A question on Publishing, the OGL, and Courtesy


Product Discussion


Hello!

(First off - please correct me if any of my assumptions are wrong.)

From my understanding of the OGL, someone (like me) may use open content created by another publisher in my own product. (assuming they have designated it as open content, I utilize the OGL properly, etc.)

My question is, is there some sort of courtesy that is observed in the community? Such as, before you use something you contact the creator and let him know, or send a complimentary copy of whatever you publish to the author?

I am (slowly) getting ready to publish and I want to maintain good relationships with everyone and I don't want to upset anyone right out of the gate. :)

Thank you so much!

Disclaimer:
I will not hold anything said here as legal advice under any circumstance. I understand I should speak to lawyer before doing anything ever. Thank you so much!


Good call on the Disclaimer. :)

So long as you reference where the material came from (preferably with a hyperlink to it) you shouldn't have any problems.


Pathfinder Adventure Path, Lost Omens, Rulebook, Starfinder Roleplaying Game Subscriber

I believe the biggie is Section 15 of the OGL, which requires that you provide details of the source material. It is a non-trivial legal entity, though, so consulting a lawyer is pretty much a necessity.

As for courtesy, nothing wrong with offering thanks, giving a heads-up, and/or sending free copies. Just remember it comes out of your earnings.


@MikeMyler - good idea about the linking, everyone likes free publicity.

@Chemlak - Thank you. I will most certainly "cite my sources". A couple of college English classes drills that into you. :)


The idea of the OGL is pretty much to avoid the requirement of any specific requests for permission/notifications of use. As long as you've completed your Section 15 properly (and met the other terms of the OGL and not re-used anything that isn't OGC) then you've done everything that's necessary.

Some authors like a courtesy notification, but if so they'll say so in their product (I've seen some ask for postcards or emails, others request a copy of whatever you've made using their OGC). Personally if they haven't specifically asked I feel I'm probably bothering them by contacting them. You're under no obligation to do any of this though as long as you followed the OGL terms. If they request a copy of your product and you want to supply one, don't forget you can always email a PDF :)

Whether you want to include something in addition on your credits page (or an equivalent) is really up to you. Personally, I'd say put something in there if you found any specific third party products made a large or particularly special contribution to your own.

Otherwise, the only need for direct contact is when you're using an additional license (such as the Pathfinder Compatibility License) in which case that license will tell you what you need to do.

Scarab Sages Contributor

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So, one of the tricky things about the OGL is it prohibits you from using other people's product titles without their permission. So you can't say "Explosive War Muffins taken from The Genius Guide to Halfling Alchemists," even though you are trying to credit the source, without permission from the owner of TGGtHA.
I, and a lot of publishers, tend to ask for permission to give such credit, which both makes sure we are OGL-complient, and acts as a courtesy notice.
I've never failed to give or receive permission, though of course I'd respect someone's wish if they did refuse.
For me, the important thing is that you are using a small part of someone else's material, or you are transforming it in some way, rather than (perfectly legally) copying all their open game content from a product, and just using it to create a competing product. Though no one really seems to do that anymore. :)


@Math Thomason - Thank you for the advice. In fact, section 11 of the Pathfinder Compatibility License is partly what made me start wondering if other OGL publishers appreciated notification if you used part of their work.

@Owen Stephens - Thank you - but to make sure I am clear, to follow your example say I were to publish a small adventure booklet where the final encounter is a muffin slinging alchemist. I would credit TGGtHA in my section 15 at the end of the pdf, and I would reprint the "Explosive War Muffin" statistics, but I would have to rename it maybe "muffin bomb" and drop any flavor text from the original publication. That would (theoretically) keep me in compliance and no one would feel I stepped on their toes?

Also - thank you for the warning. I might have accidentally used someones product title (with good intentions, but we know where that road leads). :)

I will keep my "citations" in the section 15.

As for actual usage of other publishers material, I do not ever intend to use large portions - usually never more than a single item. Most of the time, I am trying to make a weird character and grow frustrated with how none of the options I am looking at do _exactly_ what I want (I'm way too picky), so I make my own. However, I when I finally write up my own "fix" I feel it is only right to credit others whose ideas may have influenced or inspired me.


Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:

So, one of the tricky things about the OGL is it prohibits you from using other people's product titles without their permission. So you can't say "Explosive War Muffins taken from The Genius Guide to Halfling Alchemists," even though you are trying to credit the source, without permission from the owner of TGGtHA.

That's a good point, I'd forgotten about that being in there as it's the same clause that prevents you from mentioning D&D to claim compatibility without a separate license such as the d20 one and the root of such phrases as "Compatible with the 3.5 edition of the world's most popular role-playing game!" and "SRD 3.5 compatible!" ;)


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Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:

So, one of the tricky things about the OGL is it prohibits you from using other people's product titles without their permission. So you can't say "Explosive War Muffins taken from The Genius Guide to Halfling Alchemists," even though you are trying to credit the source, without permission from the owner of TGGtHA.

I, and a lot of publishers, tend to ask for permission to give such credit, which both makes sure we are OGL-complient, and acts as a courtesy notice.
I've never failed to give or receive permission, though of course I'd respect someone's wish if they did refuse.
For me, the important thing is that you are using a small part of someone else's material, or you are transforming it in some way, rather than (perfectly legally) copying all their open game content from a product, and just using it to create a competing product. Though no one really seems to do that anymore. :)

What Owen Said.

President, Jon Brazer Enterprises

Rite Publishing wrote:
Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:

So, one of the tricky things about the OGL is it prohibits you from using other people's product titles without their permission. So you can't say "Explosive War Muffins taken from The Genius Guide to Halfling Alchemists," even though you are trying to credit the source, without permission from the owner of TGGtHA.

I, and a lot of publishers, tend to ask for permission to give such credit, which both makes sure we are OGL-complient, and acts as a courtesy notice.
I've never failed to give or receive permission, though of course I'd respect someone's wish if they did refuse.
For me, the important thing is that you are using a small part of someone else's material, or you are transforming it in some way, rather than (perfectly legally) copying all their open game content from a product, and just using it to create a competing product. Though no one really seems to do that anymore. :)
What Owen Said.

Ditto.


Thank you for this thread. I and a few friends are developing a set of rules that will be based on the OGL, and riff off of the Pathfinder RPG specifically. They are unique enough to garner a brand, so we want to be sure we are above-board with the legalese of the OGL while maintaining our IP.

We are new to this realm and one of our main concerns is legality as far as published material is concerned. We "mostly understand" the OGL, but is it advisable to have counsel when we make the move to become a 3rd party publisher, or when contacting an existing 3pp?

If we do decide to seek counsel, what type of lawyer or specialty do we seek?

Thanks in advance!


Generally I would look for a law firm with Publishing and Intellectual Property experience.


One thing to note, is that some smaller companies tend not to state what is and what is not OGL in their products in accordance with Line item 7 & 8. So be careful of that.

Webstore Gninja Minion

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B.A. Ironskull wrote:
Thank you for this thread. I and a few friends are developing a set of rules that will be based on the OGL, and riff off of the Pathfinder RPG specifically. They are unique enough to garner a brand, so we want to be sure we are above-board with the legalese of the OGL while maintaining our IP.

I would tread carefully regarding this, as section 3 of the Pathfinder Compatibility License has some language regarding sublicensing—definitely consult a lawyer regarding this, as I'm fairly certain that we do not allow derivative works to claim Pathfinder Compatibility. (I'll double check to be sure...)


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Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:

So, one of the tricky things about the OGL is it prohibits you from using other people's product titles without their permission. So you can't say "Explosive War Muffins taken from The Genius Guide to Halfling Alchemists," even though you are trying to credit the source, without permission from the owner of TGGtHA.

I, and a lot of publishers, tend to ask for permission to give such credit, which both makes sure we are OGL-complient, and acts as a courtesy notice.
I've never failed to give or receive permission, though of course I'd respect someone's wish if they did refuse.
For me, the important thing is that you are using a small part of someone else's material, or you are transforming it in some way, rather than (perfectly legally) copying all their open game content from a product, and just using it to create a competing product. Though no one really seems to do that anymore. :)

Plus it get you a chance to actually TALK to other 3PP which is helpful in many ways.

Scarab Sages Contributor

Douglas Mawhinney wrote:
@Owen Stephens - Thank you - but to make sure I am clear, to follow your example say I were to publish a small adventure booklet where the final encounter is a muffin slinging alchemist. I would credit TGGtHA in my section 15 at the end of the pdf,

Correct

Douglas Mawhinney wrote:
and I would reprint the "Explosive War Muffin" statistics,

Correct

Douglas Mawhinney wrote:
but I would have to rename it maybe "muffin bomb" and drop any flavor text from the original publication. That would (theoretically) keep me in compliance and no one would feel I stepped on their toes?

That depends.

In TGGtHA, it would have been our responsibility to say what was open content.

If we said "All material other than trademarks, art, and design elements are Open Game Content' then you are free to use the term "Explosive War Muffin," and retain the fluff. We opened that up.

If we said "All game rules are Open Game Content, while all names, proper nouns, story elements, fiction, description, trademarks, art, and design elements are closed content, and not to be used without permission," THEN you'd need to call them Muffin Bombs, and use different fluff.

Douglas Mawhinney wrote:
Also - thank you for the warning. I might have accidentally used someones product title (with good intentions, but we know where that road leads). :)

That was my main point here. Even if someone does not claim a title as closed content, the OGL closes it without specific permission to use it.

(Which, so far, I have always given when asked)


Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:

That depends.

In TGGtHA, it would have been our responsibility to say what was open content.

If we said "All material other than trademarks, art, and design elements are Open Game Content' then you are free to use the term "Explosive War Muffin," and retain the fluff. We opened that up.

If we said "All game rules are Open Game Content, while all names, proper nouns, story elements, fiction, description, trademarks, art, and design elements are closed content, and not to be used without permission," THEN you'd need to call them Muffin Bombs, and use different fluff.


Very interesting interpretation Owen!

I always took the "names are IP" part to mean character and place names as such. Not names of e.g. monster races, spells or feats, which I've always considered part of the rules crunch? (= OGC).

Are other 3PP's here genereally on line with Owen on this? That is "names" are mentioned as IP, you'll have to rename spells, feats, monster races etc. before using them?


I don't think you will ever get all other 3PP to ever completely agree on things like this Jesper at Blood Brethren Games.

We tend to avoid that and just go with "All text is considered Open Game Content" in our products.

You want to use a god's name, go ahead. Like the name of a character in a module go ahead.

Contributor

I know for Pact Magic Unbound. Dario and I decided that our character names were OGL but their legends weren't.

For example, you could cite Aza'zati, the Green Wyrmling no problem but you can't reproduce that spirit's legend. We mainly settled on this policy for the d20pfsrd.org website towards the end of development; we always knew we wanted our content to be a part of that community and we thought it would be weird if players were required to remember spirit titles but not names. (Originally we thought about making names closed content too but allowing the d20PFSRD to use spirit titles to define the spirits.)

In the end, it worked out okay.


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Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:
"Explosive War Muffins taken from The Genius Guide to Halfling Alchemists,"

WANT!!!!


Jesper at Blood Brethren Games wrote:

Very interesting interpretation Owen!

I always took the "names are IP" part to mean character and place names as such. Not names of e.g. monster races, spells or feats, which I've always considered part of the rules crunch? (= OGC).

Are other 3PP's here genereally on line with Owen on this? That is "names" are mentioned as IP, you'll have to rename spells, feats, monster races etc. before using them?

If the name hasn't been reused from mythology or other sources, then yeah I assume (unless told otherwise in the OGC declaration) that it's part of the Product Identity and unavailable.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

IANAL. That said,

Class names, class abilities, and feat names aren't automatically PI. However, all "special abilities" are by default, which covers anything from a monster statblock. Spell names, too. Read that section VERY CAREFULLY.

Nothing you can't trademark or copyright is PI. So, names from mythology, "purely descriptive" combinations of words (not as simple as it sounds, getting into lawyer territory), and most single words (unless it's a made-up and distinctive word, used in one specific sense, like "Zardoz").

Nothing that is already OGC is PI, including derivative material. So, if you create a new thingie, and it contains some substantial text from existing OGC, the resulting thingie is also open content. Practically speaking, stat blocks are going to be open content, except the parts that contain PI (names, new "special abilities," any spell names or other stuff mentioned that is not OGC).

Nothing designated as OGC is PI, and vice versa. Since you are required to declare what's what, all works licensed with diligence will make it clear what's what.

Products with defective Section 15 declarations, and products with vague OGC/PI declarations, should be treated with extreme caution. Products with no OGC/PI declarations are technically defective, but you can default to the declarations made in 1d and 1e of the OGL. Because of section 13, sublicenses can survive even if the "parent" product has some defects in its license, but ...

if someone messes up and uses PI as though it were OGC, you inherit that problem. So, know the pedigree of what you use.

The Exchange

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@All, and notably RJGrady, regarding the comment about incorrect/defective OGLs... Yes, I see this constantly. In almost all cases it's simply an oversight on the part of the creator but in some cases its a clear misunderstanding of the requirements of the OGL. In almost all cases when I come across something like this I contact the publisher letting them know that I believe something is configured incorrectly or something is inherently incorrect about their OGL or how they're using it. In most cases the publisher very quickly responds indicating it was an error and is corrected in an update. In SOME cases, some very frustrating cases, the publisher either completely ignores you or discounts your pointing out their error entirely. In these cases I'm always tempted to call them out publicly but have since learned that nothing positive comes of that so I leave it for others to worry about.

Scarab Sages Contributor

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d20pfsrd.com wrote:
In almost all cases when I come across something like this I contact the publisher letting them know that I believe something is configured incorrectly or something is inherently incorrect about their OGL or how they're using it.

Indeed, John has pointed out some section 15 copy-paste errors in Rogue Genius products to me (some of which I haven't fixed yet). It's one of the great services the d20pfsrd.com provides.


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Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber
d20pfsrd.com wrote:
@All, and notably RJGrady, regarding the comment about incorrect/defective OGLs... Yes, I see this constantly. In almost all cases it's simply an oversight on the part of the creator but in some cases its a clear misunderstanding of the requirements of the OGL. In almost all cases when I come across something like this I contact the publisher letting them know that I believe something is configured incorrectly or something is inherently incorrect about their OGL or how they're using it. In most cases the publisher very quickly responds indicating it was an error and is corrected in an update. In SOME cases, some very frustrating cases, the publisher either completely ignores you or discounts your pointing out their error entirely. In these cases I'm always tempted to call them out publicly but have since learned that nothing positive comes of that so I leave it for others to worry about.

"You may be forgiven for being wrong, but you will never be forgiven for being right."

I have, unintentionally, offended people before by telling them things they didn't want to hear about the OGL. So, I've recognized that it's not my job to argue; I've done my part by providing the information. My personal policy is to gently point out the problem one time. After that, I just have to let it go, even if I see a trainwreck about to happen, or someone just doesn't "get it" about open development.


Liz Courts wrote:
B.A. Ironskull wrote:
Thank you for this thread. I and a few friends are developing a set of rules that will be based on the OGL, and riff off of the Pathfinder RPG specifically. They are unique enough to garner a brand, so we want to be sure we are above-board with the legalese of the OGL while maintaining our IP.
I would tread carefully regarding this, as section 3 of the Pathfinder Compatibility License has some language regarding sublicensing—definitely consult a lawyer regarding this, as I'm fairly certain that we do not allow derivative works to claim Pathfinder Compatibility. (I'll double check to be sure...)

Thank you, Liz Courts, for the heads up! My post was admittedly uninformed, and now I see that terminology is a very specific aspect of the process. This thread has provided a wealth of knowledge for a fledgling design co-op.

Such direct response is what makes Paizo a great company and great people. Thanks again!

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