Fleeced [CORRECTED]

by prokofy on 16/11/06 at 4:01 pm

[Editor's note/Correction: Contrary to some passages in Prokofy Neva's Op/Ed piece below, the Electric Sheep Company informs us that it does not have a real-life apparel retailer as a client and was not involved in the creation and distribution of CopyBot or the Mannequin avatars. (See comments from two Sheep, Giff Constable and Satchmo Prototype, below.) The Herald continues to investigate the CopyBot story and will bring you further details as and when they become clear.
-- Walker Spaight]

By Prokofy Neva, Community Affairs Desk

Somehow, in the welter of suddenly published chat logs, “reorganizations” that appear to signal resignations from libsecondlife (we’re told John Hurliman has stepped down and another prominent figure is in the wings to leave, too), and sordid tales of silencing people with bribes — there’s a bit of news that somehow isn’t bubbling to the surface.

And that’s the motivation for this caper with all the Bots. It seems that the Electric Sheep Company had a big client — a RL apparel store. They wanted to realize that Big Business dream we’ve heard of so many times, that involves having your avatar enter a 3-D virtual store and try on clothes to see what they’re like. Of course, us SL worlders always found that a kind of dorky idea because what person in their right mind is going to make their actual RL person’s figure as a fantasy avatar?!

The lure is great, however, so this big customer — in a rush — asked ESC to perform the magic, and they turned to libsecondlife, which they already had a relationship with. Have you seen the numerous avatars with the first name Mannequin in the list, born November 7? Are you now doing the math?

The mannequins are the CopyBots products, of course, a job that was evidently taken on commission, a bit of a wild card, since we’re always led to believe these l33t haxxors are supposedly voluntarily, crowdsourcedly, working for the Common Weal as Raph Koster is now putting it.

We never did hear what the apparel store got in the end — an army of creepy mannequins that might rustle in the closet like the Bot Boy replicas in that movie A.I.?

But you start to get the idea, perhaps. The anti-Bot demonstrations maybe don’t belong in front of the libsecondlife building in Hooper, or even on Sheep Island, but at a RL store that might be in Tokyo or Brooklyn. Along with a RL-size boycott of RL goods to express your distress and indignation at what has happened in SL.

It seems clear to me what did happen, no matter how much Hamlet Linden describes it as the happy-go-lucky hijinks of his hip pals, or how much Gwyneth Llewelyn relates it as digital heartburn and inevitable Stage of History.

The point is, if we were all supposed to be shills and be beavering away making this stuff for pennies, so that Big Business could come in and render our products pointless AND cream off the best and talented programmers and also pay them at whopping rates dwarfing our world, then…why didn’t they tell us? They could have said it was more like The Sims on Line, where you can grind away on the jam-maker and then when you get like 200,000 Lindens you *might* be able to get them sold on ebay for like $20 US lol just as an account credit that’s a contribution to your long-awaited purchase of the complete set of Time Tunnel reruns.

So where are we now? We’re nowhere. We can continue business as usual — and I actually advocate that. I always think horizontally, we need to go on making the world, stepping literally around the bots thrown at us, as an important cross-purpose to the Lindens’ and FIC’s vertikal, or top-down power structure.

I don’t like the idea that 649 seamstresses in STOP THE BOT!!! have to die for the greater glory of the platform and the glory of metaversal consulting companies to make a buck — that’s just injust. A RL store needs a cool toy for its mannequins, and we have to witness the destruction of our world?!

You don’t have to imagine SL being a little protectionist snow-globe to simply ask for fairness, equal partnership, and accountability. That’s been sorely lacking.

123 Responses to “Fleeced [CORRECTED]”

Artemis Fate

Nov 16th, 2006

And it’s finally linked to real life corporations as the one and only true source to support the constant onslaught of Prokofian conspiracy theories against the aforementioned, Congratulations!

You managed to take a LibSecondLife thing and blame it entirely on corporations. Awesome. Giant faceless scapegoats are great.
Giff Constable / Forseti Svarog

Nov 16th, 2006

Prok, I am stupified that you would flat out lie with an accusation like this. I know the Herald likes to spice things up and we normally try to take it with good humor, but this is going too far.

FACT: ESC does NOT have an RL apparel client

FACT: ESC had NOTHING to do with the creation of copybot.

Please retract and apologize.
Satchmo Prototype

Nov 16th, 2006

Prok, The Electric Sheep Company was not involved in the creation or distribution of CopyBot. We absolutely did not pay to have it developed nor do we have a client who is interested in using such a system. The avatars with the Mannequin first name were not created by anyone at ESC and we have no association with them.

In the future, if you have a question about ESC’s involvement in a project, please feel free to contact me in world or email me at chris@electricsheepcompany.com
mrlk

Nov 16th, 2006

dontcha just love tabloids

how many times have you read a rl tabloid (and i have to preface this with i used to live in the uk) and heart of heart know its a load of crap

BUT i always say you get the press you deserve

ive read and seen all this stuff the last few days and to be honest ive got bored with it – the town hall meeting to me was a waste of time cos i figured there would be a bunch of people with no clue about the realities of whatever it was someone stoked everyone up about

ive wandered round the dell thing, the nissan sim, toyota et al, i look at reuters, etc etc and what a surprise theres no one there

if corporations want to come into sl and build stuff for it to lay dormant then thats their problem

ive heard numerous counter stuff about the copybot and what it can “actually” do

the other week it was bitching about the stats

next week it will be something else

the rest of us get on and deal with it
Eric Maelstrom

Nov 16th, 2006

With an accusation this large, it would really be helpful to see some evidence and some factual source material.
Urizenus

Nov 16th, 2006

Yeah, this doesn’t make much sense to me either. It would be a funny way to make mannequins. I also think its pretty clear that copybot was a cute hack that got unleashed on the populace. I have trouble thinking of it as a commissioned object.

Prok is en route to Poland and Mark is in iceland or something so there isn’t much to be done about the post except disagree with it.
Urizenus

Nov 16th, 2006

p.s. I don’t think its right to say that Prok is lying. Prok believes this, I have no doubt about that.

If I may, I think that sometimes power, technolgical acumen, and behind doors secrecy, when combined, can be a strange brew, very capable of stoking all form of conspiracy theory. Prok’s post above is just one of many involving the sheep and coybot that I’ve heard in recent days. Maybe it’s best that they get put forth in a formum like this were they can be squarely denied.

I’m not sure what the solution to the rumors is, but maybe you guys could set up a rumor hotline folks can call when stuff like this starts to move around the grid.
Eric Maelstrom

Nov 16th, 2006

I’m sure Prok believes it, but to post something like this without citing any evidence and then vanish is a questionable tactic.
Prokofy Neva

Nov 16th, 2006

Satchmo, Giff, and others: From the minute I was first contacted about this story, I suspected it was a set-up — the very first source’s version on Nov. 8 said that Ronald Hubbard was something *both* the Sheep and the libsecondlifers were involved with. They specifically named the Sheep — there was no doubt in their mind. They specifically mentioned an individual.

I didn’t print that story for some 7-8 days, trying to check it out, even giving it to Lindens. When I saw that others were beginning to query it and pictures were showing up, I reported it — and it turned out to be true, as every other story on this subject has turned out to be true in the last few days.

The next source said very specifically, today, that CopyBot was a project commissioned by the Sheep and it involved mannequins and a store. I merely reported it. It seemd valid to me, and it seemed very important to get the story out.

Note that my piece is an “op ed” category. I put it in that frame so that I could express it as an opinion. It was my opinion that it was a valid report. I have no need to print false information about the ESC, whatever my disagreement with many of their policies and people. I have never done so knowingly or deliberately, and haven’t done so now.

I was struck in the “John” transcript on Second Citizen, how much effort was put into discussing me, my stories, my reaction, and in prepping Nimrod in one case — in that transcript — to say this or that to me. Why?

So when I was told twice about the connection, I wondered whether it was a burn; I even discussed it with Uri. I printed the story on my blog and decided to print a shorter version here.

Why was I set up, Giff and Satchmo — if that was the case, i.e. if the story is fake? I didn’t *make up* this story nor did I “lie” — I would never have put it together like that and I have absolutely no reason to concoct a story just to sell newspapers. So you tell me — why would someone close to you and this project feed this to me — through a source that had proven reliable over and over again? I guess it’s mission accomplished for you. You can go on bullying me and the Herald, intimidating us and other media from trying to inquire about your deals and your tremendous influence on our world.

I reported this story with these words: “It seems that”. This is the story as it was told to me, and backed up with chat logs. The source gave me the name from the transcript, you can see in the chat logs; they also gave me the real life name of this person, his domain address, and his location — information I didn’t see fit to print. Over and over, upon my inquiry, the source said this person was *an ESC employee*.

I’m not “vanishing” — that’s ridiculous, I just happen to be travelling on RL business. I’m happy to answer any questions.

Here are the facts as they were relayed to me, and as I saw them:

1. Numerous “Mannequin” avatars were indeed made. They were in the people list — not sure if they still are as I can’t log on.
2. Three different sources placed the Sheep around this project, with its involvement not clear.
3. The source who relayed this information had been reliable up until that time; he said an ESC employee was in the published SC transcript and that it was their commissioned project.
4. There were many stories flying around these events, and I felt it was important to cover it as quickly as I could.

I’m really placed in an odd position. I have a reliable source; I have his corroborating material; I have indirect evidence, and I have a second source that places the Sheep on the project — on their own, independently of the other source and of any questioning.

Yet you say you had nothing to do with this project, and really, I have not reason to disbelieve you.

It’s a very serious matter for a giant corporation (giant in the terms of our world) to threaten a journalist with libel, and to bully them into submission. It sets a hugely bad precedent.

I’ve relayed to you exactly how this story came to me, and how I came to report it — in good faith.

Rather than retract it immediately merely because of your massive corporate pressure, I’m going to go back to the sources and ask them why they relayed this information; why they were convinced about it; why they told me themselves so earnestly about this story.

Then I will come back and do one of two things:
1. Retract the story and make a statement of regret for unknowingly, and not maliciously, printing false information.
2. Report the story of how I was deliberately set up to discredit me.
Prokofy Neva

Nov 16th, 2006

Also I think it’s important to note that a) I will not agree to any system where I have to *clear* a story about the Sheep with Sheep personnel and b) I hope you realize how it looks to have Walker Spaight, whose blog is funded by the Sheep, to remove my posting privileges on the Herald — which merely deprives the Herald of frankly some of the best, up-to-date reporting it has had in a long time.

I’m also getting private emails from Forseti that appear to threaten me with libel suits. Let me remind you that a person who has reported a story in good faith and expressed it as an opinion about the state of affairs is not guilty of libel; and you have hardly lost any of your livlihood over this incident.
Urizenus

Nov 16th, 2006

Interesting.

This is the second report I’ve heard about libel threats from the Sheep. I’d like to see copies of all such letters please, whether formal or informal.
Fortum ACS

Nov 16th, 2006

http://www.basementcoder.com/?p=4
Prokofy Neva

Nov 16th, 2006

I will have to send this stuff next week, as I am traveling.

Let me point out that I can’t retract or delete this story because Walker removed my posting privileges so I can’t access the story. It’s up to you how you wish to handle it. I stress once again, I made this report in good faith, after even sitting on the report of the Sheep’s involvement for several weeks; I had a usually reliable source who supplied back-up information that I couldn’t impugn. It was my opinion it was true; it seemed plausible from a number of indications. I will make a good-faith effort to go back to the sources again and find out what’s up, and see if this was also a deliberate burn.
Nobody Fugazi

Nov 16th, 2006

Submitted without comment.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/5230776.stm
Mark Wallace

Nov 16th, 2006

Prok, the same thing would be happening if the story was about Millions or Rivers, trust me.

Uri, I haven’t heard that anyone is threatening the Herald with libel, I’d like to see such reports as well.
Artemis Fate

Nov 16th, 2006

“the story of how I was deliberately set up to discredit me.”

I don’t think anyone needs to go out of their way to set you up to discredit you, you do that perfectly well yourself.
Aimee Weber

Nov 16th, 2006

Walker may consider restoring Prokofy’s posting rights for one last post. While a retraction does not reduce one’s liability for libel in all jurisdictions, the ones where it does require the retraction to be “substantially as conspicuous as the original alleged defamation.”

For Prokofy’s retraction to reduce liability, it should be it’s own blog post, not a comment buried at the bottom.

Plus illustrations will make the retraction easier and more enjoyable to read.
Hiro Pendragon

Nov 16th, 2006

I think someone’s blown their street cred.

Prok, sounds like you have a choice: pony up your source or be ignored (again).
Walker Spaight

Nov 16th, 2006

The Herald does not reveal its sources to the public when they have been promised anonymity.

If there’s to be a retraction or amendment, it will be made by the editors and it will go at the top of this post, before the story begins.

We do hope to continue to run stories under Prok’s byline in future.
Prokofy Neva

Nov 16th, 2006

Dear Walker,

I cannot reveal at least one of the sources whom I swore that I would not reveal — he was very scared. As to the other, I will have to check and I am not in a position to do this at the moment. I urge you to read each and every transcript on SC, with attachments, and on Sluniverse.

As I am traveling and cannot do all of this checking now easily inworld and by email, it will have to wait until Monday. If you feel some sort of liability and need to delete this story, it’s up to you.

Proof of my good intentions here is in my very first story on this subject, where I was at great pains to explain that I felt I was being burned. I didn’t include the information about the Sheep and the specific ESC member the firs time *precisely* because I felt it was a pat set-up designed to play to their perceived eagerness on my part to smear the ESC. I have no desire to do that; in fact I’ve been critical of ESC but I’ve maintained friendly relations with ESC.

The fact is, we’re in a situation in Second Life where large corporations, and metaversal companies large by our world’s terms, are owning and influencing and running the media. Walker’s blog (not this one) is sponsored by ESC. It’s a pretty blanket suppression of speech, really, subtle and virtual though it may be.

Walker summarily removed my posting privileges before we could even discuss this story and I could guide him to all the relevant transcripts and interviews I have. While he indicates that he hopes to run stories under my byline, I take it as a lack of faith in me that he has pulled the posting privilege so I can’t even unilaterally delete or amend the story.

Accordingly, I have to resign from the Herald, and when I can get inworld, I will leave the SL Editorial group. I don’t think I can work properly under such corporate pressure — where a story reported in good faith, in a rush of stories that weren’t shown to be false, that may turn out to be false — or more likely a deliberate set-up — becomes grounds for a serious threat of a libel suit.

The $3.00 US that I make per story actually means a lot to my meager budget. The hundreds of thousands of US that ESC makes routinely hasn’t been dented in the slightest.

Meanwhile, all that’s happened is that all the FIC and their friends have merely gained yet another chance to beat me to a pulp, and the Herald has actually lost a very dedicated and actually pretty good reporter.

So I withdraw from the Herald and hope to publish on my own blog in the future.

Prokofy Neva
Urizenus

Nov 16th, 2006

Prok, if you were set up, let me take you on a little trip down memory lane…

http://syminalist.tripod.com/simsoutofline/id15.html

For the record, I don’t mind big ass retractions, and clear ammendations but I do think the post should stay. I don’t believe in hiding fuck-ups. I’ve agreed that Walker should add something to the top of the post.
Jennyfur

Nov 16th, 2006

Hey Prok – The sky is in fact falling. News at 11pm. Prove me wrong. I know for a fact the sky is falling, but I have no photographs or documents to refute the claim, but it must be true because I said it convincing right?

All I can do is shake my head and laugh.
Urizenus

Nov 16th, 2006

Prok, it doesn’t make any sense to resign over the posting priviledge stuff. That would only seem justified if someone unfairly edited or blocked a post that ought to go up. You need to give Walker the benefit of the doubt until he fucks one up. He gave you the benefit of the doubt, after all.
Walker Spaight

Nov 16th, 2006

Prok, believe me, if you have good evidence to back this story up, let’s blow the lid off the fucker, with you leading the charge. Until then, I do think a correction is in order at the top of the post. And I hope you reconsider your resignation.
tp

Nov 16th, 2006

It does sound plausable to use a copy bot that would take on the clothing and shape textures of an avatar near it then turn the copy nearby av off and leave it out as mannequin that wouldn’t need an avatar logged in to have it in a store. And I’m sure thats what a company would ask for if they wanted to advertise fashion in SL in a 3D way not just like in print.
Siggy

Nov 16th, 2006

It’s only reporting….. if the information is factual.

Everything else falls into the broad catagory:

‘Shit you made up’
mo

Nov 16th, 2006

I assumed this was reported as news. Now, after the fact, it is identified as an “Op/Ed piece” at the top of the page. Which is it?
Giff Constable / Forseti Svarog

Nov 16th, 2006

Uri, when I saw the article, I IMed prok (who was offline) immediately and said it was false, and demanded a retraction and an apology. I also wrote something along the lines of “you should know how serious I consider this and the consequences of this.” — prok would have the exact wording as I did not save the IM.

Prok and I have debated SL for years now, and Walker S. certainly knows that I often enjoy our arguments, even the infuriating ones. I am no “enemy of Prok”. This truly crossed the line. This post took a serious issue which is causing the SL community major pain, and maliciously and falsely laid it at our doorstep in the middle of a public witch hunt. Prok knows me, and half of the ESC team, and there was no attempt to fact check such a seriously damaging and defaming claim.

To address the situation again: The facts of the matter are quite simple:
1. we have no RL apparel client;
2. we made no mannequin avatars.
3. we had nothing to do with the creation or the distribution of the copybot.
4. one of our programmers has indeed been in the libSL group but has not written a single line of code with them to my knowledge.

I personally do not have a problem with libSL as a concept and as a whole, but a few individuals within that group have clearly handled this situation extremely poorly, and perhaps much much worse. I personally believe Prokofy when he says that he was manipulated. I still do not think it excuses such a post.
Schwartz Guillaume

Nov 16th, 2006

After all the vicious lies you’ve told about your “SL enemies”, it’s absolutely refreshing to see that a group with the power to stand up for themselves has revealed your poorly-written, incoherent and rambling diatribe for what it actually is.
Urizenus

Nov 16th, 2006

Mo: “after the fact, it is identified as an “Op/Ed piece” at the top of the page. Which is it?”

Look at the posted-by tag at the bottom of Prok’s piece. He posted under the Op/Ed category. Yes yes, I know, he should have made that more obvious.

Giff, thanks for the update.
Satchmo Prototype

Nov 16th, 2006
For those scoring at home:

The accusations started in Clones Pwnd?
Regarding DTV at the scene, Prokofy says in the comments
Which is dispelled by John Hurliman:
We move on to the comments of Is Linden Lab Shepherding Electric Sheep to Greener Pastures?:
I then weighed in:
The thread you are reading now is the third accusation.
Urizenus

Nov 16th, 2006

And Satch, you are keeping score because…?
Satchmo Prototype

Nov 16th, 2006

To underscore the numerous times it was made clear that ESC had no involvement with CopyBot. If you want to know why I think its necessary to distance us further from such serious accusations, IM me inworld.
Urizenus

Nov 16th, 2006

No that’s fine, Satch. It’s clear why you don’t want to be linked to copybot and fair enough that you want to point out earlier denials. I just wondered is all.
Allana Dion

Nov 16th, 2006

I don’t know what’s true and what’s not here, I don’t know any of the people involved and have no evidence in hand. But Prokofy, neither do you.

This is why journalists don’t use phrases like “It seems that…”. They use phrases such as:
“According to an anonymous source…”,
“While it has not been substantiated…”,
and the most common in a situation like this:
“The following article is an opinion piece. The opinions expressed by the author do not necessarily reflect those of The Second Life Herald.”

You are a quality writer Prokofy, your work certainly does inspire discussions. That is something to be proud of. But, you do have to follow stricter guidelines when writing for a publication than when writing on a blog. You know that already though.

If it turns out you’re not able to verify any of the statements in the article, then I would suggest at least going back and inserting a few important phrases like the ones above. (When you have returned from your trip of course and are able)
Aimee Weber

Nov 16th, 2006

So basically, Prokofy WAS TOLD of Sheep’s non-involvement with the copybot prior to publishing a story asserting Sheep’s involvement with the copybot. That’s an important detail!
Topo Gigio

Nov 16th, 2006

It’s about time that yellow journalist got knocked down a rung.
Taco Rubi

Nov 17th, 2006

WTF, good job Prok!
Nacon

Nov 17th, 2006

Grand…. more drama crap come lurking by.

Seriously… ESC start making bunch of alts with a first name “mannequins” instead of making a special request for it in last name? That sound pretty retarded, but we know they haven’t done anything retarded…. cause they’re not retarded.

I can tell you that it sounds a lot like one guy got bored and wanted to goof off by testing out many bots/clones he/she can make, Too lazy to request special last name. Just a dumbass out there screwing around in SL, simple to understand that happening.
How could it not?

You can bet your silly ass that Prok “believe” in something that he believes. Honestly I would never hire ESC for a appeal clothing fashion store in SL, ever. Real life business want to focus the selling point to their existed products, simple as it is, nothing more. Not go produce more products to sell on SL just to sell the product that you’re trying to sell in RL. …Let’s just say, Prok were not thinking at all, but..

I can bet what was on his mind.

A Story Prize. A hot story to take credit and fame as a “hero”. An every reporters’ dream… duh, except everyone is a fool to be a “wannabe” hero. …brainwash by its greedy thought?

Prok, rules are ment to be broken without any kind of lame excuse. For this one case, whoever tells you a source that ESC was part of it was a coward to deal with something that we already have… called Life. Duh, you know that very well, but time is ticking right now.

Still not telling the source? Fine, it’s made up. If it is made up just because you want to see ESC to rot. Yeah yeah yeah, you said you keep good relation with them, but that doesn’t mean you can’t have the grudges to hate their gut for whatever reason they make your stomach twist. Ho ho! Just waiting to see something to happen that make you happy watching them rot by something that you lead to. Yes, I know that feeling, I’ve done that before and it was greedy and evil but twisted and godly smart, but what will be the point?

So it actually come down to this…

ESC wins over you because you don’t have the gut to break the promise that was made to some random person who was feeding you many possible crap? Get used up like a dinner fork.

You wins by turning ESC over on their face because you knew it was importance to get the “truth” out while one person didn’t have the gut to break that out, thus had a reason to tell you in the first place.

or…

You merely felt the need to create a story to get yourself a media attention because you saw a window of opportunity to tie the whole world together with your close-minded head create an awesome conspiracy theories, similar to Watergate moment.

without any doubt, I placed my bet, but time is ticking away.
Arthur Fermi

Nov 17th, 2006

You know whats interesting, in both the RL and SL people who don’t like reports with a confidential informant always say its not true unless you expose people. Funny, Watergate had a confidential information, and wow, it was true. They don’t want the informants exposed so its “proven”, they want them exposed so they can be punished!

Confidential sources are very important, with out them, no one comes forward, there are no wistleblowers, there is no watergate, there is no iran-contra.

Arthur Fermi

“Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.”

-Thomas Jefferson, “Letter to Col. Edward Carrington”, January 16, 1787
nimrod yaffle

Nov 17th, 2006

“Still not telling the source? Fine, it’s made up. If it is made up just because you want to see ESC to rot.”

Prok is going to say me. I told him that he was being paid, but I said I didn’t know by who. Prok suggested ESC and I said it’s possible. The rest is history.

“[8:36] *** parent estate: 0
[8:36] Prokofy Neva: care to explain why you fed me a false story? you know that you told me that the ESC were in on copybot and making mannequins for a store client — i didn’t make that up, you did. But were you paid to do that? and by whom? I’ll be publishing your name shortly.
[8:37] nimrod Yaffle: Prok
[8:38] nimrod Yaffle: I told you I didn’t know if it was ESC or not, but I *did* tell you he was paid to make it, which was true
“
Random Writer

Nov 17th, 2006

While I don’t harbor anything ill towards Prok at all, she’s never done a thing to me personally, what I’m saying isn’t an attack on her for a grudge, I’d say it about any reporter with this type of journalism.

Firstly, the statement:

“”"”Also I think it’s important to note that a) I will not agree to any system where I have to *clear* a story about the Sheep with Sheep personnel and b) I hope you realize how it looks to have Walker Spaight, whose blog is funded by the Sheep, to remove my posting privileges on the Herald — which merely deprives the Herald of frankly some of the best, up-to-date reporting it has had in a long time.”"”"

This is the most self serving, self righteous post I’ve ever seen and these words alone should be grounds for removal from the Herald. Not only is she not supporting Walker’s decision, who removed her posting until things could get checked out a bit better, instead of allowing a constant barrage/attack at a group, with nary a source or proof to back any of this up (that is providable anyways), but then to say that without her the previous stories aren’t up to her standards, and the other writers are just horribly (BTW, I think Pixel is a much better writer and is fairly up to date), when you take out the op/ed pieces there isn’t much there that we can glean as solid fact. That’s not ‘reporting up-to-date’, that’s tabloid spec.

Of course, this is coming from a comment too that the Copybot was a sort of hoax…..

Majority of writers who have anonymous sources, have been in the biz awhile to where they are trusted. Since writing for the Herald (and not the story long posts before), there has been a lot of trash to weed through, lots of theories presented as fact (mostly through a bad choice of words, which btw, makes for a bad writer, not a good one). And frankly, I come in to the Herald once or twice a day, read the stories, and I’m sick of wading through trash to get to real stories because there are 3-5 stories a day posted by Prok.

Ironically, I never would have opened my mouth, had Prok not SEVERELY mistepped in this article, but since we are providing full opinions there’s mine.

Yoyoma Antelope (That’s an alt I created to quelch Prok’s desire to link an SL av to my moniker) I’m also the Queen of England, according to some private sources. No really, I swear!!!
Prokofy Neva

Nov 17th, 2006

I have gone back to all three of my sources on this, and they have all reiterated what they originally told me, and have added additional information. So what am I to do? Merely give up under pressure of a very large company that is terribly influential in our world? I simply cannot do that — for the sake of the world, and also for the sake of my own credibility and the Herald’s.

So I will go over each and every one of the points again and let readers judge.

1. I posted the piece as an op-ed because it editorialized particularly at the end about the significance of having big business and consultants have early access to aspects of the client that put them not only ahead of the pack but also disrupted the world for others. This concern remains central to this story — CopyBot caused huge havoc and loss, including financial loss, for many people.

2. Satchmo, you state very emphatically, “The Electric Sheep Company was not involved in the creation or distribution of CopyBot.” You reallly should not leave yourself so vulnerable with such a statement. Because it is easily refuted.

There are multiple sources, all reliable in the past, all with documentation including by your own Destroy TV — perhaps her past filming is saved — that puts Electric Sheep members together with libsecondlife members on Nov. 7 at the debut of the CopyBot, observing the Mannequins run through their paces. This event was a celebration and a party of the coolness of CopyBot. Perhaps that doesn’t mean that ESC was involved in the development, but it puts you in the loop way ahead of everyone else about the nature of this beast, and it also opens up the question of your distribution. Cory Edo herself has explained how she got later and tested CopyBot and determined it wasn’t that big a deal, and that means that at least to a limited extent, you passed around copies between libsl and ESC.

2. I got this information on Nov. 7 about CopyBot and a debut attended by ESC members and libsecondlife members, and I immediately sent it to the Lindens. I immediately saw that a hack or reverse engineering capacity like this that could copy avatars and their clothing and attachments was an accident going somewhere to happen for the economy and people’s creations.

I sent my source’s IM’s to me to two key office Lindens involved in programming and in abuse reports. Neither replied to me, though I saw them log on and accept my cards.

Satchmo and Forseti, the thing to have done upon seeing CopyBot, if you merely wandered by to see a cool demonstration of a thing like that, was to contact the Lindens and even abuse report it for possible copyright issues and also general disturbance of the peace by spreading panic. None of you even seemed to have considered the awful side effects of Copybot to the rest of SL – you saw it merely as something that was cool to play with and film on Destroy. That may be your only involvement — but it is an early involvement.

3. I did not publish the story on that day because it was presented to me as a story involving ESC so I became immediately suspicious that it was a set-up, knowing of my critical pieces in the past. I sat on it. I waited for Linden response. I asked around — nothing. Then a libsecondlifer bragged to me about CopyBot (Jesse Malthus) and he didn’t see it as any kind of panic-inducing and economy-wrecking device evidently, either. I decided with now two sources speaking of its existence, I should run it, but couched as a rumour story (“Clones Pwned?” is the headline I ran). I then updated it with pictures Suezanne Baskverville posted to sluniverse.com

4. Within a few days then, panic was ensuing and stores closed to demonstrate their anger at the refusal to address copyright concerns (yes there were hundreds; yes this is double and triple checked and lists are available; yes they are not backward idiots with FUD, but people angry at the loss of livlihood with a legitimate and necessary social movement.)

5. I then began getting contacted repeatedly about the background to the bot. A source repeatedly said that it was deliberate, and had been planned and even paid for. A person was identified. That person was said to be an ESC employee. I checked and couldn’t match that name to any known list of ESC employee, even though they have open lists; I figured a sub-contractor could be involved. Upon checking now, I’m told by the source that he’s not so sure personally it was ESC; perhaps it was another company; but he said he *was* sure that *his* source was emphatically repeating that the person who made it was paid by ESC. Yes, this is hearsay. But it’s important hearsay of national consequence as we saw — devastating. I began this story holding the story for days thinking it was a set-up; when the same sources continued to prove reliable on the story of Copybot and related events as it developed, I saw no reason to doubt them on this aspect of a company being paid to make Copybot, i.e. involving libsecondlife as well for a client. I wanted to make this this story got out quickly.

(btw, it doesn’t make sense to some to have another avatar copy your look and be a living mannequin, but given that no mirrors exist in SL nor can exist at this point, making another avatar instantly that you look at frontally, instantly without camera zooming, with the clothes you have selected, is one interesting way of dealing with the mirror problem.)

6. A number of other stories came out simultaneously. All along, it had been abundantly clear to me from his many past instances of bad behaviour, including helping out v-5 the time the Herald documented their stalking and harassing me at Reuters, that Baba was deliberately deploying CopyBot to harm people, with malicious intent. Walker and others curiously have some doubts about this — I hope they can catch up on all the relevant transcripts on sluniverse.com and SC. They show without a doubt that in the libchannel, the concept of deploying the CopyBot and harassing others and making them upset over copying issues, i.e. furries having their avatars with furry atttachments copies, was deliberate, and it was malicious. It was so malicious that Belaya Statosky intervened to say, hey, that’s wrong, don’t do that. It’s also evident that v-5, with their communist insignia, were involved in this CopyBot caper and released it symbolically Nov. 7 and used the names “Revolution” as alts.

7. So I have testimony that ESC were present at the debut of Nov. 7 and saw it as something cool; and also that at least one employee was in the channel talking about it with plans to harass others; and that also someone — possibly ESC — was paid to produce this bot for a client.

8. So, why didn’t I go to Satchmo or Forseti to get their comment? Because I was told the person who was paid was under contract with an NDA and would not talk. And I was told that ESC is under various NDAs, including an NDA that began in 2005 with LL to do work on an improved search engine. In the land of NDAs, who talks? Too much money is at stake. Of course, in hindsight, it would have been better to try to get a comment from ESC on a story like this, but one has to weigh their being under an NDA, and also their ability then to mount tremendous pressure on a journalist not to complete a story.

9. I also picked up in rechecking this story the fact that ESC, RRR, and Azure Islands all got access some time ago — ESC reportedly as long as 2 months ago — to the registration API to customize their new customers registration to SL — it works with a web page. I’m not sure if every developer got this at the same time; I got a URL for this api’s info and while it is publicly accessible on the SL website now, you have to “just know” about it. This story needs further checking to determine if the early or special developers’ access to this api is involved. Apparently, none of these parties feel their access to this api is anything special; they view themselves as being given the api simply because they alone can make use of it. Yet not all got it at the same time; and all got it before the rest of us got it.

10. As far as anyone attempting to burn me, or feed me crap, or even be paid to feed me crap — that problem remains live and the question remains open. I don’t have closure on that. It remains a distinct possibility particularly as we have seen from some of the released libsecondlife channel transcripts released around the CopyBot issue, just how prepared some were to manipulate public opinion and even pay for it.

11. So what am I to do with this story now? I have sources who fear being revealed claiming that someone was paid to develop the bot. They say it was knowingly and deliberately planned and made. They say an ESC employee was in on it, developing it, and even paid to do so. They have no doubt that an individual was paid, and that they worked with libsecondlife on behalf of a client. We know that Baba and some others (he is now gone from libsecondlife) conceived of its deployment maliciously. Perhaps no one fathomed just how much panic and anger it will spread. So I can only go on researching this story and hoping tht more sources will come forward to supply more information and even Lindens (who of course know and see everything) will weigh in, given the destructive consequences of CopyBot.

So given this state of the story, I can issue the following limited retraction, which Walker then fashion as he wish:

“I wish to retract the statement in the Nov. 16 story “Fleeced” as follows:

“And that’s the motivation for this caper with all the Bots. It seems that the Electric Sheep Company had a big client — a RL apparel store. They wanted to realize that Big Business dream we’ve heard of so many times, that involves having your avatar enter a 3-D virtual store and try on clothes to see what they’re like.”

This paragraph should be corrected to read:

“And that’s the motivation for this caper with all the Bots.Rumour has it that a developer was paid to produce the bot – and even paid by a RL apparel store. Sources claim this developer is from ESC, though the Herald was unable to confirm the claim. ESC says that were not involved in development or distribution of the bot, nor do they have any apparel stores as customers.”

I cannot prove — though there is some off-the-record testimony to the contrary — that the ESC were involved in creating CopyBot, or that they had any client involved in the apparel industry related to CopyBot.

I regret the publication of this statement as if it were fact in an op-ed piece and I apologize to ESC for any distress the statement has caused.”

I hope that retraction will be satisfactory to remove any pressure of retaliation against the Herald in any form from the ESC.

I do continue to ask the following questions, however:

1. When and why did ESC know about CopyBot’s creation, how did it come about that ESC members were present at its debut, and what is ESC’s relationship to the members of libsecondlife involved in CopyBot?
2. Why did ESC members attend the debut of CopyBot on November 7, and when they saw its copying capacity, why didnt they alert the Lindens or make a public statement about its threats to copyright?
3. Who is “CW” in the transcript of libsecondlife published on Second Citizen who speaks with Baba Yamamoto about deploying CopyBot, to the harm of others. Is he an ESC employee? If he is not an ESC employee, who does he work for? Was he or any other individual or company paid to produce CopyBot for any client?
Prokofy Neva

Nov 17th, 2006

Nimrod, since you are outing yourself as one of the sources here (note that I am not outing) you need to state very clearly what you did in fact say:

o that someone was paid to make the CopyBot
o that you were told this by another person repeatedly and that you believed that source to be reliable
o that the person who is said to be paid to make the bot, and is also said to be an ESC employee, is known by the initials “CW” on the libsecondlife channel transcript published on sluniverse.com where Baba is also outed as planning mischief with the bot.

Therefore, what you have said is that your source says this person CW, who may or many not work for ESC, was paid to make the bot.

Of course, there’s another possibility: your source, or you, or both, knowingly or unknowingly, set me up with false information to report this story, and were paid to do so.

comments?
Prokofy Neva

Nov 17th, 2006

Re: Satchmo’s statement: “To underscore the numerous times it was made clear that ESC had no involvement with CopyBot.”

Yet Satchmo, you are documented as having members present at the debut of the CopyBot, before others found out. It was even on Destroy TV.

And no, Aimee, I did not have any statement before the appearance of my article that ESC was not involved in CopyBot.
Prokofy Neva

Nov 17th, 2006

>Prok, it doesn’t make any sense to resign over the posting priviledge stuff. That would only seem justified if someone unfairly edited or blocked a post that ought to go up. You need to give Walker the benefit of the doubt until he fucks one up. He gave you the benefit of the doubt, after all.

Uri, Walker has removed my posting privileges without consultation, pre-emptively, in a show of lack of faith, so that I cannot even print my own correction and retraction to a story, let alone update further developemtns.

And while indicating he may accept bylines from me again, he’s then insisting that all copy has to be cleared through him. That’s unacceptable. And it’s not unacceptable because I’m a prima dona, but because we can’t run an operation involving breaking news, with the 24/7 rapid accelerating quality of Second Life, when there are queues and clearances.

I spent more than a year in total frustration while neither you nor Walker would give me posting privileges, while you gave them to every passing 18 year old kid writing on fashion or whatever. I had to watch as story after story I was working on got scooped or OBE’d by others.

And the problem with that kind of clearance is that important scoops and breaking news are therefore destined to wait until both you and Walker, who spend far less time in SL than Pixeleen, I, and others, can clear.

We were able to have really great scoops and really great live coverage in the last few weeks precisely because I could post. And I say that not as a show-off — judge for yourself. In fact, if Pixeleen didn’t have posting privileges, how could she function?

the old concept of editor and editorial board may be going the way of the dinosaur. it’s not something i’m happy with — i’m a big believer in editors and editorial boards and editorial policies. But in this world of a million blogs and IMs and transcripts and forums constantly flowing, and in the world where RL media now competes with us covering SL, we simply have to have operational capacity. That means the editorial policy has to take the form of parallel processing, not serial processing, with like-minded individuals who trust one another.

Either you trust reporters, or you don’t. You aren’t prepared to play editor on anything near a real-time basis or even 12-hour basis, so I would have to insist on posting privileges for all main reporters or else we can’t function.
urizenus

Nov 17th, 2006

email sent.
Prokofy Neva

Nov 17th, 2006

http://forums.secondcitizen.com/showpost.php?p=88202&postcount=16

Here Nimrod mentions the source as bushing. Could we get some more on that?

Cory Edo in this thread says nonchalantly that in fact it is likely that CopyBot WAS invented on commission by a client.

Hello? Don’t you folks have a clue how serious this is? Businesses use libsecondlife and get to reverse the client on commission from clients, possibly even these big-name businesses, and that gets to wreck our Second Live economy???

Please take a look at this carefully.

also the thread mentions Eddy Stryker saying “essentially the same thing to Hamlet”>

I am not guilty of libel in any way, shape, or form. I published what I was reported as fact, and while it was proven later to be more shaky speculation, it is rooted in a truth you must hear: that business can reverse engineer and create any damn thing they want to wreck other people’s second lives.
Prokofy Neva

Nov 17th, 2006

And the reason why this is important — and I hope others will research this — is that we were led to believe that libsecondlife were these earnest if wierd tekkie hackers who were making libsecondlife out of the goodness of their hearts, purely for the fun science of it, to find holes in the client, to maybe help the Lindens make better search stuff or whatever.

So to come to find out that there is speculationg, not without basis, it seems, that one or more of them may have in fact done this for pay, as a commission for a client in business, changes the chemistry of the whole thing. It means that the Lindens let some people, and not others, reverse-engineer in order to get a business advantage. That is how it appears. It bears greater investigation, and deservedly so. Cory’s nonchalant attitude that it would be normal or acceptable to work in a reverse-engineering project on special dispensation and then also not only get commissions, but make a thing that terrorized the user economy — well, that’s a serious matter. And to see people talking so cynically and maliciously about others and how they will unleash the bot on them – well, it’s appalling, and that has made some obviously rethink the project and their relationship to it.

And as others have already listed, what sort of Tangs have we gotten from this Space Program?

We got Copybot — which is still causing damage as people still cash out, quit, stop sales or live in fear and get obsessed about fighting it — that’s still going on. That was wrong to do to people.

We got giant prim — mainly used by V-5 on Satyr to grief and caper.

We got god mode — the stalkers’ dream.

Ok, anything else? That’s not to say there might be some good Tang in there, but…what will we have to suffer to get the Tang?
Cocoanut Koala

Nov 17th, 2006

Last I looked, Baba now pwns Libsl.

coco