Here's a question (and a little bit of an observation) that I am posing
to all of you for clarification.

When the first non-Wotc products started to be released, the declaration
of Open Content was very clear: "All Open Game Content is identified by
placement inside a grey box."  This made it very specific as to what was
OGC.

Recently, there has been a movement towards: "All game mechanics and
statistics derivative of Open Game Content and the System Reference
Document are to be considered Open Game Content."  Which essentially
means only the stats are OGC and everything else is PI.

Now, the last couple of books I have received carry this designation:
"All game stats and pages so designated are presented as Open Game
Content.  All other significant characters, names, places... are
copyrighted by..."  The problem I am having with this statement is that
there is no designation within the pages of the book.  This would lead
one to conclude that either everything would be closed content or open
content (obviously, a dangerous assumption).

Now, my question is, do others see this same trend?  Also, why is the
declaration language among published products becoming increasingly more
"legalese" and less specific as it was in the beginning. (Clark, your
stuff has always been legalese, but at least it is clear and
understandable.)  This spiraling trend towards less definitive language
seems to defeat the spirit of the OGL in that people who may want to use
something struggle to determine whether it is clearly OGC because of the
obscure legal language.  Now maybe, I am seeing this all wrong, but I
want to know what others think and are seeing.
--
Steve Creech
d20 Magazine Rack -
The Critic's Corner / The Gamer's Corner
www.d20zines.com

Put your hand on a hot stove for a minute, and it seems like an hour.
Sit with a pretty girl for an hour, and it seems like a minute. That's
relativity.  - Albert Einstein


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