D&D General WotC is at it again

[FrogReaver]

To clarify, as others didn't - they aren't claiming ownership. They are claiming license, which is not at all the same thing.

Or, to be even more specific, in posting to their site, you are agreeing to grant them license.

Don't want to give them license? Don't put it on D&D Beyond.

Ideally the license could be a bit less far reaching as well. Like if I post on D&D Beyond I obviously want my crap to be shared on D&D Beyond, but not shared for only god knows what else, i'm not really on board with that.

 

[AnotherGuy]

To clarify, as others didn't - they aren't claiming ownership. They are claiming license, which is not at all the same thing.

Or, to be even more specific, in posting to their site, you are agreeing to grant them license.

Don't want to give them license? Don't put it on D&D Beyond.

In a practical sense what is the effective difference?
Can WotC use you ideas to sell new product without paying you royalties?

From my rather limited understanding of that clause it appears yes.

 

[Morrus]

Didn't they have such terms since the Gleeman forums?

Side Story: Remember when WOTC did a contest for a new setting for D&D 3e? Well, I submitted an outline as per the guidelines and signed away my rights. The 'Points of Light' setting for 4e is strangely familiar to what I sent as a proposal. During a move, I lost my self-addressed envelop with the proposal inside. I can never prove this. Not that I would try to sue them. Just claiming a bit of D&D design fame would be cool. (or maybe it's just coincidence.)

I've heard half a dozen people say the same thing. Did you copy their work? Should they sue you? (No of course you didn't; but it turns out the concept isn't particularly unique and precisely illustrates why terms like this exist).

 

[Morrus]

In a practical sense what is the effective difference?
Can WotC use you ideas to sell new product without paying you royalties?

From my rather limited understanding of that clause it appears yes.

Yes (though they don't want it), but the important bit is that they can't stop you using your content, because you still own it. That's the difference between a license and ownership, and why it's important to distinguish between the them. They're different things, with different effects.

 

[Morrus]

Ideally the license could be a bit less far reaching as well. Like if I post on D&D Beyond I obviously want my crap to be shared on D&D Beyond, but not shared for only god knows what else, i'm not really on board with that.

That's basically so if they move platform in a few years, they can move the user content too; or if they are acquired, or sell the platform to somebody, they can legally transfer the content. Otherwise they'd have to delete it all--and guess what? People are historically very unhappy when all their content is deleted.

The side I'm less happy about is that that will likely include AI training in the future.

 

[FrogReaver]

That's basically so if they move platform in a few years, they can move the user content too; or if they are acquired, or sell the platform to somebody, they can legally transfer the content. Otherwise they'd have to delete it all--and guess what? People are historically very unhappy when all their content is deleted.

The side I'm less happy about is that that will likely include AI training in the future.

I’m good with what you suggest here but
I don’t really see any limits on their license (though maybe the courts have established some). So AI, or really anything else they dream up they can use it for as far as I can tell.

 

[Morrus]

I’m good with what you suggest here but
I don’t really see any limits on their license (though maybe the courts have established some). So AI, or really anything else they dream up they can use it for as far as I can tell.

Sure. But... they don't want your forum posts. Honestly, your forum posts are not worth anything. They're just covering their asses in case they make something and 12 people say "they stole my idea!" (as has ironically already happened in this thread). But that's been said a billion times, so you know that.

I just wish you could opt out of AI training specifically.

 

[The Soloist]

Sure. But... they don't want your forum posts. Honestly, your forum posts are not worth anything. They're just covering their asses in case they make something and 12 people say "they stole my idea!" (as has ironically already happened in this thread). But that's been said a billion times, so you know that.

I just wish you could opt out of AI training specifically.

I never claimed they stole my idea. I did sign away my right and I'm okay with that. WoTC are not thieves.

I'm just curious about how they came up with the term 'Points of Light', because I used it as a main idea in my proposal. Maybe, they looked at submissions from the contest, which is entirely possible, or they came up with it by themselves. No one talked about Points of Lights in D&D before 4e (that I'm aware of).

 

[Umbran]

In a practical sense what is the effective difference?

In a practical sense, the difference is that if they had ownership, you would lose the right to sell your own ideas.

Can WotC use you ideas to sell new product without paying you royalties?

Boogeyman: An imagined monster used to scare people. In this case, fear of a technicality overrunning the reality.

(Use of generic "you", instead of you, Another Guy, specifically, follows.)

1) The point is not to steal your stuff. The point is for WotC to go ahead and keep publishing its own stuff without being accused of stealing your stuff, now or in the future.

2) For almost all of us, the idea that our stuff might be stolen, and then we would fail if we publish it ourselves, is a fantasy, ignoring the fact that we weren't ever going to publish it ourselves.

 

[Umbran]

Ideally the license could be a bit less far reaching as well. Like if I post on D&D Beyond I obviously want my crap to be shared on D&D Beyond, but not shared for only god knows what else, i'm not really on board with that.

(Personifying this to demonstrate the logic. Not actually about any of the named persons.)

Frogreaver? I don't know how to tell you this... your stuff isn't that special. S'okay, neither is mine.

There are tens and hundreds of thousands of us, and vast amounts of overlap. You, and I, and Another Guy? Our stuff is all pretty much the same. We have very similar ideas. And folks at WotC have the same ideas, independently, just as you, and I, and Another Guy did. They didn't steal it, it was just frelling obvious stuff.

But, since we did post it, we have this weird idea that they couldn't have had that same idea that you, and I, and Another Guy had. They must have stolen it from you. Never mind that I had it, and Another Guy had that idea, too. But WotC stole it from you. So you sue.

There is far more risk of someone like us suing WotC over the perception of theft, than our losing out because WotC published our ideas. That's the purpose of the terms.