CopyBot

Outcry as ‘Copybot’ threatens copyright protection
Tue Nov 14, 2006 5:13am PST

By Adam Reuters

SECOND LIFE, Nov 15 (Reuters) - A software tool called CopyBot that can clone avatars, objects and textures is stoking the ire of Second Life business owners who fear their creations could be illicitly copied and sold.

“This product has caused tremendous worry among content creators who want to understand how its use may possibly affect their business,” Community manager Robin Linden said in a blog post after meeting with concerned residents. “In particular, they are concerned about theft of their creations, and the potential for unscrupulous people to undercut their prices and essentially take away their business.”

Linden Lab has attempted to make the protection of intellectual property a cornerstone of Second Life, giving residents ownership rights for the content they create in-world, and setting up a mechanism for residents to file claims of copyright infringement under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.

CopyBot was originally created by libsecondlife, a Linden Lab-supported open source project to reverse engineer the Second Life software. It allows the copying of any avatar or object, including those that are designated as “no copy” by their creators.

Amid increasing criticism, the group moved to pull the Copybot source code, but on Monday evening Copybot was put up for sale on the online marketplace SLExchange, raising the prospect that it could become widespread.

In a comment on the Official Linden Blog, apparently written before CopyBot was made available for sale, libsecondlife member Baba Yamamoto said: “CopyBot is not a product that we sell or distribute. It’s a debugging tool and silly demo with a [now] obviously bad choice of name. Hopefully you won’t be seeing copy bot on SLex any time soon.”

Yamamoto was not immediately available for comment on Tuesday.

Prim Revolution, the resident who has put CopyBot up for sale, said he has had made less than a dozen sales at L$3,000 each. In an in-world interview with Reuters, he demonstrated CopyBot by making a perfect replica of the Adam Reuters avatar (above).

“You’ll never get around the potential for abuse and the negativity associated with this particular app,” he said. “But I think the idea of clones and bots is very cool and i’ll be adding more new features for things like automated go-go dancers at clubs.”

“Even if I pull this program, plenty of other people out there have it or have the knowledge to create something bigger and better,” Revolution added. “My advice is to offer the whole package when you sell something. Don’t just offer a couch, but a couch that has several custom poses … work one-on-one with people to create unique things, and offer customization services instead of throwing up some prims for sale and forgetting about it.”

Revolution’s avatar was created on Nov. 13, but he said that he has been in Second Life for about two years. He declined to provide any additional information, including his real-life identity, citing “the nature of the (CopyBot) program.”

Robin Linden said that content creators who feel their copyrights have been violated “have the option of using the DMCA process to file a complaint. It’s a difficult process, but it is one that we’re willing to pursue on your behalf because we agree that copying is a disincentive to creation.”

Linden Lab is also considering other measures, including a “first use” tag that would signal who created an item, similar to a brand name garment label. But the company’s plans to open-source Second Life have raised concerns among in-world businesses that protecting intellectual property may become increasingly difficult in the future.

Timeless Prototype,creator of the popular Multi Gadget, told Reuters in an interview earlier this month: “If the server is put in control of users, they can reverse engineer everything,” he said. “If they had access to that source, they could take (the Multi Gadget scripts) in 10 seconds — it’s a big worry.”