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Big infringement from FFXI, don't know who to report it to.Follow

#1 Jun 30 2012 at 7:25 PM Rating: Good
So I play this game called second life and I am seeing more and more objects from the game called "mesh" running around. The scary part is someone has taken a lot of the FFXI models turned them to .dae files and imported them into the game, selling them for real life money. The collection and publicity are spreading and this guy is making money off this fast.

For a reference 540L is roughly $2.50USD.

This is a big infringement from FFXI and Sl but I don't know who to contact to report it.. SE probably will not say anything and Linden Labs is not much better. I hope someone here has some connections to get the word out to SE faster.

Proof:

https://marketplace.secondlife.com/products/search?search%5Bcategory_id%5D=&search%5Bmaturity_level%5D=G&search%5Bkeywords%5D=%5B+Manticore+%5D

https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Manticore-Wyvern-v111/3671182
https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Manticore-Carbie-v111/3515612
https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Manticore-Balor-v111/3673004
https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Manticore-Diablos-v111/3673012
https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Manticore-Ifrit-v111/3669610
and much more..



Edited, Jun 30th 2012 11:23pm by Randomguy555
#2 Jun 30 2012 at 7:33 PM Rating: Excellent
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Best thing to do would be to go to SE's official forums and see if you can find a place to report it there.

OR, you could email your complaint to Second Life's owners (I forget the name of the company). Surely they have abuse clauses in their ToS about selling copyrighted material (which this very well is). This would surely earn the seller a suspension or banning or at the very least, they'd be forced to remove their ill-gotten wares.

Or, do both!

Edited, Jun 30th 2012 9:33pm by Lyrailis
#3REDACTED, Posted: Jun 30 2012 at 7:54 PM, Rating: Sub-Default, (Expand Post) Or you could not give a **** since it has no direct effect on you.
#4 Jun 30 2012 at 8:01 PM Rating: Excellent
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Peimei wrote:
Or you could not give a @#%^ since it has no direct effect on you.


Eh, to be honest, I don't like seeing blatant copyright infringement either.

Maybe it doesn't *directly* effect us, but it could indirectly.

Why do you think companies are trying harder and harder to push more stiff DRM? Why, because of piracy and copyright infringement, of course! Who gets hurt most from this? Not the pirates... the common law-abiding gamer who wants to buy and play their games.

Copyright Infringement tends to make companies angry. When they get angry, they tend to try and do something about it. What if this kept going on, and multiple people starting profiting from SE's hard work? Then SE might change how their in-game files are used, maybe even finding encryption methods and such to make this type of thing harder to do.

Then guess what? Now the harmless .dat modders (the ones who don't use .dat mods for exploits) get punished, as do any users who use their .dat mods.

If more people like the OP would actually step up and do their part to stop Copyright Infringement when they see it, then we'd see less of this happening. And besides, I hate seeing jerks making money from someone else's hard work. This guy who's selling this stuff in Second Life didn't make that art. He ripped it off of those who did and now he's making money from it and I can't help but to think that's just plain wrong.

Turning a blind eye to petty crime because it "doesn't affect you" is half of what is wrong with the messed up world IRL. "Oh, that guy who's cheating the government out of a few hundred bucks on his tax return isn't hurting me, I won't report him". Several thousand cases later, and that few hundred turns out to be a few million. It adds up.
#5 Jun 30 2012 at 8:32 PM Rating: Decent
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Have you posted this on the official forums? When the Flag This Item link redirected me to making an account that's as far as my give a @#%^ went.

Edited, Jun 30th 2012 10:02pm by Telaki
#6 Jun 30 2012 at 8:37 PM Rating: Good
I don't think anyone would care if the models were being given away for free (free FFXI advertising in another MMO, for crying out loud!), but charging for them is in pretty bad taste, IMO. Even just selling a tool that converts .DATs to Second Life meshes would be legit, but selling the meshes themselves is most likely going to get them in legal trouble.
#7 Jun 30 2012 at 8:38 PM Rating: Good
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This reminds me of a link someone posted a while back, that was to some store that was trying to sell statues and other merchandise fashioned after FFXI related stuff. They had exact replicas of things like Dynamis Lord, only with names like "evil fantasy man!" and whatnot.
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#8 Jun 30 2012 at 8:44 PM Rating: Excellent
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ChiekaGilgamesh wrote:
I don't think anyone would care if the models were being given away for free (free FFXI advertising in another MMO, for crying out loud!), but charging for them is in pretty bad taste, IMO. Even just selling a tool that converts .DATs to Second Life meshes would be legit, but selling the meshes themselves is most likely going to get them in legal trouble.


Pretty much, this.

People using .dats within the game, or even another game at no profit doesn't bother me.

It is when they start selling someone else's work as their own, that's when I tend to get annoyed.
#9 Jun 30 2012 at 10:49 PM Rating: Default
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Peimei wrote:
Or you could not give a @#%^ since it has no direct effect on you.

Tell this to the whiners in the Neo Nyzul thread.

Second Life has been a shady-as-f*ck company for a long time now, but they should at least honor something if you point it out to them, even if they don't receive a notice.

Otherwise, SE probably has to do it themselves. Yeah, selling their models is a really crappy thing to do, but Second Life kinda revolves around that kind of crap. If it's something like importing models into GMod usually it flies under the radar.

There also appears to be a flagging system that you could use on each item, but you have to have an account to do so which leaves a horrible taste in my mouth.

Edited, Jun 30th 2012 9:51pm by Raelix
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#10 Jul 01 2012 at 1:52 AM Rating: Excellent
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For the record, the goods on the Second Life marketplace are largely set up by the players themselves, so there are always infringements of various kinds. The best thing you can do is report it directly to SL themselves, rather than Square-Enix. This will ensure that the marketer is pulled quicker and their goods removed from the system, likely resulting in a refund for the players who have purchased them.

Screaming at SE about this is the long way around, as it'll be tied up in legal for ages before any action is taken, and the end result will be no different than contacting Linden Labs themselves, since they have no direct control over what is posted there. Remember, they can only take action against rogue traders if the problem is reported.

Edited, Jul 1st 2012 3:53am by Glitterhands
#11 Jul 01 2012 at 2:08 AM Rating: Decent
I don't mind this kind of thing if it's free, it's kinda nasty if they start selling it though.

I think this came up a few times in the past, isn't that guy from China or something. I don't think they could do anything anyway due to his country of residence.
#12 Jul 01 2012 at 5:31 PM Rating: Good
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Screaming at SE about this is the long way around, as it'll be tied up in legal for ages before any action is taken, and the end result will be no different than contacting Linden Labs themselves, since they have no direct control over what is posted there. Remember, they can only take action against rogue traders if the problem is reported.


Well, really it'll take a few minutes, SE issue a DCMA notice to LL (who are American), LL pulls the content, it's that simple. Only SE can issue a DCMA notice though, whether or not SE can then claim damages from LL for hosting the infringing content I don't know, but they have to aggressively protect their IP to not do so means they lose all rights to that IP (it becomes common use, if SE can't show that they constantly protect their IP then they lose the right to protect it).
#13 Jul 01 2012 at 9:58 PM Rating: Excellent
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What pisses me off is clicking on those links, seeing the blatant rip-offs, then reading the 5-star reviews from people saying how wonderfully detailed the meshes are and how smooth the animations are, and lavishing credit on the thief for something they think he actually made. There's no mention of any of these things being from FFXI. Would be totally fine if he was giving these out for free and saying that he just ported them from FFXI, but the fact that he's completely ripped off these assets and is cashing in on it is pretty outrageous.

I'm sure SE would take notice if you post a thread about this on the official forums. Put it in the general forums and I think it would drum up enough attention for SE to do something.
#14 Jul 01 2012 at 10:17 PM Rating: Good
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While I'm just as repulsed by this as everyone else seems to be (within bounds of how much of a **** I give on any given day), I'm slightly confused as to how Second Life's currency is "real money". I mean, is there some method by which you can convert it into real, paper money that you can put in your wallet? Or is it a one way thing, ie, you can buy second life money via real money. If it's the latter, it's no different than EVE, where the money simply has a tangible reference for how much it'd be worth, and is no more real than the space ships you fly (in EVE). Or am I missing something due to not giving a **** about second life?
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Am I the only one who clicked on this thread expecting actual baby photos [of Jinte]? o.O

Except if it were baby photos, it would be like looking at before and afters of Michael Jackson. Only instead of turning into a white guy, he changes into a chick!
#15 Jul 01 2012 at 10:54 PM Rating: Good
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Lady Jinte wrote:
While I'm just as repulsed by this as everyone else seems to be (within bounds of how much of a sh*t I give on any given day), I'm slightly confused as to how Second Life's currency is "real money". I mean, is there some method by which you can convert it into real, paper money that you can put in your wallet? Or is it a one way thing, ie, you can buy second life money via real money. If it's the latter, it's no different than EVE, where the money simply has a tangible reference for how much it'd be worth, and is no more real than the space ships you fly (in EVE). Or am I missing something due to not giving a sh*t about second life?


I was always under the impression that the only way to acquire things in Second Life was to dump your real-life money in to acquire the in-game money, which is mostly true, and that it was a one-way thing. But according to Wikipedia, the answer to your question is that money trade goes both ways.

Directly from Wikipedia:
Quote:
Second Life has an internal economy and internal currency, the Linden dollar (L$). L$ can be used to buy, sell, rent or trade land or goods and services with other users. Virtual goods include buildings, vehicles, devices of all kinds, animations, clothing, skin, hair, jewelry, flora and fauna, and works of art. Services include "camping", wage labor, business management, entertainment and custom content creation (which can be broken up into the following 6 categories: building, texturing, scripting, animating, art direction, and the position of producer/project funder). L$ can be purchased using US Dollars and other currencies on the LindeX exchange provided by Linden Lab, independent brokers or other resident users. Money obtained from currency sales is most commonly used to pay Second Life's own subscription and tier fees; only a relatively small number of users earn large amounts of money from the world. According to figures published by Linden Lab, about 64,000 users made a profit in Second Life in February 2009, of whom 38,524 made less than US$10, while 233 made more than US$5000.[29] Profits are derived from selling virtual goods, renting land, and a broad range of services.

The Linden can be exchanged for US dollars or other currencies on market-based currency exchanges. Linden Lab reports that the Second Life economy generated US$3,596,674 in economic activity during the month of September 2005,[30] and as of September 2006 Second Life was reported to have a GDP of $64 Million.[31] In 2009 the total size of the Second Life economy grew 65% to US$567 million, about 25% of the entire U.S. virtual goods market. Gross Resident Earnings are $55 million US Dollars in 2009 - 11% growth over 2008.[32] In March 2009, it was revealed that there exist a few Second Life entrepreneurs, who have grossed in excess of US$1 million per year, most notably Ailin Graef, who is more well known as her avatar, Anshe Chung.[33]

#16 Jul 01 2012 at 11:23 PM Rating: Good
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Gatero wrote:
Lady Jinte wrote:
While I'm just as repulsed by this as everyone else seems to be (within bounds of how much of a sh*t I give on any given day), I'm slightly confused as to how Second Life's currency is "real money". I mean, is there some method by which you can convert it into real, paper money that you can put in your wallet? Or is it a one way thing, ie, you can buy second life money via real money. If it's the latter, it's no different than EVE, where the money simply has a tangible reference for how much it'd be worth, and is no more real than the space ships you fly (in EVE). Or am I missing something due to not giving a sh*t about second life?


I was always under the impression that the only way to acquire things in Second Life was to dump your real-life money in to acquire the in-game money, which is mostly true, and that it was a one-way thing. But according to Wikipedia, the answer to your question is that money trade goes both ways.

Directly from Wikipedia:
Quote:
Second Life has an internal economy and internal currency, the Linden dollar (L$). L$ can be used to buy, sell, rent or trade land or goods and services with other users. Virtual goods include buildings, vehicles, devices of all kinds, animations, clothing, skin, hair, jewelry, flora and fauna, and works of art. Services include "camping", wage labor, business management, entertainment and custom content creation (which can be broken up into the following 6 categories: building, texturing, scripting, animating, art direction, and the position of producer/project funder). L$ can be purchased using US Dollars and other currencies on the LindeX exchange provided by Linden Lab, independent brokers or other resident users. Money obtained from currency sales is most commonly used to pay Second Life's own subscription and tier fees; only a relatively small number of users earn large amounts of money from the world. According to figures published by Linden Lab, about 64,000 users made a profit in Second Life in February 2009, of whom 38,524 made less than US$10, while 233 made more than US$5000.[29] Profits are derived from selling virtual goods, renting land, and a broad range of services.

The Linden can be exchanged for US dollars or other currencies on market-based currency exchanges. Linden Lab reports that the Second Life economy generated US$3,596,674 in economic activity during the month of September 2005,[30] and as of September 2006 Second Life was reported to have a GDP of $64 Million.[31] In 2009 the total size of the Second Life economy grew 65% to US$567 million, about 25% of the entire U.S. virtual goods market. Gross Resident Earnings are $55 million US Dollars in 2009 - 11% growth over 2008.[32] In March 2009, it was revealed that there exist a few Second Life entrepreneurs, who have grossed in excess of US$1 million per year, most notably Ailin Graef, who is more well known as her avatar, Anshe Chung.[33]



I'm not sure whether I'm intrigued, horrified, or if I just want to laugh and say, "Oh internet, you rascal, you." Likely all three at the same time.
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Reiterpallasch wrote:
Glitterhands wrote:
Am I the only one who clicked on this thread expecting actual baby photos [of Jinte]? o.O

Except if it were baby photos, it would be like looking at before and afters of Michael Jackson. Only instead of turning into a white guy, he changes into a chick!
#17 Jul 02 2012 at 8:29 AM Rating: Good
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Well I created an account just to play vigilante. Unfortunately this is SEs fight because only they can report an infringement on copyright.
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