From time to time the issue of a copybot comes up. I think this is absolutely normal because copybot is a problem that the OpenSim community is trying to make sense of. Most of us are in reality honest people. We work, pay taxes, make purchases. We do not engage in theft or fraud because this is our moral code. Nobody wants to violate these principles in the virtual world too. Nobody wants to be called a thief. But the problem is that OpenSim consists of content whose origin is unknown. Logically, it is absolutely clear that this content was not created specifically for OpenSim. It is also absolutely clear that it was most likely created in Second Life, and then imported into OpenSim. Many objects could be taken from free 3D stocks. But it's not always clear who the creator was and on what conditions the content was imported. This content can be obtained for free in any OpenSim grid. You don't need to use any illegal methods for this. You can just go and get it. You can't blame the common user for receiving the product for free. He did not use dishonest or hacker methods, he did not pursue the goal of appropriating other people's property. At the same time, no one files complaints, the real creator does not claim his rights. If the creator does not consider it necessary to unambiguously prohibit the use of his content, does not want to fight for it, then why should a simple user do this? Does the user have the right to investigate? Should the user be doing someone else's job? Why should a user be concerned about other people's problems? Why should an OpenSim user protect the rights of SL creators if even Linden Lab can't protect it?

 The disinterest of the creators can be easily explained. OpenSim is not the target market for their products. The primitive semblance of the OpenSim economy does not in any way affect the development of the Second Life economy. For example, OSgrid was visited by just over 4000 users this month. OSgrid is a place that almost every inhabitant of OpenSim visits at least once a month. It should also be taken into account that almost every OpenSim user has more than one account. Individual users have up to 5 accounts and more on different grids. Thus, there may be much less real active users than we assume. Most of these users use OpenSim because everything is free here. That is why they are in OpenSim, and not in Second Life. They are insolvent. As a result, there remains a very small number of users who are ready to buy something in OpenSim. SL has something like 800000 of active users in 2017 (https://www.wired.com/story/second-life-plagued-security-flaws-ex-employee-says/). Almost every one of them has the ability to pay and is ready to make purchases, even small ones. Is there anything that the Second Life creators really have to lose when you compare 800000 paying users with fewer than 4,000 insolvent users who are in a completely different universe? Ok, there could be a lot more active users when you consider the closed grids. How many? I guess it much less than 800000.* Of course, there are few among the creators from Second Life who will try to arrange litigation with anonymous people who live in the constantly disappearing and emerging amateur grids. Serious people don't waste their time. This is really pointless, given that this whole "copybot" in most cases is not even used for commercial purposes, which means there is no loss of profits. It is a very good desire of some people from OpenSim to find out the original creators of things and pay them, or in some way get legal permission to use this content. But it seems to me that it is not surprising that the creators ignore these requests or reject it. All this content was created only for Second Life and not for other virtual worlds were provided, especially as unstable as OpenSim.

I think that the only thing that can be done in this case is to create something like a license that will be placed in objects. The meaning of this text should be something like: "This is an unauthorized copy of a Second Life product. This copy does not reflect the quality of the original product. The original product was created by John Smith and is legally distributed at (link to the marketplace)". That way we could at least keep the copyright. If someone wants to support the creator and thank him for a copy of the object in OpenSim, he can use the link and buy the ORIGINAL object at the ORIGINAL price. Then it will be absolutely fair. For example: Have you found a great free house in OpenSim? Excellent! Now, please, open the note with the license, go to the address in the SL marketplace and buy the original for L$ 9000. Done! Now you can be happy. Unfortunately, most of the  copybot fighters prefer to put on dramas rather than go and buy content from the original creators from Second Life. Yes, the best fight against a copybot is to simply take and redeem the SL originals of all the objects you own in OpenSim. No screaming, no resentment or drama, just take your money and take it to the original creators. So simple. Therefore, if you really care about fighting a copybot, you simply have to make a purchase on the SL marketplace. No need to write to creators, no drama involved, just make a purchase and you will make a truly valuable contribution to your struggle. All your other actions are completely meaningless and irrelevant.

There is one thing that really causes indignation for me - this is the sale of objects whose origin is uncertain. If you are not the manufacturer of the product and do not have permission from the copyright holder, you are not authorized to sell this product. Thus, when selling such products, three crimes are committed at once. You create lost profits for the copyright holders and creators. You are making illegal profits from those who buy this object. You are deceiving people by not informing them that they are only buying a copy of the original product. Such grids and persons must be banned and isolated from the community.

Copies of objects from SL are likely to be the main component of the content in OpenSim. This is fact. You can just accept this fact and move on. If you disagree with this, you can make a real contribution to the fight against the copybot: 1) Find out who the creator is and put notes in objects. 2) Buy the original objects in SL marketplace.

This is just IMHO. What do you think about this issue?

* It is a pity that I have no data on the number of users in the SL. It would be really interesting to compare.