So what DOES 1.1 allow?

[Henadic Theologian]

I mean, in the snarkiest way possible...

It gives you the right to publish stuff based on their rulesets, with the added features that they take a cut if you do well, can change the amount of cut with 30 days notice, and can revoke your right to publish at any time, while they retain the right to publish your stuff without paying you in perpetuity.

Worst deal ever.

 

[TheSword]

That’s the thing: If everything else about it was great, you couldn’t put significant investment at stake under this term.

It depends on what you mean by significant. Lots companies make investments over short term opportunities. It’s all about scale.

Don’t forget that WOTC wants to encourage people to develop new ideas, but it doesn’t want to effectively sponsor a major competitor - like Paizo.

Don’t set yourself up as competition, don’t do contentious stuff to aggravate the sponsor company or their customers, and don’t promote their competition. In most industries mine included those are basics to someone getting to play in someone’s back yard with their toys.

 

[Greg K]

Isn't the crowd source royalty on separate terms from print/pdf revenue without crowdsourcing?

 

[Greg Benage]

Isn't the crowd source royalty on separate terms from print/pdf revenue without crowdsourcing?

Sales through any platform other than KS is 25%, crowdfunded or not.

 

[Charlaquin]

A lot is being said about how 1.1 kills or attempts to kill 1.0a. That's being discussed everywhere.

Let's pretend 1.0a never existed and WotC is just making 1.1. No Paizos, no other large OGL games. WotC releasing 1.1 is the first opportunity to make D&D related content in the world.

What is in it for me?

That's not a flippant statement. Someone please explain (like I was 12 if that helps) what are the advantages and disadvantages of using it? Don't compare it to 1.0a, I just want to know what 1.1 alone would offer.

Anyone who can parse legalese, this would be appreciated.

What it allows you to do is publish printed or printable media that includes content covered by the license (presumably anything in the eventual 1D&D SRD) alongside original content of your own. To do so, you would be required to register with D&D Beyond and submit personal information and a description of the content you intended to publish to WotC for approval. They would be able to, at any time or for any reason, tell you to change or take down that content, and you would have 30 days to comply. If you wanted to do any crowdfunding for it, it would have to be through Kickstarter. If you made enough money from this content, you would have to start reporting your revenue from that content to WotC annually, and potentially pay them royalties. They would be allowed to use any content you published under this agreement in any way they want, without having to give you any notice or pay you any money. Your agreement to these terms would be perpetual and irrevocable. If someome sued you for something related to that content and WotC thought you weren’t doing a good enough job defending yourself, they could get their lawyers to step in, and you’d have to pay their fees.

Also, WotC would be able to change any of these terms at any time for any reason, and by agreeing to publish under the above terms, you would have waved any right to participate in a class-action lawsuit against them.

 

[Charlaquin]

Does most share and share alike come with "we can tell you to stop distributing it at any time we want, and we still get to use it"? (I honestly don't know).

For the record, it’s “noncommercial share alike,” not “share and share alike.” It’s a specific term for a specific kind of license. But, no, these types of licenses don’t typically allow the license holder to tell the licensee they can’t keep publishing the content.

What a noncommercial share alike license basically does is says anyone else can use, reproduce, or modify the licensed content however they want, as long as they include the same license (meaning anyone else can then use, reproduce, or modify that content as long as they include it, and so on). Most noncommercial share alike licenses also require attribution, meaning you have to credit whoever wrote the content you’re using, reproducing, or modifying under the license, though this one doesn’t.

 

[Charlaquin]

3PPs could have 3PPs

6PPs!

 

[Charlaquin]

“If you do Well”? That’s the understatement of the year. The threshold is $750,000 dollars a year (not even aggregate - every year). Surely that means the majority of medium producers would be untouched financially and only the largest would be affected by questions of profitability. Surely even EN World only falls into this camp when there is a huge kickstart like Level Up.

Secondly my understanding of the right to use creators work is not to intentionally steal it but because Joe Bloggs in his basement sells 15 copies of something on Drive Thru RPG that happens to resemble something WOC put out 5 years later and then sues WOC. It costs WOC $10k to defend that suit from a nobody and there are thousands of people like this that they couldn’t dream of keeping an eye on. Even if it’s spurious and add a couple of those together it’s just not worth it.

Lastly the need to be able to revoke the rights to publish is necessary to prevent some idjits publishing Anschluss 5e. They can’t be getting into a debate over free speech if this happens.

Wizards are allowing people to use their own work for profit (up to a point). I would be amazed if this license would have been rejected with such antipathy if it had been offered up in the nineties!

The license itself isn’t really the problem. You want to publish stuff for their game, you do it on their terms or not at all. Fair enough. I suspect fairly few creators would want to publish under these terms, but them’s the breaks.

The problem is that they’re trying at the same time to revoke a license they had previously offered, under the pretense of being irrevocable, on which a significant portion of the RPG industry has since been built and now relies.

 

[Charlaquin]

Curiously, the dropped text doesn't explain how you accept this license. No language addressing Acceptance, Consideration, or anything like that. Must've been in the accompanying contracts that needed signing.

But it's telling. So far, there's no apparent mechanism for opting in.

No, it does. It says you have to sign up for an account on D&D Beyond and submit a request to publish under this license, including personal info and a description of the content you intend to publish.

 

[Charlaquin]

Hasbro has legitimate reasons for needing to make the changes that they are to protect their business and livelihoods.

I’m pretty sure the billion dollar corporation’s business and livelihoods will be fine with or without this license.