A Tasar Collar sold on XStreet SL
A story like this really just writes its own title.
Taser International Inc. have filed a suit against Linden Lab, XStreetSL and the former owners of XSL, VirtuaTrade. Taser are the biggest producers of stun guns, of course, and it seems they’re unhappy about those residents who are infringing their trademark in SL.
It’s interesting to note however, that Taser are going straight to Linden Lab with this legal action, specifically naming Philip Rosendale, Mark Kingdon and John Zdanowski (who’s actually left LL now – nothing like jumping off the ship and getting caught on the anchor, eh?). They’ve not filed against John Doe avatars, but instead are applying pressure on Linden Lab, presumably to put pressure on them to stop the trademark violations in world.
In particular, Taser Inc. are unhappy that the Taser brand is being used in.. wait for it.. sex products! Unsuprisingly, the Taser Collar by Oni Horan (pictured above) has now been removed from XStreet SL.
This raises the question, are Linden Lab responsible for us and our actions? When circumstances like these occur, finding those directly responsible are harder to deal with in terms of First Life (FL) information, not to mention proving that they are the guilty party. So the result is that Linden Lab will have to take action and remove the offending items themselves, and clean up the mess we’re making.
And then what happens? Will Linden Lab enforce stricter guidelines on what can be created and prevent the use of FL copyrights? Do residents who use RL brands to sell wares in Second Life suddenly find their accounts disabled?
I can understand Taser’s desire to hold onto their trademark – I’ve met SL residents who have thought FL brands are operating in SL, when in fact they’re more often than not just cheap rip offs. And it seems few FL corporations want their brand associated with Second Life anymore.
One of the fundamental elements of that is around IP rights. It is really, really important that people who create great content are able to enjoy it and protect it and that was one of the things that Philip put in place and has underpinned the economy as we know it today.
One of the interesting challenges that we face is that, as Second Life becomes much more international and about 60% of our Residents now are outside of the US, we have a whole set of diverse values, beliefs, and even laws that we have to take into consideration.
Nevertheless, we believe in individuality, we prize creativity, and we are going to do everything we can to keep Second Life as open and free flowing as it has always been.
~M Linden, SL5B Opening Speech
That was almost a year ago now, and it seems that there is a lot of work that needs to be done to clarify to residents as to what they can and can’t do with regards to in world content.
There are brands, trademarks and even entire designs that are ripped directly from real world designers and corporations, and it seems the time is nearing for Linden Lab to take decisive action on these.
Crap Mariner on April 20, 2009
Did they even bother filing a DMCA?
Kalel Mommsen on April 20, 2009
i feel bad for oni… altho it won’t be long before they start looking at the rest of sl
Yoofaloof Pacer on April 20, 2009
It’s a shame companies feel threatened by a bunch of pixels. There must be more damage done by real life counterfeits than in game items. Why don’t they have their own presence in SL, that way everyone wins?
QueenKellee Kuu on April 20, 2009
Not to echo, but I’m left thinking, do they think they are too important for a DMCA? Or have they tried that in the past and seen how futile the take-it-down-inworld-only thing instead of clearing it perm from the asset servers?
Ciaran Laval on April 20, 2009
The problem for Taser is that they’re near to being in the “Hoovering” category, I fear long term they’re fighting a losing battle, but yes file it under ip infringement but leave the silliness of associated pixel bumping out of it.
Prad Prathivi on April 20, 2009
Maybe they’re trying to make an example out of Second Life.
Personally, I don’t think (unauthorised) people should be replicating RL brands or products in SL at all.. it’s a virtual world, so why not broaden creativity and make something new, innovative and exciting?
Banana Vella on April 20, 2009
I know this isnt the issue, but given the amount of revenue generated by said item it wouldnt be worth sueing over. its hardly going to be the ‘next big thing’.
And its crazy that the Taser peeps are going after the Lab and not the creator. Thats like putting my grandparents in jail if I steal a can of soda. Stoopid.
Marx Dudek on April 20, 2009
I can understand how this poor company feels. I mean, I totally changed my mind about buying a $600 RL Taser stun gun when I found out they made virtual shock slave collars for just $2! Because they’re exactly the same! And with the $598 I saved, I can buy 359 virtual Glocks for the price of 2 real Glocks! Because they’re exactly the same!
Lizzie Lexington on April 20, 2009
Very interesting….this whole idea of copyright infringement is a ticking time bomb I think for LL and SL residents. I mean its hard to create a virtual world that doesn’t incorporate real world elements or influences. Now I think being inspired is one thing, but copying is just a whole big bag of no no in my opinion.
Ciaran Laval on April 21, 2009
“Personally, I don’t think (unauthorised) people should be replicating RL brands or products in SL at all..”
Agreed, but the problem for Taser is, how many people think of the brand when someone mentions a taser gun? In all reality this is probably more of the concern for them, but words like “Tasered” are common these days. They have every right to protect their trademark but I don’t think people are deliberately infringing upon Taser the way people infringe upon Coke, for example.
Hoover, certainly in the UK, are a classic example of this sort of problem and Sony have had trouble keeping hold of “Walkman”.
Marx Dudek on April 21, 2009
Exactly. I mean, did they sue the guy who shouted “Don’t Taze Me, Bro?”
Dale Innis on April 21, 2009
I’m somewhat surprised that this has gotten to the lawsuit stage; I would think that Taser, assuming they’re uncontroversially the owner of the trademark, would have come to LL and said “those guys there are using your platform to infringe on our trademark”, and LL would have replied “whoa, look at that; we’ll fix it!”, and that would have been that. I wonder if Taser went straight to lawsuit for some reason of their own, or if they tried to get the Lab’s attention but couldn’t get through the call-director, or if LL is going to present some legal argument that it’s not their job. The latter would be interesting to read…
Dale Innis on April 21, 2009
Marx: I don’t know a jurisdiction where you can sue a private individual for using a trademark in common speech. Good thing, too.
Heidi on April 21, 2009
Anyone else see a whole lot of SL businesses going down the drain if they’d actually follow all the way through with it? Talk about empty grid…
Cristalle Karami on April 21, 2009
DMCA is for copyright infringement, not trademark issues. That is what the C is for.
Dale Innis on April 21, 2009
I don’t think alot of SL business would go under if they were made to stop using other people’s trademarks. They’d have to change their names and/or do some rebranding (or work out a creative deal with the mark owners!), but if that’s enough to send them down the drain, it’s really their own fault for basing their businesses on someone else’s hard-won brand reputation, imho…
Darien Caldwell on April 21, 2009
Wow. I guess we now know why LL logged into Oni’s avatar the other day. He was wondering why. I’ll have to let him know about the suit, I don’t think he has a clue. O.O
Darien Caldwell on April 21, 2009
I do have to point out an inaccuracy in this blog post however. The original complaint seems to be over actual replicas of Taser Products, and that the inclusion of ‘pornographic content’ caused further harm. This post makes it sound like the whole lawsuit was over this one item. Here is a link to the Bloomberg Story with actual quotes from the complaint:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=aR6xHcnBMn9M
Guen on April 21, 2009
Wow considering the amount of stores in SL that copy everything from comic book heroes/villans to well known gun brands… I doubt LL could track down every single item that’s ever been copied from RL.
And yes Heidi it would make for an empty grid indeed.
Tateru Nino on April 21, 2009
There’s John Does in the complaint as well. The document reads “and all related individuals”.
Darien Caldwell on April 21, 2009
What is your source? The filing listed here shows no John Doe as a Defendant:
http://www.rfcexpress.com/lawsuit.asp?id=46029
Ari Blackthorne on April 21, 2009
The idea of FL brands and designs being created in SL has been a long-time debate. very long time. And I agree about not wanting my FL copyrights abused in SL.
I do own and run a FL company. But I don’t use any of that I.P. in-world because SL is supposed to be a very difference environment. And alternate universe, if you will. Additionally, I actually do weekly searchs for my registered trademark and have DMCA takedowns already prepared and ready to go.
Prad, you’ll know my company name as it’s the name ahead of the domain in my email address (just swap out ‘@gmail.com” for “.com”) – and as you can see, I can very easily weed through all the content in SL to finad anything with a name like that.
Well, so can Taser.
The question comes down to how is the word taser used… has it become like “spam” (Which Hormel actually agrees is a public word, as long as it is not all capitals) or “xerox”… remember how back in the day we would say “it’s a xeroxed copy”? Thus the ‘word’ xerox (lower-case) was found not to be infringement when use to describe a photo copy.
No, I’m not a lawyer and I could be wrong on the Xerox thing – it’s just what I remember. So those products that describe “taser” (lower-case) might have a defense. BUT, that collar you show above where the word is part of it’s name…
Ouch.
Darien Caldwell on April 21, 2009
So you are saying a collar that uses the word taser to mean to shock, is more infringing than an item that actually resembles the product in question and uses the name as a brand name? That’s pretty odd logic. To taser someone has become common usage in the english language, especially after incidents as the infamous ‘don’t tase me bro’ video. Shock collar / Taser collar, they are synonymous. But making an exact replica of something out of Taser International’s catalog and selling it as a Taser shock gun, is completely in a different realm. It seems to me to be nothing more than sensationalism to single out Oni out of the dozens of more infringing items just because his item happens to be marginally related to ‘sex’.
Tateru Nino on April 22, 2009
My source is the complaint document itself. I obtained a copy first thing, before writing about it: http://www.massively.com/2009/04/21/taser-international-vs-linden-lab-crack-den-crackdown/
Prad Prathivi on April 22, 2009
That’s far too responsible.
Tateru Nino on April 22, 2009
What can I say? I like reading court filings:)
Sigmund Leominster on April 22, 2009
Well, although the DCMA doesn’t strictly provide a safe haven for trademark infringement, Taser Int. could have filed a DCMA to LL if only to alert them to the issue. If a TM infringement is made explicit, then LL have a duty to try to do something about it. A charge of “contributory trademark infringement” can be brought against a vendor or service provider if the claimant can show that they were (a) aware of the infringement, (b) did not take steps to act upon it, and (c) were in a position to benefit from the infringement.
Now, a charge of “contributory trademark infringement” might make some sense especially since LL now owns Xstreet, and if TASERs(R) are being sold using the TASER trademark, it could be claimed that LL are profiting from known sales.
Of course, LL can act by arguing (a) they had no knowledge and (b) as soon as they found out, they removed references to the TASER mark. A full-blown law suit. The actual suit appears to be based on the 15:1051 Trademark Infringement cause, so if LL can get rid of TASER references, that should be OK.
Of course, along the way, someone will make some money and someone will lose some. C’est la vie, deuxieme ou premiere!
Cristalle Karami on April 23, 2009
A good old cease and desist letter would probably sufficed, like the folks from Dune sent about 2 weeks ago. No need to send a DMCA and look somewhat foolish when it’s not a copyright issue.