> Doug Meerschaert
>
> LOL...
>
> "Gattling gun" is generic, "Foozeball" and "Old Farmer's Almanac"
> are probably
> solid trademarks, "Mensa" (which is a high-IQ society) is
> probably a trademark
> but they might be lax with enforcment... or give permission.
I'm glad you find this amusing, but you have very clearly illustrated the
problem. Every one of those examples is your opinion, and no matter whether
you are right or wrong, your opinion is completely useless in the context of
the OGL. You have to be SURE, because if you aren't you have violated the
OGL. At best this is a violated someone else's copyright and at worst
released a public-domain document. If I have to do a trademark search on
every publication to determine the owner of any trademarks I might have
used, that runs into some big $$$. If I want a game set in the modern
world, then I am not allowed to mention of Coke, Chevy, Winchester, Intel,
American Airlines, Netscape Navigator, etc... without contacting each of
these huge companies and asking permission to use them. They will either
say 'no' if their legal staff is busy, or spend several weeks analyzing the
OGL, and my document, and then craft a license agreement which may or may
not be suitable for my game. They may also charge me for their time. Such
companies ALWAYS consider their image when giving permission, and perhaps
Winchester won't like the idea that their rifles don't perform as well as
their competitor's.
This is a ridiculous situation, since there are a number of successful games
(and dozens of lesser-known examples) currently on the market that are
loosely based on 20th-century western culture.
> Of course, I'm not a laywer, you're probably not a lawyer, and there's one
> looking over the OGL who's probably a specialized IP lawyer... so
> let's not
> prejudge the man before he does his work!
Ryan's licenses to date have been very 'lawyer-lite', which is to say easy
to read and without all the boilerplate that seems to plague most legal
agreements. I'd say it is quite reasonable to take his statements at face
value and comment on them.
-Brad
-------------
For more information, please link to www.opengamingfoundation.org
