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Joshua Nightshade · 02-14-2008, 01:40 AM

This brings up an interesting subject.

As I understand it talking to other Lindens and the OpenSim(s) developers the eventual path is likely to add another sort of permission, in the hypothetical ubercloud that is the OMNIGRID, that handles whether or not something can be taken "off-grid." If I make an avatar in SL and set it such, it can be exported, either out from the SL viewer into a backup or out from the SL grid onto a third party one. At either point it really is up for grabs and permissions as we understand them cease to be.

This is, however, a lesson that any content creator in SL really needs to come to terms with, because at no point ever have the permissions systems in SL-proper ever been that failsafe. For data to be rendered on your system it has to be sent to your system. Be it graphics (textures) or prim information eventually someone will (and has at various points) figure out a way to intercept it and steal. The single exception to this so far has been scripts, because there's no need for them to be sent to the viewer in order to run them as everything is server-side and the viewer simply gets periodic notices from the server to change what it's seeing.

Anyway our content is not safe under the current SL permission system and never has been, it's just taken time for people to reverse engineer ways around getting what content they want. This has been an issue before, stealing graphics from websites has been going on since 1994 or 95 with all manner of attempted technical methods imposed to prevent it that only ever affect legitimate users.

Ultimately content creators will have to give up what is really an archaic sense of "OMG MY CONTENT MUST BE PROTECTED AT ALL COSTS," because this is the same sort of issue that on a larger scale affects the RIAA and the MPAA. DRM is failed, technological attempts to prevent human behavior don't work.

I can't say I understand fully the solution that works best in the hypothetical new grid, but I think instead of trying to hold onto your content with an iron grip and piss off customers with more and more restrictive methods of protecting it, it's probably better to build yourself a brand image around your content that is ultimately more valuable than the content itself.

02-14-2008, 01:40 AM	#9 (permalink)
Joshua Nightshade Account Closed Unedited Join Date: Jun 2007 Posts: 33,567 My Mood:	This brings up an interesting subject. As I understand it talking to other Lindens and the OpenSim(s) developers the eventual path is likely to add another sort of permission, in the hypothetical ubercloud that is the OMNIGRID, that handles whether or not something can be taken "off-grid." If I make an avatar in SL and set it such, it can be exported, either out from the SL viewer into a backup or out from the SL grid onto a third party one. At either point it really is up for grabs and permissions as we understand them cease to be. This is, however, a lesson that any content creator in SL really needs to come to terms with, because at no point ever have the permissions systems in SL-proper ever been that failsafe. For data to be rendered on your system it has to be sent to your system. Be it graphics (textures) or prim information eventually someone will (and has at various points) figure out a way to intercept it and steal. The single exception to this so far has been scripts, because there's no need for them to be sent to the viewer in order to run them as everything is server-side and the viewer simply gets periodic notices from the server to change what it's seeing. Anyway our content is not safe under the current SL permission system and never has been, it's just taken time for people to reverse engineer ways around getting what content they want. This has been an issue before, stealing graphics from websites has been going on since 1994 or 95 with all manner of attempted technical methods imposed to prevent it that only ever affect legitimate users. Ultimately content creators will have to give up what is really an archaic sense of "OMG MY CONTENT MUST BE PROTECTED AT ALL COSTS," because this is the same sort of issue that on a larger scale affects the RIAA and the MPAA. DRM is failed, technological attempts to prevent human behavior don't work. I can't say I understand fully the solution that works best in the hypothetical new grid, but I think instead of trying to hold onto your content with an iron grip and piss off customers with more and more restrictive methods of protecting it, it's probably better to build yourself a brand image around your content that is ultimately more valuable than the content itself.