Dear FashCon Members,
The unremitting rise in Content Theft in SL has made it necessary for Fashion Consolidated to firm up its policies on piracy and also businesses in a box. What follows isn’t perfect, but it’s the best we’ve got right now:
- Avatars who have had DMCA take-down orders successfully filed against them will be removed permanently from Fashion Consolidated vendor status.
- This removal from vendor status will occur even if the selling avatar has legitimate content in her or his store, and regardless of claimed ignorance that the content was stolen – this is subjective, and unprovable.
- Resellers (people who buy things from others to sell or use businesses in box) are not original designers and are not considered to be legitimate Fashion Consolidated vendors. They will also be removed if they sell no legitimate self-designed fashion content.
- Removal of vendor status is permanent and can only be overturned if all DMCA take-downs are successfully contested with LL.
- Refunds will not be given for kiosks of removed designers – the rules are clear on joining.
Now, the more lengthy bit about what this means and why we’re doing this and what we wish for to make it better:
First off, content theft is not a casual virtual crime – it’s wilfully stealing the hard work of others for financial gain. Just like any other theft, it’s mean, stupid and unimaginative and should be dealt with swiftly. Designers work and labor and tweak and hone and battle the vagueries of SL to bring us wonderous goodies and deserve to be protected by those who cherish their work – that includes by other designers, buyers, and any connected organisation.
We at Fashion Consolidated receive a number of tips from shoppers that certain stores are selling stolen goods. Sometimes this turns out to be true, other times not, and – frustratingly – sometimes we never hear from the designers themselves at all about what they think. Sometimes designers themselves contact us asking us to remove the alleged thieves from our vendor rolls. We’ve had cases of blatant theft going on undetected, and other cases of what seems to us like screaming blatant theft, but after many hours of investigation turn out to be a false trail – a common source for design, etc.
In all cases, what we need is independent third party confirmation that yes, an item was copied. We at Fashion Consolidated do not have the expertise to do this evaluation ourselves – really. We’ve tried and all we end up doing is inappropriately attempting to be self-appointed judge and jury, or reinventing the decision making process that even Linden Lab, with all its employees, takes some time to process as designers often discover. Currently, the most standard evaluation we have is this DMCA process run by the Lindens.
Therefore, if the Lindens judge that the evidence is sufficient to accept a DMCA, FashCon’s judgement is that this is sufficient and the only fair course of action to the community is to remove designer rights. If you are a designer who has sucessfully gotten the Lindens to take down the work of a resident – and that resident is marketing through Fashion Consolidated – please send Ivy Norsk (FashCon’s content moderator) a copy of the Linden or OnRez DMCA response about removing items. We will follow suit immediately and the member will immediately and permanently have their vendor status revoked. Note that this works, because, as LL explains, the consequences of a false DMCA are very RL, and very real and will probably involve lawyers. See LL’s page on DMCAs for more details.
Note: yes, we have decided for consistency’s sake that this does apply to past DMCAs against current FashCon vendors. We are aware that this may hit a few people previously successfully DMCA’d as selling stolen content, who say they have tried to “go good,” but we have decided that we cannot maintain a membership where people complain as they are kicked that “so and so did it too, why do they get to stay?” – we need to act with impartiality. So this highlights a very important issue:
If you carry stolen goods, you WILL be removed from FashCon. Ignorance of the nature of the goods you receive is no excuse in RL law, neither is it something the Lindens will forgive you for. Nor will this group. It is YOUR responsibility to ensure that nothing you sell has even the faintest chance of being stolen. If in doubt, DON’T sell it, and report the supplier. If you are DMCA’d for selling such goods, regardless of your naivety, noobness etc, you WILL be removed from FashCon, permanently.
What’s wrong with this?
The Lindens are slooooow. Also the DMCA process is onerous for designers. We recognize this and would like to have the option to accept other independent third party evaluations in the future should such an evaluating group arise. But they will have to be recognised by the whole community as good, independent trusted arbiters.
What you should do if you think you see something that you believe is stolen:
Contact the original creator by notecard informing them of the what and the where and the who, so that they can check the situation out quietly. You can also tell Ivy Norsk, and she will put the alleged thief on her watch list so she is aware this is ongoing, even if it’s impossible to act at this stage. If you can’t resolve the matter, file a DMCA with LL and let Ivy know of the outcome. You must do this to have the offender removed from FashCon. Please don’t tell us it’s obvious theft and we are harbouring thieves if we don’t kick on your own insistence – we have to be fair to all and follow a process. If you are sure you have been stolen from, follow that through: file a DMCA, or suggest that the content creator does, and we will act swiftly and with wrath and vengeance once your case is proven.
If you have been convicted via DMCA and removed from FashCon vendors: do not ask us to restore you, or have mercy. You’ve been found guilty of supporting theft of others’ work by Linden Lab. Your only recourse is to file a counter-DMCA – if that is successful and your innocence proved, your vendor status will be restored.
About BIBs: Businesses in a Box are often used by thieves to move stolen merchandise or to hide behind. We have heard “Oh, I got it from a box and I didn’t know” more times than we care to remember. We know that all of us were once naive and did not know what a BIB was, but we cannot allow the BIB to stand as a bluff, and indeed, marketing wares from a box is not something that a real designer does. So, if you are a designer and you are reselling a little something from a box, even as a little freebie enticement, get rid of that merchandise. It can only do your business harm.
On a final note: Fashion Consolidated is a huge group of about 7500. It is an open enrollment community and marketing/information service. Just because a person is a member does not mean that they are a FashCon vendor. Notes saying “I can’t believe so and so thief is in Fash Con” aren’t meaningful; if they’re a vendor – then it’s a problem.
I hope that this policy will in some small way stem the tide of thievery. And now that you are done reading we urge you all to get out on the grid and support your favorite content creators with your lindens.
Yours,
Honey Fairweather & Ivy Norsk
Owner & Content Moderator, Fashion Consolidated
Though I am very pleased to see such a strong stand against content theft taking place, I have to worry some that the “one strike” policy could create a very uncooperative climate for this matter.
The issue is that DMCA notice are, on rare occasions, abused to either silence free speech, get back at a competitor or otherwise interfere with someone’s life. This adds another incentive for someone to file a false DMCA notice.
With the DMCA, there is no need to provide proof of any actual infringement, just claim it, and with how slow Linden moves on such matters it could be a very long period of time before they are restated.
Perhaps a probation period would work better for this, giving the subject of the notice time to contest it and receive a response before being removed. Perhaps, in the event of multiple claims, more immediate action could be taken.
It is just something to consider. Over all, I really like what you are doing.
I appreciate this more than you know. I was recently a victim of content theft but noticed that it was limited to one person thus far. But other designers are victims on a daily basis and it just keeps growing. Nicky Ree, Nyte Caligari are two that seem to have had their items constantly ripped off and the perpetrators of the offense seem to multiply instead of going away. I hope that what you are doing helps stem the flow of fashion thieves. I do think that the system that you have come up with is a good idea and definitely has its merits.
In response to Johnathan Bailey – you do have to provide proof. You can’t just file a DMCA and have it go through without proof (i.e. “her outfits look like mine, she’s copying me” won’t stand up to their scrutiny, they have to be a texture or prim duplication and you HAVE to provide pictures). Also if you file a false DMCA you are opening yourself up to lawsuits because your personal information is listed, which is why very few people want to file false claims. I’m not sure but I think that filing a false claim can harm you as far as being able to file claims later on or get you banned.. Anyway here’s a link to LL DMCA policy:
http://secondlife.com/corporate/dmca.php
What about the blank sculpties that we use and embelish for our designs? Those have another creator on them. They are full perm and are designed to be used as such. I try to make everything I own my own, but how can you get around that? I do use a few sculpty accents for my pieces. Now we may get dinged on those? I make all of my own fashions… but I do also like to use sculpty blanks and I do not do those.
Thank you,
Katlaya Greggan
Katlaya, I’m so sorry I missed approving your comment earlier. In belated response – this would only apply to you if the blanks you use are stolen, so that you are reselling stolen goods. In RL, ignorance of this would be no defence, on the practical grounds that anyone could claim it without proof. The same applies on SL, so the burden has to be on the seller to ensure that everything they sell they have full permission to sell – if you don’t know for sure, don’t do it. FashCon isn’t proposing doing anything other than LL would do in the situation that someone is found selling stolen goods.
Jonathan, I hope Sioxie’s well-phrased response helped. The policy is constantly being reviewed (right now, actually) as I expected a settling down period, and I’m a little surprised at how few copies of DMCAs we’ve received – I won’t mention the numbers.. err number. It may be a reflection of the bother to go through the DMCA procedure, but in some ways this is a healthy break to ensure those that claim piracy go to the bother to follow Linden procedure.
Probation may seem tempting, but my staff’s admin effort is at max, and the purpose of this process is to remove the subjective part, which we palpably can’t and shouldn’t be doing. Someone DMCA’d can formally counter-file with Linden, and of course if that is successful, we take the appropriate action and they are re-added.
[...] Fashion Consolidated for removing PXL as a fashcon vendor according to their Content theft policy http://fashcon.com/2008/05/27/content-theft-policy/ . (PS, English is my second language so I hope there will be no [...]