WotC OGL 1.1 leaks.
(archive.ph)
You're viewing a single comment thread. View all comments, or full comment thread.
Comments (30)
sorted by:
I'm pretty sure that once you grant a perpetual license it cannot be revoked. Perpetual does mean "forever" after all. My suspicion is if they tried shut down competitors using material under the original license a court would say that the revised license only extends to WOTC content introduced after it went into effect.
Yep. The argument would be that no OGL versions are authorized anymore. (Except the poison pill 1.1 version.) Backed by Hasbro's lawyers.
I want to see them lose the court battle to put the genie back into the bottle.
It will be a thing of legend.
I wonder how much of this is driven by Pathfinder 2E doing better than them? I mean, I did hear the news about Paizo adding a bio-essentialism errata like Tasha's Cauldron of Everything did, but I can just tell anyone who wants that errata used to go screw themselves, hopefully enough.
Speaking of, is Paizo going to get caught in this mess if this goes ahead?
Honestly, I think wokeness in companies is frequently comorbid with scummy business practices like this one, now that I think about it.
PF2E is not doing better than 5E/WotC.
Legally speaking, perpetual does not mean irrevocable, it only means it does not expire. It is possible to have things irrevocable in a contract or license, but it has to be specifically called out in the text.
That said, it's still shaky ground. Courts look unkindly towards obvious bad faith. For example, Wizards themselves on Q&As have very strongly implied it would never be revoked. While the text of a contract is what matters, lying or misleading others is obvious bad faith. Especially 20 years later after allowing derivative works to thrive.
In any case, the courts have already ruled that game mechanisms cannot be copyrighted or trademarked. Creators who want to make stuff explicitly to be compatible with D&D (or any other game) cannot be stopped unless they use actual trademarks like names of things that aren't in the dictionary or public domain. If the court hears a case AND rules against WotC, it would be an absolute disaster for them, as the OGL will become completely irrelevant, poison pills or not, and One D&D will be cloned in real time with impunity.
I hope WotC is arrogant enough to sue a small-potatoes creator who successfully crowdfunds a legal defense and makes this dream come true.