Six Apart Seeks Safe Harbor From Justice League Unlimited DMCA Storm
by Alphaville Herald on 03/02/10 at 8:44 am
Embarrassed Second Life role-play superhero police force swings mighty DMCA hammer again
by Pixeleen Mistral, National Affairs desk
Herald coverage of the Justice League Unlimited has been edited by Six Apart staff to remove text and images which Six Apart has informed the Herald are subject to copyright infringement claims. This action came after the Herald declined to remove the disputed material, pointing out that the Copyright fair use doctrine clearly applies to reporting the abuses of the Justice League Unlimited – a group that has run an ongoing campaign of secret surveillance on members of the Second Life community and compiled a 1700 page wiki containing files about community members that were often false and potentially libelous.
In addition to portions of the Herald's coverage of the JLU activities, a reproduction of the e-mail sent by Six Apart to the Herald informing us of the copyright infringement claims was removed because, according to Six Apart staff, "it contained all the content which was required to be removed".
Six Apart's actions come under the DMCA "safe harbor" provisions for web hosting services. The Herald suggests chillingeffects.org to readers interested in more information about the use and abuse of the DMCA with respect to First Amendment and intellectual property rights.
run for your lives
Feb 3rd, 2010
Well old Venkman must be pitching a spandex tent today with his swollen and engorged e-peaner after getting his forced edits applied to The Herald. Better get over there GLE…
Tux Winkler
Feb 3rd, 2010
What a load of rubbish, send me the removed content, I will host it and you can link to it.
GEORGE ZIMMER, FOUNDER AND CEO OF MEN'S WAREHOUSE
Feb 3rd, 2010
JLU Wiki torrent, courtesy of the Patriotic Nigras: http://bit.ly/8OVxxg
WHERE IS YOUR KRYPTON NOW KALOL?
Lex Luthor
Feb 3rd, 2010
This is why I thank God every day that we don’t have RL superheroes. Do you think, for one moment, that power would not corrupt them?
Even in the fake world of SL, a little bit of recognition for these rat-bastards has made them think they are godlings.
It would be delicious if whoever now owns DC Comics’ copyrights would file a cease-and-desist against our fake Superman and his cronies, so Venkman had to put a big 0 on his leotards. Haven’t any of you reported these losers? If Frank Herbert’s estate could get content changed in SL…
Barney Boomslang
Feb 3rd, 2010
Well, the right thing now is to file a counter notice and request reinstantiation of content. That way the JLU is forced to actually file a lawsuite or the content will be made available again within 10 days. If Six Apart refuses to follow those procedures, they are losing their protection under DMCA and are fully liable for all damage that might arise from the takedown. There is even a handy form on the chillingeffects site to produce the correct counter notice …
Jahar Aabye
Feb 3rd, 2010
@Barney
The problem with counterfiling is that doing so would require providing Kalel with personal contact information, including name, address, and phone number.
We all know how much Kalel cares about private RL information. Any information provided in the counterfiling would almost certainly be placed in his little database and shared with his entire group.
That’s why he’s filing all these DMCAs. He knows that he can’t actually stop the dissemination of this information, especially since the jlu.sl4.me site has a domain suffix (.me) from Montenegro. He’s most likely phishing for RL information that has to be provided on any counterfilings.
Prok knows this, Pix knows this, everyone who’s been served with a DMCA by Kalel is well aware of the implications involved in counterfiling. Basically you trade your safety and security, and possibly that of your family as well, in exchange for the possibility that you might be able to catch Kalel committing perjury.
I don’t think that anyone reasonably expects that Kalel will file any lawsuits. No attorney would touch this with a ten foot pole. So I’d say it’s fairly obvious what the real result of a counterfiling would be.
Orion
Feb 3rd, 2010
Well, as it is I’m sure the name and contact info of whoever owns the secondlifeherald.com domain name is already publicly available. Therefore re-exposing that information for the purposes of a counter claim probably wouldn’t be too much of an issue. Although, what’s even more disturbing is that the service contracted behind The Herald is so willing to censor its customers like this. If I were you guys, I’d seriously look into extracting all your stuff out of TypePad, find a decent server rental / vps / colo, then move it all over to your own host. At least that way you’d have full control over your content and you wouldn’t be at the peril of whatever whim and fancy comes across those dingwads at TypePad.
All your second life are belong to us
Feb 3rd, 2010
Kalel Venkman: The information we observed directly happened in Second Life, where there is http://bit.ly/no-warrantee-of-privacy
Baloo Uriza
Feb 3rd, 2010
Why not move this site to a self-hosted Slashcode or WordPress site instead of letting some underhanded bastards who can’t read the law host it for you?
Baloo Uriza
Feb 3rd, 2010
“That’s why he’s filing all these DMCAs. He knows that he can’t actually stop the dissemination of this information, especially since the jlu.sl4.me site has a domain suffix (.me) from Montenegro. He’s most likely phishing for RL information that has to be provided on any counterfilings.”
That’s why you get a forwarding dropbox from a Mailboxes, Etc. in another state.
Tux Winkler
Feb 4th, 2010
@Jahar: Kalel only needs to ask and I will gladly provide contact information, after I have verified his real life information first (lets face it, it could be just some lunatic).
Or he could send an email to abuse@sl4.me, and I will send him our default response!
Tux Winkler
Feb 4th, 2010
@Jahar: Kalel only needs to ask and I will gladly provide contact information, after I have verified his real life information first (lets face it, it could be just some lunatic).
Or he could send an email to abuse@sl4.me, and I will send him our default response!