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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Cergorach" data-source="post: 4029478" data-attributes="member: 725">I am of the believe that content creators should be provided for, for their works to the public. The easiest way in current society is to compensate the creator with money, the easiest way to guarantee that is with copyrights. Only copyrights have been seriously 'misused' (as I indicated above).Personally I would like to see the following (over the course of time):1.) Only humans can hold the copyrights to their own property.2.) Limit copyrights to a period of time that will allow the creator ample time to be compensated. Say, 5 years.3.) Remove copyrights, but with social changes that will make sure that the creator is still provided for his work. Be that through governmental subsidy or by donation (yeah, humanity needs to be more giving for that to really work).Because option 1 and 2 are currently very difficult to attain through conventional means (the corporate lobby is far to big to allow this in democratic countries), 'free' thinkers have developed Open Source Licences, especially the viral kind. If you follow the OSS news a bit, you'll notice that it's actually working. Big companies like SUN and IBM are embracing it, even companies like The New York Times are providing funding to OSS (WordPress). The biggest alternative to Windows is Linux (with OsX gaining quickly), an OS Operating System. Companies that develop such software don't make their money selling their software, they make money providing services, such as support (but installation and schooling are also quite common).Look at the internet services such as ENworld, they don't make money in the traditional sense, money is earned through advertising and donation. While ENworld might not be the best example as they don't have a paid staff, there are many examples of sites that do have paid staff supported through adds. WotC is also starting to move in the service support direction with their digital initiative (online gaming, character creation, discussion, etc.). Computer games are also moving to a service based model, MMOs require a monthly payment. While many games still require you to buy them initially and major expansions (World of Warcraft, Lord of the Rings, etc.), others only require only monthly payments (Eve Online, Jumpgate, etc.), still others are free but allow certain ingame features through micro payments (Rappelz, Sword of the New World, etc.).While D&D is a solid brandname and the a lot of the rules changes are a step forward (a lot of the fluff changes aren't as good imho), 3.xE is open and 4E isn't really. Sure your allowed to publish material for it, but only under some very strict rules and oversight. Although we don't know the exact details, we do get the idea... With the move to 3E there were a lot of folks that said they would stay with 2E (or 1E, or Basic, or whatever edition they wanted to play). That was a choice based on preffered edition and a bit of rebbeling against a new edition (that made most of the 2E books redundant), now there is also the license issue. You would be suprised how many people prefer to use OSS over closed Software on principle (provided of course that it does what you want it to). Expect the same with 3.xE vs. 4E.</blockquote>

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