[Gleemax]Another thing not to like.

[Lalato]

What's stopping you from posting a link to your work that is outside of Gleemax? Nothing. So if you really want to get exposure on Gleemax, you can post a link instead of the actual content.

Presumably, someone that is looking to publish their work will already have a website elsewhere... so publishing there and providing a link shouldn't be a problem.

I guess I'm not understanding the uproar over this.
--sam

 

[guildofblades]

>>What's stopping you from posting a link to your work that is outside of Gleemax? Nothing. So if you really want to get exposure on Gleemax, you can post a link instead of the actual content.

Presumably, someone that is looking to publish their work will already have a website elsewhere... so publishing there and providing a link shouldn't be a problem.

I guess I'm not understanding the uproar over this.<<

Well, the problem I see is, from what I read of their stance thus far on terms of use is, they reserve the right to do anything they please with anything you post. That's a free grant of copyright, which you are right, you can simply link off site instead to avoid that and a few folks might follow the links to read it.

But the bigger problem is, in claiming the right to use "anything" you post, that is also extending into trademark usage. Essentially a free grant of use of another company's trademark.

That would be akin to WOTC being invited to participate in an industry forum community held by my company. Assuming I had a similar terms of service and assuming an official from WOTC actually posted, well, anything with the Dungeons & Dragons name on it, suddenly I would have a free license to utilize the Dungeons & Dragons name any way I pleased. Sure, they still own it, but boy, I could go to town with the possibilities of having rights to use that name. Officially published D&D material, I could sell licenses to computer game studios, novelists and others to utilize the official D&D name, etc. And that could foul up a lot of things from them. And that could all materialize out of a simple post that said, "hey, we have this new Dungeons & Dragons product available. Click on this link to our site to read more".

Obviously WOTC would NOT participate on a site that empowered the site owner thusly. Nor should WOTC have any expectation that any other publisher would participate in their site under said terms.

Its their sad box ultimately so they will do as they please. If they desire it to only be a fan site for their own game properties, then said terms of service could work. It would be up to the individual fans to decide if they had anything worth potentially losing by posting and in actuality it would basically be like a OGL environment for all WOTC properties anyway. But their initial press releases suggested they want this to be a community site for the whole of the gaming hobby, including for other publishers and the fans of non WOTC games as well. If that is their goal, their sad box will remain rather empty with the existing terms of service.

Ryan S. Johnson
Guild of Blades Publishing Group
http://www.guildofblades.com
http://www.1483online.com
http://www.thermopylae-online.com

 

[Brown Jenkin]

I am a supporter of the idea of the site and I hope it works. I am also on the side that thinks this ToS is a dealbreaker. If WotC either wants gleemax to be a WotC site or if they want to reuse ideas posted about thier own game systems that is fine by me. But if WotC wants this to be a general site then they need to change the ToS to at a minimun only allow WotC to reuse things that directly relate to thier games and not to other peoples games, systems, artwork, fiction, etc.

 

[Rawhide]

if you want to know why wotc feels the need to do this, look up darikover and "ffan fiction." F0or whatever other sins she may be guilty of, marioN Zimmer Bradley didn;t deserve to be threatened to be sued by a fan just because she allowed and read fan ficition. MZB was unable to publish a book because of that, since her publisher wasnt willing to take the risk.

If wotc doesn't do this, someone will sue them someday. period. full stop.

 

[Felix]

I'm sure the argument over the TOS is very interesting, bud does anyone have anything to say about this question:

Is there anything that the Gleemax boards provide that ENWorld doesn't already? For those of you who post to both boards, what does Gleemax offer that you can't find at ENWorld?

Bueller? Bueller?

 

[Kem]

But the bigger problem is, in claiming the right to use "anything" you post, that is also extending into trademark usage. Essentially a free grant of use of another company's trademark.

Well so far as I am able to tell (I don't have the ToS in full form atm) this is not the case.

The "can use without consent" refers to things you post that you have full rights to post, IE they have to be YOURS.

Unless you yourself own the trademark they can't touch it. Just as if you don't own the IP they can't touch it.

Although that sounds a lot like the OGL, so I might be getting it mixed up. I really want to see the full ToS before I decide its the debil.

Prolly should have done their research better, eh?

Actually you should have done your research into knowing they where going to make that feat before you published it.

And on top of that, how can it be known YOU came up with it and not WotC, which you just copied by breaking into their office or by getting a playtest version or maybe by hearing someone from WotC talking about it.

What PROOF could you have that you came up with it first, without PROVING that the people at WotC didn't already have it on the table? Because thats exactly what you are doing.

 

[Kem]

if you want to know why wotc feels the need to do this, look up darikover and "ffan fiction." F0or whatever other sins she may be guilty of, marioN Zimmer Bradley didn;t deserve to be threatened to be sued by a fan just because she allowed and read fan ficition. MZB was unable to publish a book because of that, since her publisher wasnt willing to take the risk.

If wotc doesn't do this, someone will sue them someday. period. full stop.

Thank you, I couldn't remember the author's name. I was thinking of this incident but couldn't for the life of me remember anything but the fact that fan fiction stopped her from making money from things SHE owned.

 

[Moon_Goddess]

Exactly the reason for all of this.


Everyone's panicing about WOTC is gonna steal my stuff.

They're just trying to protect themselves. This is standard operating procedure for any company. Actually it's a lot nicer than standard.


Standard rules for any company that's hired a lawyer worth his pay:
"Never use our IP, on our site or any other and if you post anything to our site we own it" That's just the way it is, they have to protect themselves.

The new Gleemax rules are freindlier but still writen to protect themselves.
"You can now use our IP, but only if you use it on Gleemax only, and well let you own the things you make that don't have our IP, but we want to be able to use it to just in case." It's basically them taking as much risk as they possibly can without being idiots.

 

[guildofblades]

>>If wotc doesn't do this, someone will sue them someday. period. full stop.<<

Business is about risks. If they feel the risks are too high, then they shouldn't be saying they are trying to offer a broad based community site for the whole industry when their terms of service very clearly are saying they won't accept the risks that can sometimes entail. Going about a business concept half assed is a sure fire way to fail at it.

Accept the nominal risks of doing business or don't bother doing business.

Ryan S. Johnson
Guild of Blades Publishing Group
http://www.guildofblades.com
http://www.1483online.com
http://www.thermopylae-online.com

 

[GSHamster]

>>If wotc doesn't do this, someone will sue them someday. period. full stop.<<

Business is about risks. If they feel the risks are too high, then they shouldn't be saying they are trying to offer a broad based community site for the whole industry when their terms of service very clearly are saying they won't accept the risks that can sometimes entail. Going about a business concept half assed is a sure fire way to fail at it.

Accept the nominal risks of doing business or don't bother doing business.

You know, if you don't like the conditions, you don't have to participate. You are also free to attempt to make your own variant of Gleemax, with whatever rules you deem proper.