New GSL Announcement

Alzrius said:

Clark, I agree that this could be worse (heck, things can always be worse), but it's somewhat hard to focus on that when things have, up until now, been better than what the GSL is offering in this regard. The OGL itself never had a restriction on what other kinds of products you could write, and even before now the GSL was never said to have this level of restriction.

Yes, things could be worse, but up until now they've been a whole lot better also.

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Alzrius, sorry if I am a little frustrated. I am not frustrated at you. I think you and I have always carried on reasoned debates even if we disagree. I respect your position. I dont not agree with it. I would be happy to discuss it.

I dont see how things are worse today than yesterday. Yesterday, you had the OGL and no GSL. You couldnt make 4E products. All you had was the OGL.

Today, you have the OGL just the same as you did then. And if you dont use the GSL (just like yesterday when it didnt exist) you still continue to use the OGL unabated forever, as was your plan without the GSL.

Instead, today, you have an additional option--you can use the GSL if you forgoe the OGL. You can say no to that. And if you do, you get the OGL just like you had yesterday, unfettered and free and no access to 4E. Just like yesterday.

So today you have a new choice. And EXTRA choice you didnt have yesterday. Now, you may not like that choice. You may wish that use of teh GSL didnt require you to give up the OGL. In a perfect world, I do too. But you cant say you are worse off. Nor was yesterday better. It was the same--you use the OGL exclusively and you have no access to 4E content. Whether you use the OGL and dont have access to 4E content because there is no GSL (yesterday) or because you choose not to use the GSL (today) your right and power to use the OGL is the same.

Orcus said:

I think I am going to just give my defense a rest for a few days.

It has become abundantly clear to me that some people are just going to complain and look a gift horse in the mouth. No matter what they get, it wont be enough.

I dont endorse that thinking at all.

This is not war on the OGL. Go, use the OGL all you want. Your ability to use the OGL today is no different than it was before this announcement and before you had a GSL. If you are happy using the OGL then you shouldnt care about not using the GSL.

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I respect you greatly Clark, but I think you are avoiding the point.
Yeah *I* can go either way. But I'm not talking about ME. I'm talking about the community. Established publishers are being told they must either give away their freedom to publish under the OGL or lose a big portion of their market base that they had up until now.

If you want to say that they had no right to that market base anyway and it was just a gift, then fine. Then look at it a different way. They have the OGL, but WotC is using its name status to bribe/extort (and no, I don't mean those in any criminal sense) existing OGL publishers into giving up that freedom.

This gift horse is of the Trojan variety.

It's not necessarily "illegal" to use sweatshops in Singapore and test chemicals on poor folks in Africa, but the almighty power of capitalism doesn't make it right or indicate people should be happy about it.

Mouseferatu said:

I don't think anyone who actually thinks it through should be mad at WotC. This is, frankly, a smart move. They're already letting other companies use their IP and property; why should they do that and still have those companies driving sales/customers to a system that no longer supports WotC itself?

I'm not at all surprised by this restriction.

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TheLe said:

No SRD man. I wasn't in a position to bribe anyone to get it early.

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I'm not sure what you mean by that, but I have a funny feeling I wont like it.

"bribe" is a pretty strong word. I'd appreciate it if you perhaps reconsidered your word choice.

Lets stick to reasoned discourse and not those kind of insinuations, please, if you dont mind.

BryonD said:

Established publishers are being told they must either give away their freedom to publish under the OGL or lose a big portion of their market base that they had up until now.

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Up till now, they did not have any access to the 4E market base. I'm not sure what you mean by that.

Clark

BryonD said:

I respect you greatly Clark, but I think you are avoiding the point.
Yeah *I* can go either way. But I'm not talking about ME. I'm talking about the community. Established publishers are being told they must either give away their freedom to publish under the OGL or lose a big portion of their market base that they had up until now.

If you want to say that they had no right to that market base anyway and it was just a gift, then fine. Then look at it a different way. They have the OGL, but WotC is using its name status to bribe/extort (and no, I don't mean those in any criminal sense) existing OGL publishers into giving up that freedom.

This gift horse is of the Trojan variety.

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Dont get me wrong, I wish that term wasnt a part of the license. Its not my preference. If you ask me:

Clark, would you prefer:

1. A GSL that let you still use the OGL but just not in the same product, or
2. A GSL that made you forgo ever using the OGL again.

Clearly, I would pick (1).

I think this shows just how close this whole thing was to not being open at all.

Clark

I don't think we should compare serious abuses of corporations that affect human rights and health in the world to that of a game publisher getting a little more control over their content, so can we stop the comparison to sweatshops, medical testing, war and oil companies please. Let's not trivialize the serious.

BryonD said:

This gift horse is of the Trojan variety.

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That may be.

All the more reason not to look in its mouth... (the trap door in the belly, on the other hand, you might want to be ready for).

I wont deny this is a strong play by Wizards. But just in the time I have posted these thoughts, I could probably have come up with one or more workarounds.

BryonD said:

But beyond that, this isn't just leaving 3E behind. They can not take back the OGL. But this is a blatant attempt to burn and pillage and salt the fields of the Open Gaming Community. I think it is ok to be mad at that kind of destructive move.

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We have invested multiple 7 figures in the development of 4e so can you tell me why we would want publishers to support a system that we have moved away from?

This is not spite, malice or some evil scorched earth policy. Yes, we want people to make 4e books and stop making 3.x. Does that surprise you?

It won't surprise me if the GSL is not for everyone. If M&M, C&C, Conan, or other OGL stand-alones are successful enough for those publishers to sustain their business more power to them. You'll get to buy their books in the future. If not, then they can jump on our license and take advantage of some pretty good perks including getting to use the most valuable trademark in PnP RPGs on their products and gain access to our IP/PI.

JohnRTroy said:

I don't think we should compare serious abuses of corporations that affect human rights and health in the world to that of a game publisher getting a little more control over their content, so can we stop the comparison to sweatshops, medical testing, war and oil companies please.

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Agreed. Our nerd rage is up, for sure. But that is stretching it even for the internet