A question about the contents of the Copyright Notice of an OGL work as
arisen on the Open Gaming Registry list. It seemed proper to pose the
question here, since it was a license issue rather than a software design
issue.
The OGL states:
6. Copyrights:
You must update the COPYRIGHT NOTICE portion of this License to include the
exact text of the COPYRIGHT NOTICE of any Open Game Content You are copying,
modifying or distributing, and You must add the title, the copyright date,
and the copyright holder's name to the COPYRIGHT NOTICE of any original Open
Game Content you distribute.
It has been suggested that a description of an author's contribution to a
work be carried with the copyright notice, so that one can always tell how a
previous author's work was used in creating a derived work. It has further
been suggested that if that work was used as the source for a new work, then
the copyright notice would only need to acknowledge the authors who's work
was actually used in the latest derivation, rather than all authors who have
contributed to all works from which you are deriving. This would mean that
authors who contributes to a source work in a manner which is not relevant
to the new work would not need to be acknowledged, since their work was not
a source for derivation.
This is a convoluted problem, so let me provide a convoluted example:
Alpha Magic creates a cool new magic system for D20. Beta Combat churns out
a hyper-realistic combat system with ablative armor and weapon condition.
Gamma Classes loves both of these works, but thinks that the basic classes
don't integrate well with them, so designs a new set of classes to use the
Alpha Magic and Beta Combat rules. Finally, Delta Futures comes along and
wants to adapt the Gamma work to a Sci-Fi setting, totally dropping Alpha
Magic but keeping the Beta Combat and Gamma Classes.
Under current section 6, all four of these authors would need to be listed
in the Copyright Notice: Alpha and Beta both contributed to the Gamma work,
and Gamma contributed to the Delta work.
The suggestion made on the Registry list would allow Alpha to be dropped
from the notice in the Delta work, since it was strictly a magic system and
was not used at all in the Sci-Fi work. The idea is that this would not
infringe on Alpha's copyright, since no Alpha material was used to create
the Delta work.
I think this is a bad idea, and here's why:
1) The author Alpha has no control or even knowledge that his work was used
by Gamma.
2) Gamma is the one who must decide how he used the previous author's works.
He must then write a short description of how the work was used. This may
or may not be comprehensive. Alpha and Beta have no opportunity to agree or
disagree with the assessment and abstract.
3) The author Delta must decide, based on Gamma's interpretation of Alpha's
work, whether or not he is using any of Alpha's work. When doing this,
there is no guarantee that a copy of Alpha's work will be available to
consult, and therefore is must rely on Gammas short abstract and
interpretation of Alpha's contribution.
4) This is a very clear-cut example. Imagine how difficult it would be if
there were another combat system thrown into the mix.
5) Interpretation and guesswork makes for bad law.
We've all played 'telephone' as kids- everyone sits in a circle and one
person whispers a message into the next person's ear. By the time it gets
back to the original person it is nothing like the original message.
The water is already starting to get muddy after only two generations,
imagine how bad it will be after four or five. I think it is possible for
this system to produce a work that does not abridge Alpha's rights, but I
think the only way to guarantee that Alpha's rights will be protected in the
future is to err on the side of caution and list all contributors of every
generation of any derived work.
I like the idea of knowing what an author contributed, but I am not willing
to rely on someone else's words to describe my material when determining
whether or not my copyright has been infringed.
Comments?
-Brad
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