Years after completely ditching the system, WotC makes their move!

[Sorrowdusk]

I understand them protecting their rights.

I understand them yanking the 3.x pdf for sale when 4ed was released.

But why yank the older PDF materials that were available for sale on the web? Other companies were paying the expenses of hosting the PDFs for sale on the Web. WOTC just had to sit back and collect the checks from the hosting companies.

I ask WHY yank that older 1ed, 2ed and basic material?

Who KNOWS? But I tell ya, there are still maaaany little nooks on the interwebs, including rapidshare, filestube and too many other places as well as the d20srd. The net is vast and infinite.

Out of curiosity, ignore this question if answering would violate anything, is there anywwhere I can download a zipped/batched/otherwise collected into a single source copy of the old 3.x releases that were free on their website e.g. the pages containing new spells/items for specfic environments or themes, portal discussion, epic progressions for a shapeshifter etc? I had them once but they were corrupted when my computer crashed and I could never bring myself to spend the hours resaving them all.

Google the title you want and become a pirate.

That is, if you think that you can kill WOTC Ninja-lawyers.

*zing*!

Duh Duh Duh-another one bites the dust!
http://www.enworld.org/forum/d-d-legacy-discussion/297801-wizards-coast-website-articles-3-x-archive.html

We're not buying 4e. Clearly, this is because there is still 3.5e material still floating around. It must be purged.

Lock your doors at night, people. WotC law-ninjas will soon be coming to torch your obsolete deadtree.

10-20% Commin for you
30-40% Lock your door
50-60% Cruxifix
70-80% stay up late
90-00% NEVER SLEEP AGAIN!

 

[Sorrowdusk]

-Double Post-

 

[aboyd]

If you do not enforce your rights against "open and notorious" infringers, it is possible to lose your ability to defend against others.

I believe you are confusing trademark law (businesses can lose their trademarks if they don't protect them) with copyright law (you can selectively enforce it with no loss of rights -- you can even sit on the copyright for 30 years until people assume you've let the information go free, then boom hit 'em all with lawsuits -- it may be mean, but it's legal).

Thus, WotC could indeed leave CK alone and have no worries about losing copyright control.

In this case, CK is relatively high profile- if WotC does not go after them, they'll have issues going after others.

This is absolutely untrue.

There are IP rights you can lose by mere inaction in the US, but copyright isn't one of them...

Wait... now I'm confused. The first two quotes of yours seem to contradict this third quote of yours. You acknowledge that inaction won't cause you to lose copyright, yet you asserted that WotC must go after CK or "they'll have issues."

What is going on here?

 

[Aus_Snow]

Ah, desperation.

It's not a flattering look, W. Yet again.

But sure, don't let that stop you digging your own grave, a little bit more each time. I for one literally could not care less.

It is a shame, however, that CK is not what it was. But, as has been said upthread, it's not like anything ever entirely disappears from the arpatubes.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I believe you are confusing trademark law (businesses can lose their trademarks if they don't protect them) with copyright law (you can selectively enforce it with no loss of rights -- you can even sit on the copyright for 30 years until people assume you've let the information go free, then boom hit 'em all with lawsuits -- it may be mean, but it's legal).

Thus, WotC could indeed leave CK alone and have no worries about losing copyright control.


This is absolutely untrue.


Wait... now I'm confused. The first two quotes of yours seem to contradict this third quote of yours. You acknowledge that inaction won't cause you to lose copyright, yet you asserted that WotC must go after CK or "they'll have issues."

What is going on here?

While it is true you cannot lose copyright via mere inaction, a good attorney can argue that selective enforcement of your rights is evidence of at least a partial abandonment- something the Ninth Circuit has suggested is possible (such as in Microstar v. Formgen, 1998) but has not yet to my knowledge had a case in which they ruled that such had happened.

I'm not saying that a ruling of partial abandonment is the probable outcome, but given that the courts are starting to entertain such ideas, WotC/Hasbro's legal department may have advised them to err on the side of caution.

Proving copyright abandonment is tricky: you have to show evidence of an intentional act (Hampton v. Paramount, 1960). In the hypothetical, the attorney would have to show that WotC's selective enforcement was deliberate; that they did not and never intended to enforce their rights against equally or more egregiously offending parties. IOW, WotC had singled out their client.

A tough burden of proof, to be sure, but not impossible...especially if actually true.

 

[DumbPaladin]

It's kind of interesting that this thread has started to become the #1 place on ENWorld for legal eagle geeks.

On a related note: I wonder how the CrystalKeep guy feels about having WotC come down on him as if he were some sort of out-of-control criminal enterprise...

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

Danny's the only one really, it'd be nice to see joethelawyer or other-lawyer-types-that-didn't-put-their-professions-in-their-usernames-thus-making-it-easy-for-me-to-recall-what-they-do-for-a-living to post on this topic.

 

[freyar]

What I'm wondering about is with the recent stirring from Legal Department, will it be turning its eyestalks at the Creature Catalog web page and subsequent uses in Tome of Horrors [3.0 / 3.5] and the more recent use in Pathfinder. I've always been curious to the exact details of whether Necromancer / SSS had the actual authority to release the classic D&D critters into d20 status.

I've been somewhat curious about this as well. Scott Greene had/has an agreement with WotC about the CC, which was, as you noted, a development area for the ToH. Necromancer Games also had a specific agreement (contract, I guess) to cover the ToH. However, I am not sure how long the CC agreement lasts/lasted. Scott may know, but he hasn't dropped in for a visit at the CC in ages. There was also a memo from someone at WotC in the early 3.0 days about using the d20 system license to convert old adventures and monsters, but (1) that can't apply any more and (2) I don't think that's what the CC was under in the first place. So the whole situation is possibly a bit murky, and the current CC crew isn't the group that was there in the beginning (even Shade, the only forum moderator still around).

After that ramble, I have a question for Danny or anyone else. I seem to recall a lot of noise in the past that game mechanics aren't copyrightable, just their specific expression in tables, etc. So shouldn't the CK business be due to some trademark infringement instead? CK certainly seemed to use a different format than WotC ever did. Just some confusion on my non-lawyerly part.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

After that ramble, I have a question for Danny or anyone else. I seem to recall a lot of noise in the past that game mechanics aren't copyrightable, just their specific expression in tables, etc. So shouldn't the CK business be due to some trademark infringement instead? CK certainly seemed to use a different format than WotC ever did. Just some confusion on my non-lawyerly part.

True, and it's why clone RPGs are able to exist.

However, snce I haven't seen the particular stuff that was removed, I can't really say with any accuracy how strong WotC's case may have been. But in general, the expression of the rules can extend to unique words (like new monster names) or specific terminology within the context of the rules. And a mere switch of word order or rules order or layout isn't going to fly.

IOW, its a question of fact for the court to sort out.

And before you get to that point, the question is "is it worth it to you to defend yourself in court- can you afford it, or should you simply comply with the C&D request?"

 

[Raven Crowking]

I DID answer that- I've seen nothing here WotC could hang a lawsuit on.

To file a lawsuit, they would have to allege facts supporting their claims if being damaged. With, as I pointed out, nearly all of the speech I've seen here falling into constitutionally protected safe harbors, there's nothing to allege from the forums. Given their history of mod enforcement, ENWorld would win on the merits (or possibly even an outright dismissal) that they did give their best efforts to keep the site infringement free.

So I'm asking you, is there some form of infringement you've seen here go unpunished that you feel could endanger ENWorld? Because I haven't seen any.

AFAICT, the GSL doesn't offer the kind of protections that the OGL did for a site like this. I would imagine that using the 4e rules to run online games could potentially be seen as infringement, should WotC ever get the VT running and want to channel/force people to use their service.

Well, given my personal assessment of ENWorld's environment, I'd think WotC would be foolish to go after the site for a variety of reasons, most boiling down to I haven't seen anything they could sue for.

I think we have seen WotC do enough things that enough people have thought foolish that I no longer believe that foolishness is a bar to action. I certainly don't expect that WotC will avoid doing something because I think it foolish.

I guess I'm saying that, based in my perceptions of ENWorld, you're asking about a scenario that has less than a 10% chance of occurring.

And what I am saying is that I don't believe we have enough information to know what that chance is. And "less than a 10% chance of occurring" still leaves a chance worth considering.

The more often we excuse the boorish behaviour of WotC.....The more often we make it the "right and obvious choice" because it doesn't impact their bottom line......the more we encourage WotC to engage in more of the same. What I am saying is, "Let's not encourage them."

Because "How would you feel about that?" isn't "What do you think the odds are?" but "How would you feel about Morrus having to respond to C&D letters, and possibly shut down the site?" I.e., how would you feel about that personally?

Because I am certain there are others who feel the same about CK.



RC