How about a deadline to WotC?

[Morrus]

The "random person" in question was Ryan Dancey, writing in the Open Game Definitions FAQ, published at Wizards.com: Open Game Definitions:Frequently Asked Questions

So my point is this: You may not associate ethics with free RPG content. But the author of the OGL did; the head of WOTC did so at the time of the OGL's release; and it was included as part of the official "Definitions" of Open Gaming.

I don't see Ryan's name on that page anywhere. Not that I'm saying he didn't write it (I have no way of knowing just looking at it), but I don't see anything saying he did.

I still disagree with it.

[Edit - ah, I see his name's in the sidebar. I still disagree with him.]

So at the very least you've got to admit that there's a real difference of philosophy around the issue, and while calling it "childish" may be useful for your business case at the moment, it isn't really intellectually rigorous.

You're misrepresenting my position. I stand by my stated opinion.

I don't know what you imagine my "business case" may be, but I would benefit from a revised GSL, which is contrary to my personal opinion on the moral aspects I've debated in this thread. If I'm making a business case, I'm doing a very poor job of it by advocating for the other side!

 

[Grimstaff]

All this ranting against WotC would make more sense if there wasn't a GSL, but there is.

Unless you're a publisher or at the very least a freelancer - why care? There is a ton of third party 4E stuff coming out, so as a gamer/consumer that need is filled. There is a functional GSL, and anyone who wants to take the publishing plunge can do so - companies like Necromancer, who wish to wait and see what the revised GSL looks like, can do so as well.

As a freelancer, there are some aspects of the original OGL/SRD that I disliked, and in no way agreed with, such as the exclusion of several classic spells and monsters from the SRD. As most of my stuff is heavily old-school influenced, these restrictions seemed unfairly arbitrary to me, but they are WotC's property, and they can do what they want with them.

Its been my unfortunate opinion so far that many folks getting upset about "where's the GSL" have no business stake in the matter, little or no knowledge of the legalities involved, and are discounting the GSL as-is based on the opinion of a couple of extremely "high-IP" publishers like Paizo and Green Ronin, rather than forming their own educated opinion.

Seldom do I see any acknowledgement of the problems the original OGL had, and created for WotC. The simple fact is that some publishers took far greater liberties with Ryan Dancy's good intentions than WotC could ignore, and it had to be addressed.

I remain hopeful that the revised GSL will be a better fit for IP-heavy publishers, but I, for one, don't see the need to have some sort of boycott or ultimatum, that would seem to be a waste of time at best, and hurtful to the intended cause at worst.

 

[JohnRTroy]

One thing I hate about the "Is there an Ethical Reason..." statement is that it can be misconstrued as implying those that don't want to give away their content are unethical, and thus the OGL concept is the only moral way you should license a game, a concept I find disturbing.

 

[Wonka]

As much as I would like to add something concrete to this thread, anything that I have to say about this issue has already been addressed at some point. So I would like to take this opportunity to state how much joy I got reading this whole discussion, just to see some of the crazy opinions that are floating out there, and the justification some people will use to attempt to make this valid. Who am I talking about? Who cares, that's irrelevant.

 

[mxyzplk]

Eh, I think the ship has sailed on having a usable GSL.

It's an undeniable fact that the current one is totally undesirable; every company with more than one employee and any IP worth protecting has eschewed it. So far it's just new solo folks with nothing to lose and extremely limited experiments (Wraith Recon, Apelords) by established companies. Ronin, Paizo, Necromancer, Troll Lord, Kenzer, Postmortem, Wolfgang Baur, Monte Cook, Sean K. Reynolds, Deep7, Highmoon, and random other guys - all quite reputable companies and noted RPG designers - have decided not to bother with the GSL. Comments like "the only people that don't like the GSL are people with no stake/knowledge" are patently false.

Really it's too late. All these guys had to plan out a path for their products when all this came up. And they correctly saw that WotC is not going to address this issue in good faith. How many times have they promised something about the GSL but "whoops, it just slipped through the cracks again?" That's not someone you enter into a business relationship with.

And a lot of the reason to go along has faded. 4e hasn't been performing to expectation (at least people like Matt Sprange of Mongoose and other people that might know say so). Wizards just laid off more of their staff, including 4e designers and people working on the failed digital initiative. This isn't the D&D of 3e, which was reinvigorating the industry and clearly something to align with. With a sufficiently nonpredatory GSL you might see more experiments, but I wouldn't be too sure they'd be found compelling by other folks outside the PDF-only crowd.

 

[Fifth Element]

I thought Goodman was using the GSL? Or are they just making 4E-compatible stuff without using the license?

 

[Fifth Element]

4e hasn't been performing to expectation (at least people like Matt Sprange of Mongoose and other people that might know say so).

How would Mr. Sprange know? Unless by "4E" you mean "Mongoose's 4E products".

And who are the others you refer to and where did they say what?

Wizards just laid off more of their staff, including 4e designers and people working on the failed digital initiative. This isn't the D&D of 3e, which was reinvigorating the industry and clearly something to align with.

In the thread about the recent layoffs, we are reminded of the layoffs that followed the releases of 3.0 and 3.5.

 

[mxyzplk]

It looks like a couple of their products are GSL (Forgotten Heroes: Fang, Fist, and Song is the only one I can find for sure) but others are not (the DCCs and other adventures just say "for 4e" and don't use any of the GSL trappings).

 

[mxyzplk]

How would Mr. Sprange know? Unless by "4E" you mean "Mongoose's 4E products".

And who are the others you refer to and where did they say what?

In the thread about the recent layoffs, we are reminded of the layoffs that followed the releases of 3.0 and 3.5.

Though the point of Sprange's post was about Mongoose's plans and not dissing 4e, it's clear from the context he is not talking about Mongoose's 4e products but the line in general, and he'd know somewhat because industry leaders talk. Early in the post he talks about industry mailing list discussions about what companies are top tier and other such businessy stuff. So maybe he's "confused" but I'd say he has a better chance at insight here than random messageboard humanoids.

And sure, there have been layoffs at Wizards before. But you have to look at what areas. The DI hasn't been delivered yet, and it's getting cuts. It's one thing to cut a surplus of editors or whatnot after the new edition's done and out, it's another to cut areas that allegedly are still working hard to finish their part.

Anyone can try to interpret all these things as "maybe they're not bad..." But the common sense interpretation is that yeah - they're bad.

 

[Fifth Element]

It looks like a couple of their products are GSL (Forgotten Heroes: Fang, Fist, and Song is the only one I can find for sure) but others are not (the DCCs and other adventures just say "for 4e" and don't use any of the GSL trappings).

So how does this tie in to your claim that "It's an undeniable fact that the current [GSL] is totally undesirable" (emphasis added)?

Especially when you already mentioned that Mongoose has a couple of GSL products as well?