A few days ago I received an e-mail about some images on my site being displayed on a website belonging to a domain called Active World....in checking all of this out I discovered that Active World is a virtual reality 3D world that is combined with a real time chat and an offer to become a citizen and stake a claim to property in the world to build a home.....Active World provides the software and the space and the pieces for the construction of your home.....what they don't seem to provide is any space to store images to decorate this home....so all of the citizens head out onto the www and nab images from websites that they visit and link the images to their walls via your server......not OK without your permission.

I visited about 10 homes in Active World and all of them had images many images linked directly to other peoples servers.....The owner to this particular home had no e-mail address so of course I had no way to contact her......I did the next logical thing....I e-mailed the webmaster of Active World and web master a "smart ass" response from a Roland that went something like this......

"Since we do not regulate the content of our worlds (i.e. users can build whatever they want, it is their responsibility) we have no control over what images they might link to from their buildings. Surely you must realize that by placing images on a publicly accessible web site you have made them available to the public. If this bothers you then I suggest that you complain to the folks who designed the World Wide Web, not me.

If you are not able to contact "***********" about this, you can always change the names of the files on your web site to break his/her links."

And this is a quote from Roland in a request from my isp to please remedy this situation.

"However I should mention that we are not content providers and do not regulate how users use our software to display images from the web."

Now of course this is not true because most of the building parts seem to come from Active World itself...........and indeed are downloaded or moved around on their site..........maybe Roland and Active World need websters definition of content.
Then there are the help files which tell you how to link to other files off the site.

Active Worlds Help Files

Unless the sound or MIDI file is in the world's sounds directory, you must also specify a path. You can also specify an absolute URL for any sound file on the World Wide Web. Click here for more information on sound and music.

NOISE

Plays a WAV file just once. For example, to play a sound named cacophny.wav just once when you bump an object, the Action text should read:

BUMP NOISE cacophny.wav

Unless the sound or MIDI file is in the C:\AWORLD\CACHE\(world)\SOUNDS directory, you must also specify a path. You can also specify an absolute URL for any sound file on the World Wide Web. Click here for more information on sound and music.

PICTURE [update=]

Places any JPEG image on the web onto special picture objects, and updates it at specified intervals. This command worked only on picture objects that were created with a specially tagged polygon with a tag value of 200. Click here for a list of objects that can be used with the Picture command and information on how to use the picture command. The PICTURE command lets you place a JPEG image from anywhere on the Web onto special picture objects, and optionally have them updated at specified intervals. The format for the command is: PICTURE [update=] can be any URL, either absolute or relative, to any JPEG image on the Web. Relative URLs come off the current world’s object path. The optional Update argument is for images that are changing frequently on the web, such as output from a digital camera, and specifies how often the Active Worlds Browser will reload the image if it has changed. Use this feature only with images that are changing frequently to prevent needless hits on the web site serving the image. (well isn't it nice that Active World is at least concerned that you don't get unnecessary hits on your server when you should be getting none at all from them in this manner)

For example:

create picture www.my_isp.com/~myname/mypicture.jpg
Example: create picture kats-korner.com/image/pic.jpg.....what does this do?......totally bypasses my website or any reference to it....steals my image....places it on their site and allows me to pay for the storage.....Cool scheme Active World/Roland!!!
bump picture /pictures/portrait.jpg
activate picture surprise.jpg name=hidden_panel
create picture theghetto.mit.edu/livepic.jpg update=30
Example: create picture kats-korner.com/image/pic.jpg update=30.... so assuming 30 means 30 mins. I now get 48 hits a day on my site from this one image just because they want to update their wall or tv screen?...and if my server charges for these hits at the end of the month I may end up with a $1000 bill because this one person or many persons at Active World have fallen in love with my image?.....now it sort of looks like Active World is promoting this behavior since these are their own "Help Files"
Following is a list of objects that can be used with the Picture command:

comp1 = computer
pict1 = large picture with frame 1:1.333
pict2 = large picture with frame 1:1
pict3 = large picture with frame 1.333:1
pict4 = medium size picture w/ frame 1:1.333
pict5 = medium size picture with frame 1:1
pict6 = medium size picture with frame 1.333:1
tv1 = television
tv2bs = big screen TV
tv3bs = big screen TV w/ wood cabinet
new1 = news stand
note this is part of the content that Roland states they do not regulate on the Active Worlds site.

I don't see anywhere in the "Help Files" that they tell their citizens to upload the image to their own "Active World Server" and link to that ...and of course there is no mention at all of asking first......according to Roland these are "PUBLIC"....images published on a public www and therefore fair game...........SO DOES THAT MEAN ROLAND/ACTIVE WORLD DO NOT CARE IF I TAKE THEIR HEADER AND PLACE A LARGE SLASH CIRCLE ON IT AND DISTRIBUTE IT ACROSS THE INTERNET....I guess that is ok too?????

I suppose this says it all......Since Active Worlds has made no effort to respond to my urging them to remedy this situation on their domain.... and since they apparently feel we out here are powerless to say how our bandwidth is spent......I am putting this page up with all of the facts as I know them....I am also posting the information that is available on how to reach Active Worlds and the sites that are affiliated to and with them.....I urge each and everyone of you to write or call these people and voice your opinion on this matter.

Go and check them out for yourself.

Circle of Fire is the company that either runs or owns Active World as far as I can see.

Thank you Shamus at Circle of Fire for the resolution of this problem.

For all of you who took the time and energy at write these companies and let it be known your position on this matter.....
THANK YOU!!
these changes would not have come about without your support. As you can see from the letters posted below I was getting no where without you.
A special thanks to Mary Broussard and Web Prestige for lending so much time, energy, and support to this project.

To whom it may concern,
You are in some way affiliated with Active Worlds at least according to them.......you may want to check out
http://kats-korner.com/action.html
if you do not condone this improper behavior on the internet please let me know when you are no longer a sponsor or affiliated with Active Worlds and I will be happy to remove your connection to them on this page.....if I do not hear from you we will assume you to are supportive of their position.
Sincerely
Linda

Letters from and response to some of the principal parties at Active World.

This is a direct quote from Russel Freeland at Synergy Corp.

"Er, FUCK YOU. You put my logo on that page? And not even with a circle and a cross! I'm insulted! :)"
My response to Russel was:

Russel,
You do nice graphics work....but you are right it does look better with a circle and cross........lol.
Your command of the English language overwhelms me:)
Linda

This is a quote from Bill Hoover at TCNS.
" That is hilarious... I love these parody sites.. Bandwidth theft ROTFLMAO"

For all of you not sure what ROTFLMAO means it means "Rolling on the floor laughing my ass off."
While Bill was rolling around on the floor laughing his ass off apparently he took leave of his senses because he did say we could display his image.......So have at it folks......maybe this will not be so comical when he starts loosing customers over it.

My response to Bill

Thanks Bill,
I am passing the message on......and telling everyone we may use you as a link to this whole mess.......You can rest assured we will.
Linda
Bills Answer back

"Umm I dont get it.. Is this for real? What mess?? I am lost here.. U R joking about "Bandwidth Theft" arent ya? I mean thats what the internet is all about.. A huge network across the planet.. Sharing and helping each other.. Not for bickering about a little bandwidth.. I just dont understand this new whiner mentality.."

Hey Bill there is a giant network of car thieves out there is it ok if they steal your car?.....and would you whine about it?.......bet my boots you would!! And since when is theft any thing but theft?....And since you are suppose to be an internet provider why don't you cough up some of that paid space you sell for the citizens to use to store images and let them link off your site?..............Why don't you become a solution for this company that you maintain you are so closely bound to?