WotC Could D&D Rights Be Stripped From WotC?

[Zardnaar]

The Oct 2 issue of the Hollywood reporter has reported that several copyright termination notices have been served on several franchises including Terminator.

How do they do this if the rights have been sold? The intent of the law is to mitigate the power disparity between an author and a corporation.

Termination Of Copyright Transfer Basics - Above the Law

Ultimately, termination of transfer is a useful tool.

abovethelaw.com

Basically authors can argue that they got ripped off by corporations that took advantage of them due to power disparities.

This was quite bad in the 50s and 60s with rights to songs signed away.

So how does this apply to D&D? As a few people here the rights to D&D have been problematic for decades dating back to the Blumes in the 70s and Gygaxs ouster in 1985.

As late as after TSR went under WotC made some sort of deal with Arnesen and Gygax over the D&D Rights.

Notice the 35 year requirement of the above law. After 35 years the original authors can apply. This was written in regards to music but it looks like there is going to be cases over movies and idk but perhaps books as well.

Now the original authors are dead. However reading that link I provided their estates can invoke it and AFAIK that means Gail Gygax.

Now this is purely hypothetical and it's probably not a good idea for D&D but morally and legally there has always been a vibe of Gary got ripped off.

WotC isn't a villain here either, they picked up the pieces after TSR collapse but they got bought out by Hasbro.

Gary did get screwed in some ways IMHO. Gail would be a terrible custodian and I'm not sure if you could even make an arguement. But if it works for movies you can argue it can be applied to books. The link above seems to imply it can be used.

Personally I'm not a fan of corporations being able to exploit copyrights for decades after an inventors death. Disney Corporation didn't invent Mickey Mouse, Walt Disney did.

IDK if Arnesen has an estate either.

 

[Beleriphon]

One thing to keep in mind is that most law still involves a "reasonable person" clause. A judge is going to take into account that TSR was actually terrible at doing what it was doing, and Gary Gygax to a degree did a lot of the damage to himself.

Also, D&D isn't actually able to be copyrighted as such. A specific book has copyright, but the idea of the name itself and brand actually can't be. Those can be trademarked, but that's different. The reason it works for a song, or a bunch of songs, is because each song is a separate creative endeavor.

I'd have to read the Copyright Act to be sure, and I'm not going to, but I'm pretty sure D&D is not going anywhere.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

The matter is about if an IP is created by only a author or by a group. And a character from a "one-shot" work can't be like the one from a saga.

And today many producers would rather to start from zero than the risk of annoying fans with the retcon or reboot of a old franchise.

If WotC would the rights they could start again with another name, for example "Endless Quest" (and D&D is copyright by WotC/Hasbro). And who would buy titles by the new owner of the copyright? The industry has showed lots of examples about a famous name isn't enough, but the prestige of a franchise or IP is based in the work of the titles. There are games of Sonic the hedgehog what are forgotten, but Freedom Planet, his "spiritual successor" has got a sequel.

Spiritual Successor - TV Tropes

A Spiritual Successor is a type of sequel that is not part of the same world or story as its predecessor, but is nonetheless considered to be a successor because it shares common themes, styles, and elements. In other words, itâ …

tvtropes.org

If a movie studio or TTRPG publisher loses some copyright, they could create a new "spiritual successor". The videogame warcraft started as a Sp. Scc. of a cancelled project of a Warhammer Fantasy RTS. Angela, Thor's sister in Marvel Comics is the Sp. Scc of a character from Spawn comics.

And today TTRPGs are like obsolete software. If I recover the copyright of a videogame from 35 years ago, now it is useless in the market. Today there are retroclones of D&D and we don't need a reprint of the original titles but we are collectors.

 

[Morrus]

It’s been released under the OGL more than once. Even if in some bizarre unlikely series of events somebody managed to convince a court that they had more right to the trademark than Hasbro has, the game would continue.

 

[Count_Zero]

It’s been released under the OGL more than once. Even if in some bizarre unlikely series of events somebody managed to convince a court that they had more right to the trademark than Hasbro has, the game would continue.

I suspect that someone might be more inclined to try to strip copyright for a campaign setting than the game as a whole - Dragonlance, Greyhawk, or the Forgotten Realms.

 

[lowkey13]

*Deleted by user*

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

That would be as asking divorce when in the next years the husband is going to become richier. Nobody wants to face against Hasbro's lawyers when you know they can buy a company as WotC, and this then wasn't a little fish. And asking the copyright when a franchise is a now a smash-hit after be rescued from the oblivion is very unpopular among fangs. A name isn't enough, Blade the vampire hunter was a blockbuster trilogy in the cinemas, but only a season as teleserie, and Buffy the vampire slayer all the opposite. Some Disney movies now are forgotten because there were before the rebirth, and after "Beauty & Beast" other studios tried to produce their own cartoon movies but they failed most of times. Where is now Dave Arneson's Blackmoor world?

And if my memory doesn't fail, the copyright is about characters and plot, but not about name of fictional countries or places, or fantasy creatures, but if these are registered as trademark.

I guess to be the owner of the copyright of a setting, you had to have created the whole world without help by more people from the same company.

 

[gyor]

I suspect that someone might be more inclined to try to strip copyright for a campaign setting than the game as a whole - Dragonlance, Greyhawk, or the Forgotten Realms.

This makes a lot more sense to me and is a lot more realistic.

The Forgotten Realms is the most likely example for this as Ed Greenwood would have a solid case to do this given the historic deal he had over the Forgotten Realms, he has solid case.

That being said he is also too nice a guy to actually do it, even if WotC deserves it for discontinuing the novel lines as far as I'm concerned.

 

[Reynard]

Trademarks neuter much of the potential of any copyright reverting to its original owners or entry into the public domain. For example, take Superman. Action Comics #1 should be entering the Public Domain in the near future (I don't recall the date off the top of my head) but that doesn't mean everyone and anyone can create Superman comics. Superman is a trademark owned by WB and is protected under a different set of laws than the individual copyright on Action Comics #1. Likewise, even if the copyright of the original version of D&D returned to the Gygax and/or Arneson estates, it wouldn't suddenly mean they owned all things D&D.