Here is the real issue: give the publishers a businessWho said that there should be?
reason to do it. Right now there isnt a good one.
Publishers are in the business of writing and selling original works, not supporting a database of collaboration. No one sees RedHat running a "make your own Linux Distro" effort. For a database to work at all, it needs to be volunteer-driven and publisher-support-optional. (I really should have written that last e-mail better. Many apologies.) Publishers should not be solicited for contributions or permission. The only thing database-makers should need from the OGC producers is for the publishers to not create a storm in the safe harbor just because a bunch of volunteers are doing the inevitable.
Everyone who has suggested a database has come to the conclusion (either by themselves or with the aid of this list) that directly competing with publishers of OGC is unethical and as much cheating as any violation of the OGL we've seen. "Sell periods" of 6 to 24 months have been proposed, and most have also realized that if a publisher goes to the bother of asking to be excluded from the database, it is only polite to do so.
However...
The OGL was designed such that re-use of others material brings with it necessary attribution. If a customer wants to look for the hottest of the smaller d20 companies, they just pick up a release from their favorite publisher and look at the section 15. But this system is a bit slow--it can be hard to match the OGC they like with the publisher who wrote it. Left alone, with no support at all, a database matching OGC with its origin would dramatically improve the recognition reward for making OGC good enough that other publishers use it.
And if a publisher wanted to seed their own material, certify their OGC as "correctly extracted", or give permission for their trademarks to be used to identify their OGC, then the database could link back to the company, directing customers to smaller companies and obscure products from larger companies. Some companies won't feel that this is worth it, which is fine and dandy--but it is something, and the size and number of companies to whom this beneift is worthwhile will grow as the database grows in size and following.
I think a public database of OGC is a natural extension of the Open Gaming License. If your business plan already takes advantage of the re-use terms of the OGL, then you may be able to justify time and effort to improve the database--and you may benefit even if you can't spare any time on the database. If your business plan is more conservative, then the database should be able to either minimize its impact on your sales or exclude you while the work is in print or during its first sale run.
DM
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