The OGL 1.1 is not an Open License

[Reynard]

of course the BIG elephants in the room is "Do I want to spend money against Hasbro law teams to prove I am right even if I know I am?"

The real question is why people think WotC wants to spend a bunch of money they don't have to just to alienate their 3PP network and some portion of their fanbase. It doesn't make sense.

What makes sense is WotC betting big on Beyond and their VTT and using that to leverage 3PP to help get people into.that ecosystem. Hence the NDA emails.

 

[pemerton]

the argument I am forseeing (again not a lawyer) is that we offer a license to use X and a license to use Y now they are trying to use license for X to make Y. Just phrased better and most likely with precedent quoted

I don't think that's an argument.

If WotC have licensed you (via the OGL 1.0a) to write a book that includes stats for Orcs and horses as published by WotC in their SRD, they don't obtain any further control over what you include in your book unless that was a term of the licence agreement. The most important such term of the OGL 1.0a is section 7 on Product Identity - but your promise not to use anyone else's Product Identity doesn't mean you've promised not to include new races with flexible stats. I haven't seen any argument that having flexible state bonuses is WotC Product Identity.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I think that you are treating the current OGL (v 1.0/1.0a) as if it were a statute. It's not. It's a private legal agreement. WotC is not bound, in respect of its future offers, by the terms of its old offers - except with respect to people who took up those old offers, and hence entered into a contractual relationship with WotC. The fact that WotC has promised Paizo that Paizo can use the 3.5 SRD under any future version of the OGL doesn't mean that, if WotC now licenses its 5.5 SRD to you under the OGL 1.1, that WotC is obliged to also let you use the 5.5 SRD under the terms of the OGL 1.0. (Unless the OGL 1.1 says so. Presumably it won't.)

This is the part I don't understand... and it appears there are people arguing both ways. Is teh OGL always able to use every SRD, or can they make a new OGL/SRD separate from the old one.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

The real question is why people think WotC wants to spend a bunch of money they don't have to just to alienate their 3PP network and some portion of their fanbase. It doesn't make sense.

What makes sense is WotC betting big on Beyond and their VTT and using that to leverage 3PP to help get people into.that ecosystem. Hence the NDA emails.

I don't know. I am trying to understand both arguments but both of you seem to have good points

 

[Reynard]

I don't agree with your second paragraph, when you say "it's largely going to be an issue of . . .".

As I said in my post, I think the most obvious argument that it is not a version is that it does not permit licensees to sub-license the rights that the OGL v 1.0/1.0a requires them to. An instrument that generates obligations at odds with those of another instrument doesn't seem to me to count as a version of that other instrument.


I think that you are treating the current OGL (v 1.0/1.0a) as if it were a statute. It's not. It's a private legal agreement. WotC is not bound, in respect of its future offers, by the terms of its old offers - except with respect to people who took up those old offers, and hence entered into a contractual relationship with WotC. The fact that WotC has promised Paizo that Paizo can use the 3.5 SRD under any future version of the OGL doesn't mean that, if WotC now licenses its 5.5 SRD to you under the OGL 1.1, that WotC is obliged to also let you use the 5.5 SRD under the terms of the OGL 1.0. (Unless the OGL 1.1 says so. Presumably it won't.)

How do you think WotC is coming under the obligation that you say it is under, in relation to future offerees/licensees?

The OGL says that. Explicitly. WotC could absolutely create a new license, open or otherwise, and try and control it that way. They did that once. It failed and tanked their 3PP support and created Pathfinder.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I don't think that's an argument.

If WotC have licensed you (via the OGL 1.0a) to write a book that includes stats for Orcs and horses as published by WotC in their SRD, they don't obtain any further control over what you include in your book unless that was a term of the licence agreement. The most important such term of the OGL 1.0a is section 7 on Product Identity - but your promise not to use anyone else's Product Identity doesn't mean you've promised not to include new races with flexible stats. I haven't seen any argument that having flexible state bonuses is WotC Product Identity.

maybe my example isn't the best... maybe new subclass set ups (different levels for abilities) can I make a 1D&D cleric subclass that works off the new line up useing the old OGL? if I stood in court and the other side showed "the class in the SRD linked to this OGL gets things at X Y and Z, but in this OTHER OGL the srd linked to it gets them at A B and C, so you can't use the old OGL/SRD for the new set up"
does THAT make it more of an argument?

 

[GMforPowergamers]

The OGL says that. Explicitly. WotC could absolutely create a new license, open or otherwise, and try and control it that way. They did that once. It failed and tanked their 3PP support and created Pathfinder.

So walk with me for a moment and help me make sure I am clear.
a new OGL with an new SRD comes out. this new one is for 1D&D with all the little tweaks we already know about and some new ones we don't
MY choices are to release a 5e (old OGL/SRD) content or use the new one for 1D&D?
OR
I can have my cake and eat it too by making it 1D&D content using the OGL/SRD from 5e?

 

[Reynard]

maybe my example isn't the best... maybe new subclass set ups (different levels for abilities) can I make a 1D&D cleric subclass that works off the new line up useing the old OGL? if I stood in court and the other side showed "the class in the SRD linked to this OGL gets things at X Y and Z, but in this OTHER OGL the srd linked to it gets them at A B and C, so you can't use the old OGL/SRD for the new set up"
does THAT make it more of an argument?

You are ignoring the explicit wording in Section 9. They can only close off the 1D&D SRD if they make OGL 1.1 an explicitly different license.

More to the point they don't have any reason to. They aren't after Grim Press level money. They are trying to tie 1D&D to their platform model-- Beyond and the VTT. That they specifically called out non book, non PDF support for D&D all but proves that (with the repeated caveat that OGL 1.1 is obviously not complete and we know they are talking to at least some 3PPs).

 

[Reynard]

So walk with me for a moment and help me make sure I am clear.
a new OGL with an new SRD comes out. this new one is for 1D&D with all the little tweaks we already know about and some new ones we don't
MY choices are to release a 5e (old OGL/SRD) content or use the new one for 1D&D?
OR
I can have my cake and eat it too by making it 1D&D content using the OGL/SRD from 5e?

According to Section 9, if it is in fact an updated version of the OGL, and the 1D&D SRD is released under it, you can use the 1D&D SRD with v 1.0 of the OGL.

BUT, if OGL 1.1 is a NEW license, that's not true. I.imagine there are some shenanigans in there defining update versus new, and that's where the lawyers come in.

 

[Alzrius]

I don't agree with your second paragraph, when you say "it's largely going to be an issue of . . .".

As I said in my post, I think the most obvious argument that it is not a version is that it does not permit licensees to sub-license the rights that the OGL v 1.0/1.0a requires them to. An instrument that generates obligations at odds with those of another instrument doesn't seem to me to count as a version of that other instrument.

Well, we don't know what the OGL v1.1 will or will not permit, since it hasn't been released yet.

That said, the issue you bring up regarding "sublicensing" (which as a term only comes up in Section 13, noting that all such sublicenses shall survive termination if you fail to comply with the license), presuming I'm understanding you correctly, looks to be predicated on the idea that a 1D&D SRD is a "derivative work" of an existing SRD (presumably one of the two published for 5E). That's a possible interpretation, but I'm not necessarily sure that would be the case, at least insofar as the definition in Section 1(b) is concerned; one could say that such a 1D&D SRD is an independent creation, particularly since WotC (as owner of both SRDs) would be in a position to assert whether or not the development of one required "translation [...] potation, modification, correction, addition, extension, upgrade, improvement, compilation, abridgment," or other form of recasting, transforming, or adapting of the other.

Admittedly, that might sound odd, but if what they did was make the non-licensed 1D&D rules unto themselves into an SRD, rather than modify (et al) a 5E SRD, that could make it a non-derivative product with regard to licensed material.