I took a little tour of Second Life airports recently to see what aircraft designers have been up to lately. Although I haven’t been gone from SL, I haven’t released anything new for quite a while, and I wanted to see how the advent of mesh — the ability to upload 3D wireframe models — had influenced aircraft design.
I was, quite frankly, blown away. The realism in the models and texturing was head and shoulders above what I’d seen in SL before the advent of mesh uploads. And having done some 3D modeling myself, I was astonished at the level of realism and accuracy. I saw fighter jets, World War II planes, commercial jets both large and small, and helicopters of all types — all of them faithful reproductions of the real-world aircraft. That the price tag on some of these aircraft was a hefty L$6000 (about $24 US) wasn’t surprising — until I started learning more about mesh.
Today I learned about mesh-sharing websites where users freely share mesh models regardless of copyright or trademark. What did I see in the aircraft sections on these sites? I saw some of those amazing aircraft that I saw in Second Life. And what I felt was profound disappointment in Second Life aircraft makers.
Since I started creating SL vehicles in 2003, I’ve been a strong supporter of the wider community of flight enthusiasts. I’ve donated my best flight scripts so that other aircraft creators could take that difficult step from designing a model to making their creation take flight, and I was more than happy to do so thinking that I was helping designers. I wouldn’t have done this had I known the direction content producers would take.
In another airport tour today, I saw F-16s, F-18s, an A-10, tanks, and helicopters, and I now have to wonder which of them was actually designed (or licensed) by the person selling them. It’s also quite likely that many of them use scripts based on a modified Terra Stingray flight script (or, as I’ve seen before, a really obsolete script of mine from the mid-2000s).
So, Second Life aircraft sellers, what’s wrong with this? How about copyright, for a start. The models and texture you upload are almost certainly the intellectual property of their designer. Unless you have explicit permission from the person who created that model, you shouldn’t be uploading that mesh.
Trademark law also plays a role here. Do you have permission to sell Star Wars designs, like X-Wings and Tie Fighters? I suspect Disney/Lucasfilm would have something to say about that. I’m not certain, but some commercial and military aircraft designs and brand names may also be protected by trademark.
I’m not saying that there aren’t aircraft makers who create their own original mesh designs. There are some very talented aircraft makers who deserve respect and admiration for their painstaking work. But at this point, can we even tell the actual designers from the mesh pirates?
So, Second Life aircraft sellers who upload other people’s mesh, if you didn’t create the model, you didn’t create the textures, and most of the functionality is from my free script, why are you charging people thousands of Linden dollars per aircraft?
And Second Life aircraft enthusiasts, how do you feel now about giving these people your money?
Addendum: It’s been pointed out to me that it’s possible to acquire a license (either paid or Creative Commons) for models. While that’s possible, I consider it unlikely that the models are properly licensed for use in SL, especially when pirate mesh models are so widely and freely available. If a model is correctly licensed, I’m sure a content creator will have no problem saying who it’s licensed from and providing correct attribution.