 February 10, 2014 - 8:40pm | "Thank you for contacting Hasbro regarding the usage of Wizards of the Coast's intellectual property and for your patience while the appropriate teams reviewed your request. My name is Sam. I am the customer-facing representative that works with those teams, and I have been directed to provide you with their answer. While we all appreciate your enthusiasm for Star Frontiers, Wizards is unable to grant you permission to use our intellectual property in the manner you have requested. Thanks again for caring enough to ask first! Sam Team Lead Customer Service and Game Support Wizards of the Coast" I've made a couple of requests to WotC over the years for the permission to translate my old game books into an interactive website for fans. Each time, denied. :-( |
 February 10, 2014 - 8:59pm | What exactly are you looking to do? I'm cursious to find out what exactly they rejected. Check you're messages. Ad Astra Per Ardua! My blog - Expanding Frontier Webmaster - The Star Frontiers Network & this site Founding Editor - The Frontier Explorer Magazine Managing Editor - The Star Frontiersman Magazine |
February 10, 2014 - 9:05pm | Specifically asked if I could create a non-commercial interactive website with the original game materials and fan creations/derivative work to allow people to play programmed SF adventures online. Obviously it would never be the same as actually sitting in a room and rolling dice but it's a project I've repeatedly thought about starting, asked about, and then been shot down by WotC. |
 February 10, 2014 - 9:05pm | Funny, our license specifically prohibits the FE from publishing modules, wonder what the issue is that triggers this. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
February 10, 2014 - 9:15pm | Also, this time I sent the request through Hasbro and got a prompt response from WotC. |
February 10, 2014 - 9:26pm | There was a group of fans working on a Games Workshop Warhammer movie, not sure if it was Warhammer fantasy or 40k. They were in Germany and were going to release it on the internet in Germany but GW sent them a cease and disist letter because there was some loophole in the law that if GW allowed them to publish the movie that it opened up their IP for anyone or something like that as the story went. I'm wondering about the restrictions against modules. It doesn't really make much sense. I tend to think that there must be a reason I just dont know about. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 February 10, 2014 - 10:29pm | modules in this case referring to what? Do you mean reprinting the TSR modules? |
 February 11, 2014 - 1:29am | The should really follow Chaosium's lead with the 'Call of Cthulhu' RPG. |
February 11, 2014 - 3:54am | I just find it immensely annoying that something can be 30 years old and out of print and the copyright owner can just sit on the IP rights indefinitely without producing new material or reprinting the old material. This kind of crap was never intended in copyright laws in this country. Originally it was something like 14 years and the owner had to renew the copyright for another 14 and after that it was fair game for derivative work. Forever copyrights stifle innovation. |
February 11, 2014 - 4:37am | I just find it immensely annoying that something can be 30 years old and out of print and the copyright owner can just sit on the IP rights indefinitely without producing new material or reprinting the old material. This kind of crap was never intended in copyright laws in this country. Originally it was something like 14 years and the owner had to renew the copyright for another 14 and after that it was fair game for derivative work. Forever copyrights stifle innovation. Tolkien intended that others would build on his work he has a famous quote that says something like "other hands and other minds" refering those that would carry the work forward that he started. Hence the Tolkien fan magazine called "Other Hands" The irony is that Zane and Tolkien Enterprises has completely stifled that with threats of lawsuits but that is another rant. Law is very much fluid. For 200 years the Constitution said what it said about who could be President and suddenly the Govinator became governor of CA and there was all this talk about should we change the constitution so he could be president? That would be another rant but thank God it didn't happen so we could elect a movie star to the oval office. As frustrating as the copyright laws are I dont know what to tell you. If I was an IP owner I would be concerned that someone else might be taking my IP and doing things with it that I didn't approve of. What is the appropriate length of time for something to become public domain? Any number we pick is sure to be arbitrary and someone will hate it. As to module Animux seems to have indicated the original modules formated as an interactive possibly choose your path sort of thing and the license Tom obtained bars us from publishing modules that we write even if we dont make a dime. I was just focused on the commonality of both of those rejections. It would seem that both rejections stem from a single point of origin and I'm wondering what that might be. For the life of me I cant imagine what it is. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
February 11, 2014 - 6:05am | I understand the desire for an artist to want to protect their creative work (not the situation with SF since TSR was sold off). I even understand the rights of a corporation to protect its financial interests. What I don't understand is the exclusion of what is effectively a dead brand from the public domain -- out of print, not generating revenue, no plans to revive the brand or create a new consumer base for it in the future. It seems like a "if we can't profit from it then nobody can enjoy it" scenario. Like a movie script locked up in dispute between two film production companies that has been sold by the original writer and will never be produced -- all of the creative effort simply dumped into an abyss. |
 February 11, 2014 - 6:28am | 1) They want to force you to only use their current games. & 2) should what the fans do prove good, they would have no IP in it and thus not profit. Sadly what they fail to realize is we are free testers. It is stupid, we are both potential customers, designers and more... they are waisting a free resource, their lack of vision is stoping them from seeing potential. "Never fire a laser at a mirror." |
 February 11, 2014 - 6:32am | One thing that is funny about them holding on to the copyright is the examples of what happens when you let it lapse. The movie "Its a Wonderful Life" (Jimmy Stewart) was a bomb when it was released in theaters. They didn't renew the copyright, it got used by television stations looking for holiday entertainment and is now one the the most popular movies of all time. If WotC would let the same thing happen and then take advantage of the renewed popularity to sell new products, but that is something they appear unwilling to even try. Sounds like a great job but where did you say we had to go? |
February 11, 2014 - 6:37am | One thing that is funny about them holding on to the copyright is the examples of what happens when you let it lapse. The movie "Its a Wonderful Life" (Jimmy Stewart) was a bomb when it was released in theaters. They didn't renew the copyright, it got used by television stations looking for holiday entertainment and is now one the the most popular movies of all time. If WotC would let the same thing happen and then take advantage of the renewed popularity to sell new products, but that is something they appear unwilling to even try. Other might sell new products but they wont. And they lose control. Its a natural human impulse to 'empire build' and to keep an empire you must control it thus they will not give up control. Besides isnt D20 space or future still in print and have the core four races in it? I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
February 11, 2014 - 11:36am | I am not sure what is in d20 future/space or modern... maybe I will poke around on that too. But on the subject of out of date materials... and space. TSR appears to have had more than one cross over sci-fi/alien races scenerio in D&D. Most folks know about the crashed alien ship that was a MA proto adventure in the World of Greyhawyk. I need to do more research but Blackmoor had the FSS Beagle and her crew run amok, create the Frogmen by messing with their DNA, St. Steven was a crew member along with a few other diety to near diety types... apparently either from Star Probe or Star Empires... surprised me to discover that, which got me thinking about odd enteries and info on creatures or NPC people in D&D. It seems Blackmoor was deadly though to the sci-fi characters and the planet was quarntined eventually in game play by two different empires... I need more info on these game races and I will try and put a resource togther if I can find the info. I just happended to find a D&D suplement this weekend as well; called Odyssey; at the used book store and low and behold aliens & an ancient IA crazy computer making war with robots and cyborgs all running amok in D&D! I did not buy it as it was missing the maps and other books... but I did go on a quest this weekend for it on the net... I will see if I can get it uploaded. I am also putting together some other TSR resource matterials, it is going slow but when I have it all togther I will share.  "Never fire a laser at a mirror." |
February 11, 2014 - 2:06pm | I say DO IT and let the yazirains sort it out. |
 February 11, 2014 - 4:57pm | thank God it didn't happen so we could elect a movie star to the oval office. I don't know, it worked out rather well last time we did that.  Electing a foreinger, well that's a whole 'nuther can of worms. |
February 11, 2014 - 6:44pm | If Arnold is the best answer the Dems have for Reagan then they should quit now. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
 February 13, 2014 - 4:43pm | We should probably leave religion & politics off the boards.  Let's keep it on topic. |
 February 13, 2014 - 11:05pm | We talk religion and politics here all the time, Family of One and Clarion Monarchy for example. -iggy |
February 14, 2014 - 2:02am |  Shhh... the Family of One will hear you... |
February 14, 2014 - 7:13am | Actually the Open folder in the forums means just that but we have hi-jacked this thread. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
February 14, 2014 - 8:39am | Star Frontiers is all about hijacking. The first module starts with a hijacking. Now what was this thread really about? Oh, We are the voluntier stewards of a game that the owners do not care to do much with and we are wondering what their motivations are for allowing three sites and denying all others. -iggy |
February 14, 2014 - 10:46am | Volunteer stewards, I like that. But to a certain degree I think we go beyond stewardship especially with the magazines. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
February 14, 2014 - 12:48pm | More like, "they who have inherited" (to misquote Zebulon's Guide). |
February 14, 2014 - 1:49pm | More like, "they who have inherited" (to misquote Zebulon's Guide). Inherited implies a transfer of ownership which is not what we have. I might not be a dralasite, vrusk or yazirian but I do play one in Star Frontiers! |
February 14, 2014 - 1:51pm | It would be interisting to do a page count of original content and fan content and see what the percentages are. -iggy |
February 14, 2014 - 3:17pm | Yeah, we don't have right of ownership, but we have "inherited" the mantle of creativity when it comes to making new stuff for the game. When Doctor Who went off the air in 1989, fans began making their own audio episodes and writing books. At first, they changed the name, calling him "the Professor" instead of the Doctor, because they didn't want any trouble with the BBC. Then the BBC saw that they could be making money from the fan stuff (which was quite good) and allowed them to use the name. These fan productions kept getting better in quality as the years went by. When the new TV series came back on the air in 2005, it was brought back and written by the very fans who'd had to avoid using the Doctor Who name years before. Now THEY are the ones making the show today. Just food for thought... |
February 14, 2014 - 6:31pm | We talk religion and politics here all the time, Family of One and Clarion Monarchy for example.
Don't get me started on the multitudes of negative impact and fall out from the Affordable Sungoggles Act. |
February 14, 2014 - 9:33pm | We talk religion and politics here all the time, Family of One and Clarion Monarchy for example.
Don't get me started on the multitudes of negative impact and fall out from the Affordable Sungoggles Act. All beings should be able to have sungoggles and they should be required to wear them at night so they can, so they can, watch and read and breath the party line. I also feel like someone is watching me. -iggy |
February 15, 2014 - 12:24am | The Affordable Sungoggles Act The UPF has just passed a new law entitled “The Affordable Sungoggles Act” declaring that every citizen MUST purchase a new pair of sungoggles by 10-35-FY94. These ‘affordable’ sungoggles will cost an average of 500-1,500 credits each. This does not include taxes, shipping, storage fees, licensing and registration fees, cleaning, maintenance, or repair costs. This law has been passed because, until now, typically only wealthy and financially responsible people have been able to purchase sungoggles. This new law ensures that every citizen of the Frontier can now have ‘affordable’ sungoggles of their own, because everyone is ‘entitled’ to new sungoggles. If you purchase your sungoggles before the end of the year, you will receive two ‘free’ sungoggle cases (does not include monthly usage fees). In order to make sure everyone purchases ‘affordable sungoggles,’ the cost of owning sungoggles will increase on average of 250-400% per year. This way, wealthy people will pay more for something that other people don’t want or can’t afford to maintain. But, to be fair, people who can’t afford to maintain their sungoggles will be regularly fined and children (under the age of 26) can use their parents' sungoggles until they turn 27, after which date they must purchase their own sungoggles. If you already have sungoggles, you can keep yours (just kidding; no you can’t). If you don’t want or don’t need sungoggles, you are required to buy them anyways. If you refuse to buy them or can’t afford them, you will be regularly fined $800 until you purchase some, or face imprisonment at the nearest Star Law penal colony. If you cannot (or don’t want to) purchase ‘affordable sungoggles’ from a private business, you can buy sungoggles from the UPF's ‘affordable sungoggles exchange.’ Such sungoggles will have the basic necessities (tinted lens, frame, and retaining strap) and will only cost ‘slightly more’ than similar sungoggles purchased from a private business. Plus, since your tax dollars will subsidize the purchase of sungoggles from the UPF’s ‘affordable sungoggles exchange,’ it will appear that you are getting a good deal. Failure to use the sungoggles will also result in fines. People living in the desert, ghettos, inner cities, are not exempt. Neither age, motion sickness, experience, knowledge, nor lack of desire are acceptable excuses for not using your sungoggles. A government review board (that doesn’t know the difference between the solar radiation, polarization, or ophthalmology) will decide everything, including when, where, how often, and for what purposes you can use your sungoggles, along with how many people can utilize your sungoggles. The board will also determine if one is too old or healthy enough to be able to use their sungoggles, and will also decide if your sungoggles have out lived their usefulness or if you must purchase specific accessories (like a 15,000Cr pair of magnigoggles or a 350Cr roll of ion bonding tape) or newer and more expensive sungoggles. Those that can afford sungoggles will be required to do so … it’s only fair. The UPF will also decide the name for each set. Failure to comply with these rules will result in fines and possible imprisonment. UPF officials are exempt from this new law. If they want sungoggles, they and their families can obtain sungoggles free at the expense of tax payers. Unions, bankers, and megacorporatios with large political affiliations ($$$) are also exempt. Sungoggles. They're not just for Yazirians anymore. |
