WHO OWNS AD RIGHTS?

Ian, in an article I wrote on imedia and linked in my recent blog post I bring up the question of WHO OWNS the product placement and advertising monies in games that are MOD by gamers and/or environments that gamers create -- if I create an environment on Second Life where I'm buying everything to 'create' it, do I own advertising/product placement rights. Has anyone challenged this yet? Can the game producers ie Sony/Everquest -- come in and spam my section with advertising? Do I own the SMS rights-- can I put up a short code so that gamers can talk to me via phone/text/multimedia messages and I can upsell them on some kind of private events? Lots of cool stuff-- thanks for your coverage and keep in touch. js joyce schwarz, www.joycecom.com

Joyce, great question. Creation in 2L is certainly a LOT different than EverQuest, and I'm not even sure it makes sense to compare them. Maybe 2L vs. There. I'll ask some friends to stop by and give their opinion on this...

This is a toughie.

From a machiavellian point of view, i guess it depends on whether there's any exclusion technology. if i put up a wall, can i make sure that a message on that wall is always visible? can i make sure that only i, the builder, can put things up there? i dont know whether SL allows both of these. in so many other worlds, like graffiti in CS, it's an open-access situation.

legally, it seems to me that this would be covered in the EULA. the EULA of every game except SL (almost) would vest all of these rights in the company that owns the environment. i guess in SL - well, let's ask cory ondrejka to comment on that. i don't know.

otherwise, as i said, in pure-modding types of worlds - like all the HL2 mods, the unreal mods, etc., the halo 2 mods - the point is moot because of open access. if i can paint, so can you. nobody owns the wall.

Right, I have an email in to Cory and hopefully he'll stop by. I think 2L is the only currently available virtual world in which it would even be technologically possible to sell personal ad space?

I suppose there is at least one object that the player can insure is not possible to alter by other players: the avatar itself. We've seen people selling forehead space in the real world, maybe they'd start selling avatar space in a virtual world. Even if just on a t-shirt.

We might also consider how those traveling billboards that you see on the streets around E3, and indeed in most major cities now, might be remediated in a virtual world. In 2L, presumably I could build a truck/airplane/tank/etc. with branded surfaces, I could just drive it around and then just store it away. Of course, then I'd have to manually chug the thing around.

More interesting would be the question you ask, Ted, about the relative permanence of messages posted on a wall or other surface. I guess we'll have to wait for Cory on that one.

Here's the other way to ask the question: should players have the ability to sell their own ad space? Feasibility is questionable on a mass scale, but that's easily fixable. Is it even a good idea? Why/why not?

The existence of the in-world ad network MetaAdverse (http://www.metaadverse.com) suggests that Second Life residents maintain the rights to sell ad space within properties that they own. However, this service currently only accommodates member created Second Life businesses and brands. Not sure what would happen if an outside corporation approached a Second Life resident (or vice versa) about setting up an ad campaign but it would certainly pose some interesting dilemmas for Linden Lab. There's the revenue sharing issue - would LL be entitled to a cut? And what if the product or service advertised violates global community standards? What if it's an ad for a competitor MMOG? Would/should LL have the right to veto its presence in Second Life?

Here's another somewhat unrelated recent article about in-game ads, from Forbes.

My favorite non-sequitur from the article:

Realism is key to many games, and real life is a place where ads and commercial products crop up all the time. Developing sophisticated games isn't getting any cheaper, so game publishers will be looking for ways to recoup some of their investment while marketers will be looking for new ways to reach their audience.