

. 

Concerning google images, see

Perfect 10 v. Google

. The use of small copied images as shown by search engines is considered to fall under fair use.

---

 Of course you don't to take their word for it, and can demand till you're blue in the face, it wont stop it from going to court. Thats what the court will decide, who own copyright and is it valid.

My point in replying to your original argument is that YOU ARE NOT REQUIRED TO BE REGISTERED in order to have copyright protection, and that YOU ARE NOT REQUIRED TO BE REGISTERED in order to claim copyright infringement.

In order to sue for damages or to prove copyright ownership in court, THEN you will need to be registered or at least have file an application for registration, but you do not have to be registered prior to the infringement. You do not need to be registered to file a DMCA. You do not need to be registered to be the owner of copyright of all your creations.

If you think people are going to register all their creations YOUR NUTS

....it cost money each time and to file for each and every thing you create would be insane. But thankfully someone was blessed and had a brain and decided that it isn't neccessary to register everytime you create something for that work to be yours,  and if someone copies your work, that you can still claim copyright infringement and they have to stop using it or face fines & penalties

 

[Randall Ahren]

---

sunshine Juneberry wrote:

In order to sue for damages or to prove copyright ownership in court, THEN you will need to be registered or at least have file an application for registration, but you do not have to be registered prior to the infringement. You do not need to be registered to file a DMCA. You do not need to be registered to be the owner of copyright of all your creations.

If you think people are going to register all their creations YOUR NUTS

....it cost money each time and to file for each and every thing you create would be insane. But thankfully someone was blessed and had a brain and decided that it isn't necessary to register everytime you create something for that work to be yours,  and if someone copies your work, that you can still claim copyright infringement and they have to stop using it or face fines & penalties

---

I am aware of that, which was my point. People are lazy and cheap. Most people won't register and if registration isn't timely, statutory damages are unavailable and it is difficult to prove actual damages. If someone copies your work, sure you can claim infringement, but the burden is on you to prove your case, including damages if registration was not timely. The people with the brains are corporations like Walt Disney that bought themselves some politicians to pass the DMCA and the Mickey Mouse Protection Act and retroactively extend the term for copyrights.

[Ziggy21 Slade]

I think you should be careful when quoting all this legal stuff, to make sure you have the necessary legal knowledge and qualifications to back it up, and clearly you don't, you are deliberately misquoting in order to win an argument.

The passage from the document you misquoted in your second post is immediately preceeded by this sentence...

Except for an action brought for a violation of the rights of the author under section 106A(a) [17 USC 106A(a)]

You then did it again with another passage in this post...

---

Randall Ahren wrote:

---

Moreover, the date upon which they registered the work is very important because if registration was not timely, they are not entitled to statutory damages or attorneys fees.  See

17 USC 412

. 

---

Once again you have misquoted, missing out this important sentence...

other than an action brought for a violation of the rights of the author under section 106A (a),

There is absolutely no need to 'register' something for copyright, if you created it you own it, it's as simple as that, if someone files DMCA against you, your stuff will be removed and YOU will have to prove you are not infinginging the complainants copyright in your counter claim, so you can demand anything you like, it won't get your stuff re listed.

LL DMCA Policy

Read the above and you will see there is absolutley no mention of any opportunity for you to...demand proof of the registration, certified by the Registrar of Copyrights and bearing the original seal.

As a merchant you should be supporting the idea of DMCA and not trying to find technicalities to circumvent it 

 

 

[Josh Susanto]

>Google is a search engine. Google shows images to help people searching for particular images that have been published in a public area.

Great. But where is the explicit consent to "help" them?

>Google shows some of my images that i have posted on Markeplace. I posted those pictures so that they can be seen on a public website. I don't think they're violating anything because they make no claim the image is theirs and all they're doing is allowing people to link to the original image. This is bad for what reason?

It's not necessarily bad. Also, there may be an agreement between LL and Goolge to which you agreed in such an example, before you posted the images. I'm 100% OK with that if it's actually there somewhere in the fine print.

>Imagine if Google or any search engine wasnt allowed to show, use, or post any copyrighted text or image in the searches, would search even work?.Would the internet work as an information superhighway?

I do see your point. But necessity is not a legal argument that automatically extends to profitable competition, especially where it is to be applied arbitrarily only to large companies providing large services. The users of my products would probably also be unable to use some of them if copyright were being proactively enforced. But because Google is simply bigger than me, we need to let them even more broadly ignore copyright questions that I'm supposed to grapple with on some kind of zero-tolerance basis? Really?

>Google is just as guilty of violating copyright as LL when people make AVs or reproduce images inworld that are copyrighted.

Thank you.

>If you have a problem with google using a thumbnail of one your images and you feel its in violation of your copyright, then you file a DMCA request and google has to stop or face fines.Its upto the copyright holder to file this is they feel violated.

I don't have a problem with that as such. I have a problem with being held to a higher standard than is Google, simply on the basis that Google is bigger and more profitable.

>I think most people don't mind, or even prefer their copyrighted images and text to be shown in google searches because it ultimately benefits them or their websites with sales, revenue, exposure, traffic ect...... Of course if they don't want it...then back the DMCA request...

As a pattern, I think that's probably a reasonable assumption. But it's still an assumption. By the same principle, I can assume that if someone has a scientific website, they'll appreciate my promotion of further interest in their subjects by using the images to produce in-world museum items, etc.

But I have been begrudged my nickels and dimes for production of fewer than 1000 SLM products (many of which are actually derived from explicitly authorized or public domain images in any case), while Google uses, indiscriminately, anything it can spider up, regardless of copyright notice, and makes billions of dollars doing it.

Please note that I have NEVER received a complaint about copyright from the pertinent copyright holder.

Even when I had an item pulled for IP violation, it wasn't the content I had loaded which was the problem. Someone had given me a copymod Ferrari, which I "repainted" with a photo meat texture I had personally produced, and then I sold it for L$1 as a "meat Ferrari". When the car turned out to be copybotted, I cooperated fully with the delisting notice. 

 

[Josh Susanto]

>If you think people are going to register all their creations YOUR NUTS **Only uploaded images may be used in postings**://secondlife.i.lithium.com/i/smilies/16x16_smiley-tongue.gif" border="0" alt=":smileytongue:" title="Smiley Tongue" />....it cost money each time and to file for each and every thing you create would be insane.

It might be cheaper than litigation, and almost certainly cheaper than winning a case where there is nothing registered.

Unregistered copyrights exist.

But failing to register them invites unactionable infringement.

If you produce things on your laptop and your laptop is stolen before you have a chance to register some of its content which is then used commercially, that would probably be a good example of where to apply the law as pertaining to unregistered copyrights.

Beyond that, it's reasonable to ask questions like "If you consider the value of this image to be greater than $5000 US, then why did you not invest in protecting it by registration of copyright?"