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Message: <blockquote data-quote="The Sigil" data-source="post: 1540421" data-attributes="member: 2013">It's not a matter of d20 publishers being as far away from "the Man" as you can get.  I suggest you look at some of the stuff I quoted from Thomas Babington MacAulay again... the guy has a keen insight into human nature.Look at that carefully.  It basically says once you set up "The MAN" against whom someone can rationalize their actions, it's just a quick trip down the slippery slope to screwing the "little guy" - because there's no convenient stopping point (do you stop at a company that has at least 30 employees? how do you know how many employees the company has? etc.) - I'm not saying it's RIGHT, just that it IS.  Agree with the stance of "sticking it to the MAN" or not, I think there can be a legitimate argument made that corporations that have lobbied (and won) copyright extensions have defrauded and stolen from the populace.  They entered into an agreement when they created the work in the first place that they would receive a copyright term of X in exchange for creating the work and contributing it to the public consciousness.  That they have now lobbied for a copyright term of X+Y, coupled with more onerous DRM laws, without offereing anything in consideration means the deal "smells bad."  IANAL, but if I am not mistaken, a contract (which is essentially what copyright is - a contract between the public and the writer/artist/etc.) is considered invalid without "grant and consideration" - meaning that both parties must receive something they did not have in return for what is given for an exchange to be binding.  The public, through the government, agreed to give Y years of copyright protection and onerous DRM laws and received nothing in exchange.  One could argue that this is a breach of the "Grant and Consideration" principle and therefore the contract is invalid and copyright term extensions are invalid (in the same way that I could have you sign a contract saying that I promise nothing and in return you will give me $100 - the legal system will not look on this as a valid contract because you received nothing in return -- you giving me $100 might be a gift, but it's not a valid contract).Simply put, there are reasonable, rational arguments out there against current copyright laws... and these taint with "guilt by association" all copyright holders in the eyes of those who subscribe to those arguments.  Because the most prominent copyright holders (RIAA, MPAA, Disney) are the ones foisting these "bad deals," the less prominent copyright holders (RPG Publishers) just get lumped in under the "bad" umbrella - in the same way that "some black kid in South Central LA" is automatically presumed to be a gang member - or at least dangerous, or the way that the "white male is the root of all of society's problems" or that "feminists are loud, obnoxious jerks" or that "hispanics aren't interested in learning English" or that "middle easterners are all terrorists" etc.  These are horrible, stupid, stereotypes that exist only because the "most newsworthy" members of the group get the press, and so we assign to all members of the group the same attributes.  As a small-fry copyright holder, I am pissed that the RIAA/Disney, et al put me in a bad light and poison the view people hold of the value of my work... in a similar way that I'm pissed that loud obnoxious American tourists have poisoned the view the world in general holds of Americans (and having lived abroad for a couple of years, it's true - you can usually spot the loud, obnoxious, "think-they-own-the-joint" American tourists a mile away - that doesn't mean ALL of us are like that).  Because of THEIR actions, I'm on the receiving end of ill will and copyright infringement.  Thanks, guys. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f641.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":(" title="Frown    :("  data-smilie="3"data-shortname=":(" />--The Sigil</blockquote>

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