D&D General Frylock on the ‘Ineffectual OGL’

[FrogReaver]

Well I say experienced from a strictly "time in practice" perspective. I checked, and he seems to have been practicing from at least 2001.

His actual arguments do seem extremely sloppy, well that or disingenuous, which is worse.

He did claim he wrote the articles for 2 different audiences. Translating some of the legalese into laymen terms may have been lost in that attempt

 

[Umbran]

The exact boundaries between Trademarks, Copyrights and Fair Use are kinda muddled when it comes to such cases....

I am pretty sure that Trademark doesn't enter into this, as the material in question hasn't been registered as trademark. The only issue at hand is between copyright and fair use.

And, if the OGL is nullified, the issue will be all those folks who used the material for commercial purposes (to sell books), which vastly limits the applicability of fair use.

 

[Umbran]

The argument is you can't copyright a single word, regardless of how unique or original it might be.

That argument will fail when you use the word... and the stat block.. and the physical description...

Though, the point I'm making is not about the Product Identity terms like mind flayer or beholder. If the OGL is taken away, it isn't just "a word". It is now every word used as a term in the game rules.

You cannot copyright the idea of having a numerical value track the health of a fictional character. But "Hit Points" is a specific way to speak of that idea - a particular expression. When stacked with every other game rules term, becomes far more than use of "a word". It becomes a pattern of use of many words - aka copyright infringement.

 

[Dausuul]

And, if the OGL is nullified, the issue will be all those folks who used the material for commercial purposes (to sell books), which vastly limits the applicability of fair use.

How would that work exactly? The whole basis of Frylock's argument is that the OGL is void because it provides nothing of value to licensees. I don't see how you could say a) the OGL provides no benefit to licensees and is therefore void and b) because the OGL is void, licensees are now liable for things the OGL protected them from.

In any case, Wizards created the OGL, and recommitted to it with 5E, and seems to be happy with it. If the courts somehow did find that it was defective and everyone who's used it is now vulnerable to a copyright infringement suit, it's still up to Wizards to file that suit. The blowback would be massive and everything they set out to do with the OGL would be trashed. Why wouldn't they just write up a new OGL without the defects instead?

 

[Shardstone]

So, his very first paragraphs has an astounding error:



No, the OGL and SRD tell the public what material was protected under normal copyright, and what was usable under the OGL,which does have some restrictions. It says so, right on WotC's SRD page. There is no public domain involved at all.

This phenomenally large error indicates to me... that we really shouldn't be paying attention to this person. Why are we reading what this guy writes?

Using one error to discount an entire argument without reading the rest of the argument isn't intellectually sound.

 

[smetzger]

eh, his arguments are not new. They were all around when WOTC released 3.0.
Only difference is that it seems he is willing to challenge WOTC on it.

The OGL basically boils down to a gentlemen's agreement that WOTC won't sue you if you abide by these rules.

There has always been the option of not using the OGL and risk getting sued. He is presenting himself as fighting the good fight. Whatever... He will most likely be sued and waste tons of his time in court. If he wins or loses I don't see any great effect on the gaming community.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Using one error to discount an entire argument without reading the rest of the argument isn't intellectually sound.

Sure it is. You read a sample to see if the whole document is worth reading. If the sample contains errors it's reasonable to assume the rest of the document is flawed.

But when it comes to a legal argument, the whole thing is like a pyramid. It is built up on a series of base arguments. And if even one of the arguments at the base of the pyramid is flawed the whole structure collapses.

 

[Lanefan]

... (though it may occasionally be patentable, eg WoTC's 'card tapping' patent)

Didn't that patent get overturned later? I know there was a challenge against it, and somehow I remember the challenge succeeding...

 

[Lanefan]

And, if the OGL is nullified, the issue will be all those folks who used the material for commercial purposes (to sell books), which vastly limits the applicability of fair use.

Unless what Frylock's after (and I rather suspect he is) is a ruling that boils down to saying WotC have, by issuing those license and freedoms, in effect waived their copyright entirely; meaning that tossing the OGL puts the whole lot into the public domain.

Somehow I doubt this is gonna happen...but I've still got lots of popcorn...

 

[S'mon]

But "Hit Points" is a specific way to speak of that idea - a particular expression. When stacked with every other game rules term, becomes far more than use of "a word". It becomes a pattern of use of many words - aka copyright infringement.

I am pretty sure no court would hold the words "hit points" to be copyright protected. Same for "Armour Class" "To Hit Bonus" etc.

But like I said, if you take/copy an actual formatted stat block, that definitely looks like potential copyright infringement to me.