New GSL Announcement

Mourn said:

One thing I would like to point out is that Mayfair Games was found guilty of trademark agreement violations in some of their "AD&D compatible" products, but not all. So, there is precedent for non-licensed "support" products being a violation of trademark rights, which would potentially work against anyone trying something like that today.

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Not true.

Mayfair published a series of unlicensed AD&D adventures. TSR sued.

As the case neared trial, TSR's lawyers decided that they were unlikely to win. As long as you observe a few reasonable restrictions, there's nothing in the law to stop you from producing supplements compatible with somebody else's game system. In fact, you can even use the system's trademark to indicate compatibility--"suitable for use with Dungeons & Dragons"--so long as there is no chance that a reasonable consumer would mistake your product for an official D&D product. (This is known as "fair use." It's why companies like Belkin can label some of their products as "suitable for use with iPod," for instance.) Convincing the court that the Mayfair products were likely to be mistaken as official TSR releases wasn't going to be easy.

Once TSR's lawyers decided that they were unlikely to win they offered Mayfair a settlement before the lawsuit went to trial--TSR agreed to grant Mayfair a perepetual royalty free license to produce AD&D material. TSR offered the settlement to avoid expensive litigation, to remove the risk that they might go to trial and lose (thus establishing a precedent and clearly signalling to every other publisher in the industry that they could all produce AD&D-compatible products), and to exercise at least some control over what Mayfair was doing (the license included some additional restrictions on Mayfair's product line). Mayfair accepted the settlement to avoid costly litigation and to secure a somewhat unique position in the industry. (They alone would possess a license to produce AD&D material; others would have to brave legal uncertainty and stand up to TSR's lawyers to produce their own AD&D-compatible product.)

Mayfair merrily operated under this license for several years.

Eventually, TSR filed another lawsuit alleging that some of Mayfair's products were not honoring the terms of the license. Before this second case was resolved, Mayfair decided to exit the RPG business altogether. TSR and Mayfair settled the suit by agreeing that TSR would purchase all rights to Mayfair's AD&D product line (effectively buying back the AD&D license as well). In fact, a couple of AD&D manuscripts that I commissioned for Mayfair (Chronomancer and Shaman) were later published by TSR.

Thus, Mayfair was never found "guilty" of anything--there was never even a trial.

Alzrius said:

I'm not a lawyer, but I believe this is only true regarding trademarks, which is something else altogether from the situation with D&D and the GSL.

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It's only true regarding commercial use of trade marks. Even then it doesn't apply when the use is descriptive, to indicate compatibility - "compatible with the dungeons & dragons (R) game published by WotC" doesn't threaten WoTC's mark, quite the reverse.

The kind of case where it does apply is a vacuum cleaner manufacturer calling their product 'hoovers'; Hoover needs to stop that or the term hoover becomes generic and loses TM protection.

Orcus said:

It doesnt take the OGL to create druids, bards, monks, barbarians, gnomes and half-orcs.

So, short answer, I anticipate having NO PROBLEM with the Advanced Players Guide.

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I don't remember exactly where I read it, so please don't make me look it up...

But wasn't one of the restrictions of the GSL something of a "don't step on WotC's planned content?"

Yes, I am well aware that my wording isn't the greatest... But I wasn't paying much attention to that part of the announcement/discussion. But it involved something of a "publishers can't print material we have planned."

Hey,

Just want to let you know I have not forgotten about this. It's almost midnight here at GAMA and I just got back from eating diner.

Today was a little nuts. Got up at 6am, drove to SeaTac airport for a 9am flight to Vegas. Talked to a couple people at the office about the GSL before the flight, worked on my 4e presentation on the plane. Landed at 11:30, cabs line at the airport and check-in lines at the hotel (no your room is not ready yet) and it is now 12:30. Grab lunch and then head up to the Skyview room to set up the WotC meet and greet. Meet and greet with retailers from 3-5:30. Talk with Linae around 5:30 about the GSL then break down the room. 6pm down to the lobby, got my room! Up to my room, track down Jesse Decker to get my bag from his room. 6:30 have my bags and my room, call the family and say goodnight to the kids. Change into jeans and a clean shirt, in the lobby at 7:30 o go to dinner. 12 am back at the room holy crap where did my day go?

Needless to say my day was busy, I don't have anything new to add. Aside from being here (and 8 hours of meetings tomorrow) this is my number 1 priority. As soon as I have something I'll let you know.

Hang in there!

Orcus said:

It doesnt take the OGL to create druids, bards, monks, barbarians, gnomes and half-orcs.

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Somehow I have difficulties believing that the GSL will actually let you do that, i.e. specifically pre-empting Wizards' own upcoming products.

WinningerR said:

Thus, Mayfair was never found "guilty" of anything--there was never even a trial.

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Hmm, I could have sworn I read a judgement (preliminary finding?) that Mayfair were liable for breach of contract re the TM license. It looked like Mayfair got screwed over badly by the earlier settlement, which put TSR in a much stronger position than they would have been in without any license.

Which may be relevant to the GSL.

WinningerR said:

Eventually, TSR filed another lawsuit alleging that some of Mayfair's products were not honoring the terms of the license. Before this second case was resolved, Mayfair decided to exit the RPG business altogether. TSR and Mayfair settled the suit by agreeing that TSR would purchase all rights to Mayfair's AD&D product line (effectively buying back the AD&D license as well). In fact, a couple of AD&D manuscripts that I commissioned for Mayfair (Chronomancer and Shaman) were later published by TSR.

Thus, Mayfair was never found "guilty" of anything--there was never even a trial.

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That's too bad. I really like their Role Aid products.

Thanks for posting Scott; It is great to hear you are on the case with the GSL issue.

I am sorry we are causing you SO much trouble, but at least we are interested in what WoTC are doing! I bet sometimes you could do without our "interest" though.

SSquirrel said:

If programmers or OGL game offers really dont' want their work to be open source, they need to not use an open license. Utilizing an open license says you don't care if others make use of your hard work.

I do think that repackaging the entire SRD for pocket PHBs and nothing new was taking advantage of the license tho. It's perfectly valid by the license, but IMO pretty lame.

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But that was something the originators of the OGL were very aware of.

There was a retailer seminar at Gen Con (either in 1999 after the 3e announcement or in 2000 when 3e appeared) where Ryan Dancey explained the implications of open gaming to store owners. He was asked that very question by one of the attendees.
"Don't you fear that someone just makes his own PHB"?
And the anwer was (and I am paraphasing as I don't remember the exact wording), "Let them do that. We will always beat them in terms of printing quality, artwork, design, and price." (The PHB was 19.95 $ back then...)

Nevertheless, I was awaiting something along the lines of the Mongoose Pocket PHB much sooner than it appeared! I still can't believe how long it took.

SSquirrel said:

Stingrays are very nice. I was buying my first bass last year and really dug the look of the Fender Jaguar bass (would go w/my Jazzmaster guitar nicely) but a trip left us broker than expected, so I bought the Squire 70s Modified Vintage Jazz Bass. Definitely doesn't play like a $280 bass

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I have a red Fender Jazz 5-string bass. I'm a guitarist but playing that bass is so much fun, as long as the low B is in tune. Man, I gotta go play that thing.

On topic, thanks for the update, Scott.