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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Alzrius" data-source="post: 3874823" data-attributes="member: 8461">This was discussed a lot at the 4E d20 meeting at Gen Con, and I was personally distressed by how many of the big names in the industry seemed to like this plan (I can be heard voicing my opinion of the idea on the audio file).I don't like the idea. While I'm "just" a consumer, it's the principle of the thing that bothers me. Setting up a few companies as being in charge of distributing the d20 License essentially leaves all other companies beholden to them if they want in on that. It essentially gives that small group huge bargaining powers - that they'll give a smaller company the license, but that company must agree to publish them as an imprint of said larger company, at a fairly cutting deal.True there will be other companies this smaller company could go to, but not many. And if the larger companies share notes or form anything resembling a monopoly, well, there'll be little to reduce their theoretical stranglehold on the d20 STL.I admit that this isn't the most likely of scenarios, but as I said, my argument is one of principle. Giving a small group of successful companies police-like power over the d20 community isn't right, in my opinion.I'm sure there'll be a lot of people who say that principle shouldn't be a factor; that businesses are there just to make money, and that's what really matters. And besides, smaller companies can just avail themselves of the OGL directly.Well, that's all true enough, and at the end of the day imprinting smaller companies could make more of a profit for the bigger companies, but the littler publishers lose out. The d20 logo does provide easier at-a-glance recognition for casual buyers, and not being able to use that will hurt sales for the small companies that need those sales the most. Likewise, if they want to sign on with a larger company, they face being in an extremely weak bargaining position. Giving a small group of companies the right to decide what is and isn't d20 is certainly optimal for them; it's everyone else I'm worried about.</blockquote>

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