Is E-Tools worth it?

[kingpaul]

Maybe a little less sarcasm is in order...I'm not disagreeing with your points, but the delivery seems a little over the top.

Both PCGen and CMP have been the focus of these kinds of arguments for over three years now. It gets tiring to have to rehash the arguments repeatedly.

 

[kingpaul]

I support programs whom have rich communities whom don't overcharge on the product. I support programs where I can go to joe blow and ask what he's doing on his script and share what i'm doing on mine.

Both CMP and PCGen have communites that support the users. Over the past several years, both PCGen and eTools have progressed and improved. If there are issues, they can be brought to their forums for solutions.

As for sharing, if you have permission from the IP owner to do so, then go for it. If you don't, then you can't.

DMgenie, and for that matter roleplaying master, are just better programs, cheaper and supported heavily by their communities.

I thought both DMGenie and Roleplaying Master were commercial products? PCGen is free. I could be wrong.

And as I said just above, both CMP and PCGen support their products through their forums/Y! groups respectively.

They just don't have big brother wotc backing them which is why I scoffed at pc-gen's recent win at the ennies.

Ummm...PCGen is a free product that has no ties to WotC.

If you think its right for anyone to tell you what you can or can't do with properity you've bought knock yourself's out I don't get into the file sharing debate.

Once again, if *you* want to create a dataset for a product that *you* own for *your* self, there's *nothing* wrong with that.

But when I transfer the equivelent of cliffnotes of a book two people own for a program we both have and you advocate breaking down the door there's something morrally worng with that.

You are still distributing someone else's IP in doing so.

IE: i can let my brother borrow my shirt, can't let my brother borrow a cd. )

But by distributing the dataset, you aren't 'lending' or 'borrowing' because the item still exists on your computer...unless you delete said file from your computer, then only 1 instance of it still exists.

MY personal feelings were decided a few years ago, and it was not something that just came. It was me, following and thinking codemonkey was pretty gutsy and risky with pcgen and then seeing it shut down. Ok.

Once again, CMP != PCGen. PCGen was in existence before CMP ever was. PCGen has not been shut down, we are still around.

But to see you guys turn complete turncoats into this fabricated argument wotc has pushed for years because of their high priced lawyers was really upseting.

When were lawyers brought in? The then board of PCGen met with Anthony Valterra, then D&D Brand Manager.

edit Put Ryan Dancey in by accident, it was Anthony Valterra instead.

I stopped using pcgen (got tired of downloading the latest java packages anyway) and looked elsewhere. And I believe thats when I found dmgenie and roleplaying master and a couple others. Big communities on other web services which rocked and the company didn't seem to be effected by the big brother mentality.

Once again, both CMP and PCGen have communities. We also don't advocate the dissemination of someone else's IP.

Someone keeps saying, what is time worth. If i say my time is worth free, if i'm in this soley so that others won't have to code then I'll do it. That's a community. Is it worth making a program and then complicating it so much that only you can come up with the good stuff and sell it for 33% of what the material iti s based off of costs?

Once again, for *your* self, you can create the datasets. If you are not the IP owner or do not have the IP owner's permission, then you can not dissemintate the IP. It has nothing to do with being a community and everything with folllowing the law.

And, for PCGen, I know we've been trying to simplify things so that users can easily do their own datasets if they wish, instead of having to wait for the PCGen datamonkeys to create the OGC ones or the CMP datamonkeys to do the WotC ones.

 

[msd]

Both PCGen and CMP have been the focus of these kinds of arguments for over three years now. It gets tiring to have to rehash the arguments repeatedly.

Thinking that everyone on these boards has been privy to those discussions and has witnessed and/or grown tired of them is a pretty poor assumption in my mind.

For someone who is not aware, it just looks like rudeness tinged with a superiority complex. It is my personal opinion (and I readily grant that yours and other may vary) that people like that are not the best spokespeople for their products.

Best of luck to you,
Matt

 

[DonTadow]

Thinking that everyone on these boards has been privy to those discussions and has witnessed and/or grown tired of them is a pretty poor assumption in my mind.

For someone who is not aware, it just looks like rudeness tinged with a superiority complex. It is my personal opinion (and I readily grant that yours and other may vary) that people like that are not the best spokespeople for their products.

Best of luck to you,
Matt

Whereas I havnt yet to complete my first year on the boards, I'd never heard it before. And several times in my own responses I really said i dont really intend on debating the intellectual properity debate. Theres not enough space. All I wanted to do was give the guy some advice about software and whats what. Then someone got off their high horse and decided to preach to me about the morals of other software communities.

I've heard it elsewhere and I really don't see hte point in discussing it anymore. I hope that the original poster enjoys his purchase.

 

[Zulithe]

So basically here if you do out and buy a book, you feel that you own the rights to do with this book all that you want to. Based on this logic it would be ok for you to buy a copy of a WotC book, scan the entire contents into a pdf file, and then share it with anyone else that ownes a copy of the book. Hey, if you own it then it is ok to share it with anyone else that owns it right? Sure this is not data that is going into a program for use but it is the same information and IP of WotC that you would be sharing, just in a different format. And if you really believe that this is legal, then you are misunderstood.

Hi. Actually, in the exact order and execution that you described it, I think it would be perfectly fine. I am not saying it is legal, just that it is not immoral and is not abusing my rights of ownership. Just my opinion. Now, if I scanned it and gave it away to people who did not purchase the book, then that would be wrong.

I am also sure that you and I own a couple of music CD's that are the same as well. How about I rip them into MP3 format and then share them with you. Same principle here. Just because you own the product, does not give you the right to share it with anyone else requardless of the format. Just ask Napster.

Again I would say that this is perfectly fine. I'm not arguing that it is legal, I'm sure that it isn't, but it is not an abuse of rights of ownership no matter how much the corporate hounds have brainwashed you into thinking that it is. If you would put some real thought into it, you would agree, me thinks.

So, what if we both owned the same CD and both ripped it into MP3 format for our own personal use, I'm sure you'd agree that it is fine. It is only the sharing with one another of something that we both already legally own that is the problem. But I see no problem. It is a problem that has been created as the result of greed.

So I am going to go back to fixing bugs with the etools datasets now as that is what I do, reguardless of those that think that etools never gets updated.

I hope I don't come off as seeming that I don't appreciate the work you or others do on the "pay" datasets. I think it is wonderful. Just, what can I say, I'm a poor college kid.

 

[kingpaul]

Thinking that everyone on these boards has been privy to those discussions and has witnessed and/or grown tired of them is a pretty poor assumption in my mind.

This discussion has been brought up for the past 3 years on this board, CMP's boards, PCGen's Y! group and WotC's group. Every time it comes up, we address it, again and again.

 

[kingpaul]

Hi. Actually, in the exact order and execution that you described it, I think it would be perfectly fine. I am not saying it is legal, just that it is not immoral and is not abusing my rights of ownership. Just my opinion. Now, if I scanned it and gave it away to people who did not purchase the book, then that would be wrong.

Unless you have permission from the IP owner of said book, distributing the scan is illegal, regardless of whether the end recipient (sp) has the book or not.

So, what if we both owned the same CD and both ripped it into MP3 format for our own personal use, I'm sure you'd agree that it is fine. It is only the sharing with one another of something that we both already legally own that is the problem. But I see no problem. It is a problem that has been created as the result of greed.

Once again, it is the distribution of IP.

Just, what can I say, I'm a poor college kid.

Does that then make it right to distribute IP that you don't have permission from the IP owner to do so?

 

[Samuel Leming]

This discussion has been brought up for the past 3 years on this board, CMP's boards, PCGen's Y! group and WotC's group. Every time it comes up, we address it, again and again.

Yeah, I can see why you guys would be tired of this subject, but things got a little more rude here then they really needed to be.

If I were in your shoes, I'd carefully construct a FAQ that addresses all these issues and point people towards it whenever these subjects come up. Just a suggestion.

Sam

 

[kingpaul]

Whereas I havnt yet to complete my first year on the boards, I'd never heard it before.

Pardon me for having a dificult time believing that. You've stated in your previous posts that you used PCGen but don't because of WotC pushing its 'demise'. If you knew about that from back then, you knew about it back then.

 

[kingpaul]

If I were in your shoes, I'd carefully construct a FAQ that addresses all these issues and point people towards it whenever these subjects come up. Just a suggestion.

You think we should create a FAQ on why distributing another person's IP without their permission is illegal?