Thanks to those who didn't doubt (long)
Greetings,
As the author of the so-called "controversial" work in question, I would just like to confirm what Vernon said: as of yesterday, Wizards of the Coast officially notified myself and my publisher, CreateSpace, that they were withdrawing the DMCA Notice that they had placed against my book. The title is already back up for sale via the CreateSpace store and will, I imagine, be back up for sale via Amazon within another day or so (not sure why that transition is slow, Amazon owns CreateSpace). Please note that the Kindle Edition is available as well. In fact, it was never targeted as part of the DMCA Notice.
I would like to thank everyone who believed in my efforts during this pleasantly brief and amicable review by WotC's lawyers. As a graduate student in Emerson College's Publishing & Writing program, I fully support publishers' rights to defend their intellectual property. I bear WotC no ill will and wish to thank them for the speed with which they reviewed both my work and the arguments towards its legality that I had presented to them. As I always maintained, I had done my research and I was positive that my work was legal. Anything else that I have ever said that could be interpreted differently would be a case either of someone misunderstanding my words or me not being clear enough. Legal mumbo jumbo is (usually) best left to the lawyers.
Please note that the cover is undergoing slight revision in order to enhance some DPI issues and the interior file will be receiving a brief addendum detailing the legal process the book just went through. As a result, the title may not be available for sale for a few days after those files are uploaded to CreateSpace and Kindle Direct Publishing later this evening. I find it odd that CreateSpace and KDP cannot leave the previous edition up for sale while the next is being reviewed by them but *shrug* it's beyond my control. A simple toggle switch of "Would you like to keep the current edition available while we review this one?" would be an improvement to their processes, imo. For those looking to order copies in the near future, I ask for your patience while these review processes are completed.
I have sent Michael of Neuroglyph games a copy of the book and eagerly await his review, if he feels the work worthy of such, on this site. If any other book reviewers are interested in obtaining a review copy, please PM me your name, company/site name, email address, and address and I will consider the request.
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Regarding how the book came to WotC's attention, I care not one whit at all. I always knew that it would and planned for such (after all, Britt Frey, former Living Greyhawk Circle member and contributor to my book, is Facebook friends with WotC employee Chris Tulach [and probably others]). HOWEVER, the person who publicly claimed to have brought the book to WotC's attention has also publicly stated (
The Piazza • View topic - Living Greyhawk/Bandit Kingdoms book has been published!):
Chatdemon said:
In order to preserve the community and prevent a massive crackdown by WotC, I was the one who reported the violation to them, resulting in the C&D. Further contact is planned to deal with the sites and groups within the community that are encouraging this blatant IP theft and similar book piracy that is going on.
Emphasis mine. I expect Chatdemon/Rich to make a public apology on every forum in which he used similar language to disparage my work. He did so WITHOUT having read it or knowing the legal situations involved. At the least, his words were arrogant and ignorant.
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With 31 regions, there was a VAST amount of material created for the Living Greyhawk campaign during its 8-year run. It is my belief that, since the 80s, there was never another time when so many people were playing in Greyhawk. Alas, WotC's decision to move forward with 4th edition spelled the end of the campaign. As they are unlikely, imo, to organize efforts such as mine (quite frankly, they probably wouldn't sell enough copies to justify their time and expense), the burden falls on those of us who served as volunteer campaign administrators to preserve the legacy of Living Greyhawk. Although it has been nearly four years since the end of the Living Greyhawk campaign, I hope that my book's example will encourage other past-Triad and Circle members to compile similar documents for their regions and meta-regions and I encourage any who wish to do so to contact me regarding my experiences with this project.
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There were some interesting questions about the work brought up in this thread which I’d like to address.
This is the second time it went out of print. It
also went out of print on the 25th of April. But that time the message from CreateSpace was different.
I had uploaded the second edition (final typo corrections) to CreateSpace at that time. While Skip and I worked very hard to find every typo before the book went live, we missed a few. As I have learned in grad school, that's not that unusual. The beauty of Print on Demand is that you can usually update your book with corrections very quickly.
I haven't read the work itself, and that makes commenting on it uncertain. However, I've read the description of the product, and I've read many posts by the author. The author has many misconceptions as to how copyright (and trademark) work, and I've been told (objection! hearsay!) that he believes this is a clear case of educational fair use. Besides the dangers generally of relying on fair use, I don't see how he falls under the definitions provided by the guidelines, and (again, hearsay) he appears to be quite arrogant in his belief that he's right (ignoring what lawyers have told him), suggesting he's going to press this issue in court.
Emphasis again mine. In the end, I was right in my beliefs that my work was legal—my apparent misconceptions as to how copyright (and trademark) work notwithstanding. Perhaps one day I’ll release the communications that occurred between me and WotC’s lawyers as a case study for Frylock to examine (after he has purchased a copy of the book, naturally
).
Oh, also, my Kickstarter comments were totally tongue-in-cheek, just as Vincent’s had been. Lost in transmission if you don’t know me, I guess. I sometimes forget that lawyers don’t have much of a sense of humor (that’s a joke, please don’t sue me!).
The fact that Frylock and others followed the Canonfire FB thread served as an excellent reminder that my work might have some sort of interest and impact greater than the sum of its LG BK parts, interest I hadn't really anticipated. This was really just a vanity project that I decided to publish instead of sending to
The Oerth Journal for various reasons. I will leave the historical significance discussions, if any, to future scholars. (Can you tell I had to read a lot of academic books on Shakespeare and Chaucer this semester? Heh.)
As for my commentary on it:
I think you had to be there. I think this book would probably rewarm fond memories for the people who wrote the adventures, and presumably the people who played through them.
…
The one somewhat interesting section for someone who wasn't in this campaign (e.g., me) is the 10-page "Timeline of Major Bandit Kingdom Events". I'm not sure these 10 pages are worth the $10 I gave Amazon, but it's definitely worth reading. Some of the ideas here really made me smile, about connections to other parts of the wide world of Greyhawk. It sounds like the BK LG people had a good, fun campaign.
Examples:
-- Alhaster and Prince Zeech references, hinting at a connection to the Age of Worms Adventure Path from WOTC.
-- Canceri plane references, hinting a connection to the Shackled City Adventure Path from WOTC
-- References to Tharizdun, Hextor, the Horned Society, Rovers of the Barrens, Shield Lands, lots of good stuff.
At the end of day, I doubt I will use much if anything from the timeline, but it was a fun read.
I’m glad you enjoyed it! The book was definitely initially targeted at a very small audience, those who played Living Greyhawk Bandit Kingdoms adventures. I was hoping that a few others who hadn’t might find the book interesting and, more importantly perhaps, useful. I’m particularly proud of the Timeline as I think it provides the first comprehensive view of what was occurring in the region during the Greyhawk Wars. Of course, most of that is extrapolated from canonical sources as I attempted to answer questions like, “How did Cranzer end up in Riftcrag and Xavendra in Groucester? Why were no Greater Bonehearts present during the sweep across the BK? Why is Aundurach a Lesser Boneheart when we have never heard of him before?” etc. Sometimes, these backstories were buried in various LG BK mods while others I created to make sense of the gaps in
Iuz the Evil and the
Living Greyhawk Gazetteer. Gygax’s old articles about the BK and Horned Society lands in
Dragon really provided the inspiration to flesh out these details.
Re: Age of Worms, as someone else said, it is Paizo-canon, not LG canon. As such, it had no impact on Living Greyhawk’s stories or characters. HOWEVER, at the urging of Britt Frey, we did give a nod to Age of Worms by using the same name they used for Zeech’s brother.
Re: Shackled City, Theo may have been following that adventure path and it may have influenced some ideas he had re: the That Which Slept imprisonment plot arc. More likely, however, is the fact that Carceri is something of a plane of imprisonment, one known for its darkness (a fitting theme since we envisioned That Which Slept’s prison to be made out of shadows and force).
I'm not an IP lawyer but, when I first read the Facebook thread I went right to the Living Greyhawk Gazetteer. The stuff above particularly named NPC's and named Greyhawk locations I see as copyright protected material.
Keep in mind that it’s one thing to claim IP protection but quite another for it to be actually legally true. Frylock can probably speak to this with more clarity should he choose to. My guess is that this was standard legalese at this time even if it wouldn’t stand up in court. Thus, it served as discouragement without having any real legal teeth. Alternatively, maybe they did have things trademarked back then which they don’t have trademarked now.
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Thanks again to those who supported me and for the kind words from those who have read the work and enjoyed it. To those who will purchase the book, I hope you enjoy it!
Hail, Iuz!
aurdraco
