Cryoban and copybot

Today I put "Cryoban" in the mall. Cryoban is a script that will detect and ban users of the Cryolife viewer (Cryo viewer), an obsolete viewer that is no longer useful for any purpose other than content theft (copybotting). If you are using it, please change: you won't be able to get in!

The copybot issue is not an easy one. To show you the textures, objects and sounds, your computer has to download them, so if it's not from the viewer, these can be grabbed at lower levels, down to your hardware. And even if the hardware prevents that, hardware can be modified by skilled people (think about your modified PSX).

You hate copybotters? You understand that copybotting frustrates creators out of Second Life? There are things you can do!

• If you are an owner, don't allow copybotters to sell stuff on your land, and ban them.
• If you are a creator, don't sell stuff on land admin' by copybotters or where they are allowed to sell.
• If you are none of the above, don't buy or hang around on land admin' by copybotters or where they are allowed to sell. Leave right away. Don't give them traffic or money.

So, how to find out someone is a copybotter? Look at the store, the vendors, inspect their contents. Inspect objects, inspect what people wear. Look at the creators profile. There are some clues:

• High quality products in a crappy store.
• High quality products in a crappy vendor. Specially beware of floating text (= creator can't make textures).
  
• Creator's profile is empty.
• Creator belongs to groups like freebies or zyngo.
• Creator belongs to no merchant groups.
• Creator has no link to his store in his picks.
• Creator has no store and is selling his products on the go.
  
• Creator was born quite recently.
  
• Creator didn't care about providing even little information in English in his profile.
• Product is full perm. Full perm products are most likely to become free, and no guenine creator wants that from the start.

I hope it helps! (^ ^)