We got an official leak of One D&D OGL 1.1! Watch Our Discussion And Reactions!

[Art Waring]

Ok so I have been on this all morning. I have timestamped the video in this post to playback where the youtuber reads what sounds like a direct source email regarding the new OGL, which he claims he received about two to three weeks ago. (I had initially said that this guy was most likely mistaken about the rumor, due to his lack of experience with the 1.0a OGL, but this is very concerning because it matches with the other sources, not to mention that he didn't actually read out the leaked document in his original video, this video has that information).


Summary: The email states that going forward "you cannot earn any income on SRD based dnd content on or after January 13th 2023 without either agreeing to the new 1.1 OGL license, or by striking a direct deal with wotc". I really, really, really hope this is just a rumor...

 

[Yora]

That's one week from now. How would WotC even be able to reach all people using the OGL and SRD content in that time to inform them of these changes? Which it legally can't make to the existing contracts anyway.

 

[Art Waring]

That's one week from now. How would WotC even be able to reach all people using the OGL and SRD content in that time to inform them of these changes? Which it legally can't make to the existing contracts anyway.

While I personally have no idea how they expect this to happen, or if is even legal, it doesn't discount it from being a possibility that they can threaten future publishers with the new 1.1 OGL without having to go to court.

And its not really one week, according to the video they (likely companies that signed the NDA) may have gotten notice up to three weeks ago, giving companies their 30 days notice to sign or essentially vacate.

 

[Nylanfs]

I'd be interested to her Ryan's and David Kenzer's takes on this. AFAIK we haven't seen anything from David, Ryan did update the https://opengamingfoundation.org/ though.

 

[Remathilis]

but it is the lion’s share that makes them a monopoly…

Bullocks. If that's the case, Apple has a monopoly on Smartphones, Microsoft has a monopoly on office software and Google has a monopoly on search engines. You need more than just market dominance, you need a mechanism that stops any competition from challenging you. There are plenty of options for each of the above, even if none of them quite reach the ubiquitous nature of the named companies.

 

[Yora]

Section 9 has the relevant clause - "you may use any authorized version of this Licesne to copy, modify and distrbiute any Open Game Content originally distributed under any version of this license.

I'm with you that I don't see how WOTC can deauthorize OGL 1.0a for existing material (for example if it was deauthorized for SRD 5.1 then it would in effect revoke the whole license, which does seem to go against the terms of the OGL 1.0a license). However, deauthorizing the use of OGL 1.0a for material released under OGL 1.1 would seem potentially doable and would be a statement made so that there is no confusion about whether certain content released under OGL 1.1 could be rereleased by others under OGL 1.0a (the question of whether OGL 1.1 would be legally considered a version of OGL 1.0a at that point might be in contention but outside that I think it would make sense).

If you want to make new 6th edition content unavailable under the new license, all they would have to do is simply call it anything other than Open Game License version 1.1. Just don't claim that the new license is a new version of the old license, and you're golden. You can put whatever you want in the new license with no legal consequences of anything that is in the OGL 1.0a.

 

[mamba]

Bullocks. If that's the case, Apple has a monopoly on Smartphones, Microsoft has a monopoly on office software and Google has a monopoly on search engines. You need more than just market dominance, you need a mechanism that stops any competition from challenging you. There are plenty of options for each of the above, even if none of them quite reach the ubiquitous nature of the named companies.

Apple doesn’t even sell the majority of smart phones (Android does), that is out on its face. MS does have a monopoly on office software.

Being a monopoly is not illegal, abusing that position is

 

[mamba]

If you want to make new 6th edition content unavailable under the new license, all they would have to do is simply call it anything other than Open Game License version 1.1. Just don't claim that the new license is a new version of the old license, and you're golden. You can put whatever you want in the new license with no legal consequences of anything that is in the OGL 1.0a.

so clearly that is not the goal, they want it for all versions

 

[Alzrius]

Weird. Because if they pull the trigger and somehow the OGL actually does go away, that’s a lot of game companies that suddenly either disappear or fall in line, and that’s them directly engaging in anti-competitive behavior and exercising a lot of power over the market.

Anticompetitive practices has a very specific meaning here, which a potential revocation of the OGL v1.0a doesn't come close to meeting.

 

[mamba]

Summary: The email states that going forward "you cannot earn any income on SRD based dnd content on or after January 13th 2023 without either agreeing to the new 1.1 OGL license, or by striking a direct deal with wotc". I really, really, really hope this is just a rumor...

is there a difference between ‘SRD based’ and ‘licensed under the OGL’ ?

Earn any income, including for already released products? Didn’t think this is even possible