Mouseferatu said:
3) However, that being said...
Let me get this straight... Wizards of the Coast is allowing other companies--competitors, small as they may be, in a niche market--use WotC's proprietary material. Without cost. It's a move that, until 2000, was absolutely unheard of in the industry in any meaningful way. It may be a move that benefited WotC, but that doesn't change the fact that it's an incredibly generous one, since most of the current companies wouldn't exist at all without it.
In effect, WotC said "Here, everyone! Play with my toys."
And now, suddenly, it's "Big Brother" or "unprincipled" for WotC to say, "Well, we only want some other companies to play with our toys"?
No. Uh-uh. I call bull excrement. There's nothing Big Brotherly, nothing unprincipled, nothing immoral about it. WotC is still being far more open, and far more generous, with other companies than anyone has any right to expect. To suggest otherwise is, IMO, an indefensible position.
I hope WotC's new license is broad enough to make the most number of people happy. But at the end of the day, if they want to dial it back, there's nothing wrong--in any sense of the word--with them doing so.
Actually, the openness of the system is a significant factor in what brought me back to D&D. In some ways, it was a commitment that WotC wouldn't harass enthusiastic fans that could, and would, create some pretty phenomenal material.
Yes, I know that wasn't exactly the intent of the licensing. But as a customer, it has been a significant draw of the game for me. More restrictive licensing is a potential warning flag for me.
Is it "wrong"? Well, not really. Unprincipled or immoral? Those are value judgements and depend largely on your perspective. However, some would argue, quite passionately, that rescinding licensing goes against the open-source movement, blah, blah, blah, etc.
From a consumer perspective, there are potential benefits as well as potential drawbacks. One potential benefit would be improved quality of products. Adding value to the D20 brand and all that. However a drawback is that there is the potential for censorship, back room deals, etc.
The strength of a liberal open license is some transparency to the system. If nobody can censor you, then anything that is released is "unimpeded" and "organic". Of course, the product could be total garbage to the majority of gamers as well. Allowing a group to have some sort of approval process makes the entire system less transparent. With less transparency comes the suspicion that certain types of products are being censored and idea sharing is somehow being controlled. However, that control might be quality control and there might be fewer products that make it to the shelves that will leave customers feeling dissatisfied.
One outgrowth of the open licensing has been more investment of more fans into the game and the game system. I love the fact that I have so many products that I use in my games on a regular basis that WotC might not have ever thought of, much less published. I use more third party products than I do WotC products. I have products from Fantasy Flight Games, Malhavoc, Necromancer Games, Green Ronin, Ronin Arts, Lions Den, Atlas Games, Bad Axe games (still using Mythin Archetypes every week in my campaign Wulf! That makes 3 campaigns so far.) My list of third party publishers is long so I won't list them all. I am just mentioning the ones that are in my line of sight as I write this. More importantly, I appreciate the fact that all of these publishers are active fans of the game! I feel invested in the success of the game, and I love sharing ideas with all of these people. While WotC designed and published the game, they didn't create the community. All of us created the community and the OGL & D20STL were factors in that process.
Changes to the licensing threaten the community to some small degree. For all of us that feel invested in that community, that might mean we feel a little threatened. While WotC, and other publishers, might be more concerned about the business impact of the licensing, the rest of us are unencumbered by such thoughts.
All of which really means we might need to adjust our thinking a little. We are invested in the game, and the community. I think we want to see everyone involved be successful. WotC isn't "wrong" to adjust the licensing to improve their business. They are well within their rights to do so. We just don't want the changes to negatively impact the community of our hobby.