>From: Rogers Cadenhead <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said
>
>At 02:41 PM 9/6/00 GMT, "Faustus von Goethe" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >The plain fact of the matter is, that if you are doing work that you
>never
> >plan to sell, you probably should *not* use the OGL. You will have
> >enormously more flexibility if you just take advantage of WotC's online
>use
> >policy.
>
>One of the goals of this effort is to replace the online use policy
>with the OGL and D20 licenses, according to past statements by Ryan
>Dancey on Usenet's rec.games.frp.* groups.
I could be dead wrong on this, but I seriously doubt that is going to
happen. There are literally THOUSANDS of fan sites out there that are
packed with stuff that violate the "Proprietary Content" clause of the OGL
and very few of these folks are going to be happy about WotC suddenly
deciding to pull the rug out from under them.
>I don't think it's good advice that people should avoid an open
>gaming license if they don't plan to sell their work. Whether you are
>publishing for-profit or not-for-profit material, there is still a
>benefit to an open license.
Where's the benefit if you do not plan to sell? There are plenty of
downsides to using OGL if you are developing "not-for-profit", but I don't
see the benefits. Maybe you could fill us in on on what you see as the
upside.
There are three downsides that I see to using OGL if you can use the online
use policy:
1. Risk.
2. Flexibility.
3. Trademarks.
1. RISK: If you use the online use policy *nobody* will mistake your work
for open source, and you will not be at any risk of "mislabelling" somebody
elses closed content as open. Should you choose to use the OGL and
mistakenly "open" someone elses copyright work then you would be legally
liable for the resulting damages - and THAT could be some serious cash,
depending on the circumstances.
2. FLEXIBILITY: Want to develop in the Forgotten realms? You *never* will
if you use the OGL.
3. TRADEMARKS: If you ise OGL, you can never say "This module is for D&D
3E", "... Forgotten Realms", "... Ravenloft", "... whatever".
So where are the upsides?
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