Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
White Dwarf Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Nest
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
EN Publishing
Twitter
BlueSky
Facebook
Instagram
EN World
BlueSky
YouTube
Facebook
Twitter
Twitch
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
Publishing Business & Licensing
It is time to forgive WOTC and get back onboard.
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Enrahim2" data-source="post: 8926537" data-attributes="member: 7039850"><p>I think this is the crux of what I think went wrong. My claim was that there was "significant" lawyer resources put into this. From my understanding there was a dedicated lawyer working closely with a business representative trying to make a draft based on very exotic requirements determined by committee between potential competitors. In addition I got the impression that those potential competitors also had their lawyers scrutinize it and got a thumbs up. This appear to be more resources than what the average indie developer could pour into trying to make a custom license for their system, and hence "significant".</p><p></p><p>However as you point out the quest they embarked on was very far from trivial, and it is in hindsight quite obvious that the amount of lawyer resources put into it was far from <em>adequate</em> if the intention had been to build a legally solid foundation for an entire industry. However my impression is that that was not the ambition for the OGL. Rather it appear mostly as a truce and a legal framework allowing for some cross use. You can hardly blame the initial drafters and approvers for failing to account for what sort of runaway success the license would be, or that WotC would completely neglect the responsibility put on them for updating the license as needed.</p><p></p><p>As I read it the <em>itention</em> for the legalese was at that stage mainly a tool to build sufficient trust for various companies daring to work together on the business side. And for this it appear to have been quite successful. And if the legal document is good enough to fulfill it's intention, why throw more legal resources on it?</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Enrahim2, post: 8926537, member: 7039850"] I think this is the crux of what I think went wrong. My claim was that there was "significant" lawyer resources put into this. From my understanding there was a dedicated lawyer working closely with a business representative trying to make a draft based on very exotic requirements determined by committee between potential competitors. In addition I got the impression that those potential competitors also had their lawyers scrutinize it and got a thumbs up. This appear to be more resources than what the average indie developer could pour into trying to make a custom license for their system, and hence "significant". However as you point out the quest they embarked on was very far from trivial, and it is in hindsight quite obvious that the amount of lawyer resources put into it was far from [I]adequate[/I] if the intention had been to build a legally solid foundation for an entire industry. However my impression is that that was not the ambition for the OGL. Rather it appear mostly as a truce and a legal framework allowing for some cross use. You can hardly blame the initial drafters and approvers for failing to account for what sort of runaway success the license would be, or that WotC would completely neglect the responsibility put on them for updating the license as needed. As I read it the [I]itention[/I] for the legalese was at that stage mainly a tool to build sufficient trust for various companies daring to work together on the business side. And for this it appear to have been quite successful. And if the legal document is good enough to fulfill it's intention, why throw more legal resources on it? [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
Publishing Business & Licensing
It is time to forgive WOTC and get back onboard.
Top