IS THERE A WAY TO PROTECT YOURSELF FROM CONTENT THEFT?
Isn’t it amazing how we start writing about the people who copybot, steal and pillage on the grid and we get called bitches for it. And then every other second life blog jumps on the band wagon and does it. Does that mean they are bitches? Well, probably but not like us. Lots of people have come to complain about what we have written here. Ok, so it’s ok for people to make content theft their favourite pastime but we aren’t allowed to make writing about it ours?
I don’t know what all the fuss was about really. Content theft isn’t some new craze sweeping the grid, it’s just that Rawly really did ‘bring it’ into the public eye with his I-dont-give-a-f*** attitude and fun style of writing. We would like to think we made a difference with the way we handle things here. I have become what I can only describe as a walking, talking security orb. I have teleported into a few stores recently and the place empties quite quickly. It tends to empty extra quick if someone happens to have asked me in IM if I want to buy some stolen skins or if they happen to be standing in a pair of stolen boots. Do I mind? Not a bit, it means there is less lag.
Last week I took myself over to Redgrave to look at a new pair of boots. I was in a rush because I was going out, so I didn’t have time to notice if the sim got quieter. On rezzing right at the front door of the Redgrave store, I was hit by two IM’S asking me if I wanted to buy stolen skins. I was graced by the sight of someone standing in front of me, afk, in a pair of the boots I was going into buy, but they were wearing the ripped version.
Fortunately, Dean Ashby happened to be nearby and was very quick to escort the people to the ban line. The Redgrave store beginning to look like the mall from Dawn of the Dead. The vast amount of ‘new’ avatars that have no payment info, wandering aimlessly or are set away, between the cocktail dresses and celebrity skins is astonishing. If looked at in the right environment setting, it can look quite creepy, ya know?
What is causing concern on the grid is the amount of Copybot protection products that seem to have found there was onto the shelves since mass hysteria broke out. As I mentioned earlier in this article, copybot and content theft have been here since the beginning of the grid, so isn’t it very surprising that someone people think they have found a way to crack it just now and not four years ago.
I was born into second life in 2006 and I can remember seeing the green spam 'I-Quit' blah blah spam on my sceen, when I would teleport to various locations. This product doesn’t work, but can still be found gracing the ‘best sold items category’ on Xstreet. One of the products I saw had over 150 comments saying it was a pile of shit. Sadly, people still saw that it claimed to stop content theft and that was it, they bought it, despite being warned not to.
Another product that was brought to my attention was a product for sale called ‘I- Spy’. It’s sold in a store that sells security orbs and chat spy things. Ok before I carry on, let me just inform you all that chat spy equipment is highly illegal in second life, so that should set alarm bell ringing for anyone with a brain. We thought it would be really awesome to get this product because it claimed to do wonderful things and seemed to be the answer to the prayers of every designer who had been a victim. To be able to put such an amazing product on these pages would have been so brilliant. But does it ever work out that way for us? Not usually, no.
This product works by giving you a script that you place into all your creations. If anyone changes the creator permissions on the item, the script will send you an IM to tell you. Sounds good doesn’t it?
At the beginning of our SL Myth busting experiment we were very excited, but we soon met a brick wall. We tried the linking prims thing, but that didn’t work. This test was proving to be a lot more hardcore than other ones we have done. To test this product, to really make sure it worked we would have to copybot something. It was at this point even the sleuths at SLIWT were baffled and we decided it was well out of our league.
What we did work out was, that if the creator of this product had actually tested it, (let’s be honest they probably didn’t) they would have also had to copybot something. I am sure if it really works it willend up being the best sold product in sl and the person who created it will end up the equivalent to SL God.
The only thing that seems to work is the Cyro Detector. Many sim and business owners are using this product now to stop anyone who uses the Cyro Viewer near their stuff. Many think its bad that it has to come to such drastic measure and many people cause a fuss when they aren’t allowed in various stores because of their chosen viewer. Lots of people don’t like that their name is being published in groups and held in various databases across sl, because they use Cyro to play sl. Shouting about it will get you absolutely nowhere. If the owner of a sim or store, doesn’t want you in it because they don’t like your viewer, then you have no one to blame but yourself. Why you would want to continue using it is beyond me.
There are no products to stop content theft in second life. The only people who can stop it are Linden Lab. Stay tuned for more info on Content Theft coming later this week.
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Another product that was brought to my attention was a product for sale called ‘I- Spy’. It’s sold in a store that sells security orbs and chat spy things. Ok before I carry on, let me just inform you all that chat spy equipment is highly illegal in second life, so that should set alarm bell ringing for anyone with a brain. We thought it would be really awesome to get this product because it claimed to do wonderful things and seemed to be the answer to the prayers of every designer who had been a victim. To be able to put such an amazing product on these pages would have been so brilliant. But does it ever work out that way for us? Not usually, no.
