If an OGC Wiki existed . . .

[philreed]

Would it affect your purchase decisions?

(Background for those wanting it.)

 

[Crothian]

I think it would stop me from getting the small PDFs since most of that is open content and with little art, but the books I'd still get since many books have much more then open content in them.

 

[BryonD]

I voted no. Not saying it would be zero, but it would be minimal.
I like supporting companies that produce good product.
And I put my money where my mouth is. There are two companies I can think of off the top of my head that have offered me free product and I have turned around to offered to buy it anway. (The usual response is to insist I not pay, but I have paid at least once and would happily do it any time).

Anyway, I don't think my vote is in any way representative of what the real market impact would be.

 

[philreed]

I honestly don't know if it would have any impact on my choices. I like to think that it wouldn't, and I would still buy the products that interest me, but how long could I really resist the temptation to save money and grab free content?

 

[jezter6]

I agree with Crothian. It would hurt publishers of short OGC products from guys like you, gareth, and louis more than it would hurt someone like Mongoose or RPGObjects. I would still buy RPGObjects books because they are full of goodies and not just single bits of material. That, and like I've said before, are an excellent value for my money...I just get more for my cash than short OGC stuff.

Since I don't buy the cheap shorties anyways, it wouldn't affect my purchasing decisions, but I do think it would affect those who rely on such products.

 

[mearls]

I find this sort of question interesting, because most OGC is (potentially) already available via p2p networks.

Unless DRM has made a come back, PDF sharing and piracy already has its impact on sales.

 

[philreed]

Unless DRM has made a come back, PDF sharing and piracy already has its impact on sales.

DRM did nothing to stop piracy.

That said, I think a lot of people that aren't willing to download illegal PDFs would be willing to access a legel source for all of the same material.

 

[Crothian]

That said, I think a lot of people that aren't willing to download illegal PDFs would be willing to access a legel source for all of the same material.

I would

 

[Yair]

I'm not sure if this is a very useful poll.

I voted "Yes", it would allow me to see a lot of products and will incline me to purchase big/hardcover products with lots of useful content, or products from consistently good writers/publishers - assuming it is clearly designated as such (which it won't be).
It will also discourage the purchase of small products, products with little non-OGC content or value, and products out of which I only want to use a fraction (and there are lots of those).
I'm not sure what the overall effect will be.

 

[mearls]

DRM did nothing to stop piracy.

That said, I think a lot of people that aren't willing to download illegal PDFs would be willing to access a legel source for all of the same material.

Right, and there's a legal source out there right now - the PDF that contains that data.

Your line of thinking assumes that every scrap of open text ends up in a repository, or that customers see no value in nice layout and art. I don't think either is the case. The time and effort needed to simply maintain and build a repository make any efforts to add art and nice layout to it a waste.