On Wed, 6 Sep 2000, Michael Cortez wrote:
> >Ryan Posted
[snipped and line wrapped]
> >This addresses one of the longstanding issues with the license -
> >namely the worry that it would be confusing for people to figure
> >out what they could and could not re-use in a product that mixed
> >Open and Closed content. The changes to the license listed above
> >mean that you have to both identify the Open content, and identify
> >any Closed content as well.
If that is the case then I suggest the following:
1) Product Identity is defined as <list of creative elements>.
2) You must designate anything derived from Open Content as Open.
You may designate anything under Product Identity as Open.
3) You must not designate anything not under Product Identity as Closed.
4) All content must be designated as either Open or Closed.
If 3) is not intended then simply:
1a) You must designate anything derived from Open Content as Open.
2a) All content must be designated as either Open or Closed.
I would be happy if either of this is the case.
But from the following quote:
>So if you define something as Open, and you don't exclude it specifically by
>saying that some subset of that Open material is instead Product Identity,
>then the whole section is Open.
>
>Ryan
I gather "something" could be seem as an entry in the following table:
| non-Product Identity | Product Identity
------+-----------------------+------------------
Open | reusable | non-reusable
------+-----------------------+------------------
Close | non-reusable | non-reusable
Most kinds of creative elements are available to anyone who wants to
declare it as Product Identity. Once declared they have an exclusive
right to use that element in Open Gaming.
"<The swamp environment> is part of my product identity."
"<A Gothic theme> is part of my product identity."
"<The single sheet format> is part of my product identity."
"<The ... plot> is part of my product identity."
(see http://www.io.com/~sjohn/plots.htm)
etc.
Not only can one use Product Identity to protect creative elements
normally available to everyone, even if something is defined as Open
(because it is partly derived from Open material) it may be rendered
non-reusable by declaring it as Product Identity.
-------------
For more information, please link to www.opengamingfoundation.org
