To:"Meadhbh Hamrick (Infinity)" <infinity@lindenlab.com>
CC: "David W Levine" <dwl@us.ibm.com>
Subject: Fwd: [MMOX] Prokofy's Goal

Hey there,

I've had some personal conversation with Prok detailed below that were followed up with this letter.   I thought I'd forward it to you as it accurately describes what Prok's goal is.   I'm not worried about her blog, 'SecondThoughts'.  I don't really care and won't loose sleep over it.

Best Regards

Dan


---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: dyerbrookme@juno.com <dyerbrookme@juno.com>
Date: Thu, Feb 19, 2009 at 10:02 PM
Subject: Re: [mmox] mmox Digest, Vol 1, Issue 48
To: dcolivares@gmail.com


Dear Dan,

If your hectoring and controlling message to me has gone to the entire group, my rebuttal of you will go to the entire group too, and also I'll be blogging about this. It's the only way to get accountability from people like you who have the awful arrogant sense of imperative that you have, dismissing my legitimate concerns that in fact do really voice the concerns of many content creators and merchants.

I cited to you very compelling back-ups for my sense of raising a LEGITIMATE concern: my thousands of tenants that I've had in Second Life for four years, many of them content creators, who aren't even informed of these accelerating processes threatening their IP; the votes on the JIRAs; the comments on blogs and forums. I don't feel at all any literal burden of proof to go around collecting petitions and citing JIRAs to people who merely throw up that demand as an obstacle to real debate.

The idea that I "don't speak for content creators" is a curious one. You don't speak for Internet users, yet you arrogate yourself to run the Internet in the IETF -- and P.S., not by democratic vote. You don't speak for content creators whatsoever, nor have any hand on the pulse of their concerns, and yet you can somehow challenge my raising of this very, very legitimate concern, simply because you are Fisking and looking for literalist ways to overturn these very legitimate concerns simply because you don't share them. If you are not the typical copyleftist bullying geek that see time and again on these forums, then why are you making common cause with them and protecting them?!

A group of people out of SL have made a proposal to IETF that does not represent anything near any consultation with the user base, and doesn't at all take on board the concerns of the users of SL, as is well established on the JIRA, forums, blogs. Among the MMOX posters are the maker and seller of CopyBot, and the most extreme of the copyleftist Lindens, as well as assorted Extropians and other wackos with a decided copyleftist outlook. They don't represent the broad user base and can't possibly be perceived as taking on our concerns. They are not legitimate as they represent the extremes on this issue; you are not legitimate as you have an obvious biased perspective on this in trying to browbeat me. I *am* legitimate when it comes to these issues by countering your extremism in a quest for a more practical and effective approach. There is no objective demand for interoperability; it is a geek concoction.

If you agree that copyright has to be protected, then you will speak up at the obvious extremism that this gang has brought to this list. But you don't. You take it upon yourself to discipline me in a private message. Shame on you. When people attempt to do that, I make it public, and I make it personal.

It is not practically possible for those of who are not coders and not schooled in the arcane geeky *cult* of the IETF to make coherent proposals. In fact, I can only point out that the people making the extremist proposals now are indeed extreme, publicize this matter, and who that saner voices will prevail.

I absolutely, resolutely, with all my heart reject your system of governance in the IETF. It is communism. I refuse to allow it to impact virtual worlds unchallenged. I reject a system of governance where nobody can challenge proposals by democratic debate, criticizing proposals as they come up, or simply opposing them and voting "no", but are forced only to make positive proposals and vote "yes". This is communism, the neotechno version of it isn't any prettier than the version of the previous centuries.

There aren't "many people" who disagree with what I've raised. You're making stuff up. In fact, look at the JIRAs (are you in fact in Second Life with a SL avatar?) and see the votes. Most people, if exposed to the issues, want the option to check off an object to go to other grids -- or not. They want copyright protection, and are alarmed at OpenSim's thuggish attitude towards copyright theft and absence of will to protect it.

Once again: I stand by what I said:

"The content creators of SL, as a mass, have NOT called for interoperability without copyright protections and without an intellectual property regime, and they are not willing to be told to call their lawyers or put in a CC notecard into their products."

You are a coward for attempting to pressure me in a private IM. If you continue to live in the fantasy that content makers are not concerned about this, and continue to imagine that they have to jump through hoops and "make a petition" in the arcane system IETF represents, you will find yourself with war. I have two words for you: Facebook TOS.

Prokofy



Message trail (reverse order)
-----------------------------------
From Dan

What are your sources for making these claims about me?  Can you post
them?   I must have missed them somewhere.

Best Regards

Dan

-------------------------------------------
From Prok

Publish away, big guy, and of course I read your email and understood it all too well: you *are* a bully.

Your method of trying to counter legitimate debate, and the raising of proper concerns about the high-handed and extreme front of the AWG invading IETF is to challenge *my* credentials. I know what I do is just and necessary in a democratic society. You don't live in one, but live in a hive-mind collective.

Prokofy

---------------------------------
From Dan

If you can publish me on your blog, then I can publish you on mine :).
 Based on the below e-mail you didn't even really read what I said.
That's fine.  Publish my politically correct statements on your blog,
just make sure to appropriately site the source and include the
context with references to statements that I've made that proove your
opinions about me.   Look back at the e-mail that I've posted to MMOX
(not many), you won't see me claim that I'm representing or speaking
for anything except myself, so throw that argument out the window
because you're just trying to throw it back on me *with no evidence*.

 My argument is, it's not what you say, it's how you say it.  And, the
way you say things is entirely counter productive to what you express
that you actually want to achieve.   Finally, here is an opportunity
to get what you want, and what do you do?  shoot yourself in the foot.

So, go ahead.  Keep me honest.  There isn't anything that I said that
I worry about.  If you feel that I'm insulting you.  Take that as
feedback.  MMOX is for productive conversations and proposals.  It's
in the rules.  I suggest you read them or unsubscribe.

Kindest Regards

Dan

----------------------------

From Prok
Dear Dan,

If your hectoring and controlling message to me has gone to the entire group, my rebuttal of you will go to the entire group too, and also I'll be blogging about this. It's the only way to get accountability from people like you who have the awful arrogant sense of imperative that you have, dismissing my legitimate concerns that in fact do really voice the concerns of many content creators and merchants.

I cited to you very compelling back-ups for my sense of raising a LEGITIMATE concern: my thousands of tenants that I've had in Second Life for four years, many of them content creators, who aren't even informed of these accelerating processes threatening their IP; the votes on the JIRAs; the comments on blogs and forums. I don't feel at all any literal burden of proof to go around collecting petitions and citing JIRAs to people who merely throw up that demand as an obstacle to real debate.

The idea that I "don't speak for content creators" is a curious one. You don't speak for Internet users, yet you arrogate yourself to run the Internet in the IETF -- and P.S., not by democratic vote. You don't speak for content creators whatsoever, nor have any hand on the pulse of their concerns, and yet you can somehow challenge my raising of this very, very legitimate concern, simply because you are Fisking and looking for literalist ways to overturn these very legitimate concerns simply because you don't share them. If you are not the typical copyleftist bullying geek that see time and again on these forums, then why are you making common cause with them and protecting them?!

A group of people out of SL have made a proposal to IETF that does not represent anything near any consultation with the user base, and doesn't at all take on board the concerns of the users of SL, as is well established on the JIRA, forums, blogs. Among the MMOX posters are the maker and seller of CopyBot, and the most extreme of the copyleftist Lindens, as well as assorted Extropians and other wackos with a decided copyleftist outlook. They don't represent the broad user base and can't possibly be perceived as taking on our concerns. They are not legitimate as they represent the extremes on this issue; you are not legitimate as you have an obvious biased perspective on this in trying to browbeat me. I *am* legitimate when it comes to these issues by countering your extremism in a quest for a more practical and effective approach. There is no objective demand for interoperability; it is a geek concoction.

If you agree that copyright has to be protected, then you will speak up at the obvious extremism that this gang has brought to this list. But you don't. You take it upon yourself to discipline me in a private message. Shame on you. When people attempt to do that, I make it public, and I make it personal.

It is not practically possible for those of who are not coders and not schooled in the arcane geeky *cult* of the IETF to make coherent proposals. In fact, I can only point out that the people making the extremist proposals now are indeed extreme, publicize this matter, and who that saner voices will prevail.

I absolutely, resolutely, with all my heart reject your system of governance in the IETF. It is communism. I refuse to allow it to impact virtual worlds unchallenged. I reject a system of governance where nobody can challenge proposals by democratic debate, criticizing proposals as they come up, or simply opposing them and voting "no", but are forced only to make positive proposals and vote "yes". This is communism, the neotechno version of it isn't any prettier than the version of the previous centuries.

There aren't "many people" who disagree with what I've raised. You're making stuff up. In fact, look at the JIRAs (are you in fact in Second Life with a SL avatar?) and see the votes. Most people, if exposed to the issues, want the option to check off an object to go to other grids -- or not. They want copyright protection, and are alarmed at OpenSim's thuggish attitude towards copyright theft and absence of will to protect it.

Once again: I stand by what I said:

"The content creators of SL, as a mass, have NOT called for interoperability without copyright protections and without an intellectual property regime, and they are not willing to be told to call their lawyers or put in a CC notecard into their products."

You are a coward for attempting to pressure me in a private IM. If you continue to live in the fantasy that content makers are not concerned about this, and continue to imagine that they have to jump through hoops and "make a petition" in the arcane system IETF represents, you will find yourself with war. I have two words for you: Facebook TOS.

Prokofy

------------------------------
From Dan

This combination response to my personal letter and to MMOX seems to
have only gone to me.  That may not be what you intended, however,
that's what happened.  I thought you'd like to know.

Additionally, my letter to you was personal, and not on MMOX simply
because it isn't the place to voice concerns and commentary like my
message.    It's really a place for proposals.   It's a place for
motion in a positive direction.  I agree, that content protection
should be done as much as technically possible to preserve an already
working and solid system.   And, MMOX is the place to create and
submit proposals on how to do that, not shoot down other motions.
We're currently working on the draft charter and deliverables.
Instead of bringing up the content protection issue as if we're over
looking it, it would be great if you could suggest improvements to the
draft charter and deliverables that would bring this working group's
goals into alignment with the way you see things working out in the
end.

My previous message to you was letting you know that there wasn't
solid evidence that the claims you made in the previous message were
true.  I suggested a positive way for you to create evidence to
present your case.  If you don't think that you can successfully
complete a petition, then your argument has no solid backing.  As, I'm
sure you're well aware, there are many people who disagree with the
way that you've presented data and the claims you've made in self
proclaimed representation of SecondLife content creators in the past.
 So, therefore, I suggest that if you're going to continue to move for
interop being dangerous and non-productive (and using SecondLife's
content creators as your backing, "Ref: The content creators of SL, as

a mass, have NOT called for interoperability without copyright
protections and without an intellectual property regime, and they are
not willing to be told to call their lawyers or put in a CC notecard

into their products."), that you formally execute a petition to do so.
 Your previous paragraph to that statement say that you don't
represent them, however, you speak for them in the following
paragraph.    I understand what you're saying.  I believe that content
protection is important.  I don't believe that the *way* you're saying
it is valid.

Best Regards

Daniel Olivares
----------------------
From Prok
I'm glad we've established that when individuals who say they represent virtual worlds, and and are engaging in virtual sound-byting "firsts," that in fact they don't represent anything but themselves. Thanks for helping to make that point clear : )

As for me, I don't make a claim to represent anything formally, by any democratic election, or by any public acclaim in any format. What I do claim, however, is to be speaking up publicly with a concern that I have heard repeatedly and that many, many people have, my thousands of tenants, and many thousands of people who have voted about these concerns on the PJIRA of SL, and the many hundreds blogging and commenting about this around SL. Voicing a concern doesn't mean a false hijacking of democratic legitimacy, it simply means voicing a concern, and it's accepted as such.

The content creators of SL, as a mass, have NOT called for interoperability without copyright protections and without an intellectual property regime, and they are not willing to be told to call their lawyers or put in a CC notecard into their products. There are plenty on the record voting for the JIRA I've indicated or voicing concern about how their IP is protected when ported to other grids; there isn't any concerted lobby or group or even blog of content creators calling for interoperability, even; that's something coders are calling for, some of whom could formally call themselves "content creators" because they make weapons or robot avatars, but that isn't representative of the lion's share of content makers.

Most content creators have not even heard about this move of the AWG into the IETF as only a tiny fraction of users read the Linden blogs and would have seen Zero Linden's post.

I don't think I need to have a mass movement at my back to raise perfectly legitimate and valid concerns about the impact of interoperability's extreme models on intellectual property.
-----------------------------------------------
From Dan
On this same token, you do not "represent" all content copyright
holders.  Just yourself.  You cannot make broad, unscientific, claims
about the majority of copyright holders in SecondLife because you
simply have not talked to them all. Maybe you should start a petition
and bring it before the IETF.  At least then, your claims will be
accurate and provable.

Best Regards

Dan
------------------------------------------------------
from Prok

representatives from 3 different virtual worlds met in a virtual world to hash out the details of how to bring the MMOX meeting into their respective virtual worlds and allow meeting participation from within them

Excuse me, but you do not "represent" these virtual worlds. You did this without the public's consent. It's also not up to you to do gate-keeping and "allow" meeting participation from within them.

Prokofy Neva