> The biggest change we're going to be making is adding a clause that
> basically prohibits anyone who uses Open Game Content from using another
> company's trademarks on that product without permission...The idea behind
this clause is
> to stop someone from just putting "this product is compatible with the D20
> System. The D20 System is a trademark of Wizards of the Coast and is not
> used with permission." on their Open Gaming products without conforming to
> the D20 System license; or worse, using someone's game brand name (clearly
> for me, the worst case would be to have someone use D&D
Ryan, can you get al little deeper into the spirit of the law here? Is
this solely to prevent an unfair use of another brand in advertising (using
someone else's hard work for brand name recognition to sell your product) or
is it to limit the competition of material between a trademark holder and
the OGL publisher? My fear is that if it's the second case it A) won't work
B) unnecessarily complicates the OGL process and C) reduces the quality of
OGL material.
It won't work because there are ways around it. While it may restrict a
publisher from saying " Compatible with Dungeon and Dragon" or "World of
Darkness" it doesn't prevent him from saying "will work with any 20 sided
die resolution" or "multiple 10 sided dice system." Any number of
euphemisms can be used to get around the issue.
What it does do is complicates the matter. People look at the guidelines
and see the restriction and perceive (and perception is often more important
than reality) it being too complicated. They see a potential difficulty or
violation and as a result shy away from the OGL relying on fair usage laws
instead.
But the legitimate OGL work then becomes an effort in checking trademarks.
I can't see how, without turning the OGL into a book of it's own you can
separate types of trademarks. It extends past gaming logos and into other
areas. Is Gattling Gun a trademark? Foozeball? Mesa? Old Farmer's
Almanac? Suddenly my work becomes an exercise in synonyms, sacrificing
precise language for less culpable verbosity. Even the phrase "roll a 1d20"
becomes a touchy subject cause of it's closeness to "D20."
Another issue, what happens if I violate this rule? Obviously I could be
sued for trademark infringement by the trademark holder, but what is the
status of my work? Who decides the issue? If someone put out an OGL
supplement called Vampires, Dragon's and the Old Gods in a very close but
not quite typeset of VTM, D&D, and CoC when in the OGL community would it be
decided that the item was in violation (for the sake of argument lets say it
is too close and should be an infringement) In other words, what are the
teeth of this clause and who's mouth are they in?
Personally I think it's fairer and easier just to restrict this to
advertising, and the outside portion of the book (or other packaging) and
let the rest remain status quo.
Dan Carreker
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Talk to your friends online with Yahoo! Messenger.
http://im.yahoo.com
-------------
For more information, please link to www.opengamingfoundation.org
