-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- On 4 Dec 1996, Ryan Russell/SYBASE wrote:

A graphic-designer friend of mine and I were talking about VRML avatars, and custom design work, and could he offer a service designing them etc...

His worry is that since everyone in the same virtual environment as his customer would see the designer avatar, wouldn't they also be able to easily rip off his work? (or his customer's property, take your pick.)

I wasn't sure...it seems to me that I read something vaguely along these lines for a cryptography protocol of some sort.. The problem is this: Is there a way for a user to "view" the client's avatar (and in this sense, the user usually has to receive a copy of the code to render the avatar and render it on the local machine) but not save a copy? Assume that a client with no save feature is not a viable option...too easy to work around.

Well, its concievable to write your own client, and make the code such that it only works with that client... I know, it kindof sucks, doesn't it?

I suppose an analogy would be: Is there a way for a person to see the plaintext, but not record it? I think that question really answers itself - no. How about alternatives? If the server of the environment only renders "views" (say, certain angles, or a bitmap) of the avatar, rather than sending the description file?

Any other thoughts?

Ryan

--Deviant PGP KeyID = E820F015 Fingerprint = 3D6AAB628E3DFAA9 F7D35736ABC56D39 "First things first -- but not necessarily in that order" -- The Doctor, "Doctor Who" -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 iQEVAwUBMqZOczCdEh3oIPAVAQHEAwf+IZ4KzMjcmb8t/HTMBvp83ChZ0VLS6xa3 +OwtpvkVGnuD4AJ+ayvDS10u4oAx78OillYDPolz6Gpnv0L+KDseo0sz7Yhgvepp HwUw4UqMDBu9BMfkITFs6IS773EIgC8JmIf8/u6xEH/tvUjl44RQlgX+YE1Ybhvq cGo3dF60fdiYzmoYvYESrMo9ldr97bImSjUE46bd4ZrtHjVTqDB75r9Uhb38SPWD SdEi6rdC4sX1dY9zdJHIruhIM5BBpZcHX9Vo8cOSvzZY1s7rHXVQgb34rIcUcx7T 2GJTeJsTS2boi9O0urkKW8FIZtq82AnBk5WsavRtEIw0O5pC0jhR2g== =aWWo -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

At 3:32 PM -0500 12/5/96, Nelson Minar wrote:

Ah, the age-old question. This is the same question as "is there a way for me to show a web page to someone and not let them copy it?", "is there a way I can loan someone my CD and not let them copy it?", etc. If you have control of the viewer, the answer is trivially yes. If you don't, then it's not.

Digital watermarks / fingerprints are one alternative - if someone steals it, you can at least prove whom it was stolen from. Or you ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ might be able to exploit some of the structure of VRML to show people an avatar but not ever reveal the *whole* thing for copying. But in general, this sort of problem seems to demand a social solution (intellectual property law), not technical.

Yes, you can perhaps show whom it was stolen _from_, i.e., the creator, but not _who_ stole it. Even in the case where each end recipient receives a uniquely watermarked or marked image, e.g., where N different instances of the work are instantiated, there are ways to obscure the source of the theft (or leak, when one is using such techniques to detect leaks of confidential information, a la the famous "canary traps"). To whit, M recipients of the work can compare their copies and remove or modify the bits which don't match up. This then yields only a "collusion set" the original creator can narrow things down to. Enough to cast doubt on the M recipients, but probably not enough to "probabalistically convict" them of a crime, unless the crime is "conspiracy." An interesting question. As Nelson notes, not something with easy technical solutions. --Tim May Just say "No" to "Big Brother Inside" We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, I know that that ain't allowed. ---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---- Timothy C. May | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money, tcmay@got.net 408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA | knowledge, reputations, information markets, Higher Power: 2^1398269 | black markets, collapse of governments. "National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."