File type discrimination

[Brown Jenkin]

I have been bothered recently by what seems to me an unsupportable position by WotC to stamp out distribution of PCGen lst files while allowing the same information to be freely traded on the Internet in E-Tools formats. Maybe someone with a better understanding of the law can help me understand this. This is exactly the same information but formatted in different file types. An alternate example of this to me is if an author in order to protect his work from copyright infringement blocked free trading of his work as Word documents, but then at the same time encouraged the same people to freely trade the exact same work as a WordPerfect document. By not only allowing others to freely swap his IP, but additionally actively encouraging it, I don’t see how he can then argue that the exact same info can’t treated the same way in a different format. The IP is EXACTLY the same. In order to claim rights to their IP don’t they need to actively defend it. By actively encouraging and supporting the free trade of this IP in any manner aren’t they giving up their rights to it? Especially as long as the original authors are properly credited, I don’t understand why I can’t use this same information in a different file format. Another example of this would seem to me is if WotC said anyone could copy and reprint hardcopies of their books and then give them away for free, but only if they used the Times New Roman font but not any other font.

Note: I am in no way officially or unofficially associated with PCGen in any way other than as a long time user of the program.

 

[Davin]

I have been bothered recently by what seems to me an unsupportable position by WotC to stamp out distribution of PCGen lst files while allowing the same information to be freely traded on the Internet in E-Tools formats.

Calm yourself. That's not what they're doing. The PCGen lst files will be back and better than before and everything will be legal and on the up-and-up and there won't be anything to complain about. Check out announcements from Mynex and company from a couple of days ago for details.

 

[Cergorach]

First off WotC are the copyright owners of D&D, thus what they do with it is entirely up to them, if they want us to make and use those files than they can. Second they have the ability to use OGL content without ristrictions. Third, they have never given the official word for us to do so, this is still not entirely legal.

Why no crackdown? Simple because that would wipe out the little support E-Tools has at the moment. And it has taken years before WotC suggested to the PcGen folks that they should remove non OGL material they did not have official permission for.

 

[Luke]

Re: Re: File type discrimination

That's not what they're doing...

No. There is a genuine issue here.

PCGen are being restricted to only being allowed to distribute the WotC SRD content (no sword & fist, forgotten realms etc).

There's a long road ahead before they can *possibly* get permission to incorporate the Wizard's copyright IP for non-SRD material.

Essentially there is currently a prohibition on copyright material being distributed in PCGen format, whilst you can get the same material in E-Tools format from the "official" site.

Part of this material is in open XML format (made easier to work with in bulk by your program, Davin), where other software can import from it, whilst other information is held in proprietory format (.rac files and others), only readable by other E-Tools programs.

It should be noted, however, that Wizards own the IP to this copyright material, and are morally and legally within their rights to allow E-Tools proliferation of said material, effectively giving E-Tools a significant "competitive advantage" over PCGen and others.

There is a moral and legal issue, however, if their official site ends up distributing closed content from other D20 publishers. I predict it won't be long before they have to enforce certain acceptability guidelines about what's allowed on their site. There will probably be a backlash where WotC are accused of "locking into" only their own material, although it's the most they can legally do (without permission). Just wait and see... "poor" old WotC always get slagged one way or another, no matter what they do.

This places WotC in what "used to be" the PCGen situation. In the days when there was only PCGen, D20 publishers could find advantage in allowing PCGen permission to distribute their copyright material. Now, WotC would appear to offer a much stronger future marketing advantage from that perspective. Looks like PCGen have started a nice campaign at GenCon with getting D20 publishers on-side for future distribution (announcement pending), but if E-Tools survives it's launch, the effect may be a bit temporary.

By the way, has anyone tried decoding the .rac or .chr file formats? I'd be surprised if there weren't a few PCGen coders having a close look. I had a quick look, and at the very least it seems the strings are in unicode format...
Davin??? Your helper is good, but it's incomplete... How about decoding those native formats for us? If only I had that much time.

I like efforts by people like Charles Greathouse, to get things like standard statblock formats. I've already started changing my own formats to make E-Tools imports easier...

 

[Brown Jenkin]

Re: Re: File type discrimination

Calm yourself. That's not what they're doing. The PCGen lst files will be back and better than before and everything will be legal and on the up-and-up and there won't be anything to complain about. Check out announcements from Mynex and company from a couple of days ago for details.

I have seen the anouncement and what it states is that when PCGen is OGL/d20 compliant, which will be soon, then WotC will listen to the request to make non-SRD material availible. They have made no statement that they will accept this request. I hope they will but there is not even a reassurance that they will look favorably upon it.

 

[Brown Jenkin]

Re: Re: Re: File type discrimination

No. There is a genuine issue here.

PCGen are being restricted to only being allowed to distribute the WotC SRD content (no sword & fist, forgotten realms etc).

There's a long road ahead before they can *possibly* get permission to incorporate the Wizard's copyright IP for non-SRD material.

Essentially there is currently a prohibition on copyright material being distributed in PCGen format, whilst you can get the same material in E-Tools format from the "official" site.

That is part of what I was talking about, although it is more than the official site as people here and elsewhere are trading this information.

Part of this material is in open XML format (made easier to work with in bulk by your program, Davin), where other software can import from it, whilst other information is held in proprietory format (.rac files and others), only readable by other E-Tools programs.

This is one of the things I am talking about. What is the legal difference between file types? If people are encouraged to trade the underling IP what difference does the wrapper make? And Davin’s program program does more than allow for the trading of monster and race proprietary formats, it allows the trading of all db information and its use has been encouraged by all who support the program.

It should be noted, however, that Wizards own the IP to this copyright material, and are morally and legally within their rights to allow E-Tools proliferation of said material, effectively giving E-Tools a significant "competitive advantage" over PCGen and others.

Yes WotC does own the IP can use it as it sees fit. I would have no problem if they made this information available officially at their site. I am not arguing about giving their product a competitive advantage in this manner, in fact if they would officially release this info I would be pleased. What they are doing however is not officially releasing it but encouraging others to input the data themselves and then trade it on the Internet. By doing this they are saying that they are giving up control of the distribution of the information. This goes to my original example of it is OK to reprint and distribute the book, but only if the font is Times New Roman.

There is a moral and legal issue, however, if their official site ends up distributing closed content from other D20 publishers. I predict it won't be long before they have to enforce certain acceptability guidelines about what's allowed on their site. There will probably be a backlash where WotC are accused of "locking into" only their own material, although it's the most they can legally do (without permission). Just wait and see... "poor" old WotC always get slagged one way or another, no matter what they do.

This places WotC in what "used to be" the PCGen situation. In the days when there was only PCGen, D20 publishers could find advantage in allowing PCGen permission to distribute their copyright material. Now, WotC would appear to offer a much stronger future marketing advantage from that perspective. Looks like PCGen have started a nice campaign at GenCon with getting D20 publishers on-side for future distribution (announcement pending), but if E-Tools survives it's launch, the effect may be a bit temporary.

I had not even considered this, but you bring up a good point. I hope that WotC is at least as thorough as PCGen in acquiring permission to distribute third party material. Until such permissions are granted however it is just as illegal for WotC to allow posting of non-WotC material as it is for PCGen to allow distribution of WotC non-SRD material. Until e-tools allows for the creation of PrCs I don’t foresee them becoming the standard. It was not until IE was able to match Netscape functionality that they won the browser war.

By the way, has anyone tried decoding the .rac or .chr file formats? I'd be surprised if there weren't a few PCGen coders having a close look. I had a quick look, and at the very least it seems the strings are in unicode format...
Davin??? Your helper is good, but it's incomplete... How about decoding those native formats for us? If only I had that much time.

I like efforts by people like Charles Greathouse, to get things like standard statblock formats. I've already started changing my own formats to make E-Tools imports easier...

As a note to anyone who is trying to decode .rac, .chr, .dll, or .exe portions of the program. This directly violates the license for the program. As the license states “You may not: ...; (2) modify or prepare derivative works of the Software; ...; (4) design or distribute unauthorized levels; or (5) reverse engineer, decompile or disassemble the Software.” If WotC is revoking this portion of the license than great, but until this happens than all third party attempts to add functionality are illegal. If Davin has official permission from Fluid and WotC great, but I have seen nothing stating that this is the case.

 

[Breakdaddy]

words, lots of words

 

[Luke]

Re: Re: Re: Re: File type discrimination

As a note to anyone who is trying to decode .rac, .chr, .dll, or .exe portions of the program. This directly violates the license for the program. As the license states “You may not: ...; (2) modify or prepare derivative works of the Software; ...; (4) design or distribute unauthorized levels; or (5) reverse engineer, decompile or disassemble the Software.”

There's no problem here.
The closest it gets to being a problem for decoding .rac or .chr files is if you misinterpret the datafiles as being software.

Apart from that, if people distribute files on the internet, and you download and decode them, that's fine. There's nothing so say that you own a copy of E-Tools, and agreed to the licence contained therein.

Is this all there is in the license with E-Tools? I haven't yet had the opportunity of review. Also, what are "unauthorized levels"?

In fact (and this one's a real eye opener), these files are being distributed without a mention of authorship, copyright notice, or any license agreement.
It's an amazing little fact. When WotC started the OGL/D20 licenses, they pointed out that if you even referred to SRD information in an e-mail, technically you should include a copy of the license - but they weren't going to be that draconian (couldn't help myself ).
There are essentially supposed to be only 2 forms of distributing D&D/D20 material. Either it's from WotC, in which case it always has clear author/ownership and copyright markings, or it's from D20/OGL publishers, in which case it must clearly display the WotC license (OGL or D20) under which it's released.

So, what they're actually allowing (no wait, encouraging), is the proliferation of their IP without any mark of ownership or copyright. Hello?

 

[Brown Jenkin]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: File type discrimination

So, what they're actually allowing (no wait, encouraging), is the proliferation of their IP without any mark of ownership or copyright. Hello?

Thats what it seems like to me. So should it matter then if this same IP is reformated into a .lst file.

 

[Davin]

No. There is a genuine issue here.

My apologies for mis-interpreting his complaint. I thought he was complaining about their refusing to allow any WotC information in lst files. Still, it sounds to me like PCGen is going to get access to "most" information along the way somewhere -- I guess we'll just have to wait and see how it goes.

Essentially there is currently a prohibition on copyright material being distributed in PCGen format, whilst you can get the same material in E-Tools format from the "official" site.

Well, I haven't seen anywhere that WotC was officially pronouncing that stuff as legal. I just haven't seen anywhere they were explicitly prohibited. And of course PCGen itself enjoyed this situation for many months before being asked to conform to the rules. I don't see how this is much different, even treating them as "equal" when they aren't quite IP-wise.

And just for the record (in case there are any lawyers watching), I've mentioned in a number of posts that I think it's a violation of copyright to be republishing stuff out of the official books without permission and I don't recommend or condone it (despite having written the program that permits it).

Davin??? Your helper is good, but it's incomplete... How about decoding those native formats for us? If only I had that much time.

Actually, I'd considered writing some kind of low-level editor for that but it's waaaay on down the line of importance, and the problem may solve itself before I get there. <innocent look>