Comments on: Update: Answer in Bragg Case; Victory in France; Casino Ad Policy (De)clarification; Sex Toy Copyright Suit; and Coca Cola’s Trademark in Second Life

By: Fantasilandia » Blog Archive » A framework for metaverses and SL. Part one. “Upstream: cons”

Thu, 07 May 2009 11:19:32 +0000

[...] to be used in Second Life in a limited context, monitoring the quality of the goods being produced. In substance, Coca-Cola is working with potential infringers, turning them into in-world markeers of Coke [...]

By: A framework for metaverses and SL. Part one. “Upstream: cons” « Fantasilandia

Wed, 01 Aug 2007 11:26:09 +0000

[...] Uncontrolled growth; recently, Second Life has been crossed by sharp controversies. The lawsuits that involved Linden Lab and its users, like the famous-infamous Bragg-Linden Lab lawsuit, and the most recent case that is involving Linden Lab, PayPal and Kevin Adelman; the nowadays announcement made by Linden Lab about the turn of screw about wagering and gambling (as posted by Mamo here); the griefing attacks; the problems related to pornography in SL; and, finally, the problem of unofficial brands that actually are in SL. All these aspects converge in showing the problems connected to the anarchical growth of Second Life. To a certain degree, it looks like the time of Far West, with ineffective laws that don’t affect users’ behaviours. On the other side, firms should need to approach the problems, searching for the possibility of establishing points of strengts where others see just traps. The reaction to the presence of an unofficial brand should not necessarily lead to the ceasing and removing of the brand itself. K Zero states the existence of at least 5 possible behaviours, which range from ignoring to engaging. For example, Coca-Cola adopted the strategy of endorsement, issuing a free license to the trademark to allow it to be used in Second Life in a limited context, monitoring the quality of the goods being produced. In substance, Coca-Cola is working with potential infringers, turning them into in-world markeers of Coke brand. [...]

By: Virtually Blind - Virtual Law | Legal Issues That Impact Virtual Worlds » Blog Archive » PayPal Identifies “Some Kind of N00b”

Sun, 22 Jul 2007 15:49:10 +0000

[...] As VB predicted two weeks ago, Reuters is now reporting that the “John Doe” in the Eros litigation left a digital trail that ties his real-life identity to his Second Life avatar, and PayPal is going to provide his name in response to Eros’ subpoena. He’s not “some kind of n00b” or anything; it’s just a reality of moving money around now. In all but a very few cases, the perception of anonymity is false. Now that PayPal has, apparently, decided not to move to quash, it will be interesting to see what Linden Lab does with its subpoena. They got an extension, so we won’t find out until around August 3. Bookmark this post on: [...]

By: Ashcroft Burnham

Ashcroft Burnham — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 20:20:45 +0000

The sex bed litigation is interesting: I read about that in The Times last week. I wonder the extent to which the plaintiff would have contented himself with a remedy that would see the defendant agree to cease selling the beds or be banned from sizable chunks of SecondLife, had it been available. One also wonders how many more cases that there are like this where the products are less valuable, and the victim of the infringement less wealthy, which are never pursued because of the enormous effort and expense required to pursue first-life litigation.

By: Benjamin Duranske

Benjamin Duranske — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 07:43:51 +0000

Wow. Technorati is damn quick on the uptake. I dumped the link to the Your2ndPlace.com post (by Nobody Fugzai) about 10 minutes after I posted this piece because the link didn’t really work in context. I so doing, I violated a personal rule against editing for content after I’ve posted, and I short-changed Nobody Fugazi (who wrote a good piece on this) in the process. Sorry, Nobody – your post contains some good analysis, but when I re-read this post after I put it up, the link to your article just didn’t fit in context. I’ll also apologize to VB’s readers, who, I think, should be able to rely on posts not changing substantially once they’ve hit the bitstream. My bad.

Here’s the link I cut: http://www.your2ndplace.com/node/222. I encourage everybody to read this post if you’re interested in this issue, as it gets into the meat of the “French law applies here, seriously?” argument.

As for the trademark registration issue, I wouldn’t read too much into that. You can trademark something without registering it, and the suit is focused on copyright infringement anyway. Regarding the possibility that it will be difficult or impossible to prove that the alleged infringing item was an actual bit-for-bit copy, that’s an interesting question, but there are ways around that in a copyright suit — in fact, proving actual copying isn’t necessary at all. I’ll cover all of this stuff at some point in the future if the case goes forward, but for now, the interesting question to me is what’s going to happen with the subpoena. Lawsuits like this move at the pace of glaciers, so there’s going to be lots of time to work out the details.

By: Nobody Fugazi

Nobody Fugazi — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 06:48:40 +0000

There was a link to Your2ndPlace.com there – something about “Confidence in the Legal Economy” according to technorati.

Not seeing it here. Interesting.

What I do find interesting is that in the SexGen bed case apparently has a lot of people who haven’t actually read the filing on it – SPECIFICALLY the filing for trademark applications in the timeline of alleged abuse, as well as a lack of demonstration that it was a copy.

I do hope you read that while you were over at Your2ndPlace.com…

By: Tony Walsh

Tony Walsh — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 03:17:24 +0000

Welcome back and thanks for the update, Benjamin, I was looking forward to your commentary on the Coke situation.

I can’t imagine how it could be worth the hassle to selectively issue licenses and worth the time to constantly monitor licensees. Seems more likely to cause problems in the community rather than build mindshare. If Coke’s not busting bootleggers [as I seem to remember reading somewhere], it’s more advantageous to bootleg than to get involved in licensing issues.

By: csven

csven — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 02:28:29 +0000

wrt the Alderman case, the Federal judge ruled Friday(?) that they could issue subpoenas.

http://www2.tbo.com/content/2007/jul/07/me-judge-oks
-real-subpoenas-in-virtual-sex-lawsuit/?news-metro