I don’t authorize you to speak my name in shadow, but that’s okay, since you don’t need my authorization to do so.

The annoying part, to me, is that the TOS (which governs the activity of residents) directly references the Branding Guidelines, which (overreaching legalese aside) really only applies to commercial entities, or people attempting to make money in one way or another from LL’s marks. I don’t know why they felt that they had to do that, I think it was probably a mistake, and I’d love for them to undo it.

To disagree slightly with Rheta: they have never said that they -will- ban residents who don’t follow the branding guidelines offworld, and who don’t respond to warnings. They’ve said that they reserve the right to, but I’m pretty sure that they have never said that they -will-. It’s a rather large difference, at least to my mind!

On “my second life” (or even “my Second Life”), I have it easy in that I don’t think I’ve ever used the term. :) Partly because it reminds me of the shuddersome Windowsy “My Computer” and “My Documents”, and partly because my second life probably began sometime when I was like eight months old or whatever, when my life as a giant orange pterodactyl or equivalent began. My life in Second Life must be my several-dozenth life by now, even counting very conservatively. I expect the same is true of most people.

And we can’t really fault them too much for being in the positiion of trying to claim what is clearly a relatively common noun-phrase. The people who picked “Second Life” and the people who are now in the position of claiming that it isn’t really a generic noun phrase at all are no doubt entirely different people. I’m sure the first lawyer that took a look at the company name from a trademark point of view quickly remembered a very important appointment elsewhere, and fled from the room! :)

Seems pretty clear to me.

As for the phrase “my second life” and variations on that phrase, I think that regardless of what they wrote, it’s fair use and I really don’t think they can or will go after people using it.

Instead, LL does things like this. Whatever; I’m just gonna use the picture I Photoshopped up of my OWN eye in my OWN hand to represent SL.

I agree entirely with you LL never meant to curtail usage of their trademarked terms in a general fashion. They have been repeating this over and over since they have presented the revised brand guidelines. But the issue at hand never was the Lindens forbidding us to use « Second Life » or « SL » et al, except for commercial purposes without license, and when it might dilute the brand (hence the crackdown on sites using the terms in their name or URL to promote themselves and their services) , nor was were we meant to pepper every mention of them with trademark signs.

Yes, some of us did attack LL on those grounds because it made them an easy target. I plead guilty on that count and looking back, I wish I hadn’t done it. It diluted the issue, with people thinking this was about using the trademarked terms at all, when it was in fact about how we are meant to use them.

Because LL have published far reaching guidelines for « Proper Reference to Linden Lab’s Brand Names in Text », which are part of the brand guidelines, and as such are subject to observance by any resident of SL under ToS clause 4.4. They say (quote edited slightly to shorten it) :

Always follow a Linden Lab brand name with an appropriate generic noun for at least your first reference to the brand name. A “generic noun” is a common noun and not a proper noun, trademark, or brand name. […] After the first reference, use an appropriate generic noun after the Linden Lab brand name as often as possible. Never use the brand name as a generic noun or verb, and never use it in the plural or possessive form. […] When providing your Second Life contact information, use an appropriate generic noun after the Second Life or SL brand names […] Always capitalize and spell Linden Lab’s brand names exactly as they are shown here, and do not abbreviate them or alter their spelling, spacing, hyphenation, or punctuation.

The FAQ and clarifications contribute examples to this, the best know being « do not write “my Second Life” », but this is just one application, not an isolated recall of one single phrase. All of the above rules apply all the time, to any writing according to LL, and as clearly stated in LL’s last clarification, they will indeed ban residents, albeit after a warning, who do not observe these rules in their off-world activities.

Now I for one strongly object to bending backwards and construing strange and insipid phrases à la « my life in the Second Life world », or maintaining a blacklist of non acceptable phrases on what, when all is said and done, is a personal web based editorial column. It as matter of free speech and freedom of the press in the most general sense to me (I’m not an US citizen, hence the limitations of the First Amendment have no relevance to my case whatsoever; and no, I did not surrender all my rights as a citizen of a EU country when I signed a service contract with a Californian company either). I am so not going to let some company lawyer in a software service start-up dictate to me how I publish about what I think is might be the next revolution in human society, just because he says he can and will get at me without having recourse to the law.

That’s about it as far as I’m concerned, though I still think this should be an issue to anyone who happens to blog or otherwise publish on the matter. Or, as the French say : point final.

Local story: our first and largest mobile operator is called “Mobitel”. The name has become a synonym for mobile phones here – you talk on your “mobitel”. Far from banning it, they embrace it and had cited it as evidence of their success.