Hello, I am lawyer with a PSA: almost everyone is wrong about the OGL and SRD. Clearing up confusion.

[FrogReaver]

yeah, I do not mind it. This is another word for expert here, and you know what makes people experts? Actually knowing the stuff they are talking about...

I don't know about you but I prefer having experts chime in over pretty much everyone else.

If I have a legal problem, I ask my lawyer.
If I feel sick, I ask my doctor.
If my car doesn't start, I ask a mechanic..

You are free to ask your lawyer about the car, the doctor about the legal issue and the mechanic about your symptoms, to avoid appealing to authority, but I do not recommend it

Then why don’t you remain silent and let the experts correct me?

 

[Maxperson]

I think @pemerton has acknowledged that this interpretation is possible, if not plausible.

About whether someone who owns the property licenses to themself? These are his recent posts on the subject.

Hello, I am lawyer with a PSA: almost everyone is wrong about the OGL and SRD. Clearing up confusion.

Whether "the Contributors" should be read collectively or distributively is a matter of construction. I think the distributed reading is more plausible, because a licence flows from each distinctly in respect of their own copyright. Damn @pemerton, you make legal speech so sexy! ;)

www.enworld.org

"WoC isn't licensing its content to itself. It owns the copyright."

Hello, I am lawyer with a PSA: almost everyone is wrong about the OGL and SRD. Clearing up confusion.

that flies in the face of what a licensor and what a licensee are, and why there even are two terms… to me that just means the FAQ is sloppy, not that it somehow manages to redefine the English language The license and not just the faq supports this. Distributing OGC makes one a licensee.

www.enworld.org

"Re the underlined: whose offer are you saying WotC has accepted?"

Hello, I am lawyer with a PSA: almost everyone is wrong about the OGL and SRD. Clearing up confusion.

that flies in the face of what a licensor and what a licensee are, and why there even are two terms… to me that just means the FAQ is sloppy, not that it somehow manages to redefine the English language The license and not just the faq supports this. Distributing OGC makes one a licensee.

www.enworld.org

"When WotC publishes a SRD with a notice of offer to license on the terms of the OGL, who has licensed anything to them such that they are a licensee?"

What @pemerton has been saying is possible, at least recently in this thread, has been about WotC being able to revoke the license.

 

[mamba]

Then why don’t you remain silent and let the experts correct me?

because you are so trivially wrong that several people (including me) could do it

 

[Maxperson]

Then why don’t you remain silent and let the experts correct me?

Hello, I am lawyer with a PSA: almost everyone is wrong about the OGL and SRD. Clearing up confusion.

Whether "the Contributors" should be read collectively or distributively is a matter of construction. I think the distributed reading is more plausible, because a licence flows from each distinctly in respect of their own copyright. Damn @pemerton, you make legal speech so sexy! ;)

www.enworld.org

Go ahead and read it.

 

[FrogReaver]

Section 1: Definitions: (a)"Contributors" means the copyright and/or trademark owners who have contributed Open Game Content;

Question for you here. Does that definition exclude contributors that have contributed OGC you are not using?

WotC owns those things with regard to everything in SRD 5.1. They are contributors.

I agree.

 

[FrogReaver]

Hello, I am lawyer with a PSA: almost everyone is wrong about the OGL and SRD. Clearing up confusion.

Whether "the Contributors" should be read collectively or distributively is a matter of construction. I think the distributed reading is more plausible, because a licence flows from each distinctly in respect of their own copyright. Damn @pemerton, you make legal speech so sexy! ;)

www.enworld.org

Go ahead and read it.

That wasn’t to me.

 

[Maxperson]

Question for you here. Does that definition exclude contributors that have contributed OGC you are not using?

That was answered in the post.

"Section 5: Representation of Authority to Contribute: If You are contributing original material as Open Game Content, You represent that Your Contributions are Your original creation and/or You have sufficient rights to grant the rights conveyed by this License.

Section 5 Allows you to become a contributor for your original works. You are not a contributor to SRD 5.1."

Third party people would be contributors to the OGC only with their original material. So if you invented some new monsters, those would be something you contributed. If you use SRD 5.1 WotC content, then that's not original to you.

 

[Hussar]

‘You’ refers to the Licensee in terms of this agreement - defined in section 1h.

Nothing about the licenses definition of ‘you’ precludes WOTC.

The argument I make is that all contributors are also licensees.

Ok, one more time.

It is not possible for WotC to make a license with itself. Or, rather, any license that it did make with itself is 100% unenforceable.

Put it another way. Suppose WotC printed a book with an OGL that was 100% in violation of the terms of the OGL. They use all sorts of WotC IP in the book as well as making multiple mistakes in their OGL declaration.

So what? Who is going to sue them? You? Me? No one can enforce an agreement that WotC is making with itself. All this circular logic about WotC being a licensee is ludicrous. They are the LICENSOR. You cannot be both. The OGL is not a licensor. It is a license. It is an agreement between WotC and whoever ends up down the chain of OGL declarations. It is never an agreement with itself. The SRD is not derivative of anything. It is what all OGC is derived FROM.

But, yes, it is impossible for "you" to include WotC.

 

[Maxperson]

That wasn’t to me.

Does it matter? It directly refutes your assertions that WotC has to license to itself through the OGL 1.0a when it uses the content that it owns.

 

[FrogReaver]

That was answered in the post.

"Section 5: Representation of Authority to Contribute: If You are contributing original material as Open Game Content, You represent that Your Contributions are Your original creation and/or You have sufficient rights to grant the rights conveyed by this License.

Section 5 Allows you to become a contributor for your original works. You are not a contributor to SRD 5.1."

Third party people would be contributors to the OGC only with their original material. So if you invented some new monsters, those would be something you contributed. If you use SRD 5.1 WotC content, then that's not original to you.

None of that answers the question I asked. Like not even remotely.