3
\$\begingroup\$

As was pointed out to me just in another question the 4th ed / D20 licence switch was not a revoke of the D20 open license. Although what I remember from that time is that publishers were forced to decide to either continue publishing D20 OR switch to 4th and all new publishers could only use the 4th edition to publish and not the D20 one.

As I said it was pointed out to me that my interpretation there is erronous so my question is, is there any info on what really happened there?

Improve this question
\$\endgroup\$
6
  • \$\begingroup\$ Hmm as there are 3 close votes I would be interested in the reason as it is a question about the history of a license model that I seemingly understood wrongly (pointed out in a comment to a different question of mine) and as far as I know there should be no broadness,... so the reason would be interesting? \$\endgroup\$
    – Thomas E.
    Jan 22, 2016 at 18:34
  • \$\begingroup\$ I don't think there are any legal terms in either license which make them exclusive, just you cannot use 3E's OGL on 4E content, because it was not released under it. Different content, licensed differently, that's all. Could you provide some reference on why you think this is not the case, because it is likely an answer just corrects this misconception. \$\endgroup\$
    – Neil Slater
    Jan 22, 2016 at 18:44
  • 1
    \$\begingroup\$ I don't really get what you mean with "continue publishing D20", or from where this came to you. \$\endgroup\$
    – Zachiel
    Jan 22, 2016 at 18:47
  • \$\begingroup\$ @NeilSlater I read back then that the publishers were put into a decision. If they wanted to further publish d20 content they were not allowed to also publish 4th edition content nor switch to 4th. And if they switched to 4th they were not allowed to continue to do any d20 publications. Not sure though how to formulate it in question to make it clearer (as I thought that I wrote just that there) \$\endgroup\$
    – Thomas E.
    Jan 22, 2016 at 18:50
  • \$\begingroup\$ @ThomasE.: If so, that will not have been a licensing issue directly, but may of been a condition of granting the 4E license in the first place. Whether it was pre-sales pressure or something legally enforceable in a contract I could not say. Do you have any reference? Without reference, and with WotC/dealer arrangements private, it could just be a rumour. \$\endgroup\$
    – Neil Slater
    Jan 22, 2016 at 19:33

0

Reset to default

Browse other questions tagged .