Rogers Cadenhead wrote:
> If everyone does that, where is the OGC material going to come from? I
> don't think there's a stigma in doing proprietary work or wanting to own
> your own work. If Paul Lidberg wants to hold onto the Hungarian film
> rights for Attack of the Humans, more power to him.
New OGC material is going to come from anyone who needs to modify the OGC material for
their
own world; eventually, everything will be covered in some way, and there will be no
more
useful OGC "rules" to be developed.
One of Ryan's stated ideals for the OGF was to eliminate "changing just to be
different", and
create an environment where only those rules changes that are *good ideas* will be
done, and
none of those changed just to keep TSR from suing you.
> However, as a general principle, if you personally benefit from open
> work, you should open your work too, at least in part. Your hypothetical
> example of someone who uses OGC content and publishes none doesn't sound
> like a contributor to me. The word that springs to mind here is "leech."
The value of D20 is the network; by contributing something to that network, you are
increasing
that value. I'm sure Ryan can quote you the theory he's working under, if you're
really
interested.
> How much monetary value has Linus Torvalds given the world? An operating
> system is so valuable that one of the world's richest companies made its
> fortune selling one. Yet Linus Torvalds and Richard Stallman gave theirs
> away for free, and most of the talk in the RPG community is about keeping
> work closed while making use of open material. Maybe I'm wrong to compare
> software and roleplaying, but to watch programmers give away millions
> while RPGers fret over pennies is hard to view charitably.
Software and roleplaying are close, but there is one important differnece:
No one ever bought a service contract for a roleplaying game. EVERY game company that
has
made a profit has done so on the basis of trademark and copyright laws. Software
companies
can make profits based on service contracts, advertising, or any number of other ideas.
Like I said in private e-mail... "If there's no profit in the venture, no one will
invest in
it." I don't see any great stock market or VC rush for RPG companies in the near
future, so
the fluke that's been driving internet companies recently simply won't happen.
DM
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