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PCGen LST Files

kristov

Explorer
Is it illegal to make your own LST file from Sword and Fist for PCGen 4.0?

Is it illegal to make your own LST file from Sword and Fist for PCGen 4.0 and then give it to your buddies you play D&D with?

Is it illegal to make your own LST file from Sword and Fist for PCGen 4.0 and then give it to everyone on the Internet who owns the book Sword and Fist?

Thanks,

Chris
 

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merton_monk

First Post
Is it illegal to make your own LST file from Sword and Fist for PCGen 4.0?

No, this is not legal.

Is it illegal to make your own LST file from Sword and Fist for PCGen 4.0 and then give it to your buddies you play D&D with?

That depends. If they all own the books for which you're making files, then there's no problem trading the files. Strictly speaking, you cannot give the files to any of them that don't have the books. Which leads into your next question...

Is it illegal to make your own LST file from Sword and Fist for PCGen 4.0 and then give it to everyone on the Internet who owns the book Sword and Fist?

Yes, this is illegal until such time as PCGen has acquired permission for Sword and Fist.

The above is true for all software - not just PCGen.

Bryan McRoberts
Code Monkey Publishing, Co-Founder
Benevolent Dictator of PCGen
 

kristov

Explorer
OK

As a followup.

How do you determine the legal difference between giving it to your buddies you play D&D with and who also own the original book - versus - people you don't know on the Internet who also own the original book?

You see what im asking?

Whats the legal specifics on "your friends" vs "people you know" vs "people on the internet" if they all meet the requirements of having purchased the original material in book form?

Thanks for the info!

Chris
 


Mynex

First Post
Zub said:


Not Legal? Whatch you talkin 'bout Willis?

No he meant 'This is not illegal'

Merton has a head cold and is hopped up on cold drugs. :p

As to the original posters question, you can verify your buddies have it, they're your buddies...

How are you going to verify that someone you don't know has it? In short, you can't hence you don't know if they do, so disseminating the list files across the net is illegal.
 

Aldymnor

First Post
I'm pretty sure it's the distribution that's illegal. What you do with your property is your business. Likewise, you can type the stats for any class in an MS word document, and save it on your computer -that's totally legal.
 

ptrpete

First Post
Re: OK

kristov said:
As a followup.

How do you determine the legal difference between giving it to your buddies you play D&D with and who also own the original book - versus - people you don't know on the Internet who also own the original book?

You see what im asking?

Whats the legal specifics on "your friends" vs "people you know" vs "people on the internet" if they all meet the requirements of having purchased the original material in book form?

Thanks for the info!

Chris

IANAL, but:

If all the people getting the product via the internet had a legally purchased copy of S&F, then it would be legal to let them download the files you made. If even one person without S&F downloads a copy, it will be illegal.

So it is practicaly impossible to distribute these files via the internet, because how can you prove that everyone visiting your site has a legal copy of the book? OTOH, emailing the files to people you trust should be okay, as long as they are truthful when they say they have the books. But you are liable for the damages if it turns out one of them lied.
 

Leopold

NKL4LYFE
your damned if you do, damned if you don't.


Bottom line: Building them is not illegal, distributing them is. Take a look at the current DCMA arguements about MP3's and take everything applied to mp3's to mean lst files...more or less
 

merton_monk

First Post
Mynex is right - I must have had too much cold medicine in me! It is indeed the distribution factor that is key - if you bought the book you can make any copy of it you desire, including typing it into your preferred file format (i.e. Lst File format). However, you do not have permission to distribute your copy at all. That means that you can't share any of the copies you have with anyone unless the owner of the copyright (Wizards of the Coast in the case of books like Defenders of the Faith) have given you permission to do so. You can share the files with other people who also own the books. There's no way to verify that people who visit a site on the web own a specific book, so placing Lst Files on the web for others to access on the web is a no-no unless you have permission from the copyright owner. That's why we work so hard to acquire permission for all the books out there so we can include them in our releases of PCGen. The nice thing about the Open Gaming License is that for material that is declared entirely Open Game Content, no permission is required (however, we will still do so since that is the professionally courteous thing to do). The only restriction we have is for material that is declared product identity - that requires specific permission. The splatbooks and dragon magazines are not OGL, therefore we need special permission from Wotc before we can include any of it.

Hopefully the above clears up your questions without getting into a technical discussion of the OGL license. If you really want to get into a technical discussion you'll need to read up on the D20 license and LGPL license as well. It's enough to make your head spin, even without cold medication!

-Bryan
 

smetzger

Explorer
Re: Re: OK

ptrpete said:


IANAL, but:

If all the people getting the product via the internet had a legally purchased copy of S&F, then it would be legal to let them download the files you made.

I don't think so. MP3.com had a service that allowed you to upload your MP3s and then you could play them whenever you wanted. To save on disc space they only kept a single copy of the song for multiple users. Record companies took them to court and won.
 

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