There are a few misconceptions about what is going on here that I better clear up. All of this can be confusing if you are new to this area. It is not my intent to do anything but put up the basic ideas for consideration. Any action must be approved by the Guild administrative board.
1. In the United States and elsewhere when an "artist" creates something, be it a book for a painting, that person receives the legal right (called copyright) to decide how that thing is used or reproduced by others. That artist can grant a license to another person or organization to allow them to display or reproduce that work of art.
Every object and every texture used in Second Life is as much a legal work of art as a novel or painting. This issue is just about copyright and licenses. It is not about which avitar has got the copies of objects. It is very possible for you to "own" in the Second Life sense a copy of an object without having a legal license to use that object. Just as it is possible for you to "own" a pirated DVD without having the legal right to reproduce it.
The only place where avitars might come in to this is that an artist voluntarily giving an avitar a copy of an object with "copy / trans - give away" permissions might be taken, lacking any other agreement, as the artist giving consent to the owner of that avitar to reproduce and distribute their work. The issue is the legal copyright and distribution rights, not what avitar happens to keep backup copies.
2. At the top of this forum there is a link called "New Guild Charter" Please click on it and read it. The New Guild is a voluntary organization, or in european terms, an "NGO". Some people seems to be confused because there was an old branch of the CDS government called the Guild. We are [u:2zudrviy]not[/u:2zudrviy] that organization.
The New Guild is similar in the CDS to the MoCA and the old School organization in that it is entirely private and limited in its activities only when it uses public funds. The Guild does not even have the exclusive right to build new sims for the CDS. It can, if the RA wishes, get a contract to build a sim, but as the debate record very clearly shows, the RA is free to go elsewhere for that work.
3. There is absolutely nothing in the charter that allows the New Guild to hold the rights to or own any objects in the CDS. Since it is not mentioned, the New Guild was not granted those rights by the government. The charter has been posted in the CDS forum for everyone to read since February 2007.
4. The New Guild does not actually own any copyright license rights to the objects (public buildings, bridges, and roads) in the CDS at the moment. In order to obtain those rights, say to Colonia Nova, it would have to go to each artist (Moon, Sudane, Brian, Tony and myself) and ask each of us to sign an agreement.
The New Guild did not exist when NFS or CN was built. It is a private organization that started only this year. Before the New Guild, all of us did our building directly for the CDS under the supervision of an organization that was branch of government. In light of this, we need to consider:
a. Are all the artists willing to hand over (use and reproduction) rights to an organization that did not exist and is not chartered to hold that property at the time of creation? What would be acceptable to the artists?
b. The New Guild has limited means of enforcement: It could threaten them with explusion from the Guild. It could also forbid them to donate their work on new projects.
c. Since the work for the Guild is generally unpaid, motivation and desire to help is the main motivating force - and any agreement has to reflect this.
