Ryan Dancey -- Hasbro Cannot Deauthorize OGL

I reached out to the architect of the original Open Gaming License, former VP of Wizard of the Coast, Ryan Dancey, and asked his opinion about the current plan by WotC to 'deauthorize' the current OGL in favour of a new one.

He responded as follows:

Yeah my public opinion is that Hasbro does not have the power to deauthorize a version of the OGL. If that had been a power that we wanted to reserve for Hasbro, we would have enumerated it in the license. I am on record numerous places in email and blogs and interviews saying that the license could never be revoked.

Ryan also maintains the Open Gaming Foundation.

As has been noted previously, even WotC in its own OGL FAQ did not believe at the time that the licence could be revoked.

7. Can't Wizards of the Coast change the License in a way that I wouldn't like?

Yes, it could. However, the License already defines what will happen to content that has been previously distributed using an earlier version, in Section 9. As a result, even if Wizards made a change you disagreed with, you could continue to use an earlier, acceptable version at your option. In other words, there's no reason for Wizards to ever make a change that the community of people using the Open Gaming License would object to, because the community would just ignore the change anyway.

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[GMforPowergamers]

So what happens to existing materials? Do they just have to go in the bin? Should I start downloading everything I have on DTRPG in case they nuke the database?

no harm in doing so, not expecting it to be necessary, but no one can tell you definitively imo

download everything today.
EVERYTHING
and if nothing comes of it, keep that backup ANYWAY...

 

[rcade]

If this is true then every website and podcast right now is in violation, as they don't have the OGL printed in full on it.

A lot of websites that offer SRD-derived content do publish the OGL with the site in Section 15. Here's an example:

Open Game License

OPEN GAME LICENSE Version 1.0aThe following text is the property of Wizards of the Coast, Inc. and is Copyright 2000 Wizards of the Coast, Inc ("Wizards"). All Rights Reserved.1. Definitions:

thealexandrian.net

 

[wingsandsword]

Okay this new OGL is bad, but it's not that.

If you put stuff up for free no issue.
If you put stuff sell it and make less then 50k a year no issue.

I can't imagine anything I or my friends make ever being effected. Even if I wanted to it would be through the DMsGuild.

THe issue isn't fans. The issue is 100% the people who do this professionally. The people who have mortgage and rent payments they make by selling D&D related stuff... not some dude that throws a few things up on the web.

Except they can revoke OGL 1.1 at will, explicitly.

A license that can be revoked at will is meaningless, it's as worthless as their "Fan Content Policy".

The OGL isn't supposed to be able to be revoked, that was a substantial part of its appeal, that the nuts & bolts of D&D were out there "in the open" in perpetuity.

Without the OGL 1.0a, there is literally nothing stopping WotC from going straight to "T$R" legal tactics like cease and desist letters, DMCA takedowns, and various other legal threats and actions. They could just unilaterally declare war on all fan and 3rd party D&D-related content on the web.

. . .and no, I don't trust WotC not to do that. If this OGL 1.1 is actually released, they will have forever forfeited that kind of trust. WotC spent a quarter-century telling D&D fans they weren't like the TSR of old, and the OGL was a backbone of that. . .now they've gone back on that.

. . .all because (as was covered elsewhere on ENWorld a few months ago), a Hasbro exec was caught saying that he thought D&D was under-monetized. I'd put money that this is an extension of that pressure from executives to get more money out of D&D.

This is WotC destroying 25 years of good will they cultivated from the D&D community in one fell swoop, and destroying any kind of trust on a scale that will take decades (if ever) to restore.

 

[Reynard]

. . .and no, I don't trust WotC not to do that. If this OGL 1.1 is actually released, they will have forever forfeited that kind of trust.

I don't think it even needs released in that form to have broken the trust. The fact that they seriously considered it and sent it out to 3PPs tells you what their goals are. Even if they walk back now, it's a feint.

 

[jgbrowning]

I don't think it even needs released in that form to have broken the trust. The fact that they seriously considered it and sent it out to 3PPs tells you what their goals are. Even if they walk back now, it's a feint.

It is hard to deny that the relationship seems to have turned adversarial.

joe b.

 

[Umbran]

All respect to Ryan, but his opinion actually doesn't matter at all. Just an opinion, he could advocate for what he could attest to the mindset of WotC at the time, but that is completely irrelevant now

His statements are somewhat more than "an opinion" as he was WotC's official voice on what the intent of the license was when it was first released, which WotC has echoed well after Dancey left.

Contracts are weird, and sometimes what everyone understands them to mean has a weight. If you've spent 20+ years establishing that it means X, suddenly unilaterally saying it means Y may not hold up.

 

[Simplicity]

Okay this new OGL is bad, but it's not that.

If you put stuff up for free no issue.
If you put stuff sell it and make less then 50k a year no issue.

I can't imagine anything I or my friends make ever being effected. Even if I wanted to it would be through the DMsGuild.

THe issue isn't fans. The issue is 100% the people who do this professionally. The people who have mortgage and rent payments they make by selling D&D related stuff... not some dude that throws a few things up on the web.

The new license is changeable at any time, so it is however onerous as Hasbro wants it to be. No one should ever agree to a contract like that. I agree to whatever percentage you want, given 30 days notice...

 

[wingsandsword]

While it would be nice to have better wording in the OGL, I think it's wishful thinking to believe that would stop what is clearly a bad-faith, malicious reading of it. The decision makers chose to do this not because the OGL allows it, but because they think they can get away with it. It's very clear that the intent of the OGL was to be open and irrevocable.

Exactly.

No matter how well worded the OGL was, they'd make or claim something to say it wasn't, and rely on intimidation and legal threats.

At this point I firmly believe they, strictly speaking, legally can't rescind the OGL 1.0a and that the "de authorization" in OGL 1.1 is invalid. . .

. . .but I have zero faith that they won't try intimidation and barratry to users, especially large-scale commercial users, of the OGL 1.0a with regards to material derived from the SRD's.

This isn't a legal strategy, it's an intimidation strategy.

 

[Von Ether]

Didn't they have a story about killing the golden goose?

I think quite a few of us have white collar stories of a VP taking over and they'd rather ruin proven processes or get rid of people who tell them "That can't work due to X or we can do Y if you give us more resources" too often.

They use the chaos to claim they made more profits and then get promoted and gone in two years.

 

[Dausuul]

Why are you constructing straw men? All I said was if you post mechanics online you are technically under the OGL not the Fan Content Policy.

No, you're not. You are under the OGL if you publish material which contains the OGL license notice.

Otherwise, you are under nothing but regular copyright* law... which usually allows you to copy mechanics as long as you put them in your own words. If you screw up, Wizards can sue you for copyright infringement, but not for a breach of the OGL -- you can't breach a contract you never accepted.

*And/or trademark law, and/or patent law, depending on exactly what you're publishing.

No. Every homebrew spell or monster is, though.

I mean, just go read the fan policy if you don't believe me.

If what you're doing is permitted by law, and you have not published under the OGL, then neither the fan policy nor the OGL affects you. Wizards is not the government; it does not get to dictate terms to other people on how they can exercise their legal rights.