[Rq-rules] OGL, MRQ, Runes

[Tom Cantine]

What's puzzling is that it purports to grant a right that in large part 
was never there to be granted.

Consider: With or without OGL, I could write a book about the 
development of RQ, including a complete description of how the rules 
worked in each edition, why the changes were made, how they were 
received and interpreted, and so on. (I could even include verbatim 
excerpts from various editions of the rules, provided I kept them short 
and abided by the principles of fair use, but I don't need to do that.) 
In principle, such a book could provided the reader with everything she 
needed to know to run a game with canonical rules for any edition.

Such a work would be entirely permissible under IP law as it stands. I 
would have mentioned the trademarks throughout, in referring to the 
various published versions, but at no point would there be any danger 
that a reader would think I was claiming my book was in any way related 
to the owners of those trademarks, any more than if I discuss Coca Cola 
in an article.

Now, suppose in writing this book, I decide that the reader could not 
get a complete understanding of my subject without my providing a 
collection of adventures and characters, to see how the rules play out 
and how the genre is organized. I could include in my book a complete, 
original adventure and setting, explicitly written for use with an 
identified version of the RQ rules, without running afoul of copyright 
or trademark.

I'll go a bit further. Suppose, after I've written and published this 
book, I decide to put together more adventures and sell them, too. I'm 
careful in my design and layout to make it very clear that I am not 
associated with any of the trademark or copyright holders of Runequest 
in its various forms. If the word "Runequest" appears at all on the 
cover, it is either in very small print ("Running this adventure will 
be easier if you have a copy of either Chaosium's "Runequest", 2nd 
Edition or chapter 4 of my "Illustrated History of Runequest") or it is 
under my name in "From the author of Illustrated History of Runequest".

I'll admit, OGL makes it a little easier to use trademarks and excerpts 
of text, but it seems to me to be a very minor concession.


On 25-Jun-06, at 3:53 AM, Ashley Munday wrote:

> What's so puzzling?
>
> If you say something's OGL you're giving someone
> permission to copy it and create derivative works from
> it. They don't have to worry about working out their
> own way of saying things, they can just retype your
> words.
>
> If you derive works from something that's OGL you can
> charge cash for it, but you can't stop anyone else
> charging cash for works derived from yours.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Ash
>
> --- Tom Cantine <tcantine at incentre.net> wrote:
>
>> I have always been puzzled by this concept of open
>> gaming licenses. My
>> understanding of intellectual property law is
>> perhaps incomplete, but
>> it seems to me that rules systems are pretty much
>> free to use anyway.
>> Copyright covers the expression of an idea, not the
>> idea itself, and
>> while it also extends to "derivative works" such as
>> those set in the
>> same universe or featuring the same characters, I
>> don't believe that
>> can or should extend to rules systems. For one
>> thing, nobody buys a
>> copy of a rulebook without expecting to be able to
>> use the rules to
>> "create" stories using those rules, and no one sells
>> a rulebook
>> ignorant of that reasonable expectation. The text of
>> the rulebook, its
>> artwork and layout, those are all copyrightable, but
>> the rules system
>> itself? How?
>>
>> A rules system might be covered by patent law, but
>> you have to apply
>> for and register those, and they only last for 20
>> years.
>>
>> So far as I can tell, then, this OGL business can
>> really only apply to
>> trademarks. In principle, you could write a game
>> supplement or
>> adventure using any game system you want, but
>> identifying it as using a
>> particular system by using the trademarked name of
>> that system would be
>> the tricky part. Strictly speaking, ownership of a
>> trademark does not
>> give you a monopoly on the USE of your trademark; it
>> only means that
>> trademark can only be used to refer to your product.
>> However, there was
>> a case decided in the sixties or so that seemed to
>> say you can't even
>> use someone else's trademark when comparing your
>> product to theirs. I
>> think this was wrong, but there you go. (This was
>> here in Canada, by
>> the way; I don't know how it works in the U.S. or
>> elsewhere.)
>>
>> Bottom line? I don't know. I just don't understand
>> this open game
>> license concept, because you can't legally prevent
>> someone from rolling
>> dice and telling stories using a mathematical
>> algorithm you happen to
>> have described, even if you happen to hold a
>> copyright on the
>> description you wrote.
>>
>>
>>
>> On 24-Jun-06, at 2:46 AM, Gianni wrote:
>>
>>> All--
>>>
>>> I had a thought this morning.... Apparently MRQ is
>> going to be an 'Open
>>> gaming Licence'. My understanding is that this
>> means the rules but not
>>> the
>>> setting (Glorantha) are going to be free and
>> usable by anybody. But
>>> since the
>>> Gloranthan Runes are now part of the rules -- it
>> is impossible to use
>>> the
>>> magic system in the basic rules book without also
>> using the
>>> corresponding
>>> runes -- does that make now the Gloranthan runes
>> also part of the OGL?
>>>
>>> Cheers
>>>
>>>
>>
> Gianni_______________________________________________
>>> RQ-Rules mailing list
>>> RQ-Rules at crashbox.com
>>> http://crashbox.com/mailman/listinfo/rq-rules
>>>
>>
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