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Message: <blockquote data-quote="woodelf" data-source="post: 1831454" data-attributes="member: 10201">Two issues here. First, i'll tackle the "easy" one--the problem with that declaration isn't that it's stingy, it's that it's useless. Unless i'm familiar with every product you've derived from and the definition of "derived from"--a definition that does not exist anywhere in the WotC OGL or attendant documents [and if we're using the standard IP-law interpretation of "derived from", i'd say that not a single thing in any of your PDFs that isn't a direct verbatim reprint from another source qualifies as derived material--pretty clearly not what the WotC OGL has in mind] --i don't know what's OGC in your work. If you want to cut down your OGC to the bare minimum, that's fine, but please use a clear designation (as the license legally requires), so that i can figure out what is OGC and what isn't. As someone has proposed: do your OGC and PI declarations pass the 6-yr-old test: can a literate 6-yr-old with a highlighter identify the OGC and PI in your document? If not, it isn't "clearly identified". That's, at best, bad form, and at worst a violation of teh terms of the license. Any statements of the form of "any derived material" or "all original names" are vague.  [Does "original" mean "first time a widget in D20 System has been given this name"? "first time this flavor of widget in D20 System has been given this name"? "a name that you can't find in a dictionary or encyclopedia"? I still don't know if "stomp" as the name of a feat is being claimed as PI--never mind whether it is a supportable claim.]  Now, as to what you "should" do: IMHO, continue to release that which you would want available, were you the reuser. Essentially, use the Golden Rule. I honestly think planning yoru strategy on how the public is going to behave is foolish, and probably futile: there'll always be those with a contrarian streak that'll get more malicious as you lock your IP down more, and i suspect that they'll roughly balance out the "benevolent" re-users that give up because not enough content is OGC to be worthwhile. I suspect that your risk of OGC extracts floating arou]nd is a roughly-constant thing, and all that'll change is who's doing them, and why. But as you lock down more IP, the good you contribute to RPGs in general diminishes, as does the odds of your specific work expanding to greater influence in the general system. So, i think locking down your IP tightly is cutting off your nose to spite your face--you're not gonna actually stop malicious reuse, but you'll definitely cut down on positive reuse.</blockquote>

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