Second Life – Page 158

October 31, 2013

Would A Second Life Game Engine Be Feasible?

Whilst pondering the many theories on the TOS change, I’ve speculated wildly and with absolutely no clues that it may be feasible that Linden Lab could have been working on a Second Life game engine. The thing with wild speculation is that you begin to convince yourself that it makes sense.

Desura, the digital distribution platform Linden Lab own lists a number of game engines for devs to get their hands on. There are big players such as Unity 3D , Unreal Development Kit and CryEngine3. However there are also much smaller players such as Ren’PY for visual novels and Adventure Game Studio for those who want to make point and click adventures. These latters ones are the ones where I think opportunity could knock for Linden Lab.

Second Life is more than capable of being used for point and click adventures. Second Life is not suitable for all action first person shooters, but for point and click adventures it could work. People are still making and selling point and click adventures.

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October 31, 2013

TOS – Mods And Rockers

In the interests of fairness and balance I’ve been taking a look at some other Terms of Service beyond Linden Lab. The results are mixed. If you want to create mods for Skyrim you have to agree to this:

“If You distribute or otherwise make available New Materials, You automatically grant to Bethesda Softworks the irrevocable, perpetual, royalty free, sublicensable right and license under all applicable copyrights and intellectual property rights laws to use, reproduce, modify, adapt, perform, display, distribute and otherwise exploit and/or dispose of the New Materials (or any part of the New Materials) in any way Bethesda Softworks, or its respective designee(s), sees fit. You also waive and agree never to assert against Bethesda Softworks or its affiliates, distributors or licensors any moral rights or similar rights, however designated, that You may have in or to any of the New Materials.”

On the other hand, if you want to post your game to Steam Greenlight, you have to agree to this:

“Before you post your game to Steam Greenlight, you must agree to the following:

You own the rights to sell the game you are posting, or you have specific authorization to represent the developer
You agree to the terms and conditions of the Steam Subscriber Agreement.“

Subscriber agreement on user generated content:

“You grant Valve and its affiliates the non-exclusive, irrevocable right to use, reproduce, modify, create derivative works from, distribute, transmit, broadcast, and otherwise communicate, and publicly display and publicly perform, your User Generated Content, and derivative works of your User Generated Content, in connection with the operation and promotion of the Steam site.”

The latter Steam terms are more along the lines of what Second Life users would like. The former terms for Skyrim mods are more along the lines of what Linden Lab seem to want.

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October 28, 2013

TOS – The Desura Connection

Being a huge fan of Sherlock Holmes, it doesn’t take me long to don a deerstalker and a pipe. However for this modern day version, I require a couple of Watsons, namely Nalates Urriah and Inara Pey. The TOS debate rolls on, it’s getting ugly in some quarters. There has been much speculation about what it all means. Quite frankly I’m now coming to the conclusion that it means very little, but a window of opportunity may have been opened for content creators and Linden Lab.

Now let’s get into speculation mode, the first person I saw making the Desura link was Nalates Urriah. In that post Nalates makes the point that the terms of service change is a Linden Lab terms of service change, not just a Second Life terms of service change. For example the same terms of service apply to both products, although there are a couple of sections in the TOS that are product specific, it’s a one size fits all TOS.

Nalates also speculates that this TOS change could be a means to eventually allowing Second Life content creators to sell on Desura. This speculation has been growing as the debate has rumbled on. Some have said that it’s not likely because Second Life content is specific to Second Life, but if the opportunity to sell to the Desura market was there, that would change. Others have welcomed the idea of extending the markets in the Linden Lab product catalogue, one person even said the concept was “Freaking awesome“. That’s where opportunity knocks.

I do think there’s potential in this area and that plenty of content creators would find the idea of selling content to other markets “Freaking awesome“. However the wording of the TOS would mean some content creators would be reluctant to participate. Then there’s the damp squib part, that’s brought to us by Inara Pey who in her own post on The Desura connection points out that sections of the TOS that many find objectionable, are actually pretty much taken from the old Desura TOS.

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October 25, 2013

TOS – We Fade To (Peter) Gray

Just when you’re talking about Linden Lab’s lack of response to the TOS issues (still need a name for this folks) Kylie of the United Content Creators Of Second Life (UCCSL … see acronyms, it’s all about acronyms) has received a response.

When Linden Lab need to get all official and make a measured and official response they have a man for the task, a man who possibly wears a suit, sunglasses and carries a briefcase with a combination lock.

One man on a lonely platform
One case sitting by his side
Two eyes staring cold and silent
Shows fear as he turns to hide

Ah, we fade to grey, Peter Gray

Look, there’s always room for some Visage! Anyway more importantly, the reply. I’m not going to copy and paste the email, it’s in the link above, but the email is the most encouraging sign yet that Linden Lab are actually listening to the concerns of content creators. There is also other intriguing information in the email, such as Linden Lab looking to open avenues for people to sell content across platforms for their other products.

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October 25, 2013October 25, 2013

TOS Applies To Nearly All Linden Lab Products

The TOS debates continue, over at SLUniverse Desmond Shang suggests: “We need a name for what’s happened. The great User Rights Theft of 2013?” Personally I’m not sure that’s catchy enough, previously we’ve had names such as GOM, when Linden Lab took over the money business and of course there’s The FIC.

Then at other times things just end in fiasco or debacle, such as The Open Space Fiasco or The Adult Content Debacle. Something catchy and short is needed, answers on a postcard to ….

However on a more serious point I’m seeing a lot of speculation that the terms of service change is a sign that Linden Lab are getting ready to sell Second Life. There’s one big flaw with this theory, the same terms of service link appears on the pages of other Linden Lab products such as Dio, Blocksworld, Patterns, Creatoverse and Desura. This ties in with the statement Linden Lab sent to Inara Pey in September, which in part said:

“Recently we updated our Terms of Service to unify the existing terms of service for our various products into a single version. This updated version included a clarification with respect to the specific rights which a user grants to Linden Lab when submitting user-created content (referred to as the ‘Service Content License’) and, except as set forth in any related Linden Lab policies (referred to as ‘Additional Terms’), the right to ‘re-sell’ such user-created content.

“As previously indicated, the updated Terms of Service encompass a wide variety of Linden Lab products and services. We made every effort to incorporate Second Life’s existing policies in a distinct manner. We realize that the general nature of portions of the new Terms of Service may have led some individuals to believe, mistakenly, that Linden Lab was renouncing existing Second Life policies and practices or attempting to expropriate content created by Second Life residents. To that end, we want to further elucidate and reiterate our practice with respect to the Service Content License (and specifically Linden Lab’s right to re-sell user-created content) in Second Life.”

Whereas that statement has not placated Second Life content creators, it does suggest Linden Lab are trying to implement a one size fits all TOS across their product range, with the exception of Versu, which may well have been an oversight. Will Versu ever appear on Android? Anyway, I digress.

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