An eco-friendly international architecture design competition is being held within Second Life where the grand prize is the real-world construction of the winning green structure. In China. Cool.

The contest is sponsored by architecture website arcspace.com, eco-architecture firm Ecoland-Ecoscape and the International Network for Bamboo and Rattan. Architects, designers and students from around the globe were invited to take part in the competition, which involves the development of an “Eco-friendly Community” to be located in a bamboo forest in Sandao, China, 14 km inland from popular resort destination, Sanya’s Yalong Bay (warm and sunny all year round, Sanya is known as China’s Hawaii). The undeveloped construction site has been precisely recreated in Second Life (SLURL), providing designers unprecedented ability to work directly with the landscape. Every step of virtual progress will be broadcast on YouTube to encourage participation by non-SL residents. The competition is currently entering its second phase, when 12 semi-finalists will be narrowed down to three winners by the jury.

Eco-architect (ecotect?) David Greenberg, of Ecoland-Ecoscape, champions the idea of “sustainable ruralism,” and challenges competitors to develop a community “where people will live, work and visit; an environment which will encourage a wide range of uses, occupied at all times of the day. The goal should be to stimulate social, technical and cultural progress.” Greenberg’s Second Life avatar explains the vision and rules of the competition in this nifty YouTube video.

The competition is taking place in two phases. At the conclusion of Phase I on June 1, the jury began the selection of twelve designs to continue to Phase II of the competition. All presentations were filmed and will be shown at YouTube, arcspace’s location in SL, and www.arcspace.com, to invite the public to comment and vote for an additional three winners who will continue to Phase II. In Phase II, the jury will select the final three winners who will travel to the actual construction site. The grand winner will be invited to assist with the construction in China. (Again…cool.)

The structure must take into account Sandao’s tropical climate and, in keeping with the eco-mission, promote the use of hybrid materials, with a minimum of 25% bamboo. Ultimately, the project is meant to demonstrate the important role of bamboo and rattan from plantations and sustainably managed forests in providing economically viable environmental services.

A few comments on copyright issues and the project generally follow.

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“Lively,” a virtual world from Google went online today, as predicted by me and 10,000 other bloggers. I’ll dig into the TOS and see how they’re approaching intellectual property and other legal issues. In the meantime… thoughts?

The SL Bar Association recently announced that it will be offering CLE (Continuing Legal Education) credit for legal seminars held in Second Life, starting with SLBA President ‘Solomon Cortes’ (David Naylor) presenting “Virtual World Legal Issues” July 15, 2008 at 12:00 Noon Pacific at the SLBA offices. This marks the first time that CLE credit has been offered for an exclusively in-world event. For non-attorney readers, CLE credit is a big deal to lawyers because attorneys all have to take a certain number of CLE credits each year to maintain state bar memberships — and these seminars can be expensive. The SLBA presentations will initially only be accredited for CLE in California and the United Kingdom, but some other U.S. states accept California accredited CLE programs, and eventual accreditation in other states and countries seems likely if there is interest.

The initial SLBA sessions will be offered free of charge to SLBA members — a fantastic benefit given that members pay just L$500 (about $2.20) a year in dues and that mainstream CLE seminars regularly run $100 a seat. Future SLBA CLE offerings may involve some fees, but the SLBA plans to keep the cost well below mainstream CLE — a benefit of holding these in-world.

The full schedule of the upcoming CLE offerings via the SLBA includes:

• July 15, 2008, 12:00 noon: “Virtual Worlds Legal Issues,” ‘Solomon Cortes’ (David Naylor)

• July 22, 2008, 12:00 noon: “Intellectual Property Enforcement in Virtual Worlds,” presented by ‘Juris Amat’ (Tamiko Franklin)

• July 29, 2008, 12:00 noon: “Internet Fraud,” presented by ‘Theophan Paine’ (Alex Roshuk)

• September 9, 2008, 12:00 noon: “Trademark Infringement in Virtual Worlds,” presented by ‘Legal Writer’ (Stephen Wu)

• September 16, 2008, 12:00 noon: “Legal Research on the (Free) Internet,” presented by ‘Cat Galileo’ (Kate Fitz)

All of the seminars have been approved for California CLE credit except the last, for which approval is pending.

Offering CLE in-world is a big step for the SL Bar Association, and I’m really pleased to see it happen. I started the SL Bar Association in late 2006, but had absolutely nothing to do with this effort, which was driven by the current ‘Cortes’ administration and spearheaded by ‘Geri Kuhn’ and ‘Cat Galileo.’ I join a lot of what I know are going to be very happy attorneys who use virtual worlds in thanking them for making this happen.

There are two new developments in Hernandez v. IGE. First, IGE has filed a declaration from CEO Brock Pierce stating that IGE merely holds stock in Affinity Media Inc. and doesn’t itself do anything or employ anyone. Second, Hernandez has moved to compel production of documents and interrogatory responses.

For the full background of this case, see VB’s complete coverage. In brief, plaintiff is suing IGE on behalf of essentially all World of Warcraft players on the grounds that IGE, by farming gold, spamming chat, camping spawns, and generally diminishing the World of Warcraft experience, allegedly prevented players from receiving the full benefits Blizzard intended them to receive as third party beneficiaries of Blizzard’s Terms of Use and End User License Agreement.

Pierce Declaration

IGE has filed a declaration from Brock Pierce (.zip) stating that Pierce is “the sole Managing Member and sole officer of the Defendant in this action, IGE U.S., LLC a/k/a Affinity Media Holdings, LLC” and that U.S. IGE “is not engaged and does not employ anyone to engage in any form of RMT, ‘gold farming,’ ‘spamming,’ auctions or any of the other activities alleged in the Amended Complaint.” Rather, “IGE U.S. consists solely of its stock holdings in Affinity Media, Inc.” The declaration was filed to support IGE’s claim in its opposition to class certification that the injunctive relief Hernandez seeks (an order closing down some of IGE’s gold farming operations) cannot be granted because IGE itself does not participate in these activities. The declaration also sheds some new light on the murky corporate structure of IGE, a subject of frequent, often entertaining speculation over at Broken Toys.

Motion to Compel

Hernandez has filed a motion to compel with exhibits (.zip) asking the court to force IGE “to produce all documents called for by plaintiff’s document request and to respond fully to plaintiff’s Interrogatories.” Hernandez argues that the motion is necessary due to “IGE’s wholesale failure to provide meaningful discovery, apart from a sparse and woefully incomplete production of scattered corporate meeting documents and reports and evasive interrogatory responses.” With less than eight weeks to go in fact discovery under the court’s current case calendar, motions like this are relatively common. The exhibits include Hernandez requests for production of documents and interrogatories to IGE, and IGE’s initial responses, for those who are interested.