Another Cease and Desist Letter: 4E Powercards

[Merkuri]

"We are dealing with huge sharing sites and torrent sites and less concerned with some guy posting his homebrew." - Scott Rouse, Nov 2008

...So now this month they're also concerned with people making power cards. How about next month?

Considering the number of powers that were taken word-for-word from the PHB, this site probably fell under the category of "huge sharing sites."

It sounds to me like they're not really concerned with people who make power cards, per say. They're concerned with people who put up a large amount of copyrighted material for other people to download.

 

[Dausuul]

Because then WoTC would have to give up some control and some of that cool IP they invented.

How would they be giving up IP? Licensing is not the same as giving up.

 

[Glyfair]

How would they be giving up IP? Licensing is not the same as giving up.

Because they either give up control, or hire entirely new staff in order to oversee the licenses. Even if they do, allowing others to work using that IP is giving up a certain amount of control.

Now, we can pretty much be sure that WotC is not going to be adding staff in order to do this licensing. Remember why Scott has said the updates to the GSL have taken so long to get released (if not in so many words)? It's because he had to take up some of the workload from a number of employees in the recent round of layoffs.

In this business environment a company that is overworking its employees already isn't going to start a new venture that requires hiring new employees and setting up a new department for an uncertain revenue stream.

Just hiring 3 employees to facilitate and watch these new sites would mean at least $100,000 a year. That's not terribly likely to be gotten back any time soon. In fact, it is likely that by the time it is, WotC will already have up the same content with a more efficient revenue stream (because they wouldn't have to share it with 3rd parties).

 

[Spatula]

The answer of course to "does a fansite have the spiritual right to reproduce IP..." is of course yes. In fact, I'd replace "right" with "need." Not wholesale copying, but as we have seen, the legal definition of "reproducing IP" is as simple as my current priest's character sheet including the power "short descriptions" from the PHB. That's technically reproducing Wizards IP and it's technically actionable. But it's also kinda expected. And some amount of this, Wizards wants to happen. It's part of building a community around your products. But how much do they want to have happen, and where does it cross the line for them?

It crosses the line when you're reproducing entire sections of the books. This really isn't difficult to figure out.

 

[Rel]

mxyzplk, I've just deleted a couple of your posts that contained personal attacks and political references. If you can't make your point without resorting to these then refrain from posting. There will be no further warnings regarding this (to you or anybody else in this thread).

 

[Mercutio01]

the legal definition of "reproducing IP" is as simple as my current priest's character sheet including the power "short descriptions" from the PHB. That's technically reproducing Wizards IP and it's technically actionable.

The Fair Use portion of copyright law has four pieces to consider to determine if something is fair use-

1. the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
2. the nature of the copyrighted work;
3. amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
4. the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.

So, with something like a character sheet, you could argue fair use. It's significantly alterered from the original product. It copies only a small portion (and with my character sheets I never wrote the whole text of a feat or skill down), and it's not substantial. My character posted online has minimal (if any) effect on the potential market. And it's not commercial in nature.

White Wolf could try to sue for copyright infringement based on a character sheet, but I'd be a) surprised if they actually did, despite the threat, and b)even more surprised if the suit won in a court of law.

 

[Kzach]

That would have been really cool.

Only if the 'new' model worked.

Did the OGL work for WotC or did it hurt WotC?

The only reason I can fathom for the about turn in policy is that the whole open movement ultimately didn't work for WotC.

It reminds me a lot of the Apple clone wars. Apple opened up the hardware side to licensing and it ended up costing Apple far more than it could ever possibly make them. They tried, they failed, and now they're more successful than ever despite closing the platform up again and being utter tight fanny's.

 

[Alzrius]

b)even more surprised if the suit won in a court of law.

What does that have to do with anything?

The legal rightness or wrongness of a civil action isn't that relevant when it's a corporation taking action against an individual. The much more important part is who has the deeper pockets (i.e. the corporation) to go through such a trial in the first place. That's why a C&D letter is usually enough - the guy with less money knows he can't take the fiscal burden, and capitulates.

 

[Mercutio01]

The legal rightness or wrongness of a civil action isn't that relevant when it's a corporation taking action against an individual. The much more important part is who has the deeper pockets (i.e. the corporation) to go through such a trial in the first place. That's why a C&D letter is usually enough - the guy with less money knows he can't take the fiscal burden, and capitulates.

Except it would be a civil case, not a criminal one, and in many cases the loser ends up covering the legal fees for the winner.

 

[Alzrius]

Except it would be a civil case, not a criminal one, and in many cases the loser ends up covering the legal fees for the winner.

I know it's a civil case, I called it that in my post.

However, I still don't think your reasoning here has merit. Given how expensive legal fees are, if a corporation files suit against an individual, and said individual goes to trial over it, they'll almost certainly never make it all the way to a verdict - their money will run out long before that.

If you can't afford a lawyer (or, quite often, team of lawyers) to make it all the way through a case, you've as good as lost. Arguing the merits of a civil case yourself isn't really a practical option, since no matter how right your position was, a practiced lawyer would utterly annihilate you in front of a judge.

Hence why I say that the actual legality of something isn't the most important factor in a civil suit - if WotC wants to stop a site from using anything that they think even remotely resembles their IP, a C&D letter will almost always suffice. No one person that they'd sue has the money to take them to court and actually make it to a verdict.