Regrets, I have a few, but then again, too few to mention. I’m not in a good place with my Second Life right now, entirely my own fault and Linden Lab have been extremely wonderful. However, one area where I cannot praise Linden Lab is with regards to the new TOS.<\/p>\n
Many of you will have seen it, many of you will have heard about it, many of you will be in fear of it:<\/p>\n
“Except as otherwise described in any Additional Terms (such as a contest\u2019s official rules) which will govern the submission of your User Content, you hereby grant to Linden Lab, and you agree to grant to Linden Lab, the non-exclusive, unrestricted, unconditional, unlimited, worldwide, irrevocable, perpetual, and cost-free right and license to use, copy, record, distribute, reproduce, disclose, sell, re-sell<\/strong>, sublicense (through multiple levels), modify, display, publicly perform, transmit, publish, broadcast, translate, make derivative works of, and otherwise exploit in any manner whatsoever, all or any portion of your User Content (and derivative works thereof), for any purpose whatsoever in all formats, on or through any media, software, formula, or medium now known or hereafter developed, and with any technology or devices now known or hereafter developed, and to advertise, market, and promote the same. You agree that the license includes the right to copy, analyze and use any of your Content as Linden Lab may deem necessary or desirable for purposes of debugging, testing, or providing support or development services in connection with the Service and future improvements to the Service. The license granted in this Section 2.3 is referred to as the “Service Content License.<\/em>”<\/p>\n I’ve bolded some of the problem, but the simple fact of the matter is that this one size fits all TOS change goes way too far and is quite simply offensive to any content creator within or outside of Second Life. I have no idea what Linden Lab are playing at here.<\/p>\n Third party sites are quite rightly, running in fear.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n CG Textures were on the case by September 6th<\/a>:<\/p>\n “6th September 2013: Terms of Service update, using our images in Second Life is no longer allowed.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n What has changed?<\/em> Why? Well they explain that in the linked post:<\/p>\n “As you can see from the highlighted portions, as soon as you upload any content to Second Life you give Linden Lab unlimited and irrevocable rights to do whatever they want with your work.<\/em><\/p>\n The previous Second Life TOS (Terms of Use) was appropriate and reasonable: when you uploaded your work, you gave Linden Lab rights to use it in Second Life and not much more.<\/em> The CGTextures Terms of Use does not allow resale of our images as ‘Textures’. The updated Second Life TOS allows unlimited resale of user generated content. Put these two together and it is easy to see that they are no longer compatible.<\/em>”<\/p>\n Did CG Textures read this wrong? Absolutely not and Renderosity soon followed<\/a>:<\/p>\n “In the past, we have allowed a Buyer to use Renderosity products for their use in the Second Life virtual world, as long as the Buyer does not sell or give away the files. However, the new TOS at Second Life gives Second Life the complete \u2018rights\u2019 over anything uploaded at their site as of the date of their new TOS. Second Life\u2019s new TOS conflicts with our Renderosity license<\/em>”<\/p>\n The comments on that post should alarm Linden Lab, because their reputation within the modelling community is taking a bashing here:<\/p>\n “I don’t blame you guys, and I can’t believe that SecondLife is doing a copyright grab.<\/em>”<\/p>\n “How nice! Legalized stealing is what this is then. I will have to change my TOU for my freebies too then. No one can use any of my stuff in Second Life either. Will up-date my website tomorrow!<\/em> ”<\/p>\n “That is plain theft… they have to know this.<\/em>”<\/p>\n “Wow — that’s kind of messed-up on Linden’s part. A user purchases something or creates something to use in SL, and by doing so, Linden claims dibs on it? Sounds like a great way to drive away their user base and\/or to stifle creativity in their community.<\/em> ”<\/p>\n Linden Lab are a growing company, they have diversified, why the hell they would want to shoot themselves in the foot with this silly TOS change I have no idea. Part of the problem is trying to apply a one size fits all TOS to all of their products, it simply does not work.<\/p>\n Linden Lab need to back off here, they do not want a reputation as the company who will happily steal your content. I do not believe there is any malicious intent from Linden Lab here, but they need to rectify this and the need to rectify it quickly.<\/p>\n
\n From 6 September 2013 you are no longer permitted to add our images to Second Life or other Linden Lab products. The use of textures downloaded prior to this date is allowed.<\/em>”<\/p>\n
\nWith their latest TOS update they go way beyond what is reasonable. We would even go as far as to say it’s plain greedy, because they claim any right they could possibly claim and show no respect for you as a user. As soon as you upload your model or texture, they can do literally anything they want with it. In theory their updated TOS gives them the right to take your model and start selling it on 3rd party market places like Turbosquid.com without giving you anything in return.<\/em><\/p>\n